Some strategies to help your business grow
Once you’ve made the decision to grow your business, it’s still a matter of deciding how you’re going to go about it. There are several growth strategies: looking to new markets, creating new products, making an acquisition, etc. Many companies design their own mix of strategies. It is essential to choose the approach that best fits your overall strategic plan. Companies are sometimes drawn to non-strategic growth opportunities to the detriment of their overall objectives.
Take into account market conditions
Act according to market conditions. For example, an acquisition can be a good strategy if the company you are targeting is undervalued in difficult economic times. On the other hand, in some circumstances, it may be more beneficial to expand your current business rather than paying a substantial premium for an expensive acquisition. It is also very important to discuss your strategy with your team and to consider the reactions and opinions of your employees to gain buy-in. Also, be sure to analyze the financial implications of your chosen strategy.
Here is an overview of growth strategies;
Market Share – Your business can carve out a larger market share with its current products. For example, you can achieve this by increasing your marketing efforts, or by adjusting your prices.
New Markets – Another strategy is to find new markets for your current products. This could mean developing your sales in another city, province, or country.
Diversification – You can also create new products for your current market, or for new customers. Going down this path may lead you to operate a line of business that is related to yours, or completely different.
Acquisition – Buying another business can be a profitable way to increase your market share, gain access to new markets, or diversify your business. This strategy gives you established traffic and activities that you can modify to create value. An acquisition can be a good strategy for expanding into a new region or another country where you don’t have a network of local knowledge.
Buying a Franchise – Buying a franchise usually offers several benefits: brand awareness, strong marketing skills, and support from the franchise owner. However, be sure to check all of your costs, including start-up costs, royalties, advertising, and materials.
Franchising Your Business – Your own business franchise can be a good growth strategy, particularly if you have set up profitable activities that can be easily reproduced by your employees.
Strategic Partnerships – Seeking strategic partnerships with other companies is a popular strategy. They can take the form of simple informal agreements between companies established in complementary markets to refer clients to each other. Some partnerships are more complex, such as joint ventures (in which two or more companies pool their resources to complete a project). For example, you can examine each of your current products or services to determine their profit margin and relevance to your business strategy. You can then eliminate those that are underperforming or not strategic. You can also review your business processes to make them more efficient.
Growing your business: 4 winning strategies
A selling HVAC maintenance contracts site study presents four strategies for overcoming the challenges faced by entrepreneurs who want to grow their businesses. Front office solutions tell over 1,000 heads of small and medium-sized businesses across USA to give us their views on growth; the results are very revealing. When asked how important growth is to a business, respondents gave an average score of 7.1 out of 10, and 38% gave a score of 10 out of 10.
The challenges of growth
While growth brings many benefits, business leaders have also addressed some of the challenges it poses (e.g., financial pressures, the burden on human resources, difficulty winning in the face of fierce competition, and insufficient knowledge. new technologies, market trends, and competitors). BDC asked SME leaders to identify strategies to overcome these challenges. She also invited her business advisers to give advice on how to implement each of these strategies.
- Be a customer-centric business
An overwhelming majority of respondents, 99%, indicated that knowing and responding to customer needs is a decisive factor in growing their business. To help you, BDC advisors have offered some advice. First, you need to know your customers better. Where are they? Who are they? What are their values, interests, and way of life?
To learn more about them, research using secondary sources (reports, surveys, etc.) or do your own analysis using interviews, focus groups, and surveys. It is generally said that 80% of sales are generated by 20% of customers. So try to understand your best customers and cultivate their loyalty. Invest in a customer relationship management system to give your team centralized access to relevant information about your current and potential customers.
- Build a winning team
Our study indicates that leaders of growing companies are taking a keen interest in human resource management. For 85% of them, this translates into better employee training, while 72% consider the hiring of more competent staff a priority.
Here is what our business advisors suggest to apply this strategy in your business:
Establish a human resources management plan that anticipates your staffing needs, addresses relevant issues, and defines how to retain and motivate employees. Develop clear job descriptions, performance targets, and assessments for your employees to be productive and strive to always give the best of them.
- Stay at the forefront, innovate
According to our study, eight in ten respondents consider innovation essential to the growth of their business. Just like understanding and meeting customer needs, innovation is one of the growth strategies used by respondents, regardless of the growth rate, size, or location of the business.
Suggestions from our advisors to stimulate your company’s capacity for innovation:
Gather ideas and feedback from suppliers, customers, and other stakeholders. Also, exploit the creativity of your employees; they know your business and industry and are often your best source of ideas. Develop with your team and maintain an innovation strategy to improve your products and services, your processes, your marketing, your business model, and your supply chain. It is also made up of gradual improvements in products, processes, and solutions.
- Invest to be the best
No wonder three in four entrepreneurs say they have invested in expanding facilities or acquiring equipment and technology to increase production capacity.
Reads the recommendations of our advisors to help optimize your investments:
- Explore what the market has to offer before making any major investments.
- Favor turnkey technological solutions rather than the development of custom applications. These are often more expensive in the long run and create dependency on the supplier.
- Minimize the impact on your cash flow by financing your growth with business loans instead of cash. Opt for loans with repayment terms that match the expected life of the assets.
- To learn more about growth and how to make it happen in your business, Click on the highlighted link and study, SMEs and Growth: Challenges and Winning Strategies.
