How To Simplify Business Strategy for Your Small Business

Every business has an identity. Having a brand means that when someone hears your name, several thoughts will come to mind. You want those thoughts to be positive. So it’s important to develop a doctrine, one to stand by, that encompasses your vision. The first step will be defining the most important aspects of your business model.

Define Your Business Strategy

Choosing your business strategy can be exciting, particularly for those with creative minds. You can go overboard though, which can dilute your progress and reduce productivity in the areas that are truly most important. Have a clear concept of how to run your business, its presentation to the public, and the philosophy you want to express through your product. These three ideas will lay the foundation of your strategy, allowing you to build on it from there.

Regardless of your business model, a refined strategy will cut out the noise that doesn't really benefit your operation as a whole. Variables can be interchanged, for instance, a restaurant with a “happy hour”, but your identity will stick. Consumers expect a consistent identity, and when it changes, your consumer base and its perception of you does as well. Getting consumer opinions is best done through surveys and can help jumpstart your business.

Build an Outline

Building an outline of the most important aspects of your strategy gives you a chance to put down what you think will work and what you feel is the best direction to take. The outline itself can be full of content, as long as you can understand it and further organize it later. Just because something is in the outline doesn't mean it has to be used. The whole point is seeing what sticks and what doesn't.

This also is a good opportunity to include ideas from staff and associates, or even the public through social surveys. Since advertising should be a part of your complete business strategy, you also get a reading on your presence in the communities you have committed to.

Your outline should include:

• Your approach to advertising and marketing, and how you want the public to perceive you
• How you'll handle your customer service
• Employee policies
• The philosophy of your business

These are just a few general examples, but by forming them into an outline you can build on them. What you have researched, what your preferences are, the end result you expect, and your main priorities to focus on.

Evaluate and Simplify

Next is to simplify the outline by building scenarios, surveying through social networking, and research. You will get an overall understanding of what works, what might work, and what sticks out to you as a needless investment of time. There will be some ideas you thought were great, but through the process of refining your strategy, you may find them counterproductive to what you actually need. While collaboration is excellent for generating ideas, resource planning can help pinpoint where your resources or time aren’t being optimized, and lets you make necessary changes more quickly based on concrete data.

In the end, your simplified business strategy will consist of priorities that you don’t intend to change in your model. These consistent priorities should also be clearly understood by any potential employees or management.

Measure and Document Your Strategy

Eventually, you will move past the point of survey and research, and put this strategy you’ve built into practice. I’ve mentioned that your approach to business should remain consistent, but that doesn't mean you can’t adjust and articulate on concepts that you feel can grow or need re-evaluation. Some things are just out of your control. An example would be Chipotle and the issue of food poisoning. One aspect of their identity was freshness and clean service. As a small business, something like that could potentially be the end. Chipotle still has issues with the public's perception, and with shareholders. One of the biggest causes of that was their lack of transparency. The psychology of the consumer changed to view that aspect of their identity as a falsehood.

The takeaway isn’t what they should have done differently, but what you could do in a similar situation, particularly as a small business. When you have a timeline of your business strategy, you’ll have the metrics needed to help get back on course when things come up that are out of your control. You can be transparent about the issue, able to directly point at the cause(s), and most importantly act on them quickly. Try using a timesheet template to get a better idea of how long certain components of your strategy takes, and adjust the timeline as needed.

Every business is different, and to an extent, every strategy will be too. The one thing in common though is that your business strategy will define the identity your business takes. It is something to have confidence in: for growth, productivity, and the protection of your investments.