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How To Take Your Business From ‘Small Fry’ To ‘Big Fish’

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Right now your business is small. You love what you’re doing and where you’re going but you’re starting to wonder how you can progress your business success more quickly. Being a small business is great but if you’re someone who aspires to go from ‘small fry’ to ‘big fish’ then you’re probably wondering what it takes to give your business the boost it needs.

Growing and developing a business isn’t always simple or straightforward, as there is a lot to think about, from budgets to planning. You have to think about a wide number of things if you’re serious about expanding your business. It’s stressful growing a business, that’s a given, but if you get your approach right, it’s worth taking the time and putting in the effort.

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | How To Take Your Business From ‘Small Fry’ To ‘Big Fish’

So, what steps should you take to start growing your business? Below is a guide to some of the ins and outs of achieving successful business growth.

Create an action plan

First things first, if you want to give your business a boost and actually see results, you need to create an action plan. Your plan of action should lay out the approach that you are going to take to growing your business.

It’s best to set large targets with a number of small goals leading to each one – this approach makes achieving growth seem more doable. You don’t want to set overly ambitious targets as this can make them seem impossibly difficult to reach. Instead, aim to keep goals achievable – remember, you can always exceed them.

Speak to a consultant

If you feel like you could benefit from some professional advice about any area of your business and how to utilise that to see growth, consider booking an appointment with a specialist consultant. Whether that’s a general business consultant or with a consultant from a more specialised field, such as speaking to a finance consultant.

If you’re struggling with a certain area of your business, such as your brand’s marketing, for instance, then you might want to consider expert marketing consultation. You might find that taking the time to speak with a specialist gives you the insight and knowledge that you need to give your business the boost it requires to meet your goals.

Work smarter, not harder

Be a smart worker, not a harder worker. Yes, growing a business requires a lot of hard work, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be smart about how you achieve business growth. Don’t be afraid to utilise smart tech as a means to an end for your business. Believe it or not, you can use smart tech to make managing your business processes simpler and easier – you can simplify and automate your entire operation.

There you have it, a simple guide to how you can make achieving business growth simpler, easier and more doable. Take note of the tips and ideas above, utilise them for your business and you should be able to make growing your business into a ‘big fish’ a little easier to achieve.

5 Key Business Considerations To Keep In Mind

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Business Considerations|5 Key Business Considerations To Keep In MindWhen you’re running a business, your mind can be a really busy place. Most of the time, when you’re in a set job, you’ll find that you have one major responsibility or role. Your job title often means that there’s a set thing that you need to work on – and that’s great. However, when you’re a business owner, there’s usually a full range of things that you need to be working on. And so, it can mean that you’re always doing so many things to keep your business running. But not only that, you have to be thinking of things to help it grow too. As a business looking for success, whether you’re currently running it from home or not, you will definitely want to think about what you want to do to make that happen. Here are five key considerations to keep in mind.

1. Marketing

To start with, you are going to want to be thinking about your marketing. What sort of marketing methods are you working on? How are you able to get your business and brand name out there? Really start to think about what it is that you want to create and pull together a marketing plan that allows you to shout about what you’re doing.

2. Outgoings

From here, you’re then going to want to take a look at your outgoings. You may find that you don’t really know what your business expenses are but that then can mean that you aren’t able to track your profits or business growth. So instead, it’s much better for you to be thinking about what costs you have to help you ensure you make a profit.

3. Manufacturing

The next thing that you’re going to want to consider is the manufacturing side of things. It could be the case that you have to find suppliers to work with, or consider doing it yourself with the right equipment. When that’s the case, you’ll want to put the right time and care into choosing a mixer or whatever it is that you need. This is to ensure that you have got the right setup in place and you know that you are able to create the products that you need.

4. Growth Plans

You should also have some sort of growth plans in mind. It’s safe to say that if you want to get somewhere you’ll want to be able to have a plan on how you’re going to get there. So start to think about the steps you need to be able to take to get to where you want to be.

