If you Google search the phrase ‘How to Grow a business’ right now, you’re probably going to find posts talking about satisfying your customers, hiring the right people, reducing risks/costs, and stuff like that. While these things are, no doubt, effective tips, they are presented in a scattergun approach.
They don’t give you a definite plan to follow. Should you hire more personnel or focus on generating more website traffic? Maybe you need to first concentrate on raising more revenue, and then later you can think of boosting brand reputation.
To get good results, you need to apply the right tips strategically. And that’s the reason we created this post – to teach business owners strategic tips to grow their businesses.
Tips to boost your business growth
A) Grow in terms of revenue: I.E. Tips to grow your business revenue
Intro: When a business owner desires growth, the first thing to target is immediate revenue. That is, to increase the cash inflow. Only after this can you start thinking of growth in terms of scaling up (expanding office space or hiring more labor), building a bigger reputation, etc. Do you feel me?
List of tips:
1) Product bundles: Apple is giving away a pair of Airpods with a Macbook Air/Pro or an iPad Air/Pro on education pricing. I’m sure this is getting you thinking about getting that new laptop you’ve been eyeing.
That’s how you create bundles and increase that damn revenue. It’s human psychology to get attracted to 2 products for the price of one.
2) Sales: People love discounts, even if it’s a tiny one, and they do set aside some of their disposable income to splurge on major sales. Grab the opportunity to shine. Make use of occasions like Labor Day, Black Friday, or just a random stock clearance sale to boost revenue whenever you’re having a dull business moment.
3) Pricing: Price and quality go hand in hand. If you have a pricey product, make sure the quality surpasses the expectations as per the price. Customers always connect high pricing to quality products. Thus, you must deliver the perceived value of your product in accordance with the price.
4) Constantly evolve your USP (Unique Selling proposition): Buyers are constantly barraged with a load of options to choose from. The only way to ensure your brand never leaves their minds is to focus on a unique selling proposition. Something you have that others can’t offer them.
Look at Amazon; ever since they came to be, the company’s been growing, despite the endless numbers of competitions rising by the day. How did they manage that?
Their USP – Customer Service and Innovation. As you may well know, many of Amazon’s innovative selling propositions (free fast shipping, few click buys, etc.) have been adopted (stolen) by many competitors over the years. Yet, they still kept on creating new ones.
You, too, need to develop your brand’s USPs. That’s the way to stay ahead of the competition, stay in the mind of consumers, make more sales, and grow your business revenue.
5) Focus on Existing customers: McDonald’s has a unqiue strategy for keeping its customer base intact. You know what that is? They have strategically worked on reducing the wait time to just a couple of seconds. As a consumer, you know McDonald’s is the fastest place to get your early morning snacks. So you always prefer to head there.
A brand that listens is a brand that sells. Keep an eye out for customer feedback and work towards customer satisfaction. Retaining a loyal customer is going to pay you way more than hundreds of unsatisfied ones.
6) Customer service: Having an efficient team to back your customer queries will make them feel at home.
Engaging with needy or unhappy consumers should not be considered a duty if you want to give outstanding customer service. Rather, your team should see these customers as a way to expand your customer base.
Customers who feel that your organization is invested in their success will be more likely to return and purchase your items again. Heck, they might even refer you to their friends/family. Free PR!
7) Testimonials: Still on the subject of free PR and business revenue growth. Testimonials are another useful tool you can leverage to your business’ advantage. Since satisfied customers will always leave feedback, you want to make it a habit to capture and showcase these testimonials on all your platforms.
The more legit testimonials you can showcase to people, the more sales you’ll draw in.
8) Develop new or additional products: Product development means creating new products to sell to an existing audience. For example, a company that sells fans can expand its line to include TV and sound systems. Such a company can sell these new products to existing customers and grow its business revenue.
9) Mobile apps: Think of the number of downloads and additional cash income stream mobile apps can fetch you. Plus the comfort and ease it offers consumers while patronizing you.
According to a study conducted by McFadyen Digital, 83% of consumers claim seamless experience across devices is paramount to customer satisfaction. This means consumers are more likely to patronize you if they have your app on their phones and tablets.
10) Sustainability: Consumers (especially Gen-Z and Millennials) would pay any amount in the name of sustainability.
If your brand can come up with a way to support the environment, you can bet more sales will come in. It can be via your products outright or brand messaging.
B) Grow in terms of customer/client base: I.E. Tips to grow your business customer base (how to get more customers)
Intro: After exhausting your existing customer base, you need more customers to further grow your revenue. And that’s where the tips in this section come to play.
