Writing a business plan can be daunting, but it doesn’t have to be! This series of articles aims to demystify business plans & give you actionable steps to create your own.
So far, we have covered Step 1: Determining your audience; Step 2: Defining your mission, vision, & core values; and Step 3: Writing your company description. Step 4 is creating a market analysis.
A market analysis focuses on your target market – the patients that will choose your dental practice over your competition. A market analysis examines the relevant business environment & where you fit in. A market analysis should address the following questions:
Who are your potential patients?
Look at demographics such as age, gender, location, occupation, education, income, & needs.
What are your patients’ critical needs?
Are those needs being met? How do they make buying decisions?
How large is your target market?
For example, if your target market is females between 18-54, how many of them are in your area?
Who are your main competitors?
How will your patients differentiate your practice from the competition?
What are your competitors’ strengths & weaknesses?
Do a SWOT analysis of each competitor. What do your competitors do that you can do better? What would make someone choose your practice over your competitor’s? What resources do your competitors have that you do not? Unsure how to do a SWOT analysis? Fear not; we will cover this in the following article in this series.
References
https://hbr.org/product/creating-business-plans-hbr-20-minute-manager-series/16998?sku=16998-PBK-ENG
Back to issue
