8 ways to develop your business strategy

Customers will respond better to companies that show them why they are better suited to serve them as opposed to companies that just tell them what services they can offer. When you establish your “why,” you can move to how you’re going to do it, and what is it that you want to do.

Steve Coughran, founder and director of Coltivar Group in Colorado, shared this tip along with many others during his webinar, “Fueling Strategic Powered Growth” for the Texas Nursery & Landscape Association.

“(Strategy) is like your game plan to fight off competitive forces that are trying to take away your resources, like employees,” says Coughran, who owned his own landscaping company for more than a decade and served on the board of directors for the Associated Landscape Contractors of Colorado. “It allows your company to get the biggest feasible piece of pie and win in the market place.”

Understand your clients.

Knowing your customers’ needs and the reasoning behind them will help you better allocate your time and sell your services in a more tailored way. While they may tell you they want a landscape for their yard, it’s your job to understand why. One customer may be trying to meet an HOA deadline, while another is in no rush to see a finished product.

Visit bit.ly/8wayslawn to find Coughran’s other tips to help grow your business.

We’ve updated our Turnaround Tour page to include the latest on the landscape companies. Ed Laflamme and Bill Arman from the Harvest Group have been working hard with the owners to turn their businesses around and turn some profits. Recently, the Wades have been focused on getting back to basics when it comes to numbers, while the team at Vineland is debating whether to keep or drop their design/build business. And Heather and Jeremy Dirksen are headed in the right direction with cutbacks on overhead and unprofitable customers.

Get a full recap at bit.ly/turnaroundtour. You can hear from the Harvesters and the owners at LANDSCAPES 2017. Editor Brian Horn will moderate a panel with the Arman and Laflamme and the three winners on Thursday, Oct. 19 from 3-4:15 p.m. You can visit bit.ly/lscape2017 to register for the event.

Want to know what was going on in the industry 10 years ago? Or maybe you missed a recent issue and want to catch up. Better yet, maybe you were featured in an issue of Lawn & Landscape and wanted to read the article.

You can do all of the above in the L&L digital archives. We have issues that go back decades, and maybe even before some of you were born. Visit bit.ly/backissuesll to see all of the past Lawn & Landscapes.

Over on Instagram, we like to highlight the events we go attend and we visit when we travel. Recently, we were lucky enough to show off our very own Top 100 event held in Cleveland.

This photo shows the executives and employees who were honored during the event.