Overlooked Ways to Cultivate Growth

Maintaining your company’s growth after a successful launch can be an intimidating task. Businesses must constantly be thinking of new and unique ideas while simultaneously fostering current relationships. 

Here are four simple principles to follow that will provide a balanced approach to business success.

Avoid “Shiny Object Syndrome”
When companies focus too heavily on acquiring new business, they can completely forget about their existing customers. It’s much less expensive to maintain an existing customer relationship than it is to build a new one, so maintain regular contact with your customer base.

Set Specific Goals to Grow Revenue
Aiming for monthly growth in these three areas can be simple and effective for growing your bottom line:

• Total number of orders: Instead of concentrating on the size of orders, simply strive to grow the overall number of orders placed. If you make that initial customer connection and prove the worth of your product, growth in order size will follow suite.
• Total number of repeat customer orders: Again, it’s easier to maintain an existing customer relationship than it is to form a new one. Building strong customer relationships early and treating loyal customers well is a valuable practice.
• Total number of new customers: While it’s more difficult to gain new customers, it’s still imperative to do so. Set definite goals for your sales and customer service departments that are realistic but demand diligent work.

Don’t Save Your Way to Prosperity
Cost control may be important, but so is competitive pricing and growing your customer base. It’s worth keeping tight margins in order to maintain customer satisfaction and relationships for long term profitability.

Use Spare Time Productively
Make the effort to reach out to prospective and existing customers to learn more about them and how they perceive your company. Be sure to ask specific questions about how you can either gain their business or improve their existing customer experience.

Sean Rudner is president and CEO of StockPKG in California, a distributor of packaging supplies for businesses.