It’s important that your business is always moving forward. Even if your business is just ticking over and you’re making decent money, that doesn’t mean you’re getting everything right. You need to be constantly looking at ways to grow your business and expand into new markets. Unfortunately, that’s often easier said than done. Even if you’re trying to grow the business, sometimes, it’s just not happening. The good news is, there are some common reasons that business growth is slow and there is usually a solution.
Poor Branding
A lot of businesses come up with a catchy name and a great logo and think that they’re done with branding, but that’s just the beginning. If you compare smaller business to the ones that have managed to grow and find success worldwide, one of the biggest differences is that their brand defines them. Companies like Coca Cola or Apple are instantly recognisable to everybody and they are constantly cultivating that brand. If you’re not doing the same, you’re not going to be able to expand into new markets easily.
Neglecting Your Existing Customers
When people think about growth, they’re usually focused on breaking new markets and finding customers outside of their normal demographic. That is important but you shouldn’t do that at the expense of your existing customers. It’s those loyal customers that come back time and time again that help you to build revenue and give you the capital that you need for business growth. If you’re not looking after them and making sure that they continue to buy your products, you’re not going to be able to afford expansion. Email marketing is one of the easiest ways to reach your existing customers. Send out some mass emails with discount vouchers and let people know about the other products that you have on offer and you should be able to generate a steady stream of sales that will help you to fund expansion.
Talent Gaps
You need a great team behind you if you’re going to successfully expand your business so it’s important that you’re identifying any talent gaps in the business and filling them before you start launching any new projects. There are some great talent risk management experts like Steve Trautman that can help you out. By analyzing your business and working out where the skills gaps are, you can ensure that you’ve got all of the expert personnel that you need in every department.
Fear Of Collaboration
It’s perfectly normal to be protective of your business and a lot of business owners aren’t sure about the idea of collaborating with other companies. The idea of giving up control and putting their fate in somebody else’s hands to some extent scares them. But you shouldn’t fear collaboration because it’s one of your best tools for growth. If you can find other businesses that complement your own, you’ll both benefit from a collaboration. They’ll have a whole load of customers that you can reach easily and vice versa so it’s definitely worth looking into.
These mistakes often make it difficult to grow but if you can solve those problems, you’ll find it easier to expand.
