A company might have a great product or service but without a business growth strategy, it may not grow at all!
A business growth strategy is the roadmap that helps a business define, articulate, and communicate where it is going. Planning is essential to all businesses throughout their entire lifespan. It helps define business goals for the future and determine steps, activities and resources needed to achieve them.
A growth strategy starts with identifying and accessing opportunities and threats within your market.
How should your company evolve to meet the challenges of today and next year.
A business growth strategy gives your company purpose, and it answers questions about your long-term plans.
Having a growth strategy is important because it keeps your company working towards goals that go beyond what is happening in the market today. They keep both owners and employees focused and aligned, and they allow you to think long-term.
The first step is to look at five important areas that will help you develop a growth strategy:
- Think long term – invest time in understanding where the market is going and what this means for your customers. Short term decisions do not help grow a business.
- Having a good value proposition is essential – this states the relevance of your product or service, what it does and why customers need it. What is yours?
- Expanding your reach – who is your target customer and what do you need to do to let them know you exist and that your product or service is relevant to them?
- Growth means new people, systems and (maybe) different ways of doing things. Grow at a pace you can manage.
- How will your marketing communicate your value proposition to relevant customers?
Once you have taken some time to write out your growth strategy and where you want your business to be in (say) 2 years, the next step is to work out your marketing plan.
A marketing plan is a business document outlining your marketing strategy and tactics. It is often focused on a specific period of time (i.e., over the next 12 months) and covers a variety of marketing-related details, such as costs, goals, and action steps. But like your business plan, a marketing plan is not a static document. This should outline:
- How you are going to keep existing customers happy and returning to buy more often
- What the goals are for getting new customers
- The marketing methods you are going to use to achieve 1 and 2
What to include in a strategic plan?
There is no set structure a strategic plan, but perhaps try to include:
- Introduction – briefly describe the strategic plan scope and duration.
- Set the scene – briefly describe your business and its history. This can serve as an ‘elevator pitch’ when explaining your business to others.
- Vision statement – describe what you want to achieve or where you want your business to be.
- Core values – outline the principles that underpin your business culture.
- Mission statement – describe the long-term purpose of your business.
- Problem statement – explain key issues that you wish to address.
- TOWS analysis – summarise the perceived external opportunities and threats and your business strengths and weaknesses in relation to them.
- Objectives and goals – outline your top-level objectives as measurable and actionable steps. These might include attracting a new type of customer, developing new products and services, or securing new sources of finance.
- Implementation plan – set out key actions (with desired outcomes and deadlines) needed to fulfil your top-level objectives.
- Monitoring and evaluation – determine which key performance indicators (KPIs) you will track, and how you will monitor the progress against actions on an ongoing basis.
- Resourcing – summarise the impact of the proposed strategy on resources, including budget, staffing, premises and equipment.
Rather than being fixed in stone, your strategic plan should be an ongoing process. You should revisit and adjust at least once a year to fit the changing needs of your business.
Get some expert help.
Managing a business can be challenging, but the challenges can be much more manageable if you have an expert to call.
Please talk to us about helping you formulate your expansion plans; we have considerable experience in helping our clients grow their businesses
If you would like to to discuss this further, please contact your client manager, email us at: success@maple.uk.com, or call the office on 01332 207336.
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