02 Dec How to Scale Your Business
Posted at 06:57h
in 3PL, FBA PREP, FULFILLMENT, LOGISTICS, SHIPPING & RECEIVING, Uncategorized, WAREHOUSE
The 4 Steps To Scale Fast
Whether it’s a side hustle, or you’re starting your business from the ground up – it’s no small task to get things off the ground. Congrats formaking it this far! If you’re like many entrepreneurs, you’ve learned as you’ve gone, and have maximized what you can do without making significant changes. If you want to scale, you can’t do it alone. Wearing all the hats will hold you back from significant growth. That minimal overhead mentality has kept your profits as high as possible, however, that’s ultimately what’s holding you back. To grow your business you MUST:
- Increase customers
- Increase the amount of money customers spend per transaction
- Increase the frequency at which they purchase
So how do we improve on those? There are four steps that I want to give to you to scale your business, so that you can avoid all of the painful lessons that I went through in scaling mine.
STEP 1 – Implement A Formula for Your Marketing Efforts
You can hit all three of those by doing one thing, and that’s called skew widening. In a nutshell, that’s having supplementary products to offer with a product a customer is already purchasing. Product A would be your standalone product. Typically, you want to focus on your best sellers. Product B, or complimentary products, that support product A and provide more value. Product C are extension products. This is stuff like swag, merchandise, think of like, hoodies and T-shirts and stuff like that. Product A is going to increase the number of customers that you’re getting in. Product B is going to increase the amount that they’re going to spend with you. And C level products are going to make sure that your loyal customers are coming back to you, again and again. If you do that well….you have hit all 3 ways to grow in one shot.
STEP 2 – Implement A Playbook To Run Your Business
When you’re just starting out, you should implement systems StandardOperating Procedures. Think of this as a playbook to run your business. This is a playbook that you hand off to an employee that you just hired that can run the day-to-day operations of the company. This is important to help you scale. You should create a checklist for each area of your business. A checklist on how to run your customer service. Checklist on how to find manufacturers. A checklist with how to do project research. A checklist on how to launch new products. And it gives your new employees a way to run the business without you micromanaging it, and without keeping everything in your head. What’s also special about this? Employees are more engaged when they can excel without you involved every step of the way. Teach them and let them fly.
This playbook, you can hand off to a buyer if you end up going to sell your business. It makes the business more valuable. So you can hand off the business, without what they call golden handcuffs. Where someone buys a business from you, but because you’re so intertwined into the day-to-day operations, you now work for them.
STEP 3 – Find Rockstar Employees
The third way that you can grow your business and scale it extremely fast, is by finding rockstar employees. So find people who are better in certain areas of the business than you are. You are probably very good at certain aspects of the business. And you certainly have weaknesses too. Maybe you’re the numbers person. Or the salesperson. Or the visionary. Or the details person.
Your likely not all of them. Play to your strengths and hire to your weaknesses.
STEP 4 – Elevate The Customer Experience
Amazon is the ultimate case study on the customer experience. Every decision is made with the customer in mind. Use that as your template. Your customer is EVERYTHING. Elevate the customer experience. Build a brand, a global brand that can withstand competition. Most good products get knocked off. But brands don’t.
So elevating the customer experience would mean, providing value after they make a purchase. Sending them emails on how to get the most out of our products, giving them testimonials of here’s how this person is using their product in a different in different ways. Share advice, how-to, getting started guides, videos, any way to elevate the value of the product that they just purchased. Also, provide supplemental products to increase customer loyalty and your bottom line.
Another simple but effective thing that you can do is add your customers into a social media group. By putting them into a social grouping, they are now surrounded by a community of people just like them. And they are staying engaged with your brand.
TAKEAWAYS
Start with scaling in mind as soon as possible. Don’t create systems that only exist when you do everything. You will need employees to scale. Get your SOP created so the business can run smoother without you. Find employees who excel in your weakness which allow you more time to thrive in your strengths. You then start removing yourself from the business, so the business becomes an asset for you, rather than a full-time job. And above all else, treat your customer well and keep them engaged in your brand. Good Luck!
Follow these four steps and scale your business, fast! If you find you are outgrowing your garage, need more warehouse space, or a logistics team to help you scale, click the button below to view our services and pricing, or chat with a team member for more information.