Marketing Strategy – Organizations and companies have had to rethink and rethink their business strategy planning in what appears to be a blink of an eye. The tension between the changing strategy and other factors is not a brainer; what made it tricky is the current economic climate and the impact of a pandemic on corporate strategy constraints.
The limits of the pandemic have essentially reduced the degree of “instability” or degrees of freedom for organizations to be strategic, agile and nimble in their change of course.
Canada has 1.78 million SMEs, many of them in the services sector, it is not surprising that these businesses are hard hit by COVID-19 and the ripple effect of closures. , social distancing and economic contraction. Many SMEs do not survive the first 10 years of activity; in fact, Statistics Canada notes that SMEs that cross the 10-year mark represent 42.9% in the service industry. Therefore, is everything lost and do small and medium business owners give up? Are the chances too high?
How could you ask yourself if there can be an opportunity when my bottom line is shrinking, and my business model is no longer stable and effective?
Let’s assume the stay-at-home policy is much longer than six months:
- What else can you do differently to keep your business alive?
- What do you sell and how do you sell it?
- Do you use different techniques and tools to get the most out of your services and products?
- Is your marketing strategy shifting to new platforms, and if so, are you tracking your data to inform your strategy?
- Are you changing your marketing methodology to align with data and opportunities?
- Is your marketing aligned in a way to drive profit and sales?
- Who are your competitors, and what can you learn from them?
- Does collaborating to complete what you offer to make more sense than competing in this environment and allows you to expand the scope of your brand and your customer base?
- Can you really take a step back and look at your business objectively, where it fits in the current market, and evaluate it objectively at arm’s length?
- It has been said if you do the same thing over and over again, you will get the identical outcome.
In a climate of chaos, change is the only constant.
Change and re-invent management, business strategy planning and strategic implementation are all fundamental leadership skills that are critical to the success and sustainability of any organization.
So it’s no surprise that many small and medium-sized businesses may have trouble figuring out what’s next? How do I change my strategy? What are my choices and opportunities I currently have?
And to be honest, these are tough questions to answer when you are a leader who has heavily invested in a business that you have built through hard work and doing what you have always considered the best.
I would suggest that companies might want to consider reaching out to a business strategy advisor to get an objective view of their landscape, a new perspective on their business model. Also, a coach to help them overcome perhaps the most significant business crisis they’ve ever had and been faced. These are all valuable investments as they will help leaders and organizations not only reevaluate what they are doing and how they do it. But, this will help leaders maintain their confidence in leading change, making business decisions thoughtful and intelligent and develop new strategies that define the stage of the organization’s next phase.
Because whether we want to acknowledge it or not, after COVID-19, there will be the next phase with a new economy and a new way of doing business after COVID-19.
How we, as leaders re-plan our business strategy, how we are using the crisis as an opportunity to rethink our business models. However, our offering, our marketing, our strategic partnership and our support systems will impact and determine whether your business does this.
Opinions expressed by US Insider contributors are their own.
