Hi, I'm Takeo Fujii.
Whether it is to raise funds or to run a healthy business, business strategy is important.
Business strategy can be called the "guiding principle of business. How do we move forward and how do we scale? Management has to create that strategy.
However, if you have just started a business from ground zero, you will be confused about how to create a business strategy.
Don't worry. In this article.Steps for entrepreneurs to create a business strategy from scratchThe following is a step-by-step explanation of how to do this.
Why is business strategy so important?
The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) has posted some interesting data on its website.
White Paper on Small and Medium Enterpriseshttps://www.chusho.meti.go.jp/pamflet/hakusyo/The survival rate of a company or private business after one year is about 72%, according to the National Institute of Health (NICE).
If you look at it this way, you'd think, "Oh, most businesses survive," but if you think about it the other way around.If you start a business this year, three out of every ten people will go bankrupt a year later.That's why.
I have seen many entrepreneurs close down their businesses due to lack of success.
From there, I became convinced of one thing. The important thing is"Strategies for Survival."That's right.
It is important to have a strategy that actually works for your business, not just a formal business plan.
Because if you know what you need to do in business, you just need to take action to do it.
Conversely, if you don't know what to do, you will be confused about what action to take.
In other words, businesses end up going out of business because of wishful thinking that "if I do this, it will work.
Three steps for entrepreneurs to create a "successful strategy
What is a successful business?
Is it enough to make a profit, to have a growing number of enthusiastic customers, or to be self-sufficient? ...Actually, a successful business is difficult to define.
So here's what I think.I'm not sure we're gonna win this thing.This is the criterion for determining success or failure.
In other words, if I do business this way, will I be able to achieve the business numbers that I expect?
It doesn't matter if it's sales, profits, or number of customers. What matters isCan you achieve the number you are aiming for within the time frame?This is the point.
Now, let's get started with the three steps to creating a successful business.
To summarize, there are three steps to follow.
- Goal setting
- Strategy creation
- Priority setting
(1) Goal setting: narrowing down actions
To get to the point where I want to be.Set goals without waste.is required.
By setting effective goals without wasting time, you can get closer to your goals in the shortest possible time.
There's a difference between setting a goal to lose -10 kg in a year and setting a goal to generate 10 million yen in annual sales in a year.
In order to set goals, you have to set the right goals.
In fact, many entrepreneurs make the mistake of setting goals. This is why they fail to achieve their goals even after two or three years.
Here are some of the many mistakes in goal setting. It is the mistake of making too many choices that are not necessary.
Cut down your to-do list and reduce tasks.
What is your to-do list for the day, and how many tasks do you complete in a day?
How many books are you going to read in a month? Is that book absolutely necessary to achieve your goal?
That's right. If you have too many tasks to do and too many choices to make, you won't know what to do.
Most of those choices are useless. The more serious entrepreneurs keep a to-do list of tasks that have nothing to do with achieving their goals and a list of books that they don't need to read.
Narrow down the tasks to be done.
The more tasks you have to do, the lower the quality of each task will be.
When the tasks to be done are narrowed down, the quality of each task will improve.
There is only one trick to setting goals. All you have to do is narrow down the tasks to be done.
Also in Greg McEwan's Essential Thinking.Just practice the bare minimum you need to do."It is explained as follows. Decide what you should be focusing on right now, not what else you should be doing right now.
Create a strategy: Make a simple task list.
I made a goal. The rest.Just make small concrete steps.It is.
In other words, the actual action is to simply decide what to do.
The key is simplicity and specificity.
Create only the steps that are actually necessary to achieve your business goals. There is no need to add tasks unnecessarily, nor is there a need for long steps.
What if I want to set up an online course business?
For example, let's say you set a goal to "launch an online course business and secure stable monthly sales.
What do you simply need to do to make steady sales in your online course business?
Here's one thing to think about. What would you do?
...If it were me three years ago, I would have thought.
- Purchase equipment to film the online course.
- Create a powerpoint document for an online course.
- Sign up for a system to run online courses.
- Place FB ads to attract potential customers.
But are these tasks actually really necessary?
At first glance, it looks like the work required to set up an online course.
However, you don't have to go out of your way to buy a camera and microphone to film an online course, but you can record your computer screen to create the course content.
You don't need to sign up for an online course system, but you can upload your course to Vimeo and send the video viewing link to your buyers via email. In other words, you don't even need a system.
...In this way, in fact.Very little work is required for me to achieve my goals.It's a good idea. Do some thinking. Cross off the tasks you don't need from the list of tasks you think you should do.
3) Prioritization: Prioritize your work.
So far, you have set your goals and organized the tasks you need to do. You should now have the "shortest distance" to achieve your business goals.
The last step is.Prioritize those tasks that need to be done.Decide what you need to start with and in what order.
The rules for prioritizing are the same as before. Put the most important tasks on the top of the priority list.
If you prioritize incorrectly, you will be less efficient in achieving your goals.
On the other hand, if you start with the most important tasks, you will quickly shorten the distance to achieving your goals.
As you can see from the actual work, the importance of the tasks is not evenly distributed.
If there are 10 tasks that need to be done, it is possible that 80% of the goal will be achieved just by doing 2 of them.
Entrepreneurs should have a simple strategy.
Some entrepreneurs, when they hear about developing a strategy, assume that they have to design a strategy that is very complex and complete.
However, I would rather recommend the opposite approach.It should be a simple strategy.
There is no end to the list of tasks that entrepreneurs should do.
That's why it's important to narrow down the tasks that really need to be done, not the ones that should be done.
There are only 1440 minutes in a day.
A day is 24 hours, and 24 hours is 1440 minutes. There are fewer hours in a day than people understand in their minds. If you live in a daze, the day will be over in a flash.
If you waste a day, you will waste a week, a month, six months, a year, and so on.
In other words, there should be no time in the day to start work that you don't have to do.
The important point is.Only do what you really need to do in a day.Please choose one. Discard the rest. And for entrepreneurs and business owners, the work that really needs to be done is the work that is directly related to generating profit.
Keep it simple and get it done in a limited amount of time.
Then, as an addendum, I explained the analog but most powerful "time management technique" in another article.
>>[The 33 minute and 33 second rule] Time management techniques using a kitchen timer
This article is my way of putting it into practice. By reading it, you will learn how to use your precious time in the most productive way possible.
Stabilizing sales, increasing profits, keeping customers coming back, whatever results you expect, it all depends on your strategy.
I hope you find the contents of this article useful.
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