8 Crucial tips for developing new business

In the March issue of our newsletter, we revealed why all businesses need a business plan and a strategy for winning and keeping new customers.  The natural progression from strategy is continuous business development – this month we outline 8 crucial tips
every company should be aware of.                                                                                

1.         Business without strategy is not a business – the strategy must include an action
            plan which should be kept live and constantly revisited in light of ever-changing
            developments.

2.         As in the point above strategic goals and targets from business planning must be constantly addressed, kept current and refined if necessary to align to business strategy.

3.         After your staff your most valuable asset is your business database. Past, current and future business can hold the key to new business.  Is your database efficiently set-up, to be maximised and ‘dissected’ for business development?

4.         Centralise your database, make staff accountable and emphasise the view that it is intellectual property belonging to the business. Protect against departing staff taking leads.

5.         A simple filter can be set up to profile the characteristics of your most profitable account, with the right criteria having been input – eg. SIC (sector industry code), company turnover, number of employees.  The more detail you have when profiling
customers (current or ideal) the better chance of discovering potential new ones.

6.         Maximise your sales team resource by ensuring appropriate skills to kick-start the sales process, crucially start with thorough desk research (internal or external data).  Although they will not be ‘on the road’ if correctly guided this desk research can provide effective and relevant information for setting up truly qualified sales meetings.

7.         Business development is almost wholly dependent on your communication with the outside world – review your image.  Do you stand out – is your image a trustworthy, effective, reliable one?  Constantly develop your image through your website, digital marketing, branding etc.

8.         Finally, competition in today’s world is fierce and to stay ahead of the game you must be better.   Keep abreast of your competitors and the external market place so you can be one step ahead.   

We hope that you enjoy reading our hints and tips - we would love to hear your thoughts and any suggestions for future topics (either for newsletters or for future blog posts).  You can contact us by email at enquiries@blueboxconsultancy.com or pick up the phone and give us a call on 084 3289 3288

If you want to know more about us and the work we do, then go to our website at www.blueboxconsultancy.com 

See you next time