You’ve acquired or built a successful business. What’s next? If you're thinking about growing or scaling your business, it's important to differentiate between the two. As defined in an article by Harvard Business Review, “Growth means adding revenue at the same pace you are adding resources; scaling means adding revenue at a much greater rate than cost.”
Scaling a business requires establishing an environment that nurtures and maintains company development. This involves the ability to grow seamlessly, backed by thorough planning, sufficient funding, and the right mix of systems, staff, processes, technology, and partners.
Here are five steps to scaling your business:
Evaluate and Plan
First, you’ll need to take a close look at where your business is at today and determine if you are ready for growth. If the answer is yes, then you’ll need to make a plan for how to achieve growth.
The most successful businesses establish a growth vision and methodically reverse engineer the plan to outline the necessary steps for each goal. And then – most importantly – they follow their plan.
Secure Funding
Scaling a business comes at a price. Your expansion strategy may call for developing new technology, hiring more employees, and creating systems to measure and manage results.
How will you secure the funds needed for growth? Whether it’s through bootstrapping, a small business loan, an investor or a line of credit, you’ll want to explore all options to determine the most suitable option for your plan.
Secure Sales/Orders
Naturally, scaling your business means scaling your sales. Do the business have the right structure in place to generate and support more sales?
In order to determine what’s needed to increase sales, you’ll want to take a closer look at the systems in place and assess areas of opportunity. Is there a sufficient lead flow to generate our targeted number of leads? Does the business have the right marketing systems in place to track and manage leads? The answers to these questions and more should help identify where support and funding should be added to support your growth goals.
Invest in Technology
With modern technology advances like artificial intelligence, there’s more ways now than ever before to leverage technology to scale a business.
Now is an opportune time to evaluate new products on the market that that not only save time and money but also handle significantly larger workloads across all areas of your business. Look at CRM, marketing automation, sales management, inventory, manufacturing, accounting, HR, shipping, and other technology systems.
Hire Staff or Outsource Strategically
Last but certainly not least are the necessary hands to carry out the growth plan. While technology provides valuable assistance and efficiencies, human resources still play a crucial role in overall operations.
Following these 5 steps can help you successfully scale your business. Applying these essential growth strategies to your business will ensure that your company is prepared to tackle any level of success, regardless of its scale. If you’re looking for creative ways to grow and scale your business, contact Transworld Business Advisors of Boston at [email protected] or call 855-652-8922.
