Want big business growth?  Start here by answering these 6 simple questions!

Think that it sounds too simple?

Think again!

The secret to big business growth is increasing sales.  And, increasing sales comes down to having a simplified sales strategy.

That's exactly what these 6 questions intend to do... they help you simplify your sales strategy, so you can get on the path of growing.

Still skeptical?  You don't have much to lose!

Answer these 6 questions if you want to see your company grow like never before.

What is Most Important for Business Growth?

Two things are most important for business growth:

1. ​Increasing sales
2. Simplicity

First off, business growth comes down to one thing: Increasing your revenue.

While there are several different types of business growth, including market penetration and diversification to name a few, they all come back to increasing revenue.

And, how is revenue increased?  By increasing sales!

Sales is at the heart of business growth.  If you can't increase your sales, you can't increase your revenue, and you can't grow in whatever way you are looking to.

Therefore, regardless of how good you think your existing sales strategy is, you should reflect on it if you're looking to enter a high growth stage. 

But, what's the key to a perfect sales strategy?

The second most important part of business growth is simplicity.  It is also the key to a perfect sales strategy.

Yes, simplicity!  The truth is that big business visions are turned into reality by the little details.

In fact, the reason most business owners fail to grow their business is because they do the opposite of simplify things... they overcomplicate them!  

They come to believe that, if something looks more complicated and intricate, then it must be more effective.  Unfortunately, they eventually come to find out that that isn’t the case.

Over-complication is the biggest enemy to business growth.

That's why these 6 questions are so effective at igniting business growth!  Because the answers to them help simplify your business strategy, so that growth can take off.

Simple questions = simple sales strategy = growth!

So, there you have it.  If you want to grow your business, 90% of your energy needs to go into increasing sales.  And, the best part is that increasing sales is actually quite simple!

What Are the 5 Stages of Business Growth?

There are thousands of businesses born every year.  Yet, most of them go through a similar life cycle.

The cycle typically starts with a challenging work-up phase, which is then followed by a period of growth, and then ends with stagnation or an unfortunate downfall.

This life cycle is made up of the 5 stages of business growth. 

The 5 stages of business growth are:

1. Start-up
2. Growth
3. Shake-out
4. Maturity
5. Decline

While these 5 stages represent a common business life cycle, most businesses don't go through this exact progression to a 'T'.  Rather, they experience many small blips during growth, followed by the dreaded business plateau. 

Also, many business owners experience different challenges with growth at different stages of the business cycle.  For some, they struggle the most with growth right off the bat.  For others, growth gets extremely challenging when they get to the shake-out phase.  

Regardless of where you are at in the business cycle or what your current rate of growth is, you've come to the right place if hitting a high growth stage is your goal!

Answer These 6 Questions to Set Your Business Growth Strategy on Fire

The answer to big business growth is simplicity.

Therefore, ignite business growth by answering these 6 simple questions!

While they might seem too simple to set growth on fire, having the answers to them will kickstart an unstoppable increase in your sales.  And, as you already know... more sales = more growth.

Simplicity unlocks the door to growth!  Answer these simple questions to fuel your sales and resultantly see your business skyrocket.

1. What Is the Unique Value of Your Business?

When an entrepreneur sets out to start a new business, they do so because they see a need for it in the market.

Whatever their idea is, that business owner sees a gap in the market and forms a new business to fill it.

While they do form a new business, odds are that they aren't the only person trying to fill that gap.

Unless they are Mark Zuckerberg in 2004 developing the first major social media platform, odds are that they have some competition!

With that said, all growing businesses need something specific that makes them stand out from their competition!  Whether it be impeccable customer service or state of the art technology, something needs to make new customers say "Oh, they're different!".

Therefore, ask yourself the question, "What is the unique value of my business?". 

If you are the entrepreneur yourself, go back to the time when you first started your business... What pushed you to do so in the first place?  What did you see missing that you know people needed? 

