3 Must Do's When Business Gets Bumpy

This week I was asked... 'What 3 things can business owners do right now to ride this (still) bumpy period and succeed?'

My answer:

1. Remain entrepreneurial
2. Get up close and personal
3. Do the planning

Remain Entrepreneurial

• It’s crucial to keep looking for opportunities. C19 has provided thousands of opportunities to pivot, diversify and to serve your clients better. Many took those opportunities and made money, but even more did not. Keep scanning the horizon for opportunities and grab the right ones.
• Focus on maximising profit – but watch your cash. Profitable business go bust because they run out of cash.
• Apply common sense, balance your intuition with analysis of the facts.
• Step up, take responsibility, decide the strategy, do the planning and JUFDI

Get Up Close and Personal

Find out what is happening out there

1. Products – what’s hot and what’s not
2. Customers. Many many customers are desperate to spend money. Re-engage with them, who haven’t you heard from, get in touch, remind them you are here and what problems you solve for them. Get up close and find out what your customers and clients want.
3. Suppliers. Re-engage with existing to find better solutions, seek out new suppliers, better stronger ones. Crucial now is reliability and continuity of supply.
4. Competitors. What are they up to, who is vulnerable who is an upcoming threat. One thing you can be certain of is that they are watching you!
5. Keep marketing. If you pulled back go hard now, and never ever let your marketing slip, there’s always at least one competitor who is marketing heavily for your clients so don’t let them drift away.
6. Keep selling. If you don't like selling then keep serving clients

Do the Planning

My favorite subject! Do the planning first, then write a short plan and execute. Don’t write a plan without doing the planning it just won't workout.
If you’re stuck use the comments above as a starting point to help you make a better plan. Further reading is available here and the Business Planning Workbook is also available.

So you need to be

• Innovative, proactive, creative. Uncovering great solutions to problems, as I’m always saying – do something different and make money.
• Review product and margins, clear obsolete stock quickly. Maybe its time for a new product or solution. Tweaking may not be enough.
• Stretch yourself, think out of the box
• Don’t ignore risk, understand it and then mitigate and manage it
• Be open to change so that the business can not only survive but thrive.

This is your half year reminder We're almost at the half year so I hope that you have scheduled in planning time to review the past six months performance and plan the next 90 & 180 days to ensure that you have a successful 2021.