Innovation and Insight: Smart business planning. Here are some questions to help your company define its business strategy.
Smart business planning – questions that can step change your growth strategy.
1) What is your vision?
- What is your big vision?
- What problem are you solving and for whom?
- Where do you want to be in the future?
2) What is your market opportunity and how big is it?
- How big is the market opportunity you are pursuing and how fast is t growing?
- How established (or nascent) is the market?
- Do you have a credible claim on being one of the top two or three players in the market?
3) Describe your product/service
- What is your product/service?
- How does it solve your customer’s problem?
- What is unique about your product/service?
4) Who is your customer?
- Who are your existing customers?
- Who is your target customer?
- What defines an “ideal” customer prospect?
- Who actually writes you the check?
- Use specific customer examples where possible.
5) What is your value proposition?
- What is your value proposition to the customer?
- What kind of ROI can your customer expect by using buying your product/service?
6) How are you selling?
- What does the sales process look like and how long is the sales cycle?
- How will you reach the target customer? What does it cost to “acquire” a customer?
- What is your sales, marketing and distribution strategy?
- What is the current sales pipeline?
7) How do you acquire customers?
- What is your cost to acquire a customer?
- How will this acquisition cost change over time and why?
- What is the lifetime value of a customer?
8) Who is your management team?
- Who is the management team?
- What is their experience?
- What pieces are missing and what is the plan for filling them?
9) What is your revenue model?
- How do you make money?
- What is your revenue model?
- What is required to become profitable?
10) What stage of development are you at?
- What is your stage of development? Technology/product? Team? Financial metrics/revenue?
- What has been the progress to date (make reality and future clear)?
- What are your future milestones?
11) What are your plans for raising funds?
- What funds have already been raised?
- How much money are you raising and at what valuation?
- How will the money be spent?
- How long will it last and where will the company “be” on its milestones progress at that time?
- How much additional funding do you anticipate raising & when?
12) Who is your competition?
- Who is your existing & likely competition?
- Who is adjacent to you (in the market) that could enter your market (and compete) or could be a co-opted partner?
- What are their strengths/weaknesses?
- Why are you different?
13) What partnerships do you have?
- Who are your key distribution and technology partners (current & future)?
- How dependent are you on these partners?
14) How do you fit with the prospective investor?
- How does this fit w/ the investor’s portfolio and expertise?
- What synergies, competition exist with the investor’s existing portfolio?
15) Other
- What assumptions are key to the success of the business?
- What “gotchas” could change the business overnight? New technologies, new market entrants, change in standards or regulations?
- What are your company’s weak links?
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