Advocates to build your business, I think

There has been a lot written about having an advocate strategy to building your business presence. Makes sense to me. Business is built on relationships and having people who know your work help you build and grow is important. So what is the best way to create and communicate with advocates?

• I have started with a list of 10 CEO, CFO and VP that I have been through my planning process. I am thinking that this is a good starting point. 
• I am thinking that maybe providing them content rich materials every 2 weeks. Something related to my flagship product and service. 
• I am considering setting up a special dropbox for files just for them (pdf). Some of my clients are old school email, a file folder and paper are all right. Anything else is new technology and they don't spend time with "new" media. I guess this means know your customers and what they like. 
• I am considering inviting my clients to get to know one another. I think we often leave clients in isolation and letting them intersect. In this case I think I am going to step our and connect them. Clients should have an opportunity to know one another. 
• I am thinking that the 10 people on my list should get acknowledged at least monthly in some way.
• I am also considering asking them permission prior to forwarding them value added content.

I hope that if I provide clients with value rich content, connect them, set the stage for additional networking, give them a place they could potentially share information privately that they will be more successful. Maybe this is something that might work for you. 

I think in business we all need to think through our client work approaches. The approach that I outlined above is open for discussion. Having advocates is important to any one's success. The challenge is often what is the best way to reach out to that small group that has the most influence on you success. 

What is the best way to communicate with those that have the most influence on your success. Maybe an advocates approach. I know for the people that I work with their way of communicating is the most important. 

Thanks for letter me write something a little different than my normal articles.

QUESTION: How best do you think a business should connect with their advocates, their fans? For me it was about writing about a lot of "I". Maybe you have a challenge like this. What did you do?

Seven Candid Strategic Questions that Every Business Leader Should Ask

Good questions are the key to successful planning and decision making. Throughout the business planning process we must consider strategic questions to help us understand the current situation, focus areas and our vision for the future. Strategic planning is an intensive process and should be a team effort - it should not be done in isolation.

A good place to start in the planning process is to focus on 'what' questions. What questions are extremely powerful tools for thinking about your business / personal strategy, goals and objectives. The key is to know which questions to ask and to be willing to take a candid look at your business.

Here are seven candid "what" questions that every business leader should ask:

What are the overall strengths and weaknesses of your business?

Strengths and weaknesses exist in all organizations and should include considerations for people, resources, culture, work processes, tools, supply chain, financial situation, etc. The list goes on and on. The important thing here is to start the process by first looking at your organization and its resources.

What are the overall opportunities and threats to your business? 
Focus here on your external world, the things you cannot control but must be aware of. Some items could include a market shift, retirement and succession, competitive movement and changes, the global business climate (local, national or international), obstacles or climate and weather effects. We often miss the opportunity to do environmental scanning. Look outside your office to truly understand the opportunities and threats to your organization.  

What political, economic, social and technological conditions impact your business? 
What's happening in your local business scene (economics)? Is there a product or service that people want or need to buy? Is technology impacting your team and their need for training? What important social change will impact the business? Are you developing leaders for tomorrow? Every answer should lead to another question. Dig deep, exhaust yourself and find people to help you through the process.   

What do you want to achieve, protect, avoid and eliminate? 
This question contains all the elements of risk planning. There are always things we want to achieve, protect, avoid and eliminate on a personal, team or organizational basis. What are they? Identify as many as possible and make a list. Examples vary but could include increased sales, keeping an established portfolio, avoiding trouble or accidents, establishing an employee health program or helping people drop a few pounds. The point here is that whatever is identified must be relevant to your business and its challenges.   

What are the key challenges you face today, tomorrow and in the distant future? 
We're in an era where we must be predictive and adaptive business leaders and professionals. Strategic planning is about time frames with past, present and future considerations. Establish what your work world should look like with time frames. Planning used to focus on 3 to 5 year cycles. That has changed. Now we must keep our eye on short-term road trips with long term implications.   

Where are we and how did we get here? 
This question is a pure honesty question. It is used to establish your present situation and to help you accept complete responsibility and accountability for it. No blame-storming allowed. Outside forces might have contributed, but at some point decisions were made to set your direction. As a business leader, you were either active or reactive and there were consequences. Capture it, leverage it and be prepared to let it go.   

What key initiatives are going to be placed on the strategic agenda of your business? Why? 
At some point you need to focus and make key decisions that will make a difference in your business. Building your strategic agenda is a different type of challenge and may require another approach. This may take 'why' questions, questions that focus on benefits and value. Before adding anything to your strategic agenda you must first clearly establish the benefits and values of those items.

Being honest about your business, the organization and its people is a challenge. When strategic planning it's important to remove yourself from the natural tendency of coming up with solutions. Establishing solutions is the action part of planning. Consider engaging an expert strategic facilitator to help. Remember that you don't plan to fail, you fail to plan and planning requires asking the right questions.

QUESTION: What do you need to do to get your business going in the right direction? Connect with me for a 30 minute discussion on some possible options to moving your business forward in a strategic direction. 1-866-559-8126 Ext 201