Growing your business can be a difficult and often
frustrating process. No matter how talented, experienced,
or proficient you are as a leader, business development may
be draining your energy, funds, and desire to achieve the
original plans you had for your company. Yet growing your
business is a critical step in maximizing your company's
potential and in revenue enhancement. So how do you achieve
success? You need a growth strategy.
Business type may dictate growth strategies. Service
businesses are certainly different from product businesses
in terms of strategies. And obviously globalization
strategies are different than local strategies. Yet,
devising the correct strategy is important for the
expansion of any business.
Here are a few ideas that would cross over any business
type, industry or size.
* LEVERAGING. Every business should be looking for ways
to leverage every thing they do in multiple ways. The
question to ask yourself before beginning anything - be it
a new service, a product offering, or an innovative idea -
is how else you might be able to leverage it. If you are
creating a new service, what else can you do to utilize
this new service? Can you offer to speak at conferences or
write an article about the service? Does it offer
opportunities for joint ventures with others? Can you
productize the service in some way? Everything you do or
create has the opportunity to be leveraged in multiple ways
if you think creatively.
* RELATIONSHIP-BUILDING. Relationships are key to growth.
You must build high trust relationships with everyone -
clients, vendors, colleagues, alliances - absolutely
everyone who deals with your business in any way, shape or
form. The more people who know you, who understand your
ethics and values, how you work and what they can expect
from you, the greater your chances of these people
referring business. Your ability to ask for referrals and
get them is also increased. Often we think of those high
trust relationships as being with clients or perhaps staff.
Yet the truth is that relationship-building crosses over
into all facets of your business.
* CLARITY. You need clear job descriptions and
understandable metrics for all staff. Sounds silly right -
how can this grow the business? But the clearer these
pieces are the greater productivity you will have.
Increased performance leads to growth.
* INFRASTRUCTURE. Building an infrastructure is often
discussed yet rarely handled. Your infrastructure will
includes budgets, planning and other piece of business
involved with creating and maintaining the foundational
parts of your company. Many business owners and leaders
overlook this critically important aspect of doing
business. How do you know where you are going if you don't
plan for it? And if you are off track how do you figure
out where you've gone wrong if you don't plan?
* LEARNING. Become a learning organization. You want to
find the lesson in everything. Every success and also each
action or move that didn't work out quite as anticipated.
Just because your marketing initiative was successful this
time doesn't mean it will be the next time. Take the time
to analyze what made something work well, or not so well.
If everyone in the company is taught how to analyze and
learn from what they are doing, success and growth are the
outcome.
Growth strategies are essential to a company's success.
But only those companies that produce products and services
that sell in the market will succeed. And only those
products and services that are marketed and put into action
skillfully will sell in the market. They sell because you
have covered your groundwork. You've built strong
relationships. Effective communication is essential within
your company. You've put a well-built infrastructure in
place. You've leveraged everything you do. You know the
answers to the basic questions that determine the success
of any business. You know who you are, what you are doing,
which is your market, who is the potential client, and you
know the challenges that keep your clients up at night.
All that remains is to provide your clients with solutions
that will work for them. That is, after all, what a growth
strategy is.
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Linda Finkle, CEO of INCEDO GROUP, works with innovative
leaders around the world who understand that business needs
a new organizational growth style. These innovative leaders
know that powerful cross-functional communication is the
highest priority and the strongest strategy for building
organizational effectiveness. To find out more, visit:
http://www.IncedoGroup.com
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