Why is business development strategy so important? The answer to that question is simple. It can be the key to the success or failure of your firm. Our hope is that this article provides you more information on business development strategies as well as a clear understanding of why it is so important for your business.
What is a Business Development Strategy?
Business development is defined as the process of identifying, nurturing and acquiring new clients and opportunities that will help you grow your business and increase your bottom line. A business development strategy is a document that is produced that will describe the strategy you use to accomplish that goal.
Identifying Your Strategy: Mission, Vision and Values
Creating your business development strategy will start by identifying your company’s mission, vision, and values. Every company must go beyond simply providing a product or service to their customers; their products and services must solve a problem. Their ability to solve a problem will give them value to their target audience.
Beyond solving a problem for consumers, there are other values companies may adhere to. Are they environmentally friendly? Do they support any groups or charities? Are their products or services doing anything that will contribute to a greater good? These can all be selling points that can help a company attract customers and increase profits.
Goals and Anti-Goals
Every business knows how important it is to set goals for themselves. But did you know it can be equally as important to set anti-goals?
Let’s start by looking at goals. Monetary goals are the most obvious as every company wants to be making money. Monetary goals should focus on smaller time intervals, so you can monitor how well you are doing. However, it is also best to keep an eye on the big picture. While overall profit can go down one month, if you are on an upward trajectory, there is no need to stress too much.
Another thing to look at is staff. Is your staff happy and productive? Is the equipment they are using providing efficiency? A staff that is happy and being treated well makes for a more successful company.
The products and services you are selling is another thing that should be considered. Are you offering new selections and upgrades to your customers? Innovations and product variety will keep customers interested in your products and keep things fresh for your company.
Now let’s consider anti-goals. Anti-goals are a relatively new concept which can be defined as things you are doing which can ultimately hurt your company. Misallocating time or money are popular anti-goals. Failing to communicate or meet with staff can be another.
Think of some of the anti-goals your company has and do your best to create a business development strategy that will eliminate them.
Identifying Target Markets and Clients
Every company has a target market and audience. A lot of companies make fatal mistakes spending time and money to get their name out everywhere when they should really be focusing on their target audience.
When creating your business development strategy, decide who your target audience is. Then determine the best channels to use to reach them and the type of imagery and language that will appeal to them. Incorporate these elements into your marketing campaigns.
Do a SWOT Analysis
SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. To do a SWOT analysis for your company, get together with your leaders to determine the following:
· Strengths: Identify the advantages your organization has as compared to the competition.
· Weaknesses: Ask yourself what your company can do to improve and what it should avoid doing.
· Opportunities: Look at interesting trends and connections to determine what sort of opportunities your company can take advantage of.
· Threats: Determine the obstacles you are facing. These could be coming from changing standards in the industry, updated technology, your competitors and more.
Go in depth to determine what improvements your company can make and how to work with your strengths in order to grow.
Sizing Up the Competition
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. This is advice to live by in the world of business. Take stock of your competition assessing possible threats they may be posing as well as the advantages your company has over them. This will be a great way for you to stay a step ahead. In some cases, you can learn from your competitor’s successes and failures as well.
Once you have all these pieces in place, you will have a business strategy that will not only work to help your company grow, but it will give you a solid idea of what your company is all about. This will strengthen your identity and make you a force to be reckoned with in your industry.
Good luck making this very important move forward!