Defining Your Purpose
If you don’t know what is is, your customers won’t either. Also, you won’t be able to tell your customers why they should choose you over your competitors.
Surely when you decided to start your business you were inspired. Was it to provide a service or product better, faster or cheaper than what was currently available? Was it to fill a gap in the marketplace? Perhaps you were inspired to run a business that people enjoyed working for or that promoted environmental or social responsibility. Whatever your mission, find it and then write it down.
Power of Why
Experience shows that companies with a clear purpose statement surpass their competition and thrive in the marketplace. Purpose statements define and cement a company’s unique competitive advantages. Additionally, companies that are clear about who they are and what they do are less likely to make ill-advised decisions in response to changes in the marketplace. A good purpose statement can guide a company for 10 to 20 years if time and effort were spent in creating it.
A strong business purpose begins with well-defined goals.
Be Specific
You want to create a statement that you and your team can look to every day and ask “Am I fulfilling the company’s mission?” For example, one statement could be “to be the leading game software developer for teens.” A more actionable purpose statement would be “Surpass XYZ games developer in sales, customer experience and speed to market.” The second purpose statement has clear goals and direction, while the more abstract version would be more appropriate for a vision statement than a purpose statement.
Call-to-Action
You can make your purpose statement stand out by including a call to action. A CTA is missing in most company purpose statements and has several distinguishing characteristics:
- Motivates and generates an emotional reaction from your team
- Easy to understand and translates into what your employees do every day
- States a goal that can be measured and identified easily
- Reflects the competitive environment in which your company functions
Purpose Statement
When creating your purpose statement, consider these aspects of your business:
- What is your company’s history and tradition? How does it influence what you want to accomplish today and in the long term?
- How do you characterize the management philosophy of the company? What input does management have in the direction of the company?
- What distinguishes your company from all of the other companies that perform the same service or function? How do you already surpass the competition? What can you do to continue surpassing them?
- What goals are realistic when considering the available resources?
- Where do you need to improve in order to beat the competition? What are your competitors doing that you can imitate and improve upon?
Looking for ways to plan your business so they align with your goals? Williams & Kunkel can help you. Call us today in Flower Mound at 972-446-1040 to have a chat.
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Source: Panalitix