3 building blocks to scale a business effectively

Acquire new clients and customers, then hire new employees to manage them; wash, rinse, repeat

Mike Belasco //July 13, 2017//

3 building blocks to scale a business effectively

Acquire new clients and customers, then hire new employees to manage them; wash, rinse, repeat

Mike Belasco //July 13, 2017//

Most businesses have an insatiable desire to grow, yet very few are skilled at the art of scaling a business effectively.

Far too many businesses still rely on outdated growth methods. Acquire new clients and customers, then hire new employees to manage them; wash, rinse, repeat. The innate problem with that methodology is that costs increase at nearly the same rate as revenue. 

Some of the fastest growing businesses in existence have mastered the art of scaling. In other words, they’ve learned how to increase revenue exponentially, while keeping costs relatively flat.

Here are a few key components companies should consider, in order to promote massive growth. Using these techniques, Denver-based e-commerce marketing agency, Inflow, grew 3,931 percent from $70,000 to more than $2.5 million from 2006 to 2016.

1. Process Development and Documentation

Perhaps the most important building block to scaling your operations lies in replication. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel every time you hire someone new, every time you launch a new marketing campaign or every time you release a new product or service.

By establishing a library of processes and resources, you make it easy to deliver consistent products and services to your customers, without any disruption. Having systems in place is also especially helpful when onboarding and training employees.

The value in creating processes and systems is far more than just scalability; having systems in place also results in time and money savings, and also makes your business more sellable if you ever decide to employ an exit strategy.

2. Focus on Company Culture

Hiring early, often and correctly can be a huge catalyst for both short and long term business growth. Most experts agree that having (or not having) the right team in place can make or break a business.

When it comes to finding the right people, it’s important to consider more than a candidate’s skillset. Tools like the Boulder-based platform, RoundPegg, can help business owners make better hiring decisions based on culture-fit, and determine how potential candidates will fit in with the existing team.

Great performance is often attributed to great company culture. The key to creating an outstanding company culture lies equally in the leadership that creates and drives it, as well as the team that supports and perpetuates it. 

3. Automate as Much as Possible

Why spend three hours on a task, when it could be completed in less than an hour with automation?

Thanks to technology, the amount of time spent on daily tasks such as administrative work, marketing and HR can be reduced drastically, leaving your team with more time to focus on the important stuff.

Not only can automation help you save time, but it can also directly add to your bottom line. According to the Annuitas Group, businesses that use marketing automation to engage with prospects, see an increase of up to 451 percent in qualified leads.

Better yet, tools like Zapier, allow users to take two apps (MailChimp and Google Sheets, for example), and tie them together without any code. In other words, there’s even automation apps for automation apps.

Bottom line? By automating as many tasks as possible, without sacrificing engagement or personal relationships, companies can save hours per week.

Scaling Is a Learned Skill

A commitment to grow, and a willingness to learn are essential to scaling a business. If your efforts to grow exponentially have failed thus far, it’s time to take a different approach.

By focusing on systems development, company culture and automation, you’ll be charting the way for a scalable business.