As part of a continuation of our How to Build a Better Business blog series, we’re covering the questions to ask when taking the fourth step in analyzing performance: conducting a customer and market analysis.
If you have a marketing plan in place as part of your overall business plan, now is a good time to review that to make necessary changes in terms of your intended customer base or the nature and geographical distribution of customers. You should update your marketing plan at least as often as your business plan. Look again at factors like:
- Changes in your market
- New and emerging services
- Changes in customers’ needs
- External factors, such as the economy and new technology
- Changes in competitive activity
Asking your customers for feedback on your business’ performance will help to identify where improvements can be made to products or services, staffing levels, or business procedures.
Next up, we’ll be discussing how to redefine business goals. Stay tuned!
This information was gathered from Info Entrepreneurs, a team of business information experts from the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal, part of the Canada Business Network.
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