10 Quick Tips to Grow Your Business

10 Quick Tips to Grow Your Business

Nancy Becher

You had a dream…you wanted to be your own boss. You wanted the freedom and the money to do the things you wanted in your life and to do them without being controlled by someone else. The boss. You were passionate about what you wanted to create, who you wanted to help and why you wanted to do it. And so you set out to run your own business.

Sound familiar? If you consider yourself to be a successful business owner, I know you started out just like that. Your dream began and you were so excited. You got your business cards, your Facebook (and other social media) pages, and you created – a job. And not only did you create a job, but one that took LOTS and LOTS of time, and LOTS and LOTS of money. Only to get not so much in return.

I’m guessing this took a long time, too. Right? Great deals of money were spent on hiring those gurus, the experts that told you they could turn you into an overnight success, only working 4 hours a week. Others touted that they had been living in their cars and then six months later were generating 6 and 7 figure incomes. If they could do it, you could too. You bought into those promises, built up your ego knowing that you were just about to turn the corner, and then nothing. Or less than nothing.

Four out of five businesses close within the first year of operation. Generally because they don’t have the monetary backing to do what’s necessary to keep the doors open. Here’s where it gets deep. Why don’t they? They might make the best widget in the world, but have they priced it right for the market? Do people know the seller exists and do they want what s/he has to sell? When a business doesn’t take the time to do the work needed to create a business (not just the production of the product or service), then the business is eventually going to fail.

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“CREATE A ROAD MAP”

There are things you can do to give yourself better odds on creating a business that is going to last. Here are 10 Quick Tips to Grow Your Business:

1. Create a roadmap of where you want to be in 5 years. This gives you a direction to focus on and helps steer your course.

2. Create both long-term goals and the short steps it takes to move yourself along the road towards those goals.

3. Put no more than 3 things on your daily to-do list. Don’t make them so complicated that you’ll never complete them, but at the same time, make them important enough that they will truly lead you towards that ultimate goal.

4. Take time to be with mentors who can advise you on right ways and wrong ways of doing the work to get you where you want to be. Don’t just hook up with someone who will give you permission to do (or not do) what you want, but find someone who is willing to spend time and energy really working with you to support your business success.

5. Have face-to-face meetings with other like-minded colleagues rather than just always communicating via social media. When you actually sit down with someone and get to know them, their businesses and what they want to happen for themselves, you will see similarities,

you are better able to understand and share the good, bad and ugly of business and in the end you find that you have stronger relationships built than you ever get with just online connections.

6. WRITE IT DOWN. When you write something down, you don’t forget. It sticks in your mind and you can look back at it and say “Oh yeah. I promised to do that”, etc. There is a form of accountability to yourself in that as well. When you put it down you can’t ignore something as easily as if you just had it in your mind at some point or another.

7. Writing is good for to-dos, for thoughts, for any number of things, but when you journal that’s a bit different. Journaling is a great way to open your mind to internal thoughts and feelings that you might not even know you were having. So, journal.

8. At least once a week, look back over the past 7 days and see what successes – big and small – have occurred. You can also look at things that didn’t occur but do not do so with negativity. Ask yourself how you felt about what happened or didn’t happen. Did you feel happy, frustrated, joyful, etc. This is also something to be written down.

9. Although it is often said to not spend a lot of time on social media, spend at least an hour a day visiting groups that are important to your business.

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Don’t do any selling, but read the comments and posts of others. Comment and ask questions. This is a great way for people to start to get to know you and to build relationships online. While 5 above says to have in person meetings, you also need to share online and to grow your network that way as well.

free you up to be the person you wanted to be and have the things you wanted to have when you originally started. It’s when you get to number 10 that you know you’ve made it and are now SOARING HIGHER!

10. And finally, when you get to the point where you are really overwhelmed because business is good – there’s just

SO much to do and you’re feeling like a juggler dropping those balls everywhere, it’s time to create the processes and strategies (including outsourcing or hiring) that will finally

Nancy Becher dreams of a world that runs on the vibrancy of thousands of small businesses, all working together, making money and living in great supportive communities.

As an author, journalist and business consultant for more than 30 years, she has worked with hundreds of companies – large and small (throughout the United States and internationally) -- helping them create strategies and processes that are built to give them more revenues, less stress and raving fans. While knowing that starting and growing a business is hard work, she also believes that there needs to be fun involved and her approach to helping others is to share with them the concept of not waiting “till pigs fly” to get out there and get started. Her first book “Baby Steps to Starting (and Running) Your Own Business” will be out early fall. Practical tips and techniques can be found on her website at www.dontwaittilpigsfly.com.

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