A Goal Without a Plan Is Just a Wish… Especially Today. Isn’t It Time To Get Started?

Do you have a roadmap for 2023 (and beyond)? Does your senior team understand the agency’s goals and their roles in growing the firm? Is there alignment within the staff from top to bottom on the future direction you’ve set for the agency?

Having a plan charts the path forward, provides common purpose and explains roles and expectations throughout the firm. It helps you and your team remain energized, optimistic and driven to overcome whatever the barriers may be on your way to success.

In today’s tumultuous world, agency owners are facing so many tough challenges including managing a remote workforce, recruiting and retaining top talent, relentless pressure on profit margins and it now being harder to win new business. And there's also the possibility of a recession.

Team alignment around a plan, maintaining unwavering energy and an everyday spirit of “Can do” are key components of a healthy culture that will attract and retain talent. Strategic Planning will help you to achieve each of these things.

 Here's what Strategic Planning will do for your firm:

1.  Provide a clear and focused approach for navigating through these difficult times.

2.  Identify a path for achieving your longer-term vision of the future.

3.  Also provide a path for capitalizing on a recession by growing greater market share in the short term.

4.  Establish objective metrics for judging your agency's level of success.

5.  Guide your talent and investment decisions.

6.  Improve your agency's performance both short-term and long-term.

7.  Serve as a significant competitive advantage for you since many agencies don't have a formal plan or team alignment.

8.  Provide exit paths that allow you to transition on your own terms and to achieve maximum market value. 

If you haven’t done so already, stop wishing and start planning for the rest of 2023 (and beyond).

Getting fully prepared.

As part of your planning, you need to be tough, self-critical and objective as you evaluate how currently prepared your agency and senior team are to meet the headwinds and opportunities ahead.

As you carefully examine your readiness for the rest of 2023, consider this reality check as you proceed through the year:

1.  What is the agency’s historical year-over-year net revenue growth rate?

2.  How much new business has your agency actually won during the past 2-3 years?

3.  Do you have enough senior client leaders and mid-level talent to grow? (And what triggers the hires to bolster these ranks?)

4.  What is your historical client attrition rate?

5.  Are you proactive with new business efforts or simply handling over-the-transom opportunities?

6.  Do you have a plan for driving organic growth with existing clients?

7.  Is your senior team adequately networking to build their referral sources?

8.  How resistant to recession are your clients and practice areas?

9.  How much in-hand revenue do you now have (and can rely on)?

Developing the strategic plan and driving growth for your agency.

Prosper Group has a proven planning methodology that can help you develop the plan that will get you to both your desired short-term destination and long-term goals. You need a plan that encompasses the years ahead... and not just the next few months (as crucial as they may be).

Our team of former agency owners, leaders and CEOs will conduct an in-depth assessment of your agency's nine Growth Drivers. These are the critical factors for attracting talent, generating growth, increasing profitability and building market value for years to come.

Based on the findings from your Growth Driver Audit, we will then work with you and your team to create the strategic plan itself.

To learn more about our Growth Driver Audit, click here.

To learn more about the value of Strategic Planning, click here.

We're here to help you prosper.  

Prosper Group exists to help the owners of independent marketing communications agencies achieve their ambitions and maximize the value of their life’s work.

Our team of former agency leaders and owners focus their deep experience on implementing proven proprietary methodologies across our three practices of agency performance, owner exit planning and M&A transactions in order to drive owner and agency success.

To learn more about us, please visit our Services pages to find all the way was can support you the owner and your agency.