How to write your strategy retrospectively
Most companies do not start with a perfectly written strategy document and then execute on it. They try experiments and learn about the market and customers over time.
This learning however can easily sit within the mind of the people who met with customers and did the research - not available to the wider team.
Writing down a strategy can sound daunting, but it can be done easily following these steps:
- How are you currently winning?
You must be doing something right, speak to current (and past) customers and ask:
- Why did they buy from you
- Who else did they look at
- Why did they not buy from your competitors
- Extract the winning formula
Aggregate this information to find common themes amongst your customers. Find the activities you are doing well that are causing customers to buy, and the little moments of delight whilst using your product/service. The problem is these only tell you why people bought, not why they did not buy. Finding customers who walked away and interviewing them is much more difficult - but possible with more traditional user cohorts and research techniques.
Write down these activities as your “how to win” document.
- Build in time to check the winning formula
User needs change over time, markets move, doing regular user research to stay current on the answers above is critical. How you win today will not be the same as how you win in the future, but starting by writing down how you currently win is the first step to scaling your strategy with your team.
- Share your “how to win”
Share your findings with your team so that everyone is on the same page and everyone knows which activities you do that cause you to win. This will lead the team to naturally double down on the things that are working, amplifying your wins.
Steve Blank - winners understand why customers buy