5. Customer Service

Finally, there’s also customer service for you to be thinking about. As you may know, when it comes to business, the key to making things work out for you, is to ensure that your customer is happy. So, if you want to be able to nail all of the other points and, of course, scale, you have to be able to produce stellar customer service too. So make sure that you are hot on emails, getting orders out, and if you’re not sure, hire a service team to help you.

Is your Business Not Growing? Here’s What you Could be Doing Wrong

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If you feel as though your business is stagnating, then you will know how frustrating this can be. You may be able to fix the issue though, if you are able to pinpoint the cause properly.

You Don’t have a Good Marketing Plan

Operating without any kind of written plan is not a good idea if you want to keep your business running like it should. If you do not have a good plan, then you may find that your competitors end up surpassing you and this is the last thing that you need. Sustained growth and cost containment all require a huge deal of planning, so you have to make sure that you explore every option here so you can prepare your business for any future hiccups.

You Don’t have a System

Believe it or not, systems save time and they also give you the chance to monitor all of the different parts of your business. If you want to facilitate growth, then you need to try and track your weekly and your monthly productions. You also need to develop and track your leads, and boost your customer retention rate. If you can use tools to monitor your customer satisfaction, then this will help you out a lot here, so keep that in mind as much as possible. Look into sample accountability to find out more. You can find additional info here.

You Cannot Differentiate Yourself

If you or your team can’t answer why you are different from your competition, then you may have just found the reason why you are not growing as well as you could be. Take the time to come up with the answer and then tell your staff. The answer here should be automatic. It’s the key to making sure that you are not selling price over value and that you are able to close big sales with ease.

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Is your Business Not Growing? Here’s What you Could be Doing Wrong

You’re Not Investing

Some say that it takes money to make money, but so many companies underspend when it comes to marketing and advertising. You have to know that your business growth is often related to how much you are able to allocate in this area. You should be spending around 9% of your projected revenue every year on reinvestment. If you can do this then you will be able to increase your company potential more than you realise.

You’re Not Staffed

You may say that you do not have enough money to hire help. That being said, you have to make sure that you don’t defer hiring staff. If you do, then you may find that you end up losing out and that you are not able to advance your company. This is the last thing that you want, so you have to make sure that you invest in your business and that you hire people to help you out with any non-essential tasks. Outsourcing is a fantastic way for you to do this if you want to stay under budget. Little things like this can really work wonders for your profit and your rate of progression.

How to help your business grow in 2021

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StrategyDriven Entrepreneurship Article | How to help your business grow in 20212020 will go down in history as one of the hardest years for businesses. Some industries, like nightclubs or stadiums, haven’t been able to open their doors since the very start of the year. Even the businesses that are normally in constant high demand, like fast food restaurants and coffee shops, have faced their own challenges and seen big drops in revenue. The sad reality is that some businesses won’t survive long enough to reopen their doors after the Christmas holidays. Those that do survive will be desperate to increase their profits to make up for the damage caused by the coronavirus. If you’re one of those businesses looking to recover, here are some of the best ways you can help your business grow in 2021.

Employ the right people

One of the most important aspects of any business is the people you employ. Choose the right employees and they will be your most important asset. Choose the wrong people to work with and they can cause all manner of problems, including poor productivity, inaccuracies and they could even damage your brand’s reputation, all of which will impact your ability to turn a profit.

To make sure your business can reach its financial potential, it’s important to choose a talented group of people who can work well together to produce a good product or provide a good service. It’s important that you choose people with the right skills you need to compete those all-important tasks. One of the best ways to ensure you find people with the right skillset is to seek the help of a recruitment agency that truly understands your industry. Whether you work in the construction industry or the performing arts, find a local recruitment agency that can instantly recognise what makes a good potential employee for your business. That way you won’t be wasting your time meeting up and interviewing candidates that are clearly not the right fit for your team. If you suddenly have a gap in your workforce that needs filling, they can find you the right person to fill that position before your productivity is affected.