List of tips:
11) Have physical branches: The era of brick and mortar stores is not over yet. The experience a physical store offers is unparalleled compared to an online shopping experience. For instance, Aesop is a personal care brand that offers you a boutique experience. This physical experience makes retail shopping fun and makes you crave more.
12) Market penetration: Dunkin’, formerly known as Dunkin’ Donuts, is a confection store that initally sold just donuts and coffee. However, the team wanted to explore the market a little bit. So they dropped ‘Donuts’ from their name to penetrate further. They now have a whole lot of baked goods, sandwiches, and a wide variety of beverages on the menu.
The market penetration move enabled Dunkin’ to cater to an audience that wasn’t just into confections. Therefore, widening your product horizons is an excellent way to penetrate into an untapped market.
13) Grow your website traffic: Search Engine optimization is the rave of the moment. Your business website stands a great chance of being discovered by newer audiences with it. Therefore, it is imperative to invest in SEO.
In case you missed the update, Search Engine Land confirmed that Organic Search (SEO) Drives 51% of Website Traffic.
You know what that means? That 5 out of every 10 persons that visit your business website come from search engines. It’s pretty obvious then that you need SEO to get newer customers.
Besides SEO, other methods of boosting a site’s traffic include referral marketing, display advertising, pay-per-click advertising, guest blogging, content marketing, Google My Business (Local SEO), online directory listings, etc.
All these can help attract the necessary traffic to your website and build a community.
14) Grow your social media presence: Not having social media is equivalent to your business not being legitimate. Be it on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter; a social media presence can bring you a whole new segment of customers that you weren’t even going to target initially.
15) Public Relations: Maintaining healthy ties with influencers or content creators can successfully convert their audience into yours. For instance, Daniel Wellington works aggressively with influencers to market their watches. As a result, it has been able to establish itself as a people’s brand, and one would kill to get their hands on a DW watch.
16) Newsletters: This comes next after having running traffic on the website. When you have a popup on the website that asks the customer to input their email address, they automatically get updates on new launches and exciting promo codes. Newsletters are a great way to build a connection with potential customers and convert their clicks to sales.
17) Paid Collaborations: This is an extension to influencer culture, where apart from sending them your product, you can pay them to review it on their page/channel. This will put your brand/business on the map and generate fresh new leads.
18) Affiliate marketing: Affiliate marketing is an online sales strategy that allows a product owner to boost sales by letting individuals who target the same audience – known as “affiliates”- earn a commission by promoting the product to others.
These affiliates don’t have to be celebrities; they can be common men/women attempting to earn some commission by marketing your product.
19) Education: If you’re a service provider, your objective is to educate people about the service that your company is offering.
For example, Cryptocurrency is a fairly new subject in the financial industry, and a lot of people are intimidated by its extreme levels of volatility. But if your service is an exchange platform for crypto, you could gain the public vote; by educating people about the dos and don’ts of investing or just about the evolution of crypto. With a tiny call to action to check out your service, you’ll surely draw in more customers.
20) Incentives: Humans love free stuff and something that makes their effort worthwhile. This tip applies mostly to services. Having an online service presence can be difficult; it is best to offer free trials with all the unique services you can. Get them used to services that they’re obligated to pay for the basic plan at LEAST.
C) Grow in terms of the workforce: I.E Tips to grow your business workforce
Intro: After growing in terms of customer base, you need to grow in terms of labor. Why? Because more customers mean increased demands and ultimately increased production.
As a business, the size of your workforce is also a testament to how big your company has grown. One of the reasons Amazon is regarded as a big brand today is because of its extremely large staff base.
List of tips:
21) Employee training: Training is a form of growth, and the quality of output highly depends on the quality of training. Your new employees could be highly skilled, but adjusting to a new company’s work atmosphere needs a push by seniors. Thus, make sure they can ride the steep learning curve with ease and feel at home.
Training shouldn’t only be given at initial stages but also intermittently to upskill and help the individuals grow in their job roles.
22) Mentorship programs: Apart from the training process, an employee needs a mentor to look up to. Mentors can foster meaningful relationships and develop a very productive system that encourages an employee to overperform.
Your staff can assist your organization in adapting to changes and reaching the next level of success when they are coached with encouragement.
23) Employee comfort zone: Don’t restrict an employee to a single kind of task that will become mundane over time. Variety boosts confidence and pushes them out of their comfort zones to explore something they probably thought they weren’t capable of.
And once they surpass their own expectations, they feel empowered and charged to perform better. Throwing some learning curveballs helps them to unleash their true potential.
24) Remote working options: Employees from all over the world can bring in their own cultural perspectives to a business and contribute to a business differently than a local employee would. Not just that, remote working also enables employees to put in more hours than they normally would due to reduced commute time.
Companies that fail to accommodate remote working can potentially lose out on great talent.
