When a company’s growth seems to be slowing down or hitting a plateau, it may be indicative of a bigger problem. However, it’s how you address the problem that can make or break your business.
To help, nine Young Entrepreneur Council members share their strategies for regaining momentum in your business, and explain why these strategies work so well to help reignite your growth.
Young Entrepreneur Council members share tips for regaining growth momentum.
Photos courtesy of the individual members.
1. Introduce A New Service
A great strategy for regaining some sudden growth and momentum is to introduce a new service. It can be any type of service, like personal delivery, one-on-one consulting or a new technique. This can often jump-start a flat business and create excitement among your current customers, as well as draw in new customers. Everyone will see it as a move toward growth and expansion. Adding a new service also creates a new promotion for your business on social media and other places, so it will generate talk and discussion. Be sure to offer an introductory price so people sign up for your new service right away. Sometimes, it’s best to offer it for a limited time so people feel the immediate need to sign up. You can also reserve limited spots so people will want to sign up now to benefit from it. – Baruch Labunski, Rank Secure
2. Take The Whole Team To A Conference
Conferences always give us new perspectives and the opportunity to meet new people, get new prospects and learn new things. Moreover, we see it as a way of doing a team-building activity while giving our team the chance to see another country. After a few days, they can look at the business from the outside and come back with innovative ideas. I’ve been doing this for some years, and it always works. The team always returns after a trip like this with at least one game-changing idea. – Alexandru Stan, Tekpon
3. Check In On Your Team
Take a step back and evaluate the creative and mental health of your employees. I find that a growth plateau happens when my employees experience burnout and, as a result, there is almost always a lack of creativity and momentum in the business. To fix burnout, it can be helpful to give your employees a break or sprinkle in some team bonding activities. Maybe that’s an afternoon off or a team pizza party or happy hour. Whatever it may be, your business cannot grow steadily when your employees are not happy and motivated to come to work every day. – John Hall, Calendar
4. Focus On Leading Well
When your business reaches a growth plateau, you need to take action to reignite your business growth. One way of doing that is to focus on being a good leader who truly works for success. As a good leader, you need to be someone who knows the exact market trends and customer demands. You need to start tracking and analyzing metrics and then start strategizing, investing and executing according to your business needs. Identify the loopholes in your team and try to mend them, even if it means hiring new employees. – Thomas Griffin, OptinMonster
5. Reassess Your Customer Segments
Your audience members all have unique goals, pain points and needs, and that’s what you use to segment your leads. The thing is, the needs of your customers can change over time and can alter as new subscribers join your list. Assessing your customer profiles and comparing them to how users feel during the plateau can help you create more appealing, personalized content for your audience. If used correctly, this strategy can help you push back against stagnant sales and grow your small business. – Chris Christoff, MonsterInsights
6. Consider An Acquisition Strategy
If you have hit a growth plateau in your business, you can look at pursuing growth through an acquisition strategy. Acquiring a competitor or other business in a similar industry can expand your footprint immediately and can also infuse new talent and ideas into your current operations. Oftentimes, entrepreneurs are wary of the risks of buying another company, but usually it is much less expensive than organic growth over the long term. – Jessica Fialkovich, Exit Factor
7. Get An Outside Perspective
Sometimes, it’s hard to see what’s going on in the game when you’re in the middle of the court. Get someone who is not involved with your company to give feedback on why your company may have hit a plateau. This could mean hiring a consultant, talking to an old mentor, asking customers for feedback or even hiring fresh people on the team. An outside and more objective perspective can help give an unbiased assessment of what the problem is and how you can move the company into a forward trajectory. – Shu Saito, All Filters
8. Expand Your Brand Awareness
You can conquer a growth plateau by shifting your focus toward expanding brand awareness. You have several options when deciding how to make this happen for your brand. You could optimize your content for search engines, engage with prospects on social media or even pay for ads on other well-known websites. Sometimes, all you need to do to break stagnant growth is get the word out to people who may have never heard of your business. – John Turner, SeedProd LLC
9. Restart Stalled Marketing Initiatives
Sometimes, a business needs to look inward at their marketing practices to kick-start growth. This is especially true if you feel like you’ve tried everything and have exhausted all external options. Review your successes and failures over the past year and make necessary changes. Are there any initiatives that showed promise but were never followed through with? If so, it might be time to give them another shot. The best solutions don’t have to be the most complicated ones. It could be that your original marketing campaigns are no longer as effective as they once were or that you haven’t been able to reach new markets. Evaluating what you have done in the past will give perspective on performing initiatives. – Tonika Bruce, Lead Nicely, Inc.
