Once your business is established and is generating cashflow, it’s important to have a plan in place to create and manage growth. Ideally, you will have structured your business and crafted your business processes to make them easily scalable, but if not you will need to explore the most efficient and safe ways to effectively expand your operations. Growth necessarily has two elements; growth in business done and scaling the infrastructure to service that business. In a service business, this will likely mean attracting more clients and adding
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Develop and maintain effective partnerships that wll help you grow and thrive.
Fundamentally change how you operate and deliver value to customers with digital technology
When merging with another company, acquiring a new one or undertaking an internal restructure
Assess market trends and give your business a competitive edge to succeed.
Identify, assess and manage a wide range of risks and threats that could harm your business.
Devise a strategy that will maximise your sales and generate a higher ROI.
From brand strategy to customer and go-to-market strategy
Identify weak areas in your business and develop a strategy for improvement
Develop an actionable plan to achieve your long-term business goals
Create innovative business ideas that can be monetised and keep your business current.
Successfully retain customers with customer and brand loyalty initiatives.
Get expert advice to hit the ground running in your new business venture.
Create and develop new products and services or refine existing offerings.
Refine your ideas and develop a robust and viable business plans
Identify your strengths, weaknesses and find solutions for complex business challenges
Find the best capital funding opportunities that will give your business the resources it needs.
Map out your long-term growth plan and develop strategies to achieve your goals
Tim Stokes, Managing Director at Profit Transformations
First, clarify your vision of what you're aiming to achieve. Is it 50% growth per year or 500%? Does your business need higher profit margins to solve cash flow challenges or higher revenue?
With a clear vision I then recommend engaging the employees to form a team with weekly meetings to update them on progress towards achieving your vision and goals.
Next, find out your current position and starting point by measuring the 3 areas of a business...
In what industry sectors do you see the greatest growth for the small and medium size businesses?
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Phil Joel, Chief Revenue Officer at Alex Solutions
Great question Todd. Love to hear from members of the SavvySME community on how they are seeing their business growing in 2013 and what challenges and opportunities they are faced with.
Let's be clear - It's been a while since I've ranted and this is going to be a good one, but bear with me, I promise there is a point to it all. SO: PR isn't dead, and content marketing isn't new....
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In an online world, what strategies would one employ to keep users engaged and coming back to your site?
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Roland Hanekroot, Founder at New Perspectives Business Coaching
The biggest mistake I made and many others have made as well, is growing too quick.
My favorite, oldest and most successful client, has grown his business continually for 12 years now and he's turning over something like $ 30 million now, but he grows slowly and steadily... he has 8 stores now, and in a few years he will have 12 or so, but he never opens a new store until the last one makes profit and unless the criteria he uses to assess a new opportunity are all perfectly alligned. He's walked away from many opportunities, simply because he wasn't confident enough they would work... many people have told him he should grow faster... but he won't and he makes more money than he knows what to do with and his staff love him and his customers love him and he loves his life....
Biggest mistake I made is to grow before I was ready
No Rush
Amanda Hoffmann - Certified Bookkeeper, BAS Agent, Owner / Manager ★ Certified Bookkeeper ★ BAS Agent at My Office Books - Virtual Bookkeeper & BAS Agent
When you are content with the amount of time vs financial gain that you return.
In my case, it's using the profit to buy assets that give me a passive income.
This in turn gives you choice.
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Looking back in hindsight, What was the one thing that helped you go from great to incredible? What do you feel was the one thing that made you reach that turning point?
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Richard Schembri, Entrepreneur - Team Coach and Mentor in Network Marketing at Team Berrygood
For me it would be plain and simple - Listen to your customers!
Once I started to not just hear my customers, but sit down and listen, help them and find a solution, my business catapulted. I find joy in helping people, this is the greatest reward, however in doing this, my business grows as well.
Leo Eliades , at Inspire Now Pty Ltd
Hi Richard thank you for sharing your experience with me. You are definitely right there is such a distinct difference in hearing and listening for both sides, thank you again Leo
Fear of failure is one of the most fundamental fears we face in life. Or is it? As Seth Godin wrote in his book Tribes, often fear of failure isn’t actually a fear at all, rather a fear of...
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Once your business is established and is generating cashflow, it’s important to have a plan in place to create and manage growth. Ideally, you will have structured your business and crafted your business processes to make them easily scalable, but if not you will need to explore the most efficient and safe ways to effectively expand your operations. Growth necessarily has two elements; growth in business done and scaling the infrastructure to service that business. In a service business, this will likely mean attracting more clients and adding the necessary staff to deliver your services and manage business operations. In a product business, it will mean making more sales and handling the increased complexity and cost of the logistics to source and distribute them.
Scaling a business without increasing demand is useless and dangerous. It increases the operational costs and overheads, without simultaneously growing the revenue stream. Therefore the first step in expanding a business is to stimulate growth by acquiring new customers and increasing income. These practices fall into two main areas - sales & marketing and business development.
On the sales & marketing side, businesses are looking to attract new customers and clients. This can be done in many different ways, and businesses should be utilising market research to build a marketing strategy that works for them and their key demographics. Further to this, the sales funnel and sales processes should be constantly reviewed and refined to ensure that the highest possible percentage of leads (generated by marketing) are converted to sales. Companies will likely utilise a mix of advertising (both traditional and digital), public relations and direct marketing techniques to generate new leads, so investing greater resources in these avenues will lead to growth - as long as the marketing strategy is effective and the sales funnel has been well constructed.
On the business development side, businesses are looking to eliminate waste and lower their expenses (thereby raising their profits), and adding new income streams. New income streams may come from the development of new products and services, the undertaking of new partnerships or the acquisition of new productive assets.
As far as problems go, a growing business is one of the best ones to have. A growing business is one which is experiencing demand which goes beyond its current capacity to deliver, and which increases its capacity to meet the new demand. It should be noted that this is not the only way to handle excess demand. Some businesses, especially consultancies and other business services, choose instead to raise their fees and become more selective about projects, allowing them to increase their earning and reputation without exposing themselves to higher overheads. Similarly, a company offering a new product who cannot meet excess demand may raise the product price, introduce a waiting list or offer limited special runs, depending on the type of product.
In most cases however, the best way for a business to generate higher profits is for that business to scale with demand. The specific way this is done will differ depending on what it is the business delivers, but it may include investing in increased production facilities or equipment, hiring new staff, developing better customer service tools, upgrading business systems, streamlining existing business processes and simply working longer hours. When the growth is likely to be sustained growth, it is wise for the business to have a scaling plan which allows production capacity to be increased sequentially using a well-defined process, to avoid business disruption and to minimise risk.
You should hire a business consultant if you have a longstanding problem without a viable solution. This can be in any business area from finance to sales and marketing. Business consultants are usually hired on a project basis until the issue is fixed or improvements are made.
When you take the time to find the right consultant who aligns with your business and work ethic, the value you can gain is immense. But you need to play your part, too. A business consultant can help you by showing you different paths, but it’s up to you to walk down it.