Once you’ve decided it’s the right time to scale, your team is in place, and your goals are set, it’s time to look at your greater business strategy.

Growing to scale will put your business strategy under more pressure than ever before. It’s not the time to gloss over issues and assume the kinks will work out as you grow. Take a closer look at every variable: infrastructure, operations, systems, products, services, and — especially — your budget. 

If there are any weaknesses in the way your business runs today, scaling will only magnify them. Set aside the time to turn your business inside out and make sure you can truly support sudden growth. Before you even consider how to scale, your marketing should already run like a well-oiled machine.

Scale back before you scale up. Examine your current processes to see where you can streamline, and determine which marketing efforts are generating a positive ROI. You have to audit what is taking place and where the strengths and weaknesses are. Being able to scale successfully means knowing what attracts and retains the customers you’ve already acquired and leveraging that knowledge for growth that’s sustainable. Identify process gaps that already exist and come up with a business strategy to address these before they turn into process chasms that cause you immense problems farther down the line. If something isn’t working with 10 staff and 50 customers, how will you cope with 100 staff and 5,000 customers? 

It is time to take a hard look inside your business to see if you are ready for growth. You can’t know what to do differently unless you take stock of where your business stands today. Try to think of everything. You’ll need to do some hard thinking and research to come up with proper cost estimates, but doing so will improve your plan. Spend time looking at the marketing systems and processes that are working for you, as well as those that aren’t, because extra strain will be felt across the board. Cut back on what’s not working. If you are scaling up, it’s time to get serious about processes.

The stages of scaling. Learn more here.

Some businesses are easier to scale than others. A truly scalable business is one that keeps low marginal costs while increasing revenue and works efficiently with less involvement from the business owner. Here are some examples:

• Software — A classic and obvious example of a scalable business. Once the product is ready, additional copies can be released with minimal extra cost. By adding monthly recurring revenues to your pricing model, you will set yourself for sustainable growth. For example, you could let customers buy your service every month, at a rate per user. They will use the software and you will have a monthly income stream 
• Social media — Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn. It seems like any new platform for sharing photos and impressions is welcomed. Social media platforms/apps help with reaching lots of people or potential customers. 
• Downloads — Digital music, books, games, and applications are similar to software’s scalability. An app, once launched, can be downloaded thousands of times a day. A white paper can be created once and added to a website landing page for downloading. More and more people will pay for such products, but you only have to put time and energy into creating them once. 
• E-commerce and events — Any product or service provided via the internet is scalable. Because of their digital (and hence easily reproducible) nature, information business, webinars, and many kinds of consulting services can be delivered to a mass of people using only a computer’s camera and microphone and an inexpensive program such as Zoom, Skype, Facetime, etc. Potential and current customers subscribe to attend a webinar and pay a fee for it. You only spend an hour or two to create the event, and profit from hosting it. 
• Line production and franchising — Most processes of line commodity production are automated. The net cost is relatively low (although you always must keep an eye on the quality). Never let down client expectations — that would undermine their loyalty. When a person comes to McDonald’s, they want the same Big Mac they had the previous time. Ray Kroc set a standard down to the smallest specifications, including weight, sauce amount, and fat content in every burger. You can set similar standards for your business that makes it both manageable and scalable. 

Become a Successful Scaleur

Scaling is a business strategy that can only be mastered by a scaleur who is a dedicated learner and considers real-time business priorities. I hope the article above has helped! Marketing Scaleurs is a scaling company that helps entrepreneurs scale their marketing efforts. We’re experts in growth marketing, product development, and more, creating custom growth plans for startups, entrepreneurs and scaleurs in order to help them gain traffic, generate leads and increase their revenue. 

If you want traffic, leads and sales, get in touch and you’ll start getting results in no time!