Planning for different scenarios

We truly are living in unprecedented times. We’ve all been affected differently by current world events, but one thing is for sure that we’ve certainly all been affected in one way or another.

Whether you believe that lockdown measures are absolutely necessary or that it’s the biggest overreaction to a problem in the history of mankind… this is the situation that we’re in, so we may as well make the best of it.

Whatever your personal situation is, the next four weeks offer the perfect opportunity (if you want to take it) to plan and execute on your next move.

The last thing you want to do is be caught unprepared for a secondary event which takes you unaware and left scrambling and pivoting on the fly again.

You can do this by looking at three scenarios:

  • Expected scenario
  • Worst-case scenario
  • Best-case scenario

These scenarios are subjective and also personal to you and your situation.

Take three blank pieces of paper, or start three pages in a Word doc, or use a spreadsheet (your preference) and write down the three headings and what those scenarios might involve

Then underneath each, write what your reaction will be to each scenario to make the best of what’s happening outside of your control.

This can seem scary, especially when looking at worst-case scenarios and what they might involve.

However… there are two very important reasons for doing this now:

  1. The fear of the unknown is exponentially worse than the fear of the known. By writing down all differing scenarios you now have an idea of what to expect, even in the worst-case… and you have a plan for how to react if that happens.
  2. With your plan written down (even if it’s just a few bullet points), there may be important parts of it which you can take action on now to be prepared for if and when each does happen.

This preparation may involve communicating with your team, writing some new content or working on your CV and lining up some online interviews… whatever it is, there is surely something you can do now to plan for later.

For me, it’s going to mean lots of communication with clients and potential clients about different scenarios and our approach to each in terms of attacking their Google rankings.

With my own website, it’s going to mean continuing to grow and work on my rankings for when things eventually return to normal (whatever that will be), so I’m coming out in a better position than I went in.

What does it mean for you?

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An SEO Consultant based in Tauranga, New Zealand. I'm obsessed with SEO at the moment, but I also love talking about and interpreting marketing in general, productivity and entrepreneurship.

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