Business Strategy 2 Business Plan Part 9 Growth Strategies

Hands-on Class Project

Business Plan Part 9 - Growth Strategies

Growth Strategy Checklist

The Class Project is to prepare an outline growth strategy for your business.

You should  use the Business Plan template for a structure (attached) but I also want to challenge you to think outside of the box so I have prepared a Checklist to get you thinking.  Use this on your own or with your Board or co-founders and spend some time discussing each heading and the questions and issues I raise for you.

You should produce an outline strategy with bullet points below each heading from the list below.  I have provided a word document template to help you with this

Growth Strategy Project

Outline your Business's growth strategy using the check list below:

1. Where do you want to be in three to five years time?

How are you going to get there?

What is your primary objective for growth? Revenues, Profits?

Can this be achieved organically? Or will you need to consider acquisitions or mergers?

Where are the best opportunities for growth? 

A. Product Development = new products in existing market

B. Market Development = grow market share in existing market by exploiting new market segments

C. Market Penetration = grow market share by bundling products, lowering prices etc.

D. Diversification = enter new markets with existing products

2. Products and Services

How are you going to enhance your current Product/Service offering?

Do you need to add new Products or Services to achieve your growth goals?

Is this a good time to revise your pricing strategy?

Evaluate how efficiently your business is operating.

Are your quality and customer satisfaction targets being met or exceeded?

Can you make improvements in your business's value chain?

Do you have a clear product differentiation strategy?

Do you clearly understand the value you add to your customers?

Optimise your inventory management to be as efficient as possible.

3. Marketing

Conduct fresh market research to understand more about your customers and markets

Do you have a clear idea of who your customers are?

Arrange calls and meetings with Customers to get feedback

Prepare a new marketing plan which is aligned to your growth goals.

Are you making the most of online marketing channels?

Can your website be improved to identify prospects and leads?

Can you employ new marketing methods to accelerate sales?

Have you set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time bound) marketing goals?

4.  Existing Customers

Can you sell more to your existing customers?

More products and services?

New products and services?

Check your 80:20.  What proportion of your customers account for 80% of your sales?

Are you dependent on a very small number of existing customers for the majority of your sales?

5. New Customers

Can you prepare a plan to attract new customers?

What goals and targets should you specify?

Set monthly sales targets and track progress

6. Sales Channels

Can you devise new routes to market to enhance your growth?

Can you start or increase your online sales?

7. Competitors

What potential threats do your competitors pose to your business?

Are there strategic opportunities that you can exploit to take advantage of their weaknesses?

Are you benchmarking your growth against that of your main competitors?

8. Finance

How has your actual performance compared to your forecast projections?

How do these results compare to those of your competitors?

Do you have sufficient capital to finance your growth?

What are the key assumptions in your financial forecasts?

What is the impact of your growth on your working capital needs?

Do you need to seek external finance? Debt? Equity?

Carefully review your cash flow projections for the next 12 months, 3 years and 5 years.  Stress test your assumptions and identify the level of headroom, runway (if applicable) and potential shortfalls.

9.Human Resources

Do you need to refresh your team?

Evaluate the performance of your people in all areas and consider how additional training could enhance performance?

Can you improve your communication to your staff about your growth strategy and goals?

Are you using KPIs and performance reviews to help employees understand their own performance?

Review your total labour costs to gross revenue over time?

Evaluate your rates of staff turnover.

10.  Summary

Can you think of any other factors that are restricting your growth?

Who is responsible for executing your growth strategy?

Will you need external help to achieve success?

Ensure that your growth plan has clear key performance indicators built in so that you can monitor and evaluate performance and success

Be flexible

Hold monthly management meetings to monitor progress towards goals - what you measure moves