Create a Winning Growth Strategy to Elevate Your Company's Business

Joe Weinlick
Posted by in Career Advice


Building a successful business creates new opportunities to expand and solidify your place in the market, but fear of overreaching may stop you from experimenting with growth strategies. Start with low-risk expansion goals to increase your assets without undoing your current progress. When you're ready to make a bigger leap, use your existing supply chain, services and customer base to identify areas where you can grow by refining your operations, marketing and product development.

Use Low-Risk Intensive Strategies

A winning growth strategy depends on how well you understand your industry, value proposition and clientele. For example, your business can't grow if you exhaust resources on product development or marketing that doesn't align with customer interests. Start small by pinpointing your company's strengths and ideal audience. Gather feedback from clients to find out which strategies attract or repel business. Study the growth patterns of successful competitors, and think about how their choices created profitable revenue streams.

In his book "The Breakthrough Company," business consultant Keith McFarland explains that fast-growing companies increase revenue early on by driving existing customers to buy more product. One common strategy is to sell products in bigger packages, whether it's physical items in bulk or bundled services. Another technique is to show customers how they can use your products in new ways.

Expand Your Reach

Once you have a strong sales foundation, promote your product in adjacent markets, says McFarland. For instance, open more locations in different cities, compete for government contracts or franchise your business. Use the power of your reputation and branding as a vehicle for growth. Form partnerships with complementary businesses by licensing your branded product or service, which lets you tap into a wider customer base, the U.S. Small Business Administration notes.

Look for ways to cut costs for consumers and streamline your production process by acquiring suppliers. Ask yourself how you can deliver services through new channels, such as building an online presence. If your product or business is primarily online, find out how consumers prefer to communicate and receive services, such as through social media and mobile devices.

Develop New Products, Set Trends

Stay in touch with consumer demands, so you can anticipate what clients want next. Developing different products helps you attract new customers while reinforcing loyalty from existing clients. Consider how Google developed from an Internet search provider to a multinational media and communications company to an electronics manufacturer, or study's Apple's successful expansion from computers to media players, tablets, phones and watches.

A smart strategy is to repackage your product as a service, and vice versa. A career coach can develop self-guided training modules, which clients can access online at any time. A shipping supplier can provide an online interface for customers to conveniently manage inventory, reorder and choose cost-saving packaging.

At every step of your growth plan, maintain detailed sales metrics to measure the effectiveness of each strategy. Ups and downs are a natural part of growth, so use failed experiments to learn how your company can improve and move to the next level.

Photo Courtesy of pakorn at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Comment

Become a member to take advantage of more features, like commenting and voting.

  • Shannon Philpott
    Shannon Philpott

    A growth strategy is extremely important, but it is only effective if managers/administrators are willing to seek out and assess feedback from clients and employees. Even the most solid strategy is bound to fail if it is misguided and striving toward an unrealistic goal.

  • Jay Bowyer
    Jay Bowyer

    While using low-risk strategy is great most of the time, I don't think it's wise to discount higher-risk moves occasionally — particularly if they have to do with new technology. If you know your industry well enough, you're likely to be able to predict the "next big thing" much more effectively than someone without your experience. If your company invests in an up-and-coming tech product or invention at the right time, you stay to increase the value of your business substantially.

  • Nancy Anderson
    Nancy Anderson

    @Abbey absolutely you would want to expand your customer base. Existing customers are great - especially if they continue to return to buy a product. But, in order to grow, a company always needs to reach more potential customers. The risk is that you spend the money trying to bring more customers in - through social media, advertising, etc. - and not bring in enough new customers to justify the cost. But the bottom line is that you have to spend money to make money and you are not going to grow if you don't take chances.

  • Abbey Boyd
    Abbey Boyd

    The article talks of driving existing customers to buy more and showing them new ways of using your products. It also says to anticipate what your client wants next. What about expanding your client/customer base? Once established, is it a good idea to seek out more/different customers? What are the risks of doing this, if any?

Jobs to Watch