How to Create a One Page Strategic Plan
Summary: Many of us in the corporate world are guilty of believing that strategic plans have to consist of 50 slide PowerPoint decks or 30 page documents covering every possible element of our strategy. In reality, the strategic planning process should not take that long and the best strategic plans should be able to fit on a single sheet of paper. This is especially true for entrepreneurs and small businesses, who should create plans that are agile and drive towards the main goals of the organization, without the fluff of long, drawn out strategic planning documents. I have also found this one page strategic plan to be effective for individual departments.
In this article, I am going to walkthrough how to create a one page strategic plan that is metric-driven and will keep you on track towards your goals.
What is a One Page Strategic Plan?
A one page strategic plan is exactly as it sounds - it is a plan that is concise and simple enough to fit on one page of paper, forcing the author of the plan to remain to the point and not waste time or energy on fluff.
I have developed what I call the “1-2-3 Strategic Planning Method”, which fits perfectly onto one page, yet provides the perfect amount of tactical direction to work towards the strategic plan.
Elements of the “1-2-3 Strategic Plan”
Creating the “1-2-3 Strategic Plan” is easy. It is a three-step process that can be done in as little as an hour. This planning method does not necessarily be for planning huge yearly strategic plans, but also shorter-term initiatives. In fact, it works great for quarterly goal planning.
As I guide you through creating this one page strategic plan using the “1-2-3” method, I will provide an example to help better understand how it is built. Here is a simple visual diagram of the one page strategic plan using my 1-2-3 framework.
Step 1: Create a Single Measurable Strategic Goal You Want to Achieve
To start, you need to determine what your main goal is. I do believe in using the SMART method, so use that model for structuring the goal. Out of all the elements of SMART, I really like to focus on the measurable part, because I have found that the hard number metrics give me good boundaries and having them definitely increases my success rate.
Let’s walk through a very simple example. Let’s say that your goal as a small business is to increase brand awareness. You have noticed that traffic to your website has been fairly flat for the past few couple of years, and the best way to get customers into the top of your funnel is by educating them through content on your website. So you decide to create the goal:
Increase website traffic by 20% over the next 12 months
Now you have your goal for the year. Time to start breaking that down into smaller pieces.
Step 2: Create Two Initiatives That Roll Up to the Single Goal
The next step is two create two separate initiatives that will directly impact achieving the goal outlined in the first step. Again, focus on these being specific and metric-driven.
In our example, your two initiatives that might help you increase traffic to your website might be:
Increase blog content on your site by 150 new, high quality, optimized posts.
Develop an email marketing strategy that delivers 24 email newsletters to your subscribers and customers/clients.
You now have two solid initiatives that can each help drive more traffic to your website. Now you have to decide on the tactics that will get those initiatives completed.
Step 3: Create Three Tactics Under Each Initiative
The final step of this one page strategic plan is to develop the tactics under both initiatives that will be built into your weekly activities. These tactics should directly drive the initiatives they fall under, therefore working towards completion of the overall goal.
For our example, let’s break down possible tactics for the two initiatives.
Increase blog content on your site to three new, high quality, optimized posts per week
Conduct a keyword research session once a week to feed a backlog of blog post ideas
Publish three new blog posts per week (this will get you to the 150 for the year)
Contract with a writing service to produce one of the three blog posts per week
Develop an email marketing strategy that delivers 24 email newsletters to your subscribers and customers/clients
Develop one email drip campaign with various calls to action to drive clicks to your website
Develop three new email opt-in modules on high traffic pages on your website
Send one email to all subscribers and customers/clients every two weeks (this will get you to the 24 for the year)
A Completed One Page Strategic Plan… Now What?
Now that you have a completed one page strategic plan using the “1-2-3” method, what is the next step?
Now, depending on what management methodology you follow, the tactics above are broken down and assigned to team members in the departments responsible for execution. The above example is very marketing-focused, so perhaps you task them with this strategic plan. If your marketing department uses a framework like Kanban or Scrum, these tactics would be broken down into cards, scheduled to be worked on throughout the year.
Stacking One Page Strategic Plans
You can create more than one “1-2-3” one page strategic plan. Maybe you have one overall plan for the company as a whole, then maybe one or two for each department. Of course you want all these plans to cascade down from the main plan, to ensure you are working on projects that are aligned with the overall business goals.
In the past, I have even assigned these one page plans to individual team members on a yearly, quarterly, or monthly basis.
My Appearance on “Marketing A Tiny Bit Smarter” Show Talking About The 1-2-3 Planning Method
Last year I was a guest on Sarah Noel Block’s “Marketing A Tiny Bit Smarter” show where I talked about a variety of topics such as Agile Marketing, how to use Scrum in marketing, and my “1-2-3 Planning Method”. Check out the video below. The whole video is worth watching, but if you just want the part about the “1-2-3” method, jump to the 6:40 mark.