Your company’s business strategy designates a set of actions to be taken to ensure its growth. When you have setup your business strategy or commercial strategy, you will need to write it down to clarify and synthesize your ideas, and thus be able to present it.
Why setup your business strategy ?
To generate the growth of your business, you will certainly have to take economic risks. Establishing your business strategy will not allow you to eliminate them. But you will be able to better control them and thus reduce them.
Based on market research, your company’s business strategy clearly sets out your objectives (in terms of turnover, growth) and the means to be implemented to achieve them. It establishes your positioning on the market vis-à-vis your competitors and gives you a precise vision of the path to follow to maintain or even develop your activity.
A good commercial, realistic and operational strategy requires an in-depth knowledge of your market. (market research is therefore a key element in building your strategy). The context of the company (strengths and weaknesses) and your financial capacities.
Among the different possible clientele segments, which will you target as a priority ? Will you be speaking to the “traditional” clientele of your activity or will you be looking for emerging segments ? What means will you use to touch them ? How will you adapt your offer to targeted customers ? Or are you going to base your competitive advantage on an aggressive pricing policy or rather on a particular characteristic of your products or services ?
In the end, the commercial strategy takes shape in the “marketing mix”. This defines the exact nature of your products or services, their price, distribution networks and means of communication. It must be built over a period of several years in order to serve as a guide for the actions to be carried out and the decisions to be taken.
How to set up your commercial strategy ?
The business strategy of each business is unique. Build your strategy based on the specific characteristics of your products, your sales objectives, and your company’s future market position.
Goals
To build your setup business strategy, you must start by setting precise and realistic goals. For example, this may be wanting to increase sales of such a product by 3% in two years. Your objectives may be financial or commercial in nature, such as wanting to expand your clientele.
You can also aim for several objectives, but be careful not to disperse too much, you may be less effective. It is preferable that you prioritize them in order of priority: nothing will prevent you from setting a second objective to achieve when the first is met, on the contrary.
To achieve your commercial objective, you will implement means and carry out various actions, which may concern all aspects of your activity.
Means and actions
-decide to start or stop the production of products ;
– you can lower your prices to widen your clientele ;
– you can create your website, change distributor.
To give overall coherence to your commercial strategy, you will have to diversify your actions in each of these areas. How can you imagine, for example, that you can sell new products without wondering which distribution channel will be the most suitable ?
A defined duration
You must have objectives and actions that take place over a defined period of time.
The costs
It is obvious that your objectives and your actions which result from it must be in line with your financial means. Be ambitious … but realistic !
Human means
The actions you can take will depend in part, not only on the number of employees you have, but also on their investment in your business. You need to know how to make them responsible and that the objectives motivate them.
For each of your actions, set up indicators that will allow you to measure the results once you have launched them. You will be able to measure the effectiveness of your actions and therefore of your commercial strategy, in order to know whether you should readjust it or not.
When you have determined your business strategy, you will need to write it down. This step is essential. It will allow you first to clarify and synthesize your ideas, and this document will also have a place in the development of your business. It will allow you to set your strategy, to be able to present it to potential partners and to verify later that the actions you are carrying out are well in line with your overall strategy. This document may also have an educational scope and serve as a guide, for example, for your future business teams. It will be a medium to explain your future decisions.
