Be Different or be dead

February 3, 2010

Why a great business plan is absolutely clear on ‘HOW to WIN’

Source: Unsplash

Why a great business plan is absolutely clear on ‘HOW to WIN’.

Traditional business planning methods have issues; they’re all screwed up. 

The first two questions you have to answer in the strategic game plan creation process:
▪️ HOW BIG do you want to be? — what are your growth and financial goals?
▪️ WHO do you want to SERVE? — what are the customer groups you want to focus on to deliver your growth goals?

”How will you WIN?”

The third and final question one asks is a critical one: “How will you compete and win?, and the answer to the question drives a stake in the ground in terms of how you will differentiate yourself from your competitors and beat them handily.

HOW to WIN follows the WHO to SERVE question. You are looking for uniqueness relative to the customer groups you have chosen to target and not the market generally.
You may have capabilities that stand out from your competitors in the mass market, but the challenge now is to focus on those that relate to the particular customer groups you have chosen to meet your revenue growth goals.

This is very important. If you have chosen customer groups ‘A’ and ‘B’ for example, then you need to differentiate yourself from others vying for the attention of these two groups specifically.
You will be searching for ways of delivering what these two groups want in a more compelling and special way than anyone else attempting to do the same thing.

Answering the HOW to WIN question involves in-depth competitor analysis: Who are they; what are their strategies? How do they differentiate? What is their value proposition?

As a practical way of determining your competitive position, I suggest creating the ONLY statement for your organization.

“We are the only ones that…” will separate you from the herd! 

Jerry Garcia, former leader of the legendary rock band The Grateful Dead, nailed it: “You don’t want merely to be the best of the best. You want to be the only ones who do what you do.”

This is not a task for the faint-of-heart. Engage your team in the task. It involves looking at every nook and cranny in your organization for opportunities to separate yourselves from the pack - brand, service, product, product support, and how you leverage technology are some examples of where you can look.

Here’s an example:
“We are the ONLY team that provides integrated safety solutions that go beyond the needs of our customers ANYTIME, ANYWHERE. We are committed to grow our customer’s business. We ONLY serve safety.”

Rules for creating The ONLY Statement

▪️ The ONLY statement must speak to the experiences and value you create for people not the products or services you want to push.

▪️ Keep it brief. It’s a sound bite not a narrative. If it consumes a page it isn’t a viable claim.

▪️ Talk to the specific customer group you are targeting not the market in general.

▪️ Test your ONLY statement with customers and employees to ensure it is relevant and true.

▪️ Consider your ONLY statement a draft. The reality is you won’t get it right the first time, so take your almost-there only statement and start working with it.

Refine it as you go. And stay alert for a response by a competitor who may suddenly come awake when they see your move.

Cheers,
Roy
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• Posted 2.3.10 at 01:53 pm by Roy Osing
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