In this article, we’ll share why a financial review is essential to creating a powerful business plan for the new year, and we’ll also show you how we do this in our FREE VIDEO WALKTHROUGH.
Nobody can dispute that business owners are reeling from a five-year period filled with unpredictable difficulties, ranging from Brexit to Covid and from global unrest to inflation. With the UK budget of 2024 to finish off the year, business owners and their business strategists have faced it all!
So, what next? On the 20th January 2025, Donald Trump will be inaugurated as America’s 47th president and has pledged immediate, dramatic change; how much the muted increases in tariffs will impact UK business, we just don’t know!
What we do know, as we step into 2025, is that the businesses that will thrive are those that not only anticipate the unpredictable difficulties, but who proactively prepare to encounter them. Now is the essential time to define your business goals and plan the strategy to achieve them.
At Palmers Accounting, we are accountants first and foremost, however, we have a passion for helping to upskill business owners to really understand their data insights, and build their detailed plan for the future. We often find ourselves in the role of business strategists -or advising business strategists– based on the powerful core metric insights we obtain from our work.
An effective business strategist should:
- Assess your current strengths and areas for development – Define where you are
- Identify where you would like to be in, for example, five years – Define where to go
- Identify the smaller and measurable waypoints to help you reach that goal – Define what to do.
Our belief is that your business will either be sculpted by you or shaped by the unpredictable economy in the coming year; and our goal is to help you plan how to build your vision.
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Keep reading to learn how an updated business plan can help your business grow in 2025 -and why it works best to analyse your metrics first.
FREE VIDEO: For a deep dive insight into how we crunch your numbers to develop a powerful strategy for your next year, watch our free 15 minute video: “How to assess your key business drivers to forecast your new financial year and plan for growth”
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What is a business plan?
As business strategists, how would we advise you to prepare for the next year? By ensuring you have a current business plan, of course!
A business plan is a document that sets intention for your business goals against an understanding of your assets, product, ideal customer, skills and market knowledge.
Essentially, a business plan
- Confirms that your business idea makes sound business sense.
- Helps you plan out the steps you need to take to achieve your goals.
- Provides you with useful financial forecasts, resource requirements and a timeline for anticipated results.
Think of it as a road map; yes, it’s possible to travel without one, but the chances are you will get lost along the way.
However, there is a difference between a basic business plan which defines key business assets and intentions for an approaching phase, and a business plan that truly outlines how to grow your business, based on analysis of performance metrics and the identification of trends, strengths and weaknesses.
A business plan is not just for start-ups!
While a business plan is often thought of as part of the start-up process, at Palmers Accounting, we believe the business plan should frequently be revisited and tweaked, in response to real-time metrics analysis.
Businesses, and the climate they operate in, change over time, so if you are planning to grow, interested in raising additional capital for expanding the business or simply want to take stock of where you are now, a current business plan is essential.
For example, part of our process is to analyse key business drivers (such as revenue, overheads and customer acquisition) from a year in business in order to highlight areas for potential profit or decreased spending, as well as the areas of focus in order to achieve powerful financial goals. These insights are directly linked to the achievement of goals and any operational changes that might be required to achieve them.
VIEW OUR FREE 15 MINUTE VIDEO
Enjoy a walkthrough of some of our process with Clare, as she explains how metrics analysis of key business drivers highlights business goals and creates strategy for the coming year!
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How a business strategist creates an effective business plan
A business strategist who is keeping on eye on current metrics will use those powerful insights to plan strategy over the next year, thus keeping a business on track to achieve the long term goals of the business plan.
In that sense, the business plan should be a working document, informed by regular analysis of key business drivers.
What are the key ways in which a business strategist can help grow your business?
Establishes short and long-term objectives for your business
You can’t have a good business plan if you don’t have clearly defined objectives.
However, you can’t have a clearly defined objective without defining the strategy for its achievement through smaller and measurable targets. Often, these smaller targets are the key business drivers that we, at Palmers, can measure and analyse.
For example, a turnover of X amount in the first quarter will rely on Y amount of products sold, after Z number of prospects. An initial business plan might arbitrarily pull intended numbers together to set goals.
Once a business strategist has some real time data to work from, however, these numbers provide powerful insights to refocus your business’ operational plans, achieve smaller targets and -therefore- the bigger goals.
WATCH OUR VIDEO: How to assess your key business drivers to forecast your new financial year and plan for growth. Click here to access
By setting clear goals, you can use your business plan as a reference tool to keep you on track with sales targets and operational milestones.
When used properly and consulted regularly, it can help you measure and manage your efforts and make key decisions at the right time.
Not sure where to start? As local accountants and business strategists, we love nothing more than helping small businesses develop a plan that’s geared to your aspirations.
Creates a marketing plan
Who is your target market? Why should they buy from you? How are you going to reach them?
These are just some of the questions that a marketing strategy will initially address, as well as providing you with an invaluable insight into your competitors and an in-depth market analysis.
A good marketing plan is essential if you want to get your sales and marketing right first time. After all there is no point advertising on social media if it’s not a channel your potential customers use. And it will also give you invaluable information about whether and when you should release new products or services.
As accountants, we find that assessing your marketing efforts from a perspective of metrics and statistics -and adjusting your business plan accordingly- can dramatically increase your profits.
For example, recording and measuring the Return On Investment of various marketing efforts against the Customer Acquisition metric often highlights the primary methods a business should refocus on with their next phase of marketing.
Tweaks in strategy, using insights such as these, are extremely powerful ways to plan for profit and keep your business strategist up-to-date and effective when sculpting the upcoming campaigns.
Enables you to seek investment
Once you have a business plan in place, you’ll have a clear idea of your financial projections and whether you need an injection of cash to really help your business fly.
The great thing about a business plan is that it answers questions about profitability and revenue generation, so it can make the difference between whether or not someone decides to invest and, crucially, how much they are willing to put into your business.
TIP: Don’t think that potential investors have to be venture capitalists! It could be you just need a line of credit from your bank for a set period of time. As experienced local accountants, we are happy to advise you on what type of investment would be right for your business.
Helps you decide whether you need a new asset
Committing resources to capital improvements and investments is never an easy decision for budget-conscious business owners. An accurate assessment of your previous year’s finances, as well as an informed cash flow forecast, is essential when planning an expansion of your business and its assets.
Not only can your business plan bring clarity to the decision and help you decide if it’s feasible to -for example- take on additional office or workspace, but it’s also part of the measurable strategy to achieve that feasibility.
Identifies any skill gaps in your business
For a business to succeed, attracting talented employees is critical, but first of all you need to identify any skill gaps in your business.
A business plan will help you identify any gaps and also whether outsourcing would be a more appropriate solution than hiring a new member of staff. In fact, a keen eye on your financial forecast is likely to show you whether outsourcing or hiring is most beneficial, especially in light of new employment costs announced in the UK Budget 2024.
Whichever option you go for, part of the business planning process is to help bring in the right talent by showing the direction and growth potential of the business.
Business strategist advice from your local accountants
If you’re not sure where to start with your business planning, why not give us a call. At Palmers Accounting, we’ve helped many business owners put a business plan in place which not only allows them to grow their business, but also have the life they want.
If you’ve found these ideas helpful and would like to find out more , join our mailing list now for exclusive access to our 15-minute video session on “How to assess your key business drivers to forecast your new financial year and plan for growth“. WATCH NOW!
Let’s make 2025 a year to remember!
