Rapid business strategy

Define how your business will compete in a particular market with a product or service.

Sessions
5
Steps
22
Last edited
Aug 20, 2026
Created by
Nova

About this process

Define the activities, actions, and goals that outlines how your business will compete in a particular market with a product or service.

Sessions at a glance
#SessionSteps
01Understand your target market402SWOT503Executive summary804Goal & Action Plan205Strategy Wall3

The process in detail

5 sessions · 22 steps
01

Understand your target market

4 steps
  1. 1

    👩‍🎨👩‍🔬👨‍🌾 3 Top markets.

  2. 2

    🧑‍🎤 Early adopters/ Beachhead

  3. 3

    What characteristics make someone a potential "buyer"?

  4. 4

    🧐🤓 What additional information do you need to discover about each segment?

Read the full text
1. 👩‍🎨👩‍🔬👨‍🌾 3 Top markets.

👩‍🎨👩‍🔬👨‍🌾 Define your market.

Focusing on your top 3 or 4 markets (6 max), define their key characteristics.

•Geographic: Countries, nations, cities, etc.
•Demographic: Age, gender, sex, education, family, and income.
•Psychographic: Lifestyle, social class, and personality.
•Behavioral: User status, usage rate, benefits, occasions, and loyalty attitude.

🧛Define your anti-buyer.

An "antibuyer" is a user who appears to fit within a target segment based on key characteristics but has a critical reason or factor that prevents them from purchasing your product or service. Identifying antibuyers is essential for refining your market targeting and crafting a sales strategy focused on the right customers. By understanding what turns these potential customers away, you can avoid misallocating resources and ensure your efforts are directed toward clients who are a true fit for your offering.

Work on the whiteboardBusiness market segmentation
2. 🧑‍🎤 Early adopters/ Beachhead

Who would be the early adopter and why?

Early adopter: An early adopter is an individual or business that will use a new product or solution. This user usually is excited about the product or solution and helps companies grow by providing feedback.

Write a note
3. What characteristics make someone a potential "buyer"?

Open the board and think about your buyer and anti-buyer.

•What do they have in common?
•What do they do different?
•How do they think differently?
•How do they feel the pain?

How would you use this information to better target your buyer? How would you use this infomation to find them? What channels will you use?

💫What characteristics make someone a potential buyer? This will be your sales qualification framework that filters leads based on your ideal customer profile (ICP)

Write a note
4. 🧐🤓 What additional information do you need to discover about each segment?

What additional information do you need about each segment? What are you assuming, and what should be tested?

Answer the following questions. Ask yourself how you know the answer, and estimate how accurate your answer actually is.

•How often do they suffer? How long, What amount of time/money is wasted by the problem?
•How do they talk about the problem (pain)? When?
•Why can't they solve it themselves?
•How have they tried to solve the problem and failed?
•What if they could solve it? What would life be like? Show them the possibilities of a life without suffering. Show them the reverse of all the things we identified above.
•What is your solution? What is the physical nature of it? What is included?🧐🤓
Add tasks
Business market segmentation
  • SEGMENT
  • SEGMENT
  • 01
  • SEGMENT
  • 02
  • 03
  • SEGMENT NAME
  • SEGMENT NAME
  • SEGMENT NAME
  • NAME
  • NAME
  • NAME
  • GEOGRAPHIC Country/Countries DEMOGRAPHIC Gender, Status, Age, etc Education and income PSYCHOGRAPHIC Lifestyle & Social class
  • GEOGRAPHIC Country/Countries DEMOGRAPHIC Gender, Status, Age, etc Education and income PSYCHOGRAPHIC Lifestyle & Social class
  • GEOGRAPHIC Country/Countries DEMOGRAPHIC Gender, Status, Age, etc Education and income PSYCHOGRAPHIC Lifestyle & Social class
  • $$$$$ (size)
  • $$$$$ (size)
  • $$$$$ (size)
  • Size
  • Size
  • Size
  • Anti-buyer
  • Describe how this user is different
02

SWOT

5 steps
  1. 1

    Define your current situation

  2. 2

    What external factors are affecting your business or the current situation?

  3. 3

    Evaluate your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats

  4. 4

    Highlight key insights and findings from the board/discussion

  5. 5

    Discuss new strategies and business opportunities based on your findings (Optional)

Read the full text
1. Define your current situation

What is the purpose of this analysis? What are you trying to evaluate or find? What major challenges are you facing?

Write a note
2. What external factors are affecting your business or the current situation?
Write a note
3. Evaluate your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats

The SWOT tool is divided into internal and external factors.

