|
|
|
|
StrategicPlanning360.com - Strategic Planning Information At Your Fingertips... |
|
|
 |
|
Planning For The Slow Season Of Your Business To Increase Sales
Every business experiences slower periods. For some, they sell more during the Christmas season while others move at a snail pace. Some sell more during the summer and others less. The key is being aware of your seasons and alternatives available to solve the challenge and change the results. All businesses need down time, breathing room to re-evaluate where we're going, and where we've been. What's working and what's not? What changes need to occur and where we want to go in the future? Have you planned your breathing room time into your calendar year? As a coach and independent professional, I know by personal experience and through the feedback of my clients, that during the slow times, stress, fears, and challenges on how to pay the bills increases. Sometimes, stress increases without any money factors because we're not used to having additional time on our hands, so our brain manifests things to fill the void. So, what are the alternatives? Good question. Let's explore the possibilities... You can use the "save for a rainy day" philosophy by moving a certain percentage from a regular account to a money market or savings account for those rainy time periods. You can plan out, on a paper calendar your seasonal periods. Look at your Income Statement for the past few years and you will see a pattern appearing. If that history isn't available, ask others in your field area. As a coach, I'm in the personal development field. I would contact others in this field, like speakers, trainers, who have experience and history and interview them on the question. After you review your historical financial information, keep in mind that future economic conditions will influence your seasonal plans. This requires a strategy on who and what you are going to use for economic indicator flags. This may require a financial planner, economist, or other professional on your support team. Reading the paper or watching the news is all well and good, however, it can also add to confusion. Too many cooks in the kitchen syndrome. Choose one or two cooks and ask the others to leave the kitchen. Remember, there are different seasons all over the world. When its summer in the United States, there is a different season in Australia and Japan. If your marketing vicinity is global, you need to plan your seasons very carefully. Each requires different marketing strategies and procedures. When marketing in the U.S. reduces, marketing in other countries will most likely increase. Especially if you are in the bathing suit business. If your business is strictly local, you can create additional products or services that will only be available during that season. This can maintain momentum. You can use the "limited availability" technique for these products. You can use this time for vacation, organize, plan, create new products, and use your rainy day funds for support. As well as, establish new joint ventures, expand personnel, test new product ideas, clean up backlogs in filing or emails, send out thank you gifts, upgrade your computer, or learn new software. Keep in mind that leaving some of these to-dos might be detrimental to your revenue generation thinking. Allowing a build up of the items that support your success, as mentioned in the above two paragraphs, can create a desire to create your own self-fulfilling prophecy. You will intentionally create a slow period when a natural occurrence wouldn't regularly happen. An indicator can be if sales don't return after the slow cycle. Pay particular attention if it occurs. Choose to do some planning today on your seasons for the money results you want tomorrow. Identify when and where your business and industry seasons are, explore all possible solutions, and work through a plan to fill the void. The results will almost be a given. Catherine Franz is a Marketing & Writing Coach, niches, product development, Internet marketing, nonfiction writing and training. Additional Articles: http://www.abundancecenter.com blog: http://abundance.blogs.com
 Strategic Planning News for Monday, Feb 6, 2012...
Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Shortening Product Life Cycle! The current state of the available technology at the disposal of designer is the most limiting determinant to what is technically and economically feasible to develop, therefore research into metatechnology such as computer science, whereby interdisciplinary spin off provides advances that both directly increase capabilities, and affects other technologies to dramatically improve system performance, is a necessity, the implication being that despite many of the basic principles being relatively static, the technology used is essentially in a state of constant development. TQM Total Quality Management, the book Every decade we seem to come up with a buzz-word to describe the things we should be doing right all the time. Forever we have heard our parents or grandparents use little phrases to get our attention. "If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right? Or "Never enough time to do it right, but always making time to do it over." Quick quotes like these and there must be a hundreds of different ones which all lead to the same thing. In the 1980's and early 1990's it was TQM or Total Quality Management. Deming and Peters harped on this like there was no tomorrow. Then later on we had the Six Sigma by GE and the Jack Welsh crowd of executives and remember the ISO 9000 series of quality and perfection. Now then let's get back to; TQM Total Quality Management, the book. If you have not read it, then you should because you can buy it at any garage sale for $1.00 or at a used book store for $4-5 dollars. Amazon has tons of used ones for sale as well. Make sure you buy the right book, as there must be 100 or more books on that subject: Three Steps to Give Your Strategic Plan Traction We all agree Strategic Planning is a critical part of a company's success. All too often, however, strategic plans stall before they ever make it to execution - or they gradually lose momentum. The organization is then left in a vulnerable and uncomfortable position of continuing to go about its business with good intentions but no focused direction or aligned action. Move intention into action using this three step remedy. Why You Need a Business Planning System NOT a Business Plan When someone mentions business planning we have been conditioned to think about writing a business plan. There are hundreds of books and articles, tons of software, an army of consultants, and a multitude government programs to help you write a business plan. There are virtually no resources to help you set up what today's business environment really demands ? a continuous, ongoing planning system. The Power of Strategic Thinking: Creating Meaningful Success Too much goal setting and strategic planning can leave you feeling like you're working against the forces of nature; too little and you end up where you never intended to be-with a life or business that is bigger, smaller, or different than what you genuinely desire. Though getting