When a business is going through rapid growth it’s make or break. The market has finally taken notice of your product or service but now it’s up to you to prove that you can live up to the expectations. A rapid growth period can feel chaotic; no longer are you trying to just stay afloat but suddenly you have to paddle.
There are a lot of great ways to support businesses going through rapid growth but we’ve found that there are three concepts that help to bring focus to the goals ahead.
What Is Rapid Growth?
Rapid growth is considered to be an explosive stage in your business between early success and maturity. This explosive stage can be a dangerous time for a high-growth startup. It’s in this stage that many businesses run into system problems. The manual or lack of processes, passed-down knowledge, and employees wearing multiple hats will no longer cut it as a business goes through lots of growth. If a business fails to fix the historically overlooked problems as they grow, those same problems could cause the entire business to collapse.
But rapid growth is also a sign that your product or service is wanted and needed by the market. As more and more competitors appear, this stage is an opportunity to show the market why your high-growth startup is the best solution out there. This growth stage requires more focus and vision than any other stage.
How to Support Rapid Growth
Here are three ways to bring focus to startups going through rapid growth:
- Identify and Focus on Your Ideal Customer Profile
- Automate Everything
- Partner with a Growth-Minded Marketing Agency
There are several ways to approach rapid growth but the above tactics are designed to help a business stay focused and foster success through such a critical period.
1. Identify and Focus on Your Ideal Customer Profile
An Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) defines which company is most likely to buy and benefit from your product or service. Your ICP goes beyond just who is buying your product but who is likely to keep using your product because it is essential to their business function.
What’s the difference between an ICP and a Buyer Persona?
An ICP answers the question: “What types of companies are most likely to benefit from our product?”
A buyer persona answers the question: “Which person at a company would be the most interested in purchasing or using our product?”
Identifying your ICP is an essential step for rapid-growth businesses to take because it can help bring focus to your sales team. Instead of focusing on leads that may not be the best fit for your product or service, an ICP helps reps focus on prospects that are most likely to convert and renew. This is especially important as your go-to-market team grows. Focusing on your ICP can help to improve pipeline velocity, reduce churn, and support rapid growth.
2. Automate Everything
Companies going through rapid growth have reached a stage in their business where manual processes just won’t cut it anymore. Automation can help to reduce bottlenecks in the way your business operates. The amount of automation a business can implement grows as the business grows but here is a list of some of the basic automated processes a business should consider implementing to support its rapid growth strategy:
- Marketing Automation/CRM
- Hubspot, Marketo, Salesforce
- Sales Automation
- Outreach, Salesloft, LeadFeeder
- HR Automation
- Gusto, Lever, TalentLyft, Lessonly
- Customer Support Automation
- Zendesk, Intercom, HelpScout
- Accounting Automation
- Quickbooks, Docusign, Bill.com
Despite the associated costs with business software, implementing automation tools can help rapid-growth businesses save time and resources — ultimately reducing wasted spending.
3. Partner with a Growth-Minded Marketing Agency
One of the best ways to support growth is by partnering with a marketing agency that has the experience to help reach your goals for growth. When a business is going through rapid growth the role marketing now plays in the business becomes increasingly important. Suddenly, your marketing team is responsible for bringing in more leads and revenue than ever before. A marketing agency can help to implement a strategy designed to hit and exceed your marketing goals.
Experiencing Rapid Growth? VSSL Can Help!
An experienced marketing agency, like VSSL, can help to bring your business from startup to best-in-class. Additionally, marketing agencies can help offset some of the workloads of your in-house team. This gives your team additional support when you need it instead of waiting to hire and onboard new team members. But beyond the day-to-day support, a marketing agency can help to drive strategy to focus on getting you past the growth stage.
Here are some marketing strategies an agency can help support during a period of rapid growth:
- Paid Media
- Social Media
- SEO
- Marketing Operations
- Marketing Strategy
- Website Rebranding
High-growth startups will only make it out of the startup stage if they have the focus and vision to stay on track. If your company is going through rapid growth and in need of a growth-minded marketing agency, let’s chat.