25) Mental health: Hustle and burnout by working are highly encouraged on social media. But what happens once your employee isn’t as efficient as before? You would replace him/her, right?
Train and mentor a new individual, consuming your time and leaving no regard for your previous employee. It’s 2021, and if mental health isn’t given priority, you’re aren’t as progressive as you think you are.
HR needs to take into account employees’ holistic wellbeing; after all, it’s a company responsibility, and they need to make sure that employees are catered to and treated with the utmost respect.
D) Grow in terms of reputation: I.E Tips to become a big name in your industry
Intro: Your reputation precedes you, isn’t that the saying? Leaving a mark on your industry is, without a doubt, the fastest way to become a household name. And once you become a household name, your brand will surely grow.
For instance, there are so many online payment apps that exist. But Venmo has become a verb in Millennial and Gen-Z conversations. You know why? Because they’ve built a reputation for themselves.
For example, Venmo makes bill splitting easier amongst a group of friends and hits the target audience right in the bull’s eye. This feature alone has made them a household name in the industry.
List of tips:
26) Social media: I said it once, and I will say it again, your social media presence is what drives people towards your brand. A lot of brands thrive on creating or joining conversations/trends/controversies on social media.
A lot of makeup brands have created a mark in the industry by being an inclusive space for people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. Their campaigns sparked a change and pushed their names into the mind of their audiences.
Seated right there, I bet you can think of many brands you discovered via social media discussions (e.g., Twitter threads, Quora search, Instagram comments, etc.)
By and large, find a way to make an impact or leave an impression on social media, and the reputation will follow.
27) Social listening: Negative feedback needs to be addressed instantly. Just like positivity goes viral online, negativity spreads quicker. And like wildfire, it has greater repercussions.
This is why just deleting feedback or comments will not suffice. You need to provide answers/solutions to what’s causing the bad reviews. That way, your brand will earn the reputation of a problem solver rather than a challenge dodger.
28) Under promise, over deliver: Amazon is the most customer-centric company in the world because it abides by everything they say. If they promise to deliver a product within 2 days with prime shipping, they make sure to deliver it within a day to exceed customer expectations.
This forms a trust that even if it backfires slightly, the consumers will not be disappointed because of the trust they’ve built.
Generally, this will result in more sales, referrals, and an overall improvement in your professional reputation. The consumer will even perceive you as someone who goes above and beyond.
29) Offline reputation: Maintaining a reputation offline is also as important as an online one.
Make your consumers happy by providing an exceptional customer experience, and they’ll gladly tell everyone they know about how great your company is. If you detect a negative pattern, you might want to investigate what’s causing it. If you don’t, your company will have a significant online and offline reputation problem.
This implies that you must maintain a happy consumer and fan base. Not only will this result in loyalty and, eventually, brand evangelists, but word-of-mouth referrals and compliments are also beneficial to a company’s bottom line. Word-of-mouth, for example, influences 50 percent of purchasing decisions.
30) Packaging: Beautiful packaging catches attention before everything. Even if it’s simple, make it elegant. Go for something fancy, then make sure your target audience resonates with it. Make it functional to add value to the entire product experience.
Consider it an additional marketing avenue for your business.
Packages increase brand awareness and offer value to products and services for the best possible customer experience. It also aids the company in distinguishing itself from its competition.
CONCLUSION
So, there you have it. I hope you enjoyed how I split the 30 business growth tips into a step-by-step growth pattern. Find out where your business currently is, and pick a section of the tips you think will help your business grow fast.
Go smash it!
FAQ
Is it possible to grow a stagnant business?
Yes, absolutely. Even if your business is perceived dead or has been stagnant for a while, you can find tips to grow and bring it back to life in this post.
Are there unique strategies on how to grow a small business?
As a small business, the things you need to focus on to grow your business include: making more sales, raising awareness about your business everywhere you can, and building a community of consumers. This is the surest way to grow a small business.
What are the strategies to grow your business?
Growing a business is not hard. First, start with your existing customers – satisfy them with exceptional customer service, encourage/entice them into buying more, and watch them bring in more buyers.
Then move on to newer customers – your website SEO, social media marketing, amid other marketing strategies should be enough to draw in new customers.
Now, scale your business up – space and workforce-wise. With a bigger workspace and larger workforce on your hands, you’re definitely no longer the small-sized business of yesterday.
Finally, build your reputation – having a big-sized office or extremely large workforce is not enough to be called a big brand. Your reputation is what does that. Build a solid reputation for your brand and watch people put you in the same bracket as the biggest boys in the industry.
When do I know my business is due for growth?
When you feel the business can do better than it’s currently doing – whether revenue-wise, workforce or workspace-wise, reputation-wise, etc.