The Mini-Strategic Plan

continued -- page 2

3. Online Channel Development, Integration and Optimization

One could argue that this is the primary priority; however, to bring some companies to par with advanced multi-channel, business-to-business direct marketing companies, there is likely a significant investment to be made, often $1-2 million or more. To manage the investment, it is logical to utilize existing products and markets to enhance performance and earnings in order to attempt to partially or totally self-fund the “Elephant in the Room” which is the necessary expansion of the online integration and optimization to ward off the effects of ‘net gnats’ and predatory pricing that takes place when a company fails to place highly in search optimization or other essential online marketing elements.

Perhaps the most significant of the mini-strategic initiatives, overall, the online initiative must, however, be co-managed with the first two priorities in order to be successful. It will also demand significant considerations of talent and skill resources, either internally or outsourced.

I view this element of the mini-strategic planning as a parallel exploration. Senior management proceeds with its ideation and process development and explores the fully-furnished structure of an advanced online/catalog direct marketing structure. This would cause, by necessity, a rapid and comprehensive online, search engine optimization, keyword, paid and organic search, affiliate marketing, and alternative online technological learning curve (blogs, iPod-casting, webinars, etc.) that can only be beneficial for the management team for the future. An equally intensive and parallel exploration and development proposal should be solicited from at least two outside providers, one young, hungry, facile and state-of-the-art, and one established, if somewhat overloaded and expensive. The comparisons between the two are instructive.

With the findings of these two approaches, it is possible—with some guidance—to reach a conclusion on the appropriate tack for company to take within ninety days. From there, a robust developmental plan can be reached on a collegial basis describing the necessary catch-up phase to be deployed to bring company into the essential area of fifty percent online orders within the next two years and the currently existing frontier of not only multi-channel direct marketing, but the growing dominance of multi-positional direct marketing (our service-oriented company at premium pricing; our speed-oriented company at variable pricing; our volume-oriented company at volume pricing; our discount company at discount pricing; our catalog-oriented company; our online-oriented company; our wholesale-oriented company; our dealer-oriented company; our mom and pop mini-dealer-oriented company; and on and on).

4. Talent Expansion

The three mini-strategic enhancements proposed doubtless will require evaluation of talent and skill resources within the company and talent and skill resources to be imported to the company. Generally, the first step is to evaluate the existing talent levels in an attempt to discover where augmentation or repositioning is likely to bear fruitful benefits. The secondary phase of the mini-strategic planning for talent is to present findings and to develop the augmentation plan, generally by the collegial consensus of senior management.

Once the talent resource plan is developed and accepted, the usual and customary recruitment and placement process can be accomplished, either internally or using an outside placement resource with experience in the multi-channel direct marketing industry.

This process is often as long as thirty days for the evaluative portion; thirty days for the plan development by senior management; and ninety to one hundred twenty days for creation of position descriptions, recruitment of qualified candidates, interview, vetting, and the offer and acceptance phase. From that point, starting dates are most often within thirty to sixty days. Therefore, the entire initiative is about six to eight months. For highly-specialized positions, such as ecommerce merchandisers with proven search engine optimization success, the length of time can be prolonged, especially when the employing city is not a top-tier geographic relocation area.

These four mini-plans within the strategic planning process can be selectively employed by a company based on the strengths and weaknesses that it perceives in its overall positioning and strategic health. Often doing just one of these ‘mini’s’ a year can assist in keeping a good company fine-tuned through repetitive and frequent self-evaluation.

Copyright © 2006 by Donald R. Libey. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced by any means without permission of the author. Contact Libey LLC; www.libey.com or call 877-903-9448.

Previous | Next

Page 1 | Page 2

Back to Top