So, if you are in business, you must see yourself as a warlord in a battle. Warlords are ordinary men fashioned or carved into warriors from childhood. They are trained to confront battles. And no warlord goes to battle without the right strategy. Whether you are prepared for the battle or not, you should know that you can’t win a business battle without a strategy.

In business, what will differentiate you from your competition is your strategy; your business playbook. Just what is a business playbook? Some call it the standard operating procedures for a business. I prefer to call it the business playbook. A playbook shows detailed plan, dynamic approach and strategy of how you intend to position your business to capture your market share. It is like your edge over your competition. It is your right strategy for the battles you will confront in the business terrain. It will differentiate you from the crowd.

The next question to ask should be: how do you create your own business playbook? The truth is: No two businesses operate with the same playbook. There is nothing wrong with peeping into a successful business playbook, but yours still need to be unique to your own business and your business terrain. 

To create your business playbook, first you must clearly define the vision of your business. What kind of business do you intend to operate? This must centered on what makes your business unique in your industry. I always say this, look into your industry and find out what others are doing wrongly. Find out the weaknesses of others and improve on them. Also, what can you do differently to surpass what others are doing? Yes, I have heard entrepreneurs say I don’t have resources to compete with the bigger brands. And here is my response to that: even bigger brands have weaknesses. Some are so big they don’t treat some of their clients—customers—nicely. Some are so big that the staff—employees—nonchalantly attend to some stuffs. If the big brands are incompetent in some areas, trust me, you can ride on their weaknesses. So, in your business playbook, decide to compete with major brands by doing what they don’t consider to be important. The best way to know what they are doing wrongly is to patronize them, and then watch the process closely.   

Secondly, define your small audience. Most entrepreneurs want to take over the world once they start their businesses. There is nothing wrong with such intention if it is a long term goal. If you see it as a short term goal, it will kill you and the business faster than you know it. What you need to do is to find a small market you can serve diligently based on your present capacity. Seize that small market, and you will see your market share gradually grow through word of mouth. Facebook today is a global brand. But in its initial stage, the focus wasn’t to take over the world. Zuckerberg just wanted his friends in his dormitory to get in on the social platform. Then it gradually grow from dormitory to dormitory, and then from school to school. Before you know it, Facebook is in Africa. Every successful business work hard to dominate a sizeable market, serve the market like no other, and then the growth becomes inevitable. So, in your playbook, find your small initial market and serve them pretty well.

Thirdly, design a marketing strategy to reaching your small market. Trust me, it doesn’t have to cost you an arm and a leg to reach your market. I mean, you don’t have to spend so much on marketing. You don’t need billboards, radio or TV ads, all you need is to tailor your marketing to where your small audience are. Yours may be door to door within your neighborhood or community. You may even need to start with friends and family, and then friends of friends and friends of family. It may be that you just have to reach your small audience through SMS or email marketing. You need to consider affordable way(s) of reaching your target market, and you will be shock how patronage will surpass your capacity.

Fourthly, devise a strategy to keep your clients or customers coming back. If you treat them exceptionally well, trust me, they will be back. You must understand why you are in business. You are not in business because you have a fantastic product; that is crap. You are in business to give exceptional value and experience that customers will never forget in a long time. So, in your playbook, you need to highlight how you will keep your customers coming back. You need to highlight how you will go the extra mile for them at all times. They are the reason why you are in business, let them know that through your actions.   

Lastly, Guide your playbook jealously like your secret ingredient. That is why it is called playbook. It is for your business alone. So, it is yours to keep. You can share it with your team, but be careful not to allow your playbook get to your enemy.