Jeremy Harbour Tells Why You Need A Strategic Plan for Exponential Growth

To make your start-up a successful venture requires you to develop a set of strategies that you use as a roadmap to ensure your success. To increase your chances of success, it is important to implement a strategic plan for potential business growth.

Jeremy Harbour, an entrepreneur with 20 years of experience helps entrepreneurs with real tactics for buying, fixing, and selling businesses. He suggests young entrepreneurs to have a future-oriented vision for their business.

According to the 38-year old businessman, “The main reason to develop a strategic plan for business growth is that you have some vague notions about your business objectives and what YOU want to achieve for yourself from your business. So, a strategic plan will help you achieve those personal goals you want for the next 5 to 10 years.”

The goal of strategic planning is to develop an action plan with short, medium and long-term milestones that are measurable. It takes into account all business areas including product/service development, staffing & team management needs, sales & marketing, financial & accounting control/operations which are effective for any business to lead the path of growth.

Jeremy Harbour has just launched a new trade association, The Business Recovery Forum (BRF), a not-for-profit association which provides one-to-one guidance and insight to businesses which fail to reap the fruits of success or fail to realize their market potential.

Launch Successful Business with Growth Hacks from Jeremy Harbour

Jeremy Harbour, a serial entrepreneur and thought leader, started his first business at the age of 14. After starting multi-million dollar businesses and creating hundreds of jobs, he is sharing his business secrets and growth hacks with future entrepreneurs in his book “Go Do!” 

Here are the major tips and ideas for entrepreneurs who want to start their own business and launch successful companies:
Be clear why you want to start your business
Don’t start a business because you are bored of your 9-5 job routine. Start only when you’re truly prepared for the journey of entrepreneurship and want to make a difference.
Create a business plan
Make a detailed business plan covering USP, target audience, market competition, and financials. Keep it simple but don’t forget to chalk out what differentiates you from the others. 
Perfect your pricing
Most entrepreneurs jump into the market without conducting market deep dive and preparing pricing model. Keep the numbers in mind so that you’ll be clear what goal you have to achieve in terms of revenue.

While above are few business hacks from Jeremy Harbour, the book is full of growth anecdotes that draw from his personal experience as an entrepreneur. Here’s an excerpt from the same book: 

“In current state of economic turbulence, everyone wants to start a business but it isn’t as easy as it sounds. It’s a journey that requires a lot of hard work and dedication. Many people end up failing. But if your business succeeds, the rewards of entrepreneurship can be very delicious”

Starting Your Own Business Seems Daunting? Consider These Key Points

Do you think about breaking your 9 to 5 grind and start your own business but are too scared to give it a try? Caution is good, but fear is not!

Jeremy Harbour, a successful entrepreneur, who lectures all over the world on the subject of SME Mergers & Acquisitions will narrate how to overcome the fear of starting your own business. Here’s how:

• Expend your time and effort to do the thorough research about your prospective business. Go to the public library and ask for the related books and journals. 
• Visit every business remotely in your area. Spend some time talking to the suppliers. 
• Plan! Write up a business plan and consider all the elements of your new business and cover every aspect including market analysis, cash flow, management structure and different sections on marketing.

“By using the three keys of extensive research, preparation, and detailed planning, you will acquire the knowledge to make an informed decision about the feasibility and survival of any new business. This will not only overcome the very rational fear you feel but also give you the self-confidence to set you started the right way, ” Jeremy Harbour says.

How To Be A Risky Entrepreneur and Still Win The Race

“The larger the risk, the larger will be the profit, the smaller the risk, the smaller will be the profit” - this quote defines the entrepreneurial world. As an entrepreneur, taking risk is challenging as well as motivating. Generally, the goal of each entrepreneur is to mitigate risk to as near zero as possible. But, risks are what keep us on certain paths and help us avoid others, especially the less profitable ones.

Each entrepreneur has their own identifiers of risk and reward. Jeremy Harbour, Singapore-based successful entrepreneur, advises we take risks in business to touch the heights of success. He has also written a book named Go Do! especially for young entrepreneurs who are scared of taking risks. Go Do! is comprised of a very interesting chapter titled ‘Risk.’ As the name suggests, the chapter particularly contains the description about why people fail to live up their dreams of starting a business. Jeremy also discusses the issues of failure and why it is important to try something rather than regretting later in life not doing it. Failure with a learning experience is much better than not trying at all.

