By Yinka Kolawole, with agency report
ALL entrepreneurs desire business growth but most don’t know how. It is one thing to start a business but growing a business is where the real challenge lies. The big question is how do you grow a small business with little or no money?
Focus on the business mission
”The thing I really care about is the mission; making the world open” – Mark Zuckerberg.
The first strategic step to growing a small business on a lean budget is to focus on fulfilling the business mission. The reason is because the business mission is where the entrepreneurial spirit dwells. It is the heart of the business, the core.
The business mission is the reason why the business exists. You might grow your small business to a substantial size but if that growth does not help fulfill its mission, the business growth will be short lived. So stay true to your business mission; it’s the first prerequisite to growing a business successfully.
Develop a challenging vision
The need to grow a business is usually prompted by circumstances and such circumstance can help forge a vision for the business. The kind of vision you develop depends on how fast you want your growth rate to be and the level you want to grow. Set challenging goals that will force you out of your comfort zone.
Challenging vision
Don’t develop a vision you are comfortable with, develop a business vision that forces you to use your critical thinking skills. A challenging vision should force the entire business team to come up with creative growth strategies that enable the business grow faster than the average industrial growth rate. So don’t settle for average; set a challenging business goal and go for it.
Reposition your business team
”Bringing together the right information with the right people will dramatically improve a company’s ability to develop and act on strategic business opportunities” – Bill Gates
To grow your business, the right people have to be in the right position, that is, reposition your business team. Analyze the strengths and weaknesses of your business team and delegate duties to them according to their strength. If there is a weak chain in the business management team; consider bringing someone in to fill the gap. A strong business management team is essential to business growth.
Strengthen the business internally: ”The most important espeedf issue is often not technical but cultural. It is convincing everyone that the companyfs survival depends on everyone moving as fast as possible” – Bill Gates
Most entrepreneurs are always in a haste to grow externally because itfs more obvious and gives the entrepreneur a sense of prestige. But more important than external growth and expansion is the internal growth. Businesses have failed because of too much success. They grew big but couldn’t sustain the pace; so they shrank and collapsed. Internal business growth entails strengthening your bottom line, improving your employees’ effectiveness and machines’ efficiency. It may also mean automating your business processes. Once a business effectively grows internally, growing externally will be seamless.
Mind the cash flow: ”The most important word in the world of money is cash flow. The second most important word is leverage” – Rich Dad
Cash flow is the life blood of business. Growing on a lean budget, every kobo has to be accounted for. You must know your numbers and above all, you must know your financial position at all times.
Customer care is key
While growing internally, you can instigate external business growth by taking care of your customers and encouraging word of mouth. Customers are the reason you are in business so make sure they are not ignored during your growth process. Find as much customers as you can and keep as much as you can. Most importantly, allow your existing customers help your business find more customers by encouraging them to talk about your company. Word of mouth was the way Amazon grew to become multi-billion dollar companies.
Regular employee performance evaluation
Maximize every resource at your disposal, leaving no room for inefficiency and waste. You must also evaluate your employeefs performance rate at regular intervals and any employee that doesn’t meet your standard should be fired.
”Generally I like other people to fire because itfs always a lousy task. But Ifve fired many people” – Donald Trump
Seek strategic alliance
”Our success has really been based on partnerships from the very beginning” – Bill Gates
Forming strategic alliance is an effective way to grow big, while still remaining small. Look within your neighborhood first for opportunities to form strategic alliances and if you can’t find any; create one.
Focus on the core; outsource the rest
If there is any secret to growing a small business from scratch on a lean budget; then it’s definitely outsourcing. Outsourcing helps businesses grow internally (with increasing profit); yet remain small to the outside world. With the rate at which business is changing, it’s now possible to operate a million dollar company from just a small office using the power of outsourcing. Every business has a core. So find your core, focus on it and outsource the rest.
Re-invest the profit: Growing on a lean budget requires you re-invest every single profit into the business. Re-investing profits is essential to business growth.
Stick to the process: The last but not the least step to growing a small business is to stick to the process. Building a successful business is not an overnight process; itfs a process that takes time and requires persistence. To stick it through to the end of the process, you need to see the big picture of where you are heading to; you need to envision the end point of that process.
Starting the growth process of a business is easy but keeping at it is difficult because with growth comes the need for constant change. If you are in the same entrepreneurial journey of growing a business with me, I encourage you to stick it through and keep moving forward. I will see you at the top.
Culled from: http://www.vanguardngr.com
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