5 Tried-and-True Business Growth Strategies
Having a growth strategy in place is essential to ensure your business hits its milestones. What are the best ways for a young company to implement a strategy and manage growth? Here are five tips from business veterans:
1. Hire the right team
Nothing is more important for business growth than hiring the right people, says Paul May, founder and CEO of BuzzStream, a link building website. May says employers should have a “very rigorous hiring process” to find the right people for the company and the job. Afterwards, the company should provide adequate technical and intellectual support to these people to retain them and allow them to be successful.
There is no magic formula for hiring the right people, but extensive interviewing, checking references, and looking at prior work experience greatly helps. Your company could also implement an internship program to recruit the best talent fresh after graduation.
2. Any plan is better than no plan
Having a bad plan is better than having no plan. This is a piece of advice widely attributed to Peter Thiel, the legendary co-founder of PayPal and one of the first investors of Facebook. What entrepreneurs can take from this piece of advice is that it’s important to plan for growth. If you are too worried that your plan is bad and implement no plan at all, the growth you hope for will most likely not happen. Don’t expect to “wing it” when it comes to the future of your company. Keep in mind that your competition will have a growth strategy even if you don’t.
3. Narrow your focus
This ingenious piece of advice comes from John Turner, the former CEO of Usersthink.com. He says it’s important to note the difference between scaling up and doing many things--the two don't necessarily mean the same thing. It is possible to hurt growth by focusing on too many products, which end up being subpar because the resources are shared unequally. Turner’s advice is to focus on a few things that your company is really good at; master these core products, and then experiment with other things. That’s really scaling up.
4. Know your market
Seth Shaw, board member and advisor to Postal.io, cannot emphasize enough the importance of having a data analytics team. If you don’t know your market, you simply don't know how to grow. He says a data-driven business plan is bound to be stronger and more successful in the long run than one that is driven by whims.
In the age of Big Data, if your company does not religiously collect market data such as consumer buying habits, you’ll miss out on the opportunity to get to know your customers intimately. If you don’t know your customers, your marketing plans and new projects are bound to fail.
5. Self-fund as long as possible
The last piece of advice comes from Martin Senn, founder of Davinci Virtual Office Solutions, who encourages business owners to self-fund for as long as possible. Outside investors and venture capitalists can meddle in your business plan and you can lose focus, which is the worst thing that can happen to a company looking forward to growth.
