You’ve established your business and now you are looking to take the next step. Perhaps opportunities are presenting themselves but you are too small an operation to take advantage. Or maybe you know the potential of the market is much greater than your current set up allows you to be a part of. Whatever your reasons for wanting to grow your business the process requires the same key considerations.
How will growth impact your business?
This comes down to the type of business you have and your point of difference in the market. For instance, if customer service is your point of difference, expanding capacity and the size of the market can’t be done at the cost of the customer experience. You would need to bring your existing customers with you. You would need to be proactive and not reactive and equip the new business with the capacity to service and support a growing market.
What will growth look like for you?
Will you need more employees to process more orders? Will you need differently skilled employees to cope with the changing shape of your business model? Are you looking to expand your market overseas? Will the structure of your business need to change? Will you need to change your manufacturing process or service delivery? What impact will change have on quality or product/service delivery and how might you preempt and mitigate potential problems to avoid negatively impacting your business?
Preparing for growth
The resources you draw on and preparation you put in to the planning for the early stages of growth will determine whether you are successful or not. Taking advantage of the labour of freelance workers is an option to facilitate the early stages of growth but would be a high risk strategy for sustaining growth long term. How you fund growth should all be part of the plan and options may exist at both government and private level.
Government funding might be a place to start. Private sources of funding include venture capitalists, angel investors and crowdfunding. Secured loans are also an option if you have assets to offer. Unsecured loans will depend heavily on your business credentials, plans for the future and order book.
How will you sustain growth?
Sustained growth is what you should be aiming for. If you get the business model right it will likely come down to how well you can finance your increased overheads. Managing the budget is crucial to the success of a growing company. And this isn’t just down to maintaining the sales pipeline but how you manage productivity and efficiency within your business.
Ultimately your brand should grow to reflect your changing business model. Managing your brand as a means of communicating change can facilitate the process, but if change affects your existing customer base negatively the impact on your brand may stifle your growth in the early stages.
The bigger picture?
No successful growth strategy is achieved without a detailed plan. This is your business plan which should include your plan for growth over the long term. The business plan is a living document and will need to be revised at every stage of your growth.
Within your business plan you need to:
- Define your goals and objectives for growth.
- Stay focused on your core strengths and your point of difference in the market.
- Have a strategy to maintain and grow your brand along with your business.
- Maintain a strong financial foundation. Keeping an eye on the numbers is critical.
- Build a strong team. Make sure you have the range of skills necessary to achieve your ambitions and get ready to scale up responsibly.
And finally…
Growing your company can be exciting. It’s the next stage for many ambitious business people and can lead to incredible rewards. However, achieving growth calls for responsible and realistic decision making. Risk, as in all areas of business, should be measured and well planned and growth will not suit all business. If you take a responsible approach, keep an eye on your key metrics and put financial management at the core of your decision making, the odds for success will be in your favour.