Can You Handle The Growth?

Sometimes it comes overnight, while other times it takes years. But either way, when your business suddenly starts to boom, it can be an exhilarating and wonderful feeling. It also can be a nightmare.

How are you going to handle the increase in customers? How will the business be able to service the regular customers? Will your employees be able to keep up with the new initiatives and suddenly expanding business? Will you get any sleep?

These are just a few things to worry about as you suddenly have double, triple, quadruple the number of orders coming in for your product or service. Yet, when business growth is not properly managed, it can lead to serious issues that could harm your company in the long-term, like the inability to provide quality customer service or will the product line suddenly become shoddy, giving customers an inferior product? What would happen if all those customers went online, and complained about your business? That growth could be gone in an instant, if the backlash of the experience becomes too great.

But these are good problems to have. So how do you handle rapid growth? We have provided some ways, using entrepreneurs that have experienced such growth, to ensure your company handles the sudden influx of orders.

• Empower Your Employees: One thing that will happen as soon as the orders start skyrocketing, is that you will be pulled in a thousand new directions. How can you scale? Where can you find a reliable new distributor? Who will respond to all these media calls, now that your business is suddenly hot? That’s why, for many parts of the business, you need to allow the employees do what they do. Kit Hickey, creator of Ministry of Supply, writing for Forbes said that she took her six team members and empowered them in various aspects of the business from product development to customer advocacy. By doing so, you will have a dedicated person to each aspect of your business.
• Plan For It: Often, when companies struggle with growth, it’s because they didn’t plan for it. Don’t worry about sounding like you’re ahead of the game, just because you’re laying the groundwork, in case rapid growth does hit your business. Troy Sheer of TRANCE Marketing Group told ToiletPaperEntrepreneur.com that you should always be preparing for this exact scenario. Know who you will turn to for distribution help. Know how you will control costs. Know technologies that can help you scale. By doing so, you will be ready when those order forms start flying in.
• Grow As Large As Is Necessary: Sometimes when your business is booming, there’s an outside reason, like a holiday or bad weather. Sometimes, that growth is completely coincidental. That means you must manage the growth inside your business to build only as large as you think you will grow. Joel Ohman, creator of CreditCardChaser.com, talked to MyWifeQuitHerJob.com about how sometimes companies mistake short-term growth for size that will always be there. So they hire 20 employees, but then in six months, there’s 50% of the work coming in. Make sure you’re setting your expectations while you grow.
• Embrace It: Having a thriving business that consumers or customers clamor to should be a proud moment. It’s what every business owner dreams about. So enjoy it as it’s happening. Tell your friends, family, the media, partners and clients, as they will all be proud to be apart of your growth story, which could lead to even further growth.

It’s not always easy to handle your suddenly thriving business. But make sure you use caution and planning, in order to keep the business running strong years down the line.

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