Creating a business growth plan is essential for any company that wants to increase its revenue and expand its reach. It helps to establish clear goals, identify potential challenges, and implement strategies to overcome them.
As an entrepreneur, you certainly have a bigger picture of where you want your business to be in the near future. Before any growth planning happens, it’s vital to know what success means to you. To achieve a set of business goals, you’ll need alignment with your team. Having a growth plan that defines the strategies to implement helps achieve your goals and keeps you true to your purpose, becoming the inspiration for your employees and other stakeholders in your business.
With a detailed business growth plan, you can achieve clarity knowing where to focus and what the profitable opportunities are to prioritize first, how to recognize the lessons from past experience and what to avoid to prevent future losses, to further penetrate the market, minimize future risks, and increase revenue streams. Keeping you accountable, a business plan helps monitor progress at every step affording measurable accountability and to ensure no stone has been left unturned in the effort to reach the agreed goals. Planning and preparation is to power your business for unmatched growth.
That said, here are six steps to follow when creating a business growth plan:
Assess your current performance
Evaluating your overall business performance and target market gives insights into where your organization currently stands. One of the ideal ways to do that is by conducting a SWOT analysis which defines your key strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Essentially, this gives you a clear picture of your current and future potential. This way, you can plan how to capitalize on various business opportunities using your strengths and methods to eliminate threats by rectifying weak points.
Work with the right growth partner
Growth is a process, and making complex decisions on your own can be overwhelming. Therefore, it’s best to alleviate future barriers to growth by working with professionals who can help you achieve your desired business objectives faster.
A growth partner has the technical expertise to support your growth plan by ensuring you choose and implement effective strategies that make sense for suit your business growth stage. For instance, a partner like Beyond Points can actively work with you to identify the right marketing opportunities and craft creative and original campaigns suited to your specific product or service. With a wealth of experience behind in the organisation, they identify what makes sense strategically for your growth goals, growing your ability to grow returning customers and engaging and memorable brand experiences, profitably.
Outline and get clarity on targeted growth options
Unlike the typical business plan, a marketing plan addresses growth opportunities. Deep diving into a customized SWOT analysis is a start to identifying opportunities and key areas of expansion. Here are some business growth strategy examples for your consideration:
- Diversification: Product line expansions or development of new commodities to meet demand.
- Channel Strategy:Strength of brand visibility, community and responsiveness.
- E-Commerce Economics: Understanding profit, cash flow and inventory management.
- Market expansion:You may want to introduce your product or services in other regions to target new customers. This requires efficient market penetration strategies to win prospective buyers and drive sales.
Note that some of these initiatives are mutually beneficial. For instance, intensifying your marketing paid and organic campaigns will attract more customers and increase revenue.
Proof of Product and MVP
Knowing you are providing a solution for a real-world problem is key and of course, contributing to a relevant cause. today this is becoming vital by consumer demand. Market research and audits to leverage existing data are excellent ways to determine whether this is true or false. It’s possible to gather information using small scale paid social media tests, surveys and interviews, and analyze the data to unveil industry trends or learn more about customer behavior. Being clear of your competitive analysis and how it’s received by your target market will have a strong influence on your product market fit. Generally, the findings you uncover at this stage influence the strategic direction and type of goals.
Write attainable growth goals
Based on the above findings, you can clearly define objectives based on reality. Outline your short-term targets and long-term growth goals knowing in today’s economy one needs to be fluid and flexible, ready to pivot and adjust to the changing macro environment. Goals are key to actualizing and accomplishing your growth plan and should be smart and measurable:
- Measurable:Quantifiable goals should be measurable and trackable – hint numbers to shoot for so you can recognize when the team gets close to or completes the milestones.
- Achievable:Set realistic targets that you’re able to deliver and specify any roadblocks.
- Relevant:Ensure your goals relate to the core growth objective or a particular skill.
- Time-bound:This gives you a timeline for attaining a specific goal. For instance, you can set quarterly targets for acquiring new clients.
Include information on your growth tools
Next, list the growth tools you’ll leverage to fuel your expansion. They include:
- Funding requirements:The capital you’ll need to fund your expansion and how you’ll get it. For instance, you can elaborate on ways to connect with potential investors or consider the need for partnerships.
- Technology tools:The digital tools you’ll require to improve efficiency. You’d want to collaborate with e-commerce growth partners with long-term experience supporting online brands’ growth for a clear and strategic roadmap.
- Marketing tools:How your marketing strategies evolve as you scale to ensure increased levels of customer engagement.
- Human Resources: Ensure you have the human capital to grow.
Implement your business growth plan
Apply what you have on paper to your day-to-day business operations. Also, reviewing your growth plan from time to time is vital to track your progress and set yourself up for success.
Conclusion
A business growth plan brings the difference between success and stagnation. With the right business growth mindset, knowing the reason you wake up every day with clear strategic direction will keep you on track to domination and crushing the competition. Keeping yourself accountable as the business leader firstly, realistically evaluating current performance, preparing to take on growth opportunities, staying within realistic time frames, and supporting team with growth tools, should ensure your plan is successfully put into action.
There’s a lot to think about as a business founder or co-founder. Reaching that first million-dollar revenue goal and moving swiftly forward to manage the growth into multi-millions can be demanding as much as it is rewarding. Being supported by the right growth partners and a team who appreciate your long-term growth plans and goals can alleviate the pressure and allow time to enjoy the journey on your way to your success destination.
Remember, a business growth plan is a living document and should be reviewed and revised regularly to ensure it remains relevant and effective.
References
- “The Importance of SWOT Analysis”, Source: https://medium.com/dlt-labs-publication/the-importance-of-swot-analysis-2ae85762f4b8/
- “10 Business Growth Strategies: What, You Can GROW Out of Business?”, Source: https://medium.com/swlh/10-business-growth-strategies-what-you-can-grow-out-of-business-eb6032ea639b
- “Market Research”, Source: https://www.entrepreneur.com/encyclopedia/market-research
- “A Guide to Goal Setting”, Source: https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/188454
