When you start a business you first focus on: Planning, Hiring, Training, Product Creation, Management and Marketing -usually in that order. But prior to launch, you work on all of them at once.
Since all elements must be in place in order to have a business, you then set all of them up.
After launching, however, you then keep working on all of them at once, since they are all important, right?
Well, not exactly.
All of them are important, but once your business is up, you focus on ONE action at any given time, depending on where your sales are.
You go through all of the elements in cycles, in a virtuous cycle that, if done right, will let you ride an upward spiral of sales.
See my formula below showing what you should focus based on your volume of sales:
If Sales Are… |
You Focus On… |
Low
|
Marketing |
Stable |
Management and Customer Service |
Growing |
Up selling and High End Services
|
Booming |
Growing your team and Taking your Business One Level Up |
“The Cycle”
If sales are low, odds are, people don’t even know you exist.
Find ways to let them know you’re in business, and let them find you, with a smart permanent strategy. This will let potential customers know about you and the value you can give to them.
Keep in mind that Marketing will only be effective if you have a clear understanding of your market and the value that you are providing. If you have that right, you can craft your message and then it is just a matter of finding the right marketing channels for your desired audience.
Effective marketing should result in a boost in sales. If it does not, then you need to address either you marketing materials, your marketing channels or the value you are providing.
After marketing, you move forward to taking care of customers.
You find ways to know if everything is ok with their expectations, results and satisfaction, and make sure all possible issues get handled by installing corresponding systems to take care of them.
When management is smooth and sales are growing, you then switch to better ways to add value to your customers. This can be done by up-selling existing customers or creating higher end services. Think of one on one coaching, consulting services or sessions.
If all of the above goes well, you then have booming sales, which allows to shift focus on reinventing your operating platform, and plan for getting on the next level. You hire, train, create higher end products.
You then do the cycle again, starting with marketing, then management, then up-sell, then grow.
Remember, the key is to focus on ONE element at a time, based on your sales level, and then keep moving to the next task as sales grow. If sales don´t grow, you stay on that activity until they do and keep the cycle going.
If this makes sense to you and would like to keep learning business frameworks like this, just join my email list by entering your name and email on the form on your right.
Until next time.