•Strengths: Strengths are an internal factor of the product or services that provide an advantage over other products. They are normally considered as a competitive advantage. These kinds of features can be a product or business characteristic.
•Opportunities: Opportunities are external to the product or business and normally are related to partnerships and strategies. Some companies also add the strategies that are currently in consideration in this section.
•Weaknesses: Internal product or business factor that puts it at a disadvantage when the customer or stakeholders are competing for your product or business to other alternatives.
•Threats: External factors impacting or that can impact the product or business. This area is sometimes preventive and can focus on forecasting new technologies, policies, natural disasters, etc.
Work on the whiteboardSWOT
4. Highlight key insights and findings from the board/discussion
Write a note
5. Discuss new strategies and business opportunities based on your findings (Optional)

Evaluate the following strategies:

•Attack Strategies
•Avoid Strategies
•Reinforce Strategies
•New Market Opportunities
Work on the whiteboardSWOT
SWOT
  • Strengths are an internal factor of the product or services that provides an advantage over other products. They are normally considered as a competitive advantage. These kinds of features can be a product or business characteristic.
  • Internal product or business factor that puts it at a disadvantage when the customer or stakeholders are competing for your product or business to other alternatives.
  • 01
  • DEFINE YOUR SITUATION
  • This is a sticky note.
  • This is a sticky note.
  • 02
  • EXTERNAL FACTORS AFFECTING YOUR BUSINESS OR SOLUTION.
  • This is a sticky note.
  • External factors impacting or that can impact the product or business. This area is sometimes preventive and can focus on forecasting new technologies, policies, natural disasters, etc
  • Opportunities are external to the product or business and normally are related to partnerships and strategies. Some companies also add the strategies that are currently in consideration in this section.
03

Executive summary

8 steps

Only one person needs to go over this session and answer all the questions. The only time you know you have a strategy is when you say "NO" more than you say "YES". No to the increasing number of the wrong opportunities coming your way, no to the wrong customers to your business model. This workflow will help you articulate a clear and differentiated strategy, supported by a strong core culture that delivers on the brand's promises. During this session, you will create an executive summary. The summary should explain what you’re working on and what "needs" you’re solving The summary shouldn't include too many details. The goal of the executive summary is to sell your reader on your project/strategy: excite them, motivate them, and inspire them to keep reading.

  1. 1

    Vision.

  2. 2

    Need or problem

  3. 3

    Investment opportunity.

  4. 4

    Industry analysis.

  5. 5

    Competitive analysis.

  6. 6

    Operations plans.

  7. 7

    Unique selling proposition.

  8. 8

    Goals

Read the full text
1. Vision.

Define where the company is headed in the next three or five years. What is your measurable Brand Promises to your customers/users?

Write a note
2. Need or problem

What problem are you trying to solve? What will prompt a customer to buy/use your product or service?

Write a note
3. Investment opportunity.
Write a note
4. Industry analysis.

Provide information about the market and this specific industry.

Write a note
5. Competitive analysis.
Write a note
6. Operations plans.
Write a note
7. Unique selling proposition.

What do we accomplish? Consider target audience and the collective end goal.

Write a note
8. Goals
Write a note
04

Goal & Action Plan

2 steps
  1. 1

    Define your goal.

  2. 2

    Start defining your yearly action plan.

Read the full text
1. Define your goal.

Define your goal. What are your goals for the coming year?🔥 Include at least two KPIs. Identify the departments or team members who are responsible and should be held accountable for reaching this goal.

2. Start defining your yearly action plan.

Add your major steps, events, and milestones that must be taken to achieve your goal. How? Use sticky note or tasks If you are using sticky notes use a different color per department or team. (Define each team or Team member and their tasks and responsibilities by adding information inside the 👫Team/people section) Task or event duration can be shown by making sticky notes longer.

Plan
  • Double click here to enter the goal for this action plan...
  • Milestone or task
  • Milestone or task
  • Milestone or task
05

Strategy Wall

3 steps
  1. 1

    Set the Vision Anchor (BHAG)

  2. 2

    Understand the Time Horizons (Columns)

  3. 3

    Populate the Strategic Pillars (Rows)

Read the full text
1. Set the Vision Anchor (BHAG)

Mental Model: A 10–30 year Big Hairy Audacious Goal that feels intimidatingly ambitious yet simple to measure.

What to add: A single North Star metric or impact statement (e.g., "Power the operations of 100,000 scaling businesses worldwide").

2. Understand the Time Horizons (Columns)
•5–3 Years (Aspirations): Macro outcomes. Focus on strategic positioning rather than daily execution.
•1 Year (Activities): Annual milestones. Focus on major projects and thematic goals for the current year.
•Next 90 Days (Actions): Quarterly execution. Focus on immediate deliverables, owners, and tactical outputs.
3. Populate the Strategic Pillars (Rows)

Relationships & Partnerships

•5–3 Years: Ecosystem targets, key industry alliances, or elite advisory boards.
•1 Year: Specific channel partners, co-marketing programs, or top 10 enterprise account profiles.
•90 Days: Outreach lists, scheduled warm intros, or signed preliminary partnership terms.

Achievements (Impact Beyond Money)

•5–3 Years: Category leadership status, proprietary benchmarks set, or widespread community reach.
•1 Year: Key product release milestones, published industry reports, or team expansion marks.
•90 Days: Feature launches, keynote delivery, or closing 3 flagship case-study clients.

Rituals (Operational Routines)

•5–3 Years: Organizational operating cadences designed to scale across teams seamlessly.
•1 Year: Standardized team habits (e.g., Monthly Business Reviews, quarterly strategy retreats).
•90 Days: Immediate cadence fixes—implementing daily async updates, retro cadences, or weekly sprint reviews.

Assets & Investment (Resources)

•5–3 Years: Proprietary technology, capital reserves, IP portfolio, or brand equity.
•1 Year: Annual budget allocations, primary software stack investments, and headcount hiring plans.
•90 Days: Purchasing essential software licenses, onboarding key contractors, or approving immediate sprint budgets.
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Created byNova·Official process
Last edited Aug 20, 2026·5 sessions · 22 steps