Archives 2022

Thinking of starting a new business can be very easy, but the rest of the path can be difficult.

Just like how an architect creates a blueprint before building a house, a business plan is a tool to build a foundation and develop a structure for the future of your business. 

Business plans are integral for success – they can help secure funding, project financial growth, and flesh out operational details. Creating an organized and effective business plan requires a deep understanding of business management and expertise in the relevant industries.

A business plan gives you a means for capturing your entrepreneurial vision in writing. It enables you to fine-tune your aspirations and recognize where there are gaps or inconsistencies in what you want to accomplish. 

Another important way in which business plans can provide tangible help is by aligning everyone in an organization with the vision and strategy going forward.

A business plan helps you better understand your competition, the market you’re entering, and customer trends and preferences.

Expert opinions and numerous studies show that business plans improve corporate satisfaction, are useful for angel investors and venture capitalists, and increase a company’s chances of raising capital by 2.5x.

A business plan will help you identify red flags in advance. It’s an excellent way to do a “reality check” and recognize warning signs of impending doom. With a realistic view of whether your business idea has a chance of success, you can make an informed decision about whether to move forward, cease and desist, or alter your course.

Having a business plan allows you to make better decisions because it helps prevent decision-making on the fly. It gives you strategic direction, so fewer outcomes are left to chance. Not only is a business plan important for startups, but it’s also a valuable tool for established businesses. All businesses change and grow. All industries evolve. Therefore, a business plan should be approached as a living, breathing document that needs to adapt to the circumstances at hand and its environment.

Now that you have a solid grasp on the “why” behind business plans, you can confidently move forward with creating your own!

Remember that a business plan will grow and evolve along with your business, so it’s an important part of your whole journey—not just the beginning!

Mohamad Seifeddine

Many factors go into a successful startup, such as market need, financing, a viable business model, and marketing. However, finding the right team – specifically, the right co-founder or cofounders – is a crucial first step. 

Your cofounder is your business partner. They are the one you’ll be spending long hours with in the trenches, building your business from the ground up.

So, it’s critical that you choose your cofounder wisely.

But, how does one even start looking for a co-founder and is it really as simple as it sounds? Well, to start off, one has to set a skillset requirement before endeavoring on such a journey. Listed here are a few tips that might help you find a co-founder for your startup.

1- Write a “job description” for that ideal partner

The most productive way of finding a decent co-founder is for you to write a comprehensive job description for that role. The only reasonable way to do it is to look at the strengths and potential weaknesses of your business. Once you realize what you need from your co-founder and find out which particular skills that person must have, put it in the job description. Also, try and look for someone who complements your skills with theirs, in order to ensure that your cooperation is productive and that your business is flourishing.

2- What Skills do you Lack?

Ask yourself what skills you are lacking, and what you would like to see in your co-founders skillset? You have to be perfectly clear on what skills will be needed for the success of the startup, and what is it that you are looking for. Take a look at your management team, and see what skills they are lacking; by identifying the necessary roles in your management team, you will figure out the real number of co-founders you need for your business. Each business member has its own roles and responsibilities which have to be fulfilled, which is why you are looking for someone with a decent skillset to fill those shoes.

3- Where to Look for a Co-founder?

There are many places where one could go searching for a co-founder. It all starts with the network of people you know; if someone can vouch for a particular person that is a great place to start. Another thing you can do is look at online “matchmaking” sites for business partners. Your last option should be an open job posting.

4- Take Your Time

Finding the right co-founder is a lengthy process, so take your time and do not rush it. Trying to speed up the process can only bring about bad results, which is something you might want to avoid. Get some time and look for the perfect candidate, spread the word on business forums and sites and monitor people’s reactions. If you have more than one person applying for the job (which is usually the case), test their skillsets and try and find the one that best complements yours. If none of them fits you right, just keep looking and in time, a perfect candidate will appear.

5- Avoid Family and Good Friends

Sooner or later, all startup founders (or at least the majority of them) consider reaching out to a member of family or a really good friend to be their co-founder. On one hand, it makes sense. You know this person. You know their good and bad traits. You trust them. Trust us, taking on a member of the family or a good friend as a co-founder is a huge mistake.

6- Be Diverse

In today’s world, most of the startups are being founded by college students who are 20 to 30 years old. Normally this creates a lot of space for different people with the same ideas. When hiring, you should be as diverse as possible, for extraordinary ideas are born out of diverse backgrounds and extraordinary experiences.

7- Research

Once you go through these steps, choosing a co-founder will be much easier. You will know what to look for in a person, and his skillset will determine whether he is the right fit for your business or not. Remember, take it slowly this just might dictate the future of your business. Do your research and start searching.

In the last 15 years the coaching industry has exploded and excelling in this fierce competition is another task that needs to be accomplished. Businesses exist in a competitive environment which makes building your brand not something “extra” that you have to do. It’s a crucial component of building your business!

What is branding?

Marketing and branding are both important, but the difference between the two is what makes branding so important for your coaching life.

“Branding” is who you are; the person. And “marketing” is how you build awareness for that identity; the logo.

Both are important to expanding your reach and maintaining client loyalty.

Branding is not just about having a pretty logo and color palette—in fact, the visual aspect of your brand is only the icing on the cake, so to speak. Branding is more about the ingredients of that cake, and how they work together to create a tasty and cohesive representation of your life coaching business.

HOW WILL BRANDING IMPACT YOUR COACHING BUSINESS ?

It will help people associate you with the results they’re looking for in their life and it will give you a strong platform to stand on and share the truths and hopes your clients need in their life.

1. Positions you as an authority
2. Builds your credibility
3. Makes marketing easier
4. Helps you grow your business 
5. Helps you make a larger impact
6. Connects with your audience and attracts your ideal clients
7. Showcases your strengths and what you bring to the table
8. Illuminates what makes you unique and different from other providers in your space
9. Shares a glimpse into what it’s like to work with you

BRAND STRATEGY

Your brand strategy informs nearly every decision you’ll make in your business and most importantly, it’s the way you’ll make an emotional connection with your clients–it’s all the reasons why they’ll choose you instead of any other coach.

A good brand strategy has many benefits for your business:

1. Command a Premium Price: Brand strategy gives you the power to position yourself as an empathetic, trustworthy coach with a unique set of value propositions offered by none of your competitors.
2. Communicate a Clear Message: People need what you offer. You know as a coach that you can make a difference. Unfortunately, the people who need your coaching services the most will have a hard time connecting with you if you don’t have a clear message that explains how your brand will solve their problem and transform their life. 
3. Increase Client Loyalty and Referrals: If you deliver what your brand promises, your clients will remember you.The most successful coaches at some point stop selling and grow through client referrals. Why, because happy clients want to talk about their experience and want others to share in this experience. 
4. Differentiate Yourself from Other Coaches in Your Niche: You’re facing a lot of competition, it’s difficult to stand out, and potential clients have lots of options when it comes to choosing their coach.That’s why differentiating yourself is more important than ever. 

WHY IS BRANDING SO IMPORTANT?

What is a Pitch Deck? (Definition)

A pitch deck is a presentation delivered to investors to explain your company, the problem you are solving, important milestones, the stage your company is at, and what you’re looking for in terms of investment.

What should a Pitch Deck include?

#1. Company introduction

This should be a one-sentence explanation of what your business is and the kind of value you want to provide to customers.

#2. Problem and solution

Your business SHOULD be looking to solve a problem. As such, you need to mention which customer faces the problem and how your product or service solves that problem. 

#3. Market opportunity

Go into detail about who your primary customer is and how large the potential market may be. Try to find quantifiable data that supports the information you give on this slide.

#4. Product or Service

Go into greater detail and explain how the product or service solves the problem that customers are facing and how your startup offers a better solution than existing incumbents. 

#5. Traction and growth potential

This is an important slide that aims at showing the attention that the product-company-service is receiving and why it is a great opportunity that the investors do not want to miss. The takeaway from this slide is that you have developed the necessary momentum to scale up in the upcoming months.

#6. Competitors

Your potential investors need to know what they’re up against. Your “Competitors” slide shows who your competing businesses are and what makes you different.

#7. Team

Who are the key players in your business? Who will be the point of contact? What experience does your team have and what makes them stand out from the crowd?

#8. Financials

The financials slide helps investors understand what projected revenue will look like over the next several years. It should contain detailed numbers about your business and finances. At this point, you should have already completed a business plan, and you can pull plenty of data from the financials section of your plan. 

#9. Investment ask and use of funds

At this point in time, your audience and investors should have a clear idea of what you can offer. It is now time to make it clear what you expect in return. Present a clear set of figures detailing specific funds you require, together with how these funds would be used, and what ROI an investor can expect to make.

Do you need any help with your pitch deck? Contact us!

Attracting investors can easily be one of the most challenging things that you encounter when you launch your startup. However, you can’t grow your business without investors, which is why the sooner you start working on getting them on board, the better!

If you are starting a business, thinking about starting a business, or already well on your way and looking to raise your next round, here are a few things I encourage you to do to build excitement and successfully raise funding:

1. Make your business easy to understand. Do one thing, and do it extremely well.

Deciding on your “core competency” ! 

Without a clear core competency, it is very difficult for customers, investors, and even employees to get a firm grasp on what it is the business actually does. What’s the goal? What’s the one thing the business will be known for? What’s the problem, what’s the unmet need, and (in a single sentence) what’s the solution?.

If you can’t explain what problem your business solves, how, and why, in a sentence or two, then chances are you aren’t quite sure either. And if you aren’t 100 percent sure of what problem your business is solving in the world, investors aren’t going to know what they’re investing in.

2. Develop a strong business plan.

Your business plan is an essential document that proves one thing to investors: that your business is worth their risk. Your plan should clearly outline your business objectives and goals.

Show that you have a deep understanding of your target market and provide a complete description of the product or services you offer.
An essential section of the business plan is your marketing plan. It defines your market size and growth prospects and should show trend influences and sales potential.

3. Provide Management Team Bios & References

Investors have a keen interest in both you (as the founder) and the management team—from understanding their industry background to their business experience. They need to feel confident that you and your team can lead the company to grow and make a return on their investment.

Ensure you exude confidence and passion and demonstrate your willingness and ability to change course should your company need to shift direction. 

Other positive traits investors look for in founders are the ability to make decisions with input from your leadership team (there’s no room for indecisiveness), excellent relationship and networking skills, and the ability to build a company around core competencies and deliver on them.

Final thoughts

Investors assume risk whenever they invest. An exit opportunity provides them a “reward” for their risky move. It’s therefore imperative to integrate an exit strategy into your business plan. Let investors know how you plan to return their investment. Will you pursue an acquisition? Merge with another company?

Choose an exit strategy that aligns with your business and personal goals. Your time frame may vary, so think about when you may want to implement your exit strategy as well. The objective is for all parties to exit profitably.

As exhilarating as it is, the fundraising process can be intimidating. But when you’re prepared, you can go in strong and confident—moving you one step closer to achieving your goal. Need help getting your financials in order? Do you have further questions about how to attract investors to your business? Contact us!

A strategy is a set of decisions on where you want your business to be in the future, in line with your company’s mission.

A strategy is usually created in a strategic planning process by the senior leaders of an organization. Models that involve employees in developing strategies are on the rise and seem to pay off.

How do you know your strategy is the right one? Well, you don’t. But with some clear strategic goals, you avoid the confusion that prevents many companies from growing. Or to phrase it differently: “We might be wrong, but at least we’re not confused.”

How do you get there?

How do you make your strategy a reality?

Roadmap

The roadmap is your first step in executing your strategy. It defines where you are right now, where you want to be according to the strategy and then describes which milestones you need to reach to get to where you want to be.

STEP 1: DEFINE WHAT’S NECESSARY

To create a roadmap, make a list of things necessary in your strategic target state. To guide this, stick to the categories: People, Processes, Tools and Partners.

STEP 2: WRITE DOWN WHERE YOU ARE TODAY

In the next step, you define where you are today. Again, it makes sense to stick to the categories.

STEP 3: DEFINE AN EFFECTIVE WAY TO CLOSE THE GAP

Now create the actual roadmap – a high-level execution plan on how you will close the gap between today and your strategic goal. This road-map will be the basis for goal-setting for your organization and successful strategy execution. The roadmap will always have a time component to it as it lays out the milestones in a chronological way.

STEP 4: OBJECTIVES AND KEY RESULTS

Use the milestones identified in the roadmap to lay out the most critical tasks for the next three months. An excellent tool for this is Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). You are breaking down the 1-to-5-year horizon into manageable steps of three months. This clarity will help your team to set the right priorities. You will have to handle your regular business in parallel while working on strategy implementation. Staying focused on three topics per quarter will make sure your resources are used most effectively.

People

ALIGNMENT

You want your team moving jointly in the new direction. You must be able to transport the message of why the new set of strategic goals is important for the company. Your team needs to have a deep understanding of the strategic roadmap. Senior executives and team managers need to communicate the meaning of the strategic initiatives over and over again in team meetings. Provide insights into how the strategy execution process is going, where you stand and what the next steps are. The more visual, the better.

TRAINING

As for any change process, training your team is a powerful tool to ensure effective execution of your strategy. There are different training demands that arise from a strategic shift.

• Make sure everybody has an in-depth understanding of the strategy
• Create the capabilities and expertise that might be necessary but missing as per your roadmap
• Executive education to develop the right leadership skills across all management levels

REWARD MECHANISM AND INCENTIVES

When you change your strategic direction, the way you incentivize and reward your team might have to change as well. Make sure your strategy is reflected in your compensation components as well.

ORGANIZATIONAL RESTRUCTURING

Your new strategy might make it necessary that you restructure your teams. Let’s say you want to diversify your product offering for your two main customer groups, it could be a good idea to change from a functional structure to a divisional structure.

RECRUITING

When you need new roles or new employees, create a recruiting roadmap that is in sync with your strategy execution roadmap.

Resources

Your organization’s ability to effectively execute your strategy not only depends on your people, but also on the way you distribute resources. There are two possible implications.

WHERE YOUR RESOURCES GO

You might need to reallocate resources from one topic to another which is more important for your strategy. Make sure you cut budgets that don’t have relevance for your new strategy. That can be painful for the teams, but with the right people measures, the change will be easier to digest.

HOW YOU DISTRIBUTE RESOURCES

Depending on your strategy, it’s possible that you have to change the way resources are distributed. Where it is a top-down budgeting approach today, you might want to switch to a more autonomous and agile approach to enable your product teams to develop products quickly. This all depends on what your strategic goals are.

Measure Success

Last but not least, while executing on your strategy it makes sense to measure your success frequently. This will enable you to give feedback back into the organization, showcase the successes on the way and keep engagement up. And of course, you want to know if your measures are paying off. Share the progress widely and in graphical form, e.g. as a big printout of your roadmap and an up-to-date dashboard of your measures. Also, use the quarterly OKR workshops to communicate progress.

Regardless of what you want to do, owning your own business is a goal for many. Being an entrepreneur, growing a business, gaining financial security is a dream for most. Not everyone is equipped to be an entrepreneur or business owner. This is when the help of a business consultant is needed for assistance!

An investment must be made not just in the form of money, but also time, and other commitments. Starting a business is not easy. With many types of companies, the rate of failure is high. To increase chances at success, experts can assist. Experts through consulting services provide the necessary support for business startups and entrepreneurs.

Consultants work in many ways to assist clients with a new business. It can be from basic items such as help structure the new business, creating a business plan, doing research, achieve certain objectives, milestones, and more. A consultant puts best practices ahead since many have done the work already many times before. This strengthens the process and outcomes.

In the beginning of a new business, there is much that is required to be done. Not just done but done correctly. This can range from the basic setups of a business, the structure, licenses, to product design and development. Services may need to be created, priced, and so on. It all depends on the type of business. Are you needing a retail space? What type of business are you starting? A consultant can assist. Speak to one about your business startup and/or idea.

A key benefit of consultants when working with them is the momentum.

The speed of getting things done is critical with a startup business. Often, uncertainty slows things down or is the cause of a complete stall or stop. Procrastinations can happen here quickly.  Consultants move on business topics quickly. Working with a consultant helps avoid slowdowns. Momentum is created when working with the assistance of a business consultant. They add knowledge and details as required, keeping the pace moving forward. Consultants know the next steps are help entrepreneurs, investors, and business startups follow them. Steps are taking in the right order, tasks executed properly, and the startup is successfully established. Speak to a consultant and find out if this is right for you.

Click here to download Smart Interventions startup business brochure to discover our services!