The one thing holding back your business growth | SmartPA

Whatever your industry, whatever the size of your business, whatever stage in the journey you’re at, most of us are striving for the same thing. It’s all about business growth. However you define it – increasing sales, maximising profits, strengthening your position within the market, attracting new customers or talented team members, or the much sought-after magic combination of all the above – most would agree that business growth is the key to ensuring any business has a real future.

With this in mind, we set out to uncover the best ways to aid business growth and reveal the number one thing holding many businesses back. The answer is surprisingly simple…

Top 10 ways to boost business growth

Who better to provide us with a valuable insight into business growth than our clients? SmartPA has worked with more than 5,000 businesses right across the world. Their unique experiences, advice, and results from tried-and-tested methods have contributed to our top 10 ways to boost business growth.

1. Hire the right people: Having a loyal and dedicated team behind you that genuinely understands where you’re going makes all the difference. The alternative of regularly recruiting replacements costs time and money, and can seriously affect team morale too.
2. Get to know your core customers: What makes them tick? How can you nurture their needs? What will inspire their loyalty? Sometimes the best way to gauge this is just to ask them directly, so request honest feedback and reviews.
3. Draw up a plan of action and keep everyone on the same page: Whether it’s business goals, marketing plans or sales targets – everyone needs a clear focus.
4. Ensure your customer experience is the best it can be: Perfect your customer service by anticipating, meeting, and exceeding your customers’ needs wherever possible.
5. Keep an eye on your competitors: Think about what they are doing, as well as what they are not doing and stick to your vision of how you differentiate your brand from theirs.
6. Know your numbers: Ensure you’re always up to date with all business financials such as margin, profit, tax, and outstanding invoices.
7. Share your story: Spend time on social media spreading your brand message and connecting with existing and potential new customers. Read our Q&A with our founder about the growth journey of our virtual assistant business.
8. Network: Whether it’s online or in-person, network, mingle, chat, and connect. Be open to advice, ask questions, and share your experience. You never know, these simple exchanges could lead to valuable strategic partnerships in the future.
9. Contribute to the bigger picture: Cement your business’s reputation for making an essential and meaningful impact by help the wider community or doing your bit for charity.
10. Be open to change: Be flexible and adaptable when you need to be. Be open to the prospect of diversifying if necessary and keep refining what you do.

What’s holding you back?

Each of these steps is a simple, straightforward, common-sense idea. So why are so many businesses not fulfilling each one and maximising their business growth?

For countless companies, the number one thing holding back their business growth is a lack of time. We’ve seen it repeatedly here at SmartPA – businesses that have the potential, talent, confidence, and creativity to action each of these points, but that just don’t have the time to fully commit to doing so.

But whilst no one can magically stop the clocks, thankfully there is a simple way of effectively creating extra time so you can focus on achieving these 10 steps.

The easiest way to create extra time

The easiest way to create extra time is to start by recognising the true value of yours. If you’re getting bogged down in the day-to-day nitty gritty admin of running a business when you’d rather be focusing on the bigger picture and maximising business growth, it’s worth considering handing over these responsibilities to a professional who will complete these administrative tasks quickly and efficiently.

Read our blog on how admin is impacting your business productivity.

Whether it’s admin support, bookkeeping, or email and diary management for example, outsourcing a virtual personal assistant to manage these tasks will free up a sizeable chunk of your time. And knowing that all these admin duties will be completed to a high standard by a trained professional will give you the peace of mind and clarity needed to direct your own energy into something much more productive.

How SmartPA can aid your business growth

SmartPA specialises in providing a wide range of administration and back-office support services. Every one of our SmartPAs goes through an intensive eight-week exclusive training and accreditation programme which ensures their admin services are world-class and that your business is in safe hands.

We spend time drilling down into the details of our clients’ businesses to get an in-depth understanding of their goals, processes, and work culture, before integrating seamlessly with their existing systems. We tailor packages to suit each client’s unique business needs. And with no time wasted on recruitment or inductions, our highly trained executive virtual assistants can jump straight in when required and start saving you time, right from the get-go.

Discover more

To discover where your business is losing valuable time and how SmartPA’s virtual assistants can help you on the way to maximising your business growth, get a free tailored quote by contacting us today.