The success of any business is dependent on several key factors, including people, market opportunity and an effective business strategy.

Numerous books and blogs have discussed what an effective business strategy should look like, however in our experience we should focus on a few key elements:

Where are we now?

• What is our customer proposition?
• Do we meet the needs of our customers?
• Is our sales strategy effective?

Where do we want to be?

• Define the key business targets
• Develop products or services that meet the needs of our customers
• Ensuring we have an effective sales process that focusses on customer retention, customer acquisition and maintaining business profitability

How do we get there?

• Understanding the gap between where we are now and where we want to be
• Building a step plan to bridge the gap. This may include new products, services, routes to markets, additional training, new employees/team members

To support this approach you need to make sure your team is aligned with the key elements outlined above, that you regularly review your performance against your goals, and that you continue to work ‘on’ the business covering such areas as medium term planning, the opportunities that technology presents, developing your product or service to meet the evolving needs of your customers.