Becoming “scalable ready” means that a company has the capacity to grow its operations and revenue significantly. Many company leaders think that if they can get more business and they have good cash flow for a couple of months, they’re scalable ready.
When sales are continuously rising, it’s tempting to scale based on projections. However, if your anticipated sales don’t happen as quickly as you thought, the market shifts, and you don’t have enough reserves, you have just taken on more overhead.
Additionally, your sales will have an impact on operations. If you have a lot of sales but your back office operations rely on manual systems, your attempts to scale will have negative outcomes.
Before you jump on your desire to scale, remember these 9 tips:
1. Plan for scalability: Scaling requires careful planning and execution because a change in one area of your business will impact other areas. If you don’t carefully plan, you’ll be dealing with customer service and employee relations issues.
2. Build a strong foundation: A scalable company needs to have a solid foundation in terms of your company’s infrastructure, systems, and processes. This includes not only having robust and scalable IT systems, streamlined workflows, standardized operating procedures, but those processes should align with your company’s Contribution, Vision, Mission, and Values.
3. Define a scalable business model: A scalable business model is one that can accommodate growth without requiring proportional increases in resources. There are many ways to build a sustainable and scalable business model. If you’re a service-based company, you may create products. If you’re a product-based company, you may create a service. At our Wake Up Profitable Boot Camp, where we teach a systems approach to scaling, we look at the best way each company can scale but also how the scaled model will impact your operations.
For many companies, scaling doesn’t mean making a big investment either. There may be assets you’re not using or not using as well as you could that will benefit your company. One of our clients created a consulting arm from her product-based business, not only adding another income stream but increasing the lifetime value of each client.
4. Develop a compelling value proposition: A company needs to clearly articulate its value proposition to customers and differentiate itself from competitors. One way to do that is to create your Signature Asset. A signature asset is a unique model, program, process, or system that defines your approach and distinguishes you from all others that have similar products and services.
5. Focus on market validation: Validating the demand for the company’s products or services in the target market is crucial before scaling. This may involve conducting market research, piloting the business model in a smaller market, testing different marketing strategies, and refining the product-market fit.
6. Build a strong team: Having a skilled and motivated team is essential for scalability. How do you build an effective team? By understanding their innate human wiring and learning how to align their natural wiring with how you need that position executed is a game changer when scaling a business. When you understand the environment in which they best thrive, you can align people with your positions, keep them highly engaged, and increase satisfaction and productivity.
7. Be Fiscally Fit. Scaling typically requires an investment so be sure you secure adequate funding or save enough in your reserves. To be funding-ready, create solid key performance indicators that are reviewed regularly. If you can show a lender that you’re responsible in managing your numbers, they are more likely to fund your next level growth.
8. Embrace technology: Use technology to automate processes, streamline operations, and enhance customer experiences. This may include adopting cloud-based systems, data analytics, apps, and other technologies that can drive efficiency and effectiveness. These solutions also don’t have to be expensive to be effective.
9. Focus on customer success: Satisfied customers are more likely to be loyal and refer others to the company, which can fuel growth. Ensuring excellent customer service, delivering value, and building strong customer relationships can help drive customer success and support scalability. Remember to give your biggest fans an opportunity to support you, by asking them to leave a review.
By following these tips and setting up a continuous improvement culture, your company will increase its scalability readiness, and position itself for sustained growth.
Invitation
If you are inspired to learn the Entrepreneurial Edge System’s approach to scaling your business, join us for the Wake Up Profitable Boot Camp for Business Owners on April 25-26, 2023. Walk out with your Blueprint to Scale by registering today at https://www.excellerateassociates.com/wake-up-profitable-boot-camp/
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