8 Steps to Get Your Business Out of a Rut
Most business owners want to invest in their company in order for it to expand. In the early days, you may see exponential growth; people are learning about your company for the first time, they’re having positive first impressions, and the novelty of your brand is still fresh enough to help it spread.
This is both thrilling and reassuring, since it opens up new revenue streams while also supporting the existence of your business concept.
But what happens when this expansion reaches a halt?
Fortunately, there are numerous small business growth tactics you may employ to resurrect your company and re-establish its momentum.
Is Your Business Stagnated?
First, determine whether your company’s growth has genuinely stalled. Most organizations experience activity cycles, which include busy and sluggish periods. They also tend to fluctuate in response to economic conditions; if the broader economy is in a slump, it’s only reasonable to see a little decline in sales or no growth.
If you’ve seen a flattening in sales for more than six months, or if you’re observing stalled momentum in a variety of areas, your firm has reached a plateau. This isn’t a strict rule because different industries have varied growth rates and paths to expansion, but it’s still crucial to think long term when considering your company’s growth.
Tactics to Try
So, what strategies can you employ if your company’s growth has completely stalled?
- Set the right goals (and expectations). Take a look at your current goals and expectations, and be willing to reset them. There’s a chance that your perceived stagnation is only the result of poor expectations, supported by a goal that never made sense for your business in the first place. How fast should you be growing, exactly? And keep in mind that if your business grows too fast, that can also be a problem. With better goals and expectations in place, your plateau may no longer look as intimidating.
- Get outside perspective. Try to get some outside perspective on your business. Depending on your access to resources and how long you’ve been in business, that could mean talking to a mentor, hiring a consultant, or just getting some fresh people into the team. Outside observers will be able to provide a more unbiased take on how your business works and what it could be missing.
- Change up the leadership. Businesses are strongly dependent on leadership to drive growth and support operations. If things aren’t going your way, consider changing that leadership up. That could mean hiring new people to serve as managers and directors, or it could simply mean changing the perspectives and attitudes of the leaders you already have in place. In any case, change is a practical requirement if you want your business to get back on its feet.
- Focus on innovation. Even a single prominent innovation could be enough to spark new life and new growth into your business. Make sure you make innovation a focal point for your business; encourage your staff members to come up with new ideas on a regular basis, and direct plenty of funding for the research and development of new products and services.
- Analyze your competitors. If you’re suffering from slow growth, take a look at your competition. If you notice that all of your competitors are struggling in the same way, this could be an industry wide problem. If there’s one competitor who seems to be thriving in this environment, try to figure out what it is they’re doing differently. Copying your competitors may not be the correct approach, but at the very least, you can learn something from them.
- Ask your customers for advice. Your customers are the lifeblood of your business, so ask them what they think about it. Are they happy with the services and products they’ve received? Is there more that your business could be doing for them?
- Get to a new market. You can also try to kickstart your business’s growth by getting to a new market. For example, you could try to reach a new demographic with a new line of products, or you could physically expand to a new geographic area.
- Periodically reassess. Take the time to reassess your goals and your progress toward those goals. Things change quickly in the business world, so you have to remain adaptable.
These strategies may not be able to lift your company out of a rut right away, and some of them may not be a good fit for your brand in particular. However, as long as you continue to experiment and push your firm ahead, you should be able to restore and revitalize the momentum that brought you here.
