When I start working with clients one of the early pieces of work I do is to ask them is to provide me with what they know about their market, the size, growth, trends and what they understand about their competitors.
Guess what in many cases if they do have anything written down its out of date, often it’s in their head or is just gut feelings. So I always build a small amount of research time into the project proposal.
But the worst thing is that up until now these clients business management or business planning (if they do any) is based on this lack of knowledge.
When I talk to businesses in the first place the comments I get are:
We don’t need all that, we just want more sales
Well we don’t have time for research.
We don’t need/can’t afford a marketing manager.
We don’t have anyone with that expertise in house
We can’t afford to pay someone like you to carry out research
Let’s take the first comment
Trying to plan or run a business without research is crazy. To use an example that’s like driving a car blindfold down the fast lane of the motorway without any idea of your destination, that would be a pretty stupid thing to do.
For instance if the long term trends in your market means that its going to change radically you need to know about it.
Secondly time invested now can pay dividends and prevent expensive mistake or more importantly the knowledge gained can give you the edge over your competition.
Lastly costs money or time spent should be seen as an investment not a cost.
If you are a start up business and really have no money you can do it yourself for free.
You don’t have to spend a large amount of money. I don’t buy market research reports for instance. In the UK we have the library’s service and most counties have a least one which is designated as the County Business Library.
I am a great fan of these facilities. For instance they hold copies of Keynote Market Research Reports. These are major pieces of market research that have been funded by big businesses/organisations and you can view them for free either in hard copy, (or on the computer in my County library).
I spend a lot of time there making notes and you can take some limited photocopies.
I could of course examine Keynote reports via the Keynote Website but you can only see the executive summary to get the rest costs sometimes thousands of pounds, but why would I want to do that?
Of course you can also use the internet and do some free research.
So no more excuses, let your competitors stay in blissful ignorance and steel a march on them.
Do it today!
For more information about how simple techniques could help your business e-mail me today!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Friday, 11 January 2008
Thursday, 10 January 2008
Successful Business Bucks the Trend
Earlier this week I had a review meeting with a client that I started working with just 12 months ago. The small independent business operates in the home improvement retail sector.
The business owner had hit the classic growth plateau, the business had been running 5 years was doing OK, but the owner was running around like mad and missing time with his family. He wanted to grow the business further but was unable to see how this could happen.
After carrying out a free diagnostic I identified that the business could grow with the right growth and development strategy but that he also needed to work on the business and not in the business. Also the business needed to work smarter not harder.
I worked with the owner to put together the clear vision, strategy and tactics to grow the business and rethink how the business operated. This was then translated into a robust business plan containing SMART objectives and accurate financial forecasts so that we could accurately measure costs and sales. The forecasts also allowed us to track the impact of strategy and tactics.
We also repositioned the business to concentrate on the higher net wealth clients and to turn away the lower value business to the big chains that were in the usual aggressive price war. The secret was to avoid competing on price and spending lots of time producing design layouts for business that would not be closed or if won would be on lower margins.
We projected a reasonable growth of 20% and to retain a good gross profit margin.
So how did this approach pan out?
We just examined his final end of year results he achieved 68% growth and exceeded the targeted good gross profit margin by 1%. The changes we made has meant that he is now able to take an extra day a week off, plus several breaks. He is relaxed, happy and is now looking at planned expansion funded out of profit. He now gets a very large proportion of business from recommendations and is spending a lot less on advertising.
The business is expected to hit the five year growth target that we set at least 1 year earlier.
Meanwhile his competitors both the small independents like him and the large national chains are all struggling even harder and fighting over low profit business.
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
The business owner had hit the classic growth plateau, the business had been running 5 years was doing OK, but the owner was running around like mad and missing time with his family. He wanted to grow the business further but was unable to see how this could happen.
After carrying out a free diagnostic I identified that the business could grow with the right growth and development strategy but that he also needed to work on the business and not in the business. Also the business needed to work smarter not harder.
I worked with the owner to put together the clear vision, strategy and tactics to grow the business and rethink how the business operated. This was then translated into a robust business plan containing SMART objectives and accurate financial forecasts so that we could accurately measure costs and sales. The forecasts also allowed us to track the impact of strategy and tactics.
We also repositioned the business to concentrate on the higher net wealth clients and to turn away the lower value business to the big chains that were in the usual aggressive price war. The secret was to avoid competing on price and spending lots of time producing design layouts for business that would not be closed or if won would be on lower margins.
We projected a reasonable growth of 20% and to retain a good gross profit margin.
So how did this approach pan out?
We just examined his final end of year results he achieved 68% growth and exceeded the targeted good gross profit margin by 1%. The changes we made has meant that he is now able to take an extra day a week off, plus several breaks. He is relaxed, happy and is now looking at planned expansion funded out of profit. He now gets a very large proportion of business from recommendations and is spending a lot less on advertising.