Introduce yourself to your customers once more

If you’re involved in an industry that has been forced to close temporarily or reduce the services you provide, it’s important to remind your customers of your existence once you are able to fully reopen. Even if you have been able to remain open, it may be that the restrictions have meant many people just haven’t required your products or services. A lot of businesses are in this very situation, for example those who sell travel insurance or even those who sell suits and dresses for big evenings out socialising.

One of the best ways to attract those customers back is to act like those customers are brand new to your business. Create a marketing campaign that explains the advantages of using your products or services. Remind them of how they can buy goods from you or access your services. Make sure this marketing is located in the places where your target audience spends most of their time. For young people, this could be on social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram. For the older generation, this could be in newspapers and on the radio, although an increasing number of people in this demographic are now using social media.

Revisit your pricing

Over the last few months, it’s probably not just your earnings that have taken a big hit. It’s likely that some of your customers also have a lot less money than they did this time last year, whether that’s because their hours have been reduced at work, they’ve been furloughed or they’ve lost their job completely. If this is the case, the main obstacle stopping them buying your product may be the price. Consider either reducing the price of your products or offering cheaper alternatives for those who have a smaller budget. For example, you could offer a product in smaller quantities or made from cheaper materials.

On the other end of the scale, there could be customers with lots of money saved up as they weren’t able to go on their annual holiday or they just spend less money on things like day trips and nights out. Consider offering luxury packages to encourage these customers to spend more money with you. You could group several of your products together and sell them as a bundle, offering customers a small discount for buying all of the products together.

Strategies to Transform Your Small Business into A Large One

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Strategies to Transform Your Small Business into A Large One

Small businesses play a large role in the world’s vibrant economies, as they employ many people and drive innovation and competitiveness. According to the US Small Business Administration (SBA), small businesses constitute 44% of the country’s economic activity. However, every small business owner’s primary goal is to have a company that expands and eventually becomes large and profitable. So which smart strategies can help turn your small business into a large one? Here are four points to consider:

1. Extend your market reach

Making your products or services available to new customers is a great way to expand your small business into a large one. New markets represent new customers, who also represent fresh opportunities for increased earnings. You should open stores in new areas to introduce your business to new customers. Experts also recommend targeting new groups in your locality who could use your products and services, aside from your regular customers. Finding and promoting new uses for your product also encourages existing customers to purchase more from you. Therefore, it would be advantageous if you extended your market reach to increase sales and transform your business into a more stable model. Over time, this stability will only lead to increased earnings that will transform your business into a large one.

2. Introduce new products and services

Many business experts agree that the business world is in constant flux, and as such new products and services are crucial to the survival of companies. Consider introducing new products and services that attract new customers and encourage your existing ones to buy more. Accomplishing this can be quite tricky, but with research and flawless execution, you could be on your way to bigger things. First of all, you must identify a pressing need through customer interaction, employee brainstorming, and personal research. Then, you must develop and test a product concept that meets this urgent need. Developing a good prototype is essential here, so reach out to experts to find out how it works and how best you can bring your ideas to life to permeate new markets.

3. Consider franchising

Research reveals that 80% of McDonald’s locations are franchises. Franchising is a useful tool that you can also leverage to transform your small business into a big company. As your small business begins to experience success, consider licensing your branding, business model, and processes to others who will market your products under your brand name. Franchising has many benefits that should make it a vital consideration in your business expansion plans. Firstly, it can substitute capital acquisition as a less risky and more cost-effective way of business expansion. Franchising also gives you more motivated unit managers because your franchisees are business owners themselves with a vested interest in your business’ success. It facilitates faster growth because you team up with already successful companies, which catapults you to a market leadership position within your industry ahead of your competitors. You should see franchising as a way to increase your business’ profitability, penetrate new markets, and transform your small business into a large company.