Jeremy Harbour - Ways To Grow Your Business Than Just Sales And Marketing

Jeremy Harbour Wants You To Be The Hero, Not A Victim

Every good story has a villain. In the Hollywood film Money Monster that villain is (SPOILER ALERT) the CEO of a large company. However, the movie’s protagonist is not the disgruntled underdog Kyle - who in the story, lost his life savings banking on a bad investment tip delivered on the titular fictional investment television programme of the film.

The character of Kyle, who presumably is meant to represent the working man, serves neither as a hero nor the villain, but seemingly as a channel for ranting, raving, expletives and threats of violence. While critics are not wowed by the depiction of Kyle, who neither felt like a threat nor evoked any real sympathy from the audience, I feel he is a fantastic representation - of all the vitriol leveled at the wealthy, or “upper classes”.

Why all the hate?

“Class Warfare” is a term thrown about these days and friction between social classes are not exactly a new thing.

For all its detractors and failings, capitalism offers opportunities for social mobility as never before seen in history. Entrepreneurship offers the chance for upward mobility even in China - which is still ruled by the communist party - and in India, in spite of its caste system.

Making someone the villain does not make you the hero

The saying “once bitten, twice shy” is not without merit. Human nature is such that we’re more prone to focus on the negative than we are to be swayed by the positive.

Between the shenanigans that led to the 2008 financial crisis, growing income inequality, the shrinking middle class, and the disruption digital technology having on many industries, people can feel that their financial futures are threatened and the best way to appease the “tiger” is to find a scapegoat.

It’s easy to make someone else the “bad guy”. Blaming our misfortunes on others can temporarily make ourselves feel better. However, it does nothing to actually improve our lot in life.

Be the hero

Aside from the few who have the good fortune of being born into a wealthy family, the rest of us have to work for our money. And aside from the few who win the lottery, none of us get rich accidentally.

If you’ve got the entrepreneurial bug, or a great business idea, but don’t have the money to get a start-up going, you don’t need to give up. You just need to know how to write a business plan. Once more, the resources and knowledge are all just a mouse click away.

It’s natural for people to envy those who “have it better” and it’s all too easy for people to fall into the trap of envy. Like Kyle making the cardinal error of putting all his financial eggs in one basket, one can play the victim and blame others for their own poor decisions. Or, one can start taking charge and working for that difference.

At the Harbour Club, I, Jeremy Harbour, coach people on how to attain and sustain this. I started my first business at the age of 15, and there’s no reason why you can’t start building a $10 million dollar business in 10 weeks, today.

Jeremy Harbour Explains The Power In Numbers

Entrepreneur coach Jeremy Harbour often asks his audience: “Have you ever tried breaking a pair of chopsticks? Easy, isn’t it? They are so fragile that we often break them accidentally.”

“But how about a whole bunch of chopsticks? It’s suddenly much more challenging. The individual chopsticks may be vulnerable, but together they are stronger, and with the right numbers, they are virtually unbreakable.”

The same is true with businesses. Small businesses are inherently vulnerable, but through collaboration and partnership with others, they can gain the strength of a larger business.

The SME Struggle

Even at the best of times, small businesses are vulnerable, and it is an accepted fact of entrepreneurship that many businesses will fail within their first ten years.

Debt & Capital Vulnerabilities

With many small businesses barely breaking even, any fluctuation in cash flow can have a disastrous effect.

Global Economic Changes

Small businesses can be very vulnerable to global changes. These global economic changes can negatively affect small businesses in every country, but those in smaller economies are most at risk.

Expansion

Although expansion is a positive sign, it is also a time when businesses are highly vulnerable. Quick expansion can result in rash decision making, leading to hires and purchases that the business may come to regret later.

Safety in Numbers

Just like chopsticks, businesses can find safety in numbers. By combining small businesses into a larger group, each one lends their strength to the others. This decreases their vulnerability to bad debt and global fluctuations and can help them expand quicker and with lower risk, taking advantage of their combined strength.

This strategy is called agglomeration and was invented by serial entrepreneur Jeremy Harbour, who also teaches courses on buying and selling business at The Harbour Club.