The business is expected to hit the five year growth target that we set at least 1 year earlier.
Meanwhile his competitors both the small independents like him and the large national chains are all struggling even harder and fighting over low profit business.
To quote a character from the TV programme 'The A Team,' " I love it when a plan comes together," (and so do my clients)!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Wednesday, 9 January 2008
Company Website’s, Some Basic Preparation
With regularity I meet clients who believe that if they set up a great website it will bring in lots of sales and solve all of their problems.
The problem is that before you launch a website you need to start much further back.
Why do you need the website, what is it going to do?
Is it a just a sales brochure website?
Will customers want to order from it via an e-mail?
Is a full e-commerce site what’s needed and if so how will your customers pay, and what payment/credit cards will you accept and what’s the cost?
But more importantly often the website is built in isolation from the rest of the business.
Have you got the ability to handle a large increase in sales admin, dispatch and delivery wise? What about returns?
Can your suppliers handle the increase in sales have you got back up suppliers? If it all takes off as you hope can you cash flow the big increase in sales? More businesses fail through running out of cash as they expand than you would believe.
Does the website conform to the legal requirement’s, in the UK under trading law websites must have certain information in place.
Four vital elements that must be on every the website are:
Terms and Conditions, (accessible form every page)
The VAT registration number
The details of the company registered office.
If you are a Limited Company you must also show the Company Registration Number.
Lastly you can’t just show a non geographic phone number i.e. 0800, 0845, 0870 etc. you must also prominently show a normal non geographic phone number
All of these are requirements under UK law. If your website does not comply it is recommended that these compliance issues should be addressed with some urgency. After all you don’t want to Trading Standards Officers giving you a hard time
More to follow!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
The problem is that before you launch a website you need to start much further back.
Why do you need the website, what is it going to do?
Is it a just a sales brochure website?
Will customers want to order from it via an e-mail?
Is a full e-commerce site what’s needed and if so how will your customers pay, and what payment/credit cards will you accept and what’s the cost?
But more importantly often the website is built in isolation from the rest of the business.
Have you got the ability to handle a large increase in sales admin, dispatch and delivery wise? What about returns?
Can your suppliers handle the increase in sales have you got back up suppliers? If it all takes off as you hope can you cash flow the big increase in sales? More businesses fail through running out of cash as they expand than you would believe.
Does the website conform to the legal requirement’s, in the UK under trading law websites must have certain information in place.
Four vital elements that must be on every the website are:
Terms and Conditions, (accessible form every page)
The VAT registration number
The details of the company registered office.
If you are a Limited Company you must also show the Company Registration Number.
Lastly you can’t just show a non geographic phone number i.e. 0800, 0845, 0870 etc. you must also prominently show a normal non geographic phone number
All of these are requirements under UK law. If your website does not comply it is recommended that these compliance issues should be addressed with some urgency. After all you don’t want to Trading Standards Officers giving you a hard time
More to follow!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Monday, 7 January 2008
Pareto the Last Word!
I have shown several ways to use this simple tool on the top 20% of your customer base and previously even suggested that you sack a few customers from the 80%, but what do you do with the rest of the 80%.
Profile the customers in the top 20%, what are their characteristics? What are the common aspects?
Now examine the remaining group and profile them are there any customers with the same or closely similar characteristics? Group them together.
Now target this group as your secondary targets and try to covert them to add to your top 20%.
Any customers that are left over now should also be contacted but not as regularly or intensively as the others.
From now on any prospective customers that you find should be profiled in the same way.
Also you now know the profile and characteristics of customers who you should advertise to and hopefully the marketing messages that will attract them.
Remember the golden rule is to apply effort where it will have the most effect!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Profile the customers in the top 20%, what are their characteristics? What are the common aspects?
Now examine the remaining group and profile them are there any customers with the same or closely similar characteristics? Group them together.
Now target this group as your secondary targets and try to covert them to add to your top 20%.
Any customers that are left over now should also be contacted but not as regularly or intensively as the others.
From now on any prospective customers that you find should be profiled in the same way.
Also you now know the profile and characteristics of customers who you should advertise to and hopefully the marketing messages that will attract them.
Remember the golden rule is to apply effort where it will have the most effect!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Maximising Your Sales
Remember that Pareto Principle (aka "the 80/20 Rule")?
Well here’s another use of this powerful technique
I said before that 80% of your business will come from 20% of your customers and you should concentrate the first wave of marketing effort on this 20%.
Firstly are you contacting them regularly or like a lot of businesses I meet are you being complacent?
Set up a regular contact schedule for this year.
What other products or services could you be selling to them after all the hardest and most expensive part has been done you have acquired them as a customer. Very often this group are not fully aware or have forgotten what else you can do for them.
