A company’s survival comes through its growth.
“If you don’t grow, you die.”
American investor Mary Meeker explained. But how to grow a business? In the guide you are reading you will find the answer to this question, as well as some secrets for how to best plan and implement sustainable growth of your business.
How to grow your business from the ground up
It is worth clarifying at the outset what is meant by business growth. You need to know that there is no one-size-fits-all solution to the question: in fact, corporate growth can result in the increase, over a given period of time, of an organization’s size, capacity, profit, or market share.
The ways to achieve this valuable goal, then, are many. Whatever the goals, however, there is one indispensable tool that must be used if the business is to actually succeed in growing: the business growth plan.
How to develop an effective business growth plan
The day-to-day management of a startup (or, more generally, a company) is often complicated: there are many aspects to keep under control and unforeseen events are the order of the day. Living (only) in the present, however, is not a viable option: in order to grow your startup, in fact, you necessarily need to look beyond, into the future. The business growth plan is what, in a way, forces you to do that. But what exactly is it?
The business growth plan is a detailed document that explains where you see your startup in a given time frame (which, typically, ranges from 1 to 2 years) and also encapsulates within it faster business goals (usually on a quarterly basis).
There are several benefits associated with the proper drafting of a business growth plan: thanks to this valuable document, in fact, you have the opportunity to keep an eye on your market share and your penetration within it. Not only that: you can also mitigate future risks. And that’s not all: the business growth plan also serves to give investors an accurate picture of future growth, with concrete indications of sales targets and revenue plans.
Business growth: Goals, strategies and measurement
To develop an effective business growth plan you must first define precisely what sales goals you intend to achieve. As we have already mentioned, growth can translate into many different goals: for example, you might expand the range of products you offer in the market or achieve higher profits or even hire more people. Remember, in this regard, that the goal you set out to achieve can also be a combination of different goals.
After defining the goals, you need to identify the time frame within which you intend to achieve them (this varies from company to company, depending on the company’s history and specific characteristics).
The third step is to plan the best actions to achieve the goals you set for yourself. Of course, different goals require different actions, and these also depend on the resources and tools available to your startup.
The “perfect” plan doesn’t exist-don’t forget to define useful metrics to keep track of your progress so you can adjust your actions if necessary. Metrics must be clear, simple and quantifiable. No action is insignificant: assign metrics to even the smallest ones because your success depends on them, too.
The last step is by no means less important than the others. On the contrary, the success of your business growth plan depends on it: allocate a budget to ensure that it can be executed as planned or, if you do not have sufficient resources, secure an investment.
Innovative ideas to grow your business
Now that you know, in theory, how to develop a business growth plan, it is time to understand, in more practical terms, how to grow a business. The ways, as already pointed out, are many, but some innovative ideas have, in recent times, proven more effective than others.
In the previous lines we have already talked about market penetration: in practical terms, it consists of increasing sales and market share within your target industry. There are several strategies to achieve this goal: you can offer incentives or discounts or you can launch a massive marketing campaign to make your brand known to more people, or you could expand your distribution channels.
If you want to expand into new markets with the products or services you already offer, you could move into new geographic areas (perhaps by partnering with foreign companies), target different customer segments, or identify new sales channels that allow you to reach more people.
Remember, too, that developing new products or improving those you already offer allows you to better meet the needs of your customers and thus win new markets. If you want to diversify your offerings, you might target related areas so you can reduce your risks.
To grow your business, you can also focus on digital innovation: from “simple” eCommerce to investments in automation software and artificial intelligence, again there are many ways to smooth business processes, improve the customer buying experience and find new markets.
One last piece of advice: look beyond your startup. Keep in mind, in fact, that strategic partnerships, as well as even acquisitions or mergers with other companies, can be a springboard for growing your company and increasing its competitiveness in the marketplace. The same goes for franchising, which allows you to expand quickly while minimizing capital investment.
Examples of successful business growth plans
To understand business growth strategies even better, it is the case now to cite some successful examples from recent entrepreneurial history.
In terms of using incentives to increase its customer base, the case study par excellence is that of PayPal, a payment system now used by millions of individuals and businesses to send and receive money online. You may not know that PayPal went from having 1 million users in March 2000 to 5 million users in the summer of that year. How? Just by providing an incentive for user activation: with each sign-up PayPal gave away a $20 donation, an amount that was then gradually reduced to 0.
Speaking of product diversification, it is impossible not to mention the case of Amazon: in addition to its eCommerce that everyone knows and uses by now, the company, in recent years, has focused heavily on other products or services, from smart devices (Amazon Echo) to streaming services (Amazon Prime Video).
On the subject of mergers/acquisitions, the most striking case, however, is that of Facebook, which acquired Instagram and WhatsApp, thus expanding its social media offerings and gaining new users and markets.
Finally, Google is a classic example of how to grow a company by leveraging technological innovation: through the famous 20 percent rule, Big G has in fact encouraged its employees to devote a portion of their work time to innovative projects, not necessarily related to their daily operations. This is how Gmail and Google Maps were born.
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