Anyone can come up with a big startup idea but not everyone can work on it and make it known to the general public. Setting up your business that boosts its prospects of surviving and over-growing is the trickiest part of business growth strategies for startup owners. Having a well-planned growth strategy is more than a marketing strategy. It’s a crucial wheel in your business, without it your business is on the verge of collapse.
Most businesses go through the same five stages of growth, each handling its opportunities and challenges. Once you’re able to identify your current stage you’ll be able to get prepared and choose the right business growth strategies. Known as the business life cycle, there are mainly five stages.
- Seed and Development
- Startup
- Growth & Establishment
- Expansion
- Maturity and Possible Exit
During a time filled with everyday new changes, some trends are making their way into the new year so you should keep an eye out for your business growth. To lead your business in the right direction we have curated a few business growth strategies for startup owners
Establish Measurable Goals for your Startup
Having long terms decided goals give your business consistent direction and motivation and are a key to a successful business model. They also give your team a path to follow by reducing confusion around your business plan and growth expectations. Establishing long-term business plans will help you to focus on both small and major tasks throughout, which will eventually lead to increased productivity. Four major aspects of establishing goals for your startup include Measurable, Specific, Time-based, and Relevant.
Understand Your Target Market
Creating and distributing marketing content in an untargeted way can be both ineffective and inefficient. Your target market will be the people most interested and you think are the most suited for your products. Instead of making assumptions try and understand their needs and motivations. Demographics such as age, gender, background, education, family, and occupation can help you determine more clearly. Having a specific target market will help you craft personalized messages that resonate better with potential customers. You can also use social media, surveys, emails, or quick calls to get information about your customers.
Analyze the Competition
When it comes to analyzing your competition, being proactive is better than being reactive. The purpose of analyzing your competitors is to understand their strengths and find the gaps in the market. It will help you enhance your business growth strategies resulting in giving you a competitive edge over others in the market. Some of the benefits of doing competitive analysis are
- You stay in touch with the market
- You’ll have two different perspectives on the market
- You’ll be able to identify priority improvement areas
- You get more opportunities
- You identify threats so that you mitigate them earlier
Identify a Value Proposition
Your value proposition will outline how your products help your customers. By having a value proposition your target audience will understand the value of your offering which will eventually increase your start-up growth. Identifying your value proposition will help new investors engage in your start-up. They will be able to see how your product offering has the potential to be sold for years.
Get Creative with Sales & Marketing
Due to fast-evolving technology and regulations, digital marketing platforms have become increasingly challenging. This is why many traditional companies are exploring other sales channels and marketing strategies. To mitigate these challenges you have to get creative with your selling methods to improve your business growth strategies.
Widen your Online Footprints
To improve their business growth strategies business owners must adapt and be practical when it comes to sales. To gain a significant proportion of customers businesses need to expand their online footprints. Be active on review sites, build a website, and engage more on social media. As such, expanding your online reach is a powerful and attractive growth strategy for businesses.
Build a Team
No matter how brilliant your ideas and strategies are, if you’re playing alone you’ll lose out to a team. The employees, your team will decide whether the business will thrive or die at an early stage. And this is confirmed by many successful business owners all around the world. Determine all the key roles needed for a start-up and start with CEO skills and then shortlist the candidates for hiring and training.
Prioritize Work Culture
Throughout the pandemic period, a higher number of businesses are facing resignations as employees are changing their definitions of work-life balance and what they expect in company culture. You can’t decide if you don’t know what culture you want to begin with. Have clear values, beliefs, and missions that make up your company culture and help you build business growth strategies. A healthy work culture enhances productivity, improves employee engagement, and attracts new talents which will eventually enhance your brand reputation in the marketplace.
Customer Retention
One of the strong business growth strategies for startup owners is retaining existing customers. Your customer retention rates show how you nurture and convert both existing and new customers. Retaining customers can lower your business costs while increasing your revenue. In order to retain existing customers, trust is an important factor. To build trust, have regular communication with your clients, avoid the mistake of over-promising and under-delivering, get regular feedback, express how you value them, and reward loyal clients.
Bonus Tip
Aside from dedication and good business practices, applying the right strategies is important to progress to the next phase. To save you time and boost your customer service we have a perfect tool for you, Picktime. Picktime is a free cloud-based appointment scheduling software. From business to education to medical to beauty & wellness the platform is tailored to serve every business need.
Picktime is rated the best in the industry for serving the happiest customers by G2, Capterra, and Crozdesk. With Picktime you get 24 hrs full email support at multiple locations. Picktime provides a customized booking page, a unique URL, with a book now widget for your website so that you don’t lose any clients. To reduce your administrative tasks Picktime provides automatic email and SMS reminders for bookings, booking forms, self-scheduling, and team management.
- One-on-one & Group Bookings
- Time zone Conversion
- Payment & Invoice
- Google/Apple/Outlook Calendar Sync
- Detailed Reports
- Import/Export Contacts
- Over 100+ Integrations
Not only this, it has a user-friendly interface that can be accessed on any device (Smartphone, Laptop, Tab, SmartTV).
Industries are constantly changing and controlled and sustainability is the key for startup owners to make their businesses successful. Research the market thoroughly, have a unique selling point, craft exclusive marketing strategies, and adapt to new changes to stand out and grow your business.