you and your organization where you most want them to be at any given time can be hard work it can also be exhilarating. Is there a better way? Is it possible to minimize the stress and maximize the exhilaration while still accomplishing those things that are most important to you? Leverage - A Small Step For You /A Big Change For Your Career Cassy was an employee of a nonprofit who had been at her job 5 years. She came to me because she felt that the organization she was working for didn't value her and was upset because others had been promoted but she had not. Seasonality: What's the Big Deal? Do you work in or own a business that's affected by seasonal cycles? Do you live in a community whose population changes significantly during the year (e.g., tourist influx, students returning to college)? Do you ever feel stressed out or frustrated by the seemingly constant changes or the extreme highs and lows of your life or your business? Akron OH; A great place to do business When looking at Akron carefully one cannot help but notice it's brilliant location to rivers, water, large cities and middle class consumer spending populations. With Canton to the South, high-end and growing Fairlawn to the North, Kent State and University of Ohio both a stones throw; the potential for any business is quite apparent. There are 160 trucking companies many of which are located in the area due to its proximity to large markets on a major freeway. Everything you want is there or can be delivered within days. Business Planning and the ?Bozo? Factor "Bozo" ? A clown with a forlorn look, always finding negative implications in every activity or event. A person who tries to find a way to prevent you from moving ahead, giving excuses such as "we've always done it this way, or this is not our culture" when presented a new opportunity or challenge. Normally associated with people who are uncomfortable with learning new techniques, processes, or relationships. Building a Better Brick-and-Mortar with the Billion-Dollar Web More than $117 billion passed hands from Internet shoppers to Internet vendors in 2004, according to the statistical research firm comScore. That's billion, with a B. Compared to the year before, the figure represents a whopping 24 percent increase in sales. Compared to the early 1990s, when the Web was a questionable commercial venture, today's $117 billion is proof-positive that the Web is the full-fledged money-making machine. It seems to be a big enough pie that any merchant with a Web site can cut out his heaping slice. Sony's PSI Project In 1989, Sony founded its Institute of Wisdom at the request of its founder Masaharu Ibuka and former chairman Akio Morita. The Best Entity to Hold Real Estate Possibly THE most frequently asked question of me is "What is the best business entity to use for real-estate investments?" My recommendation to most people is that a limited liability company (an "LLC") is the best entity for this type of use. Here's why: Corporate Venturing For Emerging Growth Companies The boom of the dot-com era in 1999 brought the emergence of corporate venture capital as a major source of funding to the private equity markets. Corporate venture investments peaked in the third quarter of 2000 with 608 deals totaling a combined $4.9 billion. A few of the top corporate venture capital investors of 2000 included Nokia Corporate ($500 million), Oracle Corporation ($400 million), Intel Corporation ($300 million), Sun Microsystems, Inc. ($300 million) and Daimler Chrysler ($100 million). Three Easy Ways To Know Thy Competitor "Did you hear what your competitor is doing?" This question has caused many business people to freeze in their tracks. How about you? Does your sales team know what your competitors are doing? And if a prospect was to ask them, "give me 10 unique reasons why I should buy from you and your company," could they answer this question without a pause? "Knowing thy competitor" is critical, and this article will outline three easy ways to know more about them, than they know about you! Let's get started! Restaurant Startup - Part 1: Market Research ? What are Potential Competitors Doing? The first step in starting a restaurant is proper planning. One must lay out a plan complete with goals, priorities, and the tasks that he will need to complete in order to achieve these goals. The biggest mistake first time restaurant owners make is improper planning. Ambition, while absolutely required, is simply not enough to succeed in the highly competitive food service industry. Financing Business Expansion for Your Small Company How you finance the expansion of your business is important. Borrowing and understanding the consequences of borrowing for your financing is extremely important. If you are going to borrow the money to finance the expansion of your business, you need to make sure that you are not going to get yourself into a cash crunch situation. This is where you are going to have a lot of money coming in from new business completed and invoiced but not have enough current cash flow. When you borrow you will be financing new equipment, locations, signage, or perhaps a new work truck on a credit line, lease or loan payments. The initial payments are going to be due before you get your increased income from the expansion in. This can be a major critical problem and we do not want this to happen to you. Connecting Your Offline Business to Your Online Business These may sound like no brainers, but you'd be surprised. No matter how high-tech your business has become, there is no doubt you still have some non-electronic aspects of your company. These are things like your business cards, stickers, and work shirts, to name a few. 19 Questions to Supercharge Your Business Plan Whether you are seeking capital for your company or are optimizing your business strategy, the most important element - particularly for outside investors - may be your written business plan. You can tune-up and supercharge your plan using this 19-step checklist. When your written plan firmly answers yes to each of these 19 questions, your market/product strategy is in terrific shape plus you increase the odds of attracting investment capital. Going Self-Employed ? A Few Handy Hints The day you decide to take the plunge and work for yourself will be one of the most life-changing choices you ever make, whether starting a company large or small or as a freelance; from the very first moment of being self-employed, you and you alone will stand or fall by your decisions and actions. You will be responsible for steering your business through all its ups and downs, good times and bad times with no guarantee that everything will turn out right in the end. Menu Driven Business Planning A menu is the foundation of any restaurant; Guests will support or avoid a restaurant for its food. Starting with a preliminary menu is a simple and basic approach to restaurant development. Begin with a menu, and you are light years ahead in the restaurant development process. A menu will tell you and your Guest what you are trying to be as a business, and greatly enhance your chances for success.
|
Copyright © 2005 - 2012 StrategicPlanning360.com. All rights reserved. Legal Info Site Map |
 |
