5 Easy Business Growth Strategies Using Business Systems

All too often businesses fail to grow and owners get frustrated because they lack the business systems to allow things to operate smoothly.

This is one of the most critical elements of running a successful business. You have to build a strong foundation with systems or it teeters.

Most businesses start with a plan to grow, and sheer will pushes them forward in the beginning, but later comes exhaustion and burnout, especially when the owner is trying to do everything.

The reality is, until this foundation is built, the owner will have to keep doing everything! Until these systems that allow things to be easily delegated are put in place, the owner will continue to be the bottleneck.

So instead of thinking big picture growth, let’s talk about daily growth strategies. These are the elements that are important to build that strong foundation for long-term success.

Here are 5 every day growth strategies to building a strong foundation:

#1: Calendar and Email Business Systems

Protecting Your Time with Your Calendar

By far the thing that can control our lives and soon be the tail that is wagging the dog is calendar and email. Have an assistant block your calendar so that you have designated times to work on things. Don’t have an assistant yet? Fine, you are the assistant. You can still do this task.

Sit down and block 1-3 hour blocks of time to work on areas of the business that need your attention like Marketing, Sales, Financials, Client Work, Team and Management and Planning. (Need help with this, check out our YouTube video on how to do block calendaring.)

With some intentional focus, you will soon be in the habit of having admin days or half days for marketing and sales time to move your business forward. Use your calendar as the profitable tool it was always meant to be!

Email Suck

Next, don’t get sucked into email where you are there for hours. We’ve got to triage what needs your attention. What’s going to be closest to the money and drive a sale? What’s going to help a team member get their project going so they don’t have to wait for you.

Triage. Such a vital word for tackling your email. Cambridge Dictionary describes “Triage” as the the process of examining problems in order to decide which ones are the most serious and must be dealt with first.

Triaging emails are the type of tasks that an assistant can do for you with a little training and some clear policies and procedures. You can have an amazing superstar assistant do most of this for you. Or… for the next 3 weeks do it yourself and vow to get an assistant to help you (even if just for 3 hours a day), so it reduces down your time spent with emails.

So how are you going to implement this? Well, 1) you could do it all on your own and do the triaging of emails into urgency and types of task, or 2) get an assistant and lean in to resources available to you to help train them up fast. (We’ve got a handful of policies and procedures specifically for owners and their assistants to get the most out of their day. Key elements like how to manage their calendar, their emails, and their day-to-day operations. These we call the vital systems. If you need help with who to hire and how to hire, we also have a package to help with this!)

Want a strong foundation for your business? Get the emailing and calendaring business systems set up. they are vital elements and the first place you should start.

#2: Marketing: From Ideas All The Way Through To Execution

Owners, we have lots of ideas, but we need to build a plan, both a strategic and a tactical plan and EXECUTION!

Enter the Marketing Assistant.

Now this person might start off part-time, and later become full time. It’s one of those things where we give them smaller projects and build up our confidence that they know what they’re doing and allow them to thrive. That will allow them to do it faster, more productive, and have more bandwidth to take on more projects.

So start with small tasks and get them up to speed. Then hand more tasks over. It also is a great way to get it out of your brain and onto paper or documented. What are the projects you want to tackle and start laying the groundwork for getting those done.

If you have never worked with a Marketing Assistant be prepared to be thrilled with what they can accomplish. That is if they are trained correctly and you have good systems in place.

Sound like a double edge sword? Wondering what comes first, the chicken or the egg? Wondering if you should you build the systems first or hire the person? I get asked this all the time and I’m fond of saying do both! Some people like to work on things on their own, others want to save themselves 10-15 hours and use our package on how to hire, onboard, and work with the marketing assistant. The best part is that it comes with all those key marketing policies and procedures and it gives you the training on how to hire and onboard the person to get them working productively.

Let’s build the right framework and a strong foundation to allow you to develop more marketing with less stress!

#3: Referrals And Showing Gratitude To Your Clients.

This is one of the greatest part of having clients. The opportunity to continue to nurture and help people and make sure that we have more and more referrals coming in.

But all too often the business owner is TOO BUSY to have the time to nurture those relationships.

This is where a Client Happiness Coordinator takes this off your plate.

But again, you don’t just hire someone and hope they know what they’re doing. You need good scripts, templates, and procedures that illustrate WHO Shall do WHAT by WHEN. These types of business systems are what provide the clarity and timeframes to a new person. It is what describes what you want to have accomplished so they can step in and do a great job. (And yes, we have a whole package on How to Hire, Onboard, and Work with a Client Happiness Coordinator and yes, it comes with a 50 page policy and procedure manual.).

We’ve helped thousands and thousands of business owners build these systems up and empower new team members to really take ownership. Whether the person starts at 5 hours or whether it is someone you currently have on team, by giving them the training and the procedