Planning Your Online Business Strategy

 

Hi! 

It's Franny again and I am here to bring you more goodness in my study. 

Today I did a study on Online Business Strategy and it was so interesting to see business from the point of view of the customers as well as the business. so, in this post, we will be looking at how to balance the customer and the business experience. 

First, let's start by explaining the benefits of an online strategy. 

An online business strategy helps get all the ideas out of your head and into a usable format. It helps to increase clarity and focus. 

You're probably wondering Where do I start? Well here are a few steps to know that;

• Clearly define your goals. For example, your goal might be to increase sales by 20%
• Articulate what your business stands for, that is, your mission statement.
• Identify your Unique Selling Points(USP). This will help you stand out from your competitors. 
• Grow your email marketing list. 

Next thing you would want to focus on is understanding customer behaviour. You can't use the same approach for your offline and online customers. The behaviour as to how they purchase from you is not the same so your approach towards both has to be different. 

Customers are the key to success and understanding them is super important. Customer experience is something that has to be treated as high priority. Here are a few tips on how to improve your customer experience;

• Customer touch point: a touch point is any stage where a customer comes into contact with your business. Most times, it applies to offline retail stores and it's an excellent way to build customer loyalty. 
• Understand the purchase journey of your users. To make it easier to understand their journey, put yourself in their shoes and answer the following questions; "where do I go when I need answers?", "where do I normally spot new brands and businesses?" , "what helps me make a purchase decision and do I still see a brand again after making a purchase?"

These questions will help guide your process in creating a seamless experience for your customers.  Anotehr approach is doing a survey with your customers to know how they knew about your business and feedback as well. Always remember, the more value a site has to someone, the more likely they will want to return to it. Always always keep that in mind. Great!

Now another hurdle to cross is standing out from your competitors. This is where your USP comes into place. What makes you different? What makes your wig business different from the next Instagram wig vendor? These are the questions to ask yourself. 

I understand sometimes that finding your USP can be tricky so to do that, here are a few questions to ask yourself; who is my target audience?, who are my competitors, what problems does my target market have and how can I solve these problems? These questions give a clear perspective. Another tip is to look at what your competitors are doing and look for how your business can do it differently. Also, remember that your USP is for your target audience and not everybody. 

The final line of thought here is How Do You Use Your Goals To Improve Business Performance?

Let me walk you through this, can I?

Now, you will make use of something called KPIs(Key Performance Indicators). They are quantifiable measurements used to focus attention on metrics most important to the business goals. It helps track the progress of a business. KPIs must be measurable, practical, achievable and provide directions. You can shorten it to MPAPD or MAPPD to make it easier to remember. 

How do you know what your KPIs should be and how are they measured? 

You can do that with the method called SMART. This means Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound. For every goal set, this should be used to determine if it makes sense. For example, saying I want to increase sales isn't a clear KPI, but saying I want to increase sales by 20% by getting at least 50 new customers to purchase wigs on our platform in the space of 3 months is a clearer perspective of the KPI. 

These few tips can go a long way in helping your business grow, so try them and see for yourself. 

I hope these pointers were clear? I hope you're enjoying this learning process like I am.

Till the next post.

Franny.