Do you want to grow your small business?

You want to grow your small business. That’s the whole point of this surely. The long days and nights are in chase of building a business from the ground up to become a local staple, a regional icon and maybe even a global phenomena. Now that’s true for some and not for others but growing your small business is part of the fun and challenge of running a business and no matter what your long term goal is, you want to always be heading in a positive direction.

The common thinking with this is to grow your business is the key priority, the thing that needs to be done in order to ensure your business is a success. While it is certainly true that a business can benefit from strong early investment, the key to growing your business is always getting your foundations in order first. 

In the current age of high inflation and a cost of living crisis that seems to be here to stay, we’ve seen many small to medium businesses across a variety of industries fall away and many larger businesses feel the pinch. The heavy investment first, ask questions later approach is no longer viable and to be perfectly honest, it never really was. 

Being realistic is the best solution in most situations and it goes double for growing your business. You may want everything all at once but in a competitive and increasingly cost-strapped marketplace, are you going to have the clients to cover the costs? Slow and steady is currently winning the race and it’s easy to see why. 

Small businesses have always been best regarded for providing a more personal and engaged service than larger brands as they have more time to cater to their smaller client list. Now is the time to hone in on that and grow your business slowly and with a clear strategy. We’ve discussed before how SEO is the perfect tool to grow your small business and that’s becoming increasingly apparent. Local SEO is perfect for small businesses as it is :

• Cheaper than other marketing
• Locally focused
• Built around what your customer is looking for
• Where your customers are

Digital marketing is the future; it is as simple as that. It’s where most of your customers are going to be, it is far more accessible than more traditional ways of advertising for small businesses and it can be done on a smaller budget. Local SEO is the perfect modern marketing tool and it allows you to grow your business the right way.

Look, this is not to say you can’t grow your business by throwing money at it until something sticks. However, in the current climate, who really has money to throw? Growing a small business in an economic downturn requires patience and being realistic. Know your business, know your customers and grow slowly over time. Earn a reputation for providing personal and professional service to your customers, increase your online presence with local SEO and build out your local network. It won’t be easy and it isn’t guaranteed but it is a far less risky strategy than taking out a business loan on a business that doesn’t really need it.

Ask yourself a simple question, do you need to grow right now and risk your business’ future or do you want to keep building one step at a time? Growing your small business isn’t a one size fits all solution and if you have a well of gold coins to dig into, by all means invest. However, the more realistic long term solution is going to be getting your ducks in a row and finding your niche that your customers want you for. Then, down the line if you do want to invest, you have a much better idea of what to put your money towards and should hopefully be in a better, more suitable position to capitalise on it.

If you want support in finding out what the strengths and weaknesses are in your small business, why not try our free 73 point business audit? We'll help you define the key points of your business and where you need to address first.