If you are a sales rep or part of the sales team, get together with the rest of your team and hunker down on that unique value proposition.  Even better, refer back to your company's original vision statement for inspiration.

The more specific you can get about it, the better!  If you can't tell someone in a few words what makes your company unique, then you haven’t gotten specific enough yet.

Once you have a firm grasp on the unique value or selling point of your business, you can make adjustments to both your sales and marketing strategies to hone in on that value in your messaging!

Set your business growth plan on fire by going back to the reason why you went into business in the first place... to add unique value to the market in a way that nobody else was!

2. Who Is Your Ideal Prospect?

When it comes to next level business growth, you need strategic planning.

Perhaps the area you need to be the most strategic and specific about is your target market.  By that, you need to know exactly who your ideal B2B prospect is!

When you know who your perfect prospect is, you know exactly what kind of business would benefit the most from your unique value proposition.  

To help you answer the question of... "who is my ideal prospect", you should create an ideal prospect profile.

An ideal prospect profile is a drawn out image of who your perfect prospect is.  Literally, take out a piece of paper and pencil, and start drawing a caricature of who your perfect prospect is.  Consider thinking about the following:

1. What are the demographics and psychographics of your perfect prospect?
2. Why does this particular prospect benefit so greatly from your unique value proposition?
3. How does your company benefit from working with this particular prospect?

Remember, be as specific as possible when creating your profile!  The pickier you are now, the more time and energy you save for yourself later.

Having the ideal prospect profile helps jumpstart growth in two key ways, including:

1. It identifies who exactly you should target for lead generation
2. It helps you build stronger relationships with your existing customers and new ones down the road

First off, lead generation can be the most time consuming part of the entire sales process.  That is, at least, if you don't know exactly who to target!

Having an ideal prospect drawn out allows you to save more time generating and reaching out to leads.  While it might significantly cut down the number of leads you generate, the ones that you do gather will be of significantly greater quality.

Second, when you know what kind of prospect you are dealing with, you stand a better chance at understanding how to most effectively communicate with them.  And, with better communication comes better business relationships.

Having successful business relationships is essential for sustainable business growth.  When you have excellent relationships, the more likely your current market is to stick with you for the long term and refer you to other ideal prospects!

In conclusion, identify who your ideal prospects are to ignite business growth.  The more specific you can be, the better for growth!

3. What Is Your Sales Strategy?

Straight-up: Sales is the central tenet of all business growth.  Regardless of whether you are part of a large or small business, the type of industry you're in, or how strong you think sales strategy currently is, sales is still the key to growth.

Think about it... Whether you want to grow to new markets, work on product development, create new products, or grow within your current customer base, you need to invest.  And, the more sales you make, the easier it is for you to invest!

Therefore, if you want growth but aren't focused on sales, then consider growth impossible.

Instead of just asking, "What is your sales strategy?", perhaps a better question to ask is, "Is your sales strategy simplified?".

Just like how business growth is a matter of asking simple questions that result in giant leaps, sales works the same way!  The more you try and complicate your sales strategy, the worse off things usually are.

For example, many sales teams are under the assumption that they need to have multiple, long sales meetings to get to know their customers.  They think that it’s healthy for a sales cycle to last many weeks, if not months.

However, they are sadly mistaken!  

What would be more effective is cutting multiple sales meetings down to just one or two, and maximizing time in those meetings by asking the right questions!  Simpler put, simplifying things is the way to go.

In the end, sales teams that simplify their sales strategies down get more value out of the sales process in less time!  Not only that, but their prospects are happier, because they don't have to spend months on end trying to find a solution to their problem.

Effective sales strategies that lead to growth are rooted in simplicity.

And, remember... Sales is the most central piece to business growth!  If you want to see your business grow, then don't underestimate the value of a simplified, high-quality sales strategy.

4. What Are You Offering?

Continuing on with the subject of simplicity, your deliverable should also be simple and straightforward!

