If you want to grow your business successfully, then you need to get the basics right. In this article, we’ll delve into our top six tips on how to grow a company successfully.
1. Clear Vision and effective communication
The most important thing that determines business success is the business owner’s thinking. Allowing yourself time to think, dream and get a clear vision is essential to business growth. Without a clear vision and effectively communicating it, how will you and your employees know where they are going? If the business owner has a clear vision, and shares it with all stakeholders, it’s highly likely that the business will also go in the same direction.
2. Set your goals and develop growth strategies
Your goals for your business will provide an overall framework for everyone to follow. The strategies you’ll use to achieve those goals should serve as a roadmap. It will help you to build a structure and bring a focus to decision making.
Once you’ve translated your goals into strategies, you can develop systems and processes that will help with the smooth running of the business.
Many businesses fail in the execution of their strategy. Don’t be afraid. It’s better to execute a mediocre plan correctly than it is to execute a perfect plan poorly.
3. Employ or outsource top-performing talent
A successful business depends on its people. That is hard-working, determined people whose goals are aligned with the organisation’s goals.
The more your organisation is seen to trust employees with responsibility and to invest in their career development, the more likely it is to attract and retain top performers.
But rather than rush to hire people as you scale up, consider outsourcing tasks and using freelancers or temps. This could save you from hiring the wrong people and facing costly turnover.
Sir Richard Branson, Founder of the Virgin Group, says, “There is little point recruiting great people if you don’t then give them the autonomy to take their role and run with it. It also frees you up as the founder to focus less on the day-to-day activities and more on the over-arching objectives laid out in your roadmap.”
4. Attracting and retaining customers
To build your business, you also need to develop a system to attract and retain high-quality customers. For that to happen, you must understand your customers’ needs and pain points. What burning needs do they have? What keeps them from falling asleep at night?
Your customers must believe that your products or services will meet their needs or overcome their challenges.
Many business owners make the mistake of focusing their entire sales and marketing efforts and budget on attracting new customers. They often overlook the needs of their existing customers.
Ignoring your existing customers is a huge mistake. People don’t like to feel as if businesses take them for granted once they’ve placed an order. If they feel neglected, they’re likely to move to another company.
It doesn’t matter if you run a small business or a large corporation. Your company must deliver an exceptional customer service experience.
5. Know the Hazards
Rapid growth might be desirable, but your company must be able to cope with its effects. For instance, can your company meet a sudden influx of orders? What impact would that have on your cash flow? There are dangers of scaling up too fast. They include:
- Hiring the wrong people
- Losing track of your finances
- Management mistakes
- Not maintaining customer service
- Ineffective business operations
- Technology problems
- Cash flow mistakes
6. Stay Focussed
The easiest way to stay focused on what’s important during the scaling up stage is to have expert help from a part-time CFO who has big business experience.
For a fraction of the cost of a full-time CFO, the CFO Centre can provide you with a highly experienced CFO who will work with you on a part-time basis to help you with scaling up your business.
Get in contact with us today so we can book in a consultation meeting with one of our dedicated Regional Directors.
“Most people never pick up the phone and call; most people never ask. And that’s what separates, sometimes, the people that do things from the people that just dream about them.” – Steve Jobs, Apple’s Co-founder.
Photo by Basil James on Unsplash
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