Ask them why they do business with you and how you could improve the service further, you want them to tell you if there are problems not your competitors. Don’t assume all is well just because they are buying.
Apply these principles today and watch your sales grow, and don’t forget it hasn’t cost you anything to get this new potential business so it’s more profitable when you cost the sale against new potential customer sales for the same product or service.
If you want to hear other ways to grow your business then contact me today!
More later.
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Well here’s another use of this powerful technique
I said before that 80% of your business will come from 20% of your customers and you should concentrate the first wave of marketing effort on this 20%.
Firstly are you contacting them regularly or like a lot of businesses I meet are you being complacent?
Set up a regular contact schedule for this year.
What other products or services could you be selling to them after all the hardest and most expensive part has been done you have acquired them as a customer. Very often this group are not fully aware or have forgotten what else you can do for them.
Ask them why they do business with you and how you could improve the service further, you want them to tell you if there are problems not your competitors. Don’t assume all is well just because they are buying.
Apply these principles today and watch your sales grow, and don’t forget it hasn’t cost you anything to get this new potential business so it’s more profitable when you cost the sale against new potential customer sales for the same product or service.
If you want to hear other ways to grow your business then contact me today!
More later.
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Friday, 4 January 2008
‘Sacking a few customers,’ Using the Pareto Principle
Yesterday I mentioned the Pareto Principle (aka "the 80/20 Rule")
Today I am going to talk about one exercise using this rule; I call it ‘sacking a few customers’.
What am I crazy? No I am deadly serious
When I start on a business growth project a large proportion of the clients that I work with are wasting vast amounts of money, valuable time and resources chasing and doing business with customers and products that bring I low levels of profit.
The big lesson is that I can pretty well guarantee that 20% of the profitable business comes from 20% of their customers.
But all of the marketing effort and activity is mostly aimed at the 100%.
This is what I call scattergun marketing.
If you were a hunter would you just go out into the fields with a big gun and blast away at the bushes and hope that you hit something?
Of course not if you were sensible you would go out with your snipers rifle go to the watering hole at feeding time and making sure that you were upwind of your prey you would use one shot to hit your selected prey.
So why not apply that principle to your business.
Firstly you need to have good information about who purchases what products and services and at what price, (do you have varying levels of discount?).
Then see who is giving you the best profit, often it’s not the customers who buy the most?
Now you know who to target and who not to, (are there some customers that you can’t change to become the 20% most profitable within the 80%? If so why are you dealing with them in the long term?
Does anyone have a problem with this logic? It works for most of my clients, so why don’t you take advantage of this powerful technique.
Remember it’s all in the numbers!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Today I am going to talk about one exercise using this rule; I call it ‘sacking a few customers’.
What am I crazy? No I am deadly serious
When I start on a business growth project a large proportion of the clients that I work with are wasting vast amounts of money, valuable time and resources chasing and doing business with customers and products that bring I low levels of profit.
The big lesson is that I can pretty well guarantee that 20% of the profitable business comes from 20% of their customers.
But all of the marketing effort and activity is mostly aimed at the 100%.
This is what I call scattergun marketing.
If you were a hunter would you just go out into the fields with a big gun and blast away at the bushes and hope that you hit something?
Of course not if you were sensible you would go out with your snipers rifle go to the watering hole at feeding time and making sure that you were upwind of your prey you would use one shot to hit your selected prey.
So why not apply that principle to your business.
Firstly you need to have good information about who purchases what products and services and at what price, (do you have varying levels of discount?).
Then see who is giving you the best profit, often it’s not the customers who buy the most?
Now you know who to target and who not to, (are there some customers that you can’t change to become the 20% most profitable within the 80%? If so why are you dealing with them in the long term?
Does anyone have a problem with this logic? It works for most of my clients, so why don’t you take advantage of this powerful technique.
Remember it’s all in the numbers!
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Thursday, 3 January 2008
It’s all in the numbers!
If you are reviewing the performance of your business or trying to grow it there is one simple tool that can be applied to any business in a number of ways.
It’s called the Pareto Principle (aka "the 80/20 Rule")
80% of your business will come from 20 % of your customers.
80% of your profit will come from 20% of your products/services.
80% of your problems comes form 20% of your customers.(they are often the 20% of customers who are problem payers.
So the trick is to apply effort where it will have the most effect!
More of this in a later post.
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
It’s called the Pareto Principle (aka "the 80/20 Rule")
80% of your business will come from 20 % of your customers.
80% of your profit will come from 20% of your products/services.
80% of your problems comes form 20% of your customers.(they are often the 20% of customers who are problem payers.
So the trick is to apply effort where it will have the most effect!
More of this in a later post.
Alan Briggs
Dynamic Business Strategies Ltd
Tel: 07917 446068
E-Mail: info@dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
Website: www.dynamicbusinessstrategies.co.uk
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