Let’s face it: owning a business is hard, never mind trying to think up the best strategies possible for preserving and promoting the growth of a start-up. When businesses are new, they are especially fragile. Anything could go wrong.
Growth – manageable growth – is always the goal to bring your small business face-to-face with some of the big names. But what does growth mean and how do we achieve it? Most of growth comes from planning and ensuring our businesses can keep their doors open for years to come.
To help you out a little, here are 5 of the best strategies for protecting and preserving your start-up, as well as promoting manageable growth.
Research your field.
It isn’t a bad idea to get the ball rolling on market research before you actually make any initial business ventures. Research the field, demographics of your audiences, and use this information to craft an accurate business plan.
More than that, researching the field will help you to stand out from the competition. By understanding the trends, you can make small tweaks to your business venture to really stand out on competitive landscape and add additional value for your possible future customers.
Make connections.
Sometimes, the best way to get started in an industry or a field is to forge connections. You may be surprised at the sort of relationships you will make – whether that’s hiring a new contractor or simply meeting a more experienced business professional who can give you some insight on how your field, the competition, and some tips and tricks. Who knows? You may even forge a partnership that can benefit both parties later down the line.
Don’t burn bridges. Often, word gets around in tight industries and fields, and you might very well need to work with the same person again in the near future. This includes past employees, employers, partners, and even competitors.
Get insured.
This should go without saying but depending on your industry you may be required to purchase small business insurance. Even if there is no legal obligation for you to carry coverage, it is highly recommended as technically anything could happen on the job and, for particularly fragile businesses, one substantial financial loss could mean closing your doors for good.
Depending on your business ventures, you may need anything ranging from your classic general liability insurance to all the odds and ends – equipment breakdown insurance, business interruption, commercial auto insurance, or even cyber liability. With the right insurance and the right coverage at a small added expense, you may be able to save your business from suffering huge financial losses – losses of the sort that could put you out of work, for good. You would never want to have to cut your dreams short after only just getting started. Shop around for a quote that fits your needs or consult with a professional commercial insurance broker that can get one for you.
Set (tangible) goals.
It’s time to start goal-setting. Keep your goals reasonable and manageable; not everything is possible all at once, but you want to have an idea of where you are heading. This comes with good research, financial analysis, and overall determining who your target customer is. What are their needs? Their requirements? Their budgets?
When it comes to goals, you may want to have an idea of what your growth will look like in a few years, what your marketing plans will look like, and partnerships you might forge. Write your goals down.
At this time, it might even be a good idea to think up a possible exit strategy. A good business plan may include an exit strategy – even one with multiple routes.
Assess your finances.
Starting a business requires money. You may want to conduct a break-even analysis to determine the absolute minimum you will need to achieve in order to prevent your business from losing money. Determine your profitability and then ask yourself how much revenue you will require to cover each and every one of your expenses. Then, price your product or service. Consider your fixed rates, total costs, variable costs, etc. Don’t forget about material and labour expenses! Finally, analyze your data. How much do you need to sell in order to be profitable?
Chances are, if your business is just starting out you may want to consider supplementing your initial capital by a variety of means. Depending on several factors, such as how much you need, options available to you, and your creditworthiness, you may have several options for acquiring funding for your start-up business. These may include any of the following,
- A business loan or grant. You can acquire a commercial loan via a bank, even while this can oftentimes prove difficult. As an alternative, you can opt for online small business loans offered by private lenders. You may even find some success applying for a loan through grants, although this can be competitive. Try to find grants that are specific to you, such as women-owned business grants, government grands, or minority-owned business grants.
- Crowdfunding. You can launch a kickstarter or crowdfunding campaign to try and raise a lesser amount of funds from a variety of supporters. In recent years, kickstarters have proven to have massive success, as there are so many reliable crowdfunding platforms out there for various kinds of businesses.
- Investors. You may want to bring on an investor if your goals require significant funding from the get-go. Investors may offer several millions of dollars or even more to a beginning company, so long as the expectation is there that they will have some kind of role in the way that your business operates.
All in all, running a small business, ensuring you can steadily grow, and generating revenue is hard work. Hopefully, these tips helped you out and you have a better idea of how you can keep expanding without worrying about all your future plans falling apart!