By that, we mean that you need to be able to say in a single sentence what your deliverable is.  And, that deliverable should be the thing that solves the ideal prospect’s specific challenges and pain points.

Where many B2B businesses go wrong when trying to achieve growth is thinking they must expand their offerings.  However, the opposite is usually the case.

What is better is to slim down and simplify your product or service offerings to one straightforward deliverable.  That deliverable can come in different variations, but it should still be a single deliverable that solves a specific problem, nonetheless!

Think of it this way: If you are trying to achieve greater market penetration, wouldn't it be better for you to say to your potential customers "We sell simple SEO software that increases organic search traffic!” than to say “We sell SEO and CRM software to grow online traffic and to organize your customer base!”?

The more you say that you offer, the harder it is to market and sell because the more confusing things become for the prospect. 

For example, does Salesforce sell CRM software, or CRM and SEO software?  While their CRM services are extensive, they are able to say in one sentence… “We deliver CRM software!”.  

As a result of focusing on one single offering and making it perfect, Salesforce has been able to grow to the most well-known CRM software provider in the world.

While it might at first seem counterproductive to growth to simplify offerings, it's truly a solid growth tactic!

Fight the intrigue to expand offerings! In the end, it will only confuse prospects, who truly desire as straightforward of messaging as possible.

Maximize the impact of your offering by sticking to one single deliverable!  Remember, if you can’t say in one sentence what it is that you sell, then your deliverable is still too broad!

5. What Value Will Your Customers Get From You?

The purpose of a business is more than just to deliver a product or service.

For example, some people would say that the purpose of a car business is to sell cars that get people from point A to point B.  But, that is only partially true!

If that were totally true, then the world's very first car company, Peugeot, would be the only car company in the world today because it filled the need for automobiles in the market.  

Yet, Peugeot is obviously not the only car company in the world!  If Peugeot filled the need for people to get from point A to point B, why would other car companies have popped up in the world afterwards? 

The truth is, Peugeot doesn't just sell cars.  Cars are their deliverable, but they also sell a specific emotional desire with their cars.

Consider this: When you walk into a Honda dealership versus a Mercedes dealership... there's a huge difference, even though they both sell cars.

Why? Because both cars satisfy different emotional desires!  And, prospects choose a car company to buy from based on which one fills their own emotional desires.

With that said, in addition to your product or service, you also need to identify what emotional desire your company fulfills.  More specifically, what is the emotional value that prospects get when they purchase your deliverable?

Are you the kind of company that fulfills the emotional desires of prospects who want a Mercedes, Honda, or somewhere in between?

Consider the emotional desires like the packaging on your product or service...  While it isn't necessarily the product or service itself, it does impact the way that the prospect sees it.

When answering the question of what value your product or service delivers, reflect back on your unique value proposition.  That unique value should shed light on what emotional value you have to offer.

With a grasp on that value, you can then use it during your sales pitches to create stories!  Because, in the end, stories are what secure deals.

6. What Are Your Metrics?

Last but not least, you can answer the 5 questions above and create a fantastic business plan for growth.  But, how are you going to track that growth?

If growth isn't measured, it isn't managed!

With that said, you need to create specific business goals and metrics for measuring those growth to keep track of your progress.

For example, if your goal is to expand your product line to a new market, how will you measure that growth?

While it sounds very obvious, so many businesses forget to track their growth and resultantly fall off the rails!

Therefore, sit down with your entire team to create measurable goals.  If you can't measure the growth, then you can't manage it!

Final Thoughts on Igniting Your Business Growth Strategy

If you've made it to this point and are still skeptical that this all sounds too easy to kickstart business growth, just remember that you can't lose much by trying.

So many business owners have tried and failed at growing their businesses because they think that it needs to be difficult.  They think that they need to jump through hoops to be successful, when in reality it's the opposite.

While growing your business is certainly challenging, that doesn’t mean that it is complicated!

Big results are created by answers to simple questions.  Start here with these 6 simple questions and watch your business take off.