Suppose you're the owner of a burgeoning online retail company that specializes in custom handmade crafts. With growing customer demand, intense competition, and the dynamic nature of the online marketplace, you're feeling overwhelmed. It's time to move your business to the next level, but you don't know where to start. Here's where understanding and applying strategic planning models can guide your business's growth and development.
Strategic Planning Models are methods or frameworks that organizations use for guiding their decision-making process during strategic planning. These models provide a systematic approach for setting goals, finding the optimum path to achieve these objectives and ensuring that every team member understands their role in this process. Prime examples include the OGSM, SWOT, Balanced Scorecard, and Scenario Planning Models.
They help you align your vision with your actions, assess your current situation, anticipate future scenarios, and make informed decisions. Implementing a strategic planning model is crucial for your business. It can map out how you'll grow your customer base, navigate competitive threats, expand product offerings, and increase profitability.
OGSM Model: It's an acronym that stands for Objectives, Goals, Strategies, and Measures. In your case, your objective could be to become a leading online retailer of handmade crafts; goals might include increasing customer base or sales; strategies could be improving customer service, and measures could be the increase in returning customers or sales figures.
SWOT Analysis: Identifying your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Strengths might be your unique product offerings, weaknesses could include limited brand awareness, opportunities might be untapped markets, and threats could be new competitors.
Balanced Scorecard: It’s an approach where performance is measured from four perspectives—financial, customer, internal process, learning, and growth. You would monitor metrics like revenue, customer satisfaction, efficiency of the order fulfillment process, and your team's ability to innovate.
Scenario Planning: This entails imagining and planning for different future scenarios. Suppose increased automation in craft production or flora and fauna-inspired designs gain popularity. You would develop action plans for each.
By choosing the appropriate strategic planning model for your business and using it methodically, you'll be better equipped to guide your business towards sustained growth and success. It provides structured guidance to underpin your decisions, navigating the uncertain waters of the online retail marketplace with increased confidence.