Whether your venture is a recent start-up or a mature entity, it is a given that business owners and leaders must continually take steps to spur business health and vitality—in other words, growth = life. Many small businesses don’t make it past their first few years so to increase your chances of success, you have to be strategic from the very beginning. It’s important to direct your energy and resources toward actions known to work. Without a rationable straight-forward plan for growth, your business could struggle to take off and become sustainable. Presented here are five basic growth strategies, one or more which will likely work for your enterprise.

1. Increase market penetration
2. Indentify new channels
3. Introduce market segmentation
4. Develop partnerships
5. Prioritize exising customers

Market penetration

This is a fancy way of telling yourself to cultivate a thriving client roster that is populated by a mix of new, lapsed clients who’ve been enticed to return and, best of all, legacy clients you’ve worked hard to keep within the fold. Market penetration is arguably the most critical business strategy of all; Freelancers and small businesses owners and leaders would be wise to employ ongoing tactics to take aim at long-term success with the use of a good market penetration strategy.

The goal is to increase sales within your current market. This can be difficult, as it requires you to beat your competition, but appealing to your current client list is an often successful path to growing sales revenue and profits. Clients do business with those they know and like and they do more business with those they know and trust.

New selling channels

Finding new opportunities to sell your products can be an excellent way for your small business to grow, especially if your current market is highly competitive. The internet has opened up alternative selling opportunities, giving you unexpected and innovative ways to reach out to not only your existing clients but to other markets, too. For example, if your business is online-only, consider opening a pop-up shop, maybe to capture Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day shoppers. If the strategy is promising, consider devising a way to become a permanent fixture at the pop-up location. See the partnership heading below and consider the possibility of a consignment arragement with a vendor colleague whose products complement yours.

If your small business operates from a physical store, then do the reverse and consider selling certain of your products online to broaden your reach (work with a skilled product photographer who will make your products look their best). B2B service providers can perhaps bring certain of your services online—maybe coaching sessions conducted by way of videoconferencing?

Market segmentation

Here, we have another fancy term for a simple tactic. Freelancers and small business owners often struggle to get traction in large markets because it’s nearly impossible to compete with bigger and better-financed companies. They’ll out-flank you on every metric, from breadth and depth of their product line to the advertising budget. For this reason, you might need to reevaluate your brand’s place within your market and hyper-focus your preferred playing field.

Think niche. Market segmentation involves dividing a broader market into smaller groups based on demographic information or buying habits. Then, you can choose one of these segments for your niche target audience. Marketing to a highly specific group of potential customers is easier than trying to appeal broadly to a massive group.

If you offer more than one product or service, market segmentation also helps you promote different products or services to different consumer groups. Taking this marketing approach will require careful research to discover which market segments are the most likely to buy each of your products or services, so be prepared for a time-intensive process. You can use email surveys, website analytics and purchase histories to find trends in your existing customers’ demographic or behavioral traits. Once you identify the most appropriate market segments for each of your product categories, create more targeted content for potential clients.

Partnerships

Partnering with another small business gives all parties involved access to a wider audience and if all works according to plan, everyone generates more sales and makes more money. However,

You’ve gotta know who you plan to dance with because a disappointing partnership deal can get ugly and steps must be taken to avoid misunderstandings and confusion. Due diligence is imperative when proposing a partnership of some sort. It is critical that you discuss the agreement—- responsibilities of the partners and expectations for outcomes—-in advance and, ideally, in face2face meetings. Then, follow up the agreement with unambiguously written emails. Due diligence is a must- do when proposing a partnership of some sort.

The partner’s products and services should be complementary, never a competitor, to your line, to ensure their client base will have an interest in your products or services. Ideally, a partnership should significantly benefit both business ventures. A partnership can take any form, from selling items on consignment to co-hosting a full or half-day professional development conferenceto sub-contracting a portion of a project where your own expertise would fall short—providing graphic arts or videography services at an event where you are he principle player. services could be an opportunity to tackle a big project by combining your resources, and it can be a chance to connect with another professional who may be able to offer their wisdom or skills. You could work with a partner to develop a new product, or you could host an event that promotes both brands. A consignment sales arrangement is usually low-stress and can be tested quickly and easily to illustrate how partners can work together.

Current clients

One of the most ill-advised yet common strategic missteps that business owners routinely make is prioritizing new client acquisition over developing client retention protocols. Clients with whom you have a history have demonstrated their confidence in your organization and need only a little love from you and your team to secure their loyalty and future business. While there is no doubt that recruiting new customers is an essential business goal, it is in fact customer retention that is the key to business success, as we discussed above in market penetration. Convincing a client to remain (or return) to your business is far easier than convincing a new client to give you a chance. Client retention is the engine that drives sales revenue and profit. Moreover, current and returning clients are your cheerleaders and are a good source of word-of-mouth advertising.

BTW, an email marketing strategy is probably the easiest way to stay in touch with the roster of clients you regularly work with. The right call-to-action will help you persuade clients and other website or social media visitors to surrender an email address in exchange for receiving something (free) that they value, such as an interesting report, informative e-book, revealing case study, or link to a podcast or webinar in which you participated (always provide an opt-out feature).

To your curated list, you may promote your brand and yourself by sending updates about new products or services, talks you’ll give, classes you’ll teach, charity events you’ll join, special pricing deals and other relevant news. Finally, you can as well demonstrate your respect for your clients by periodially conducting (short) surveys to guage their opinions on how you address their needs and what you can do to improve the client experience.

Thanks for reading and Happy New Year. I appreciate your presence and support!

Kim

Image: This is how we do it. Window washers from a family-owned small business in Gresham, OR working for a local small business colleague. © The Oregonian March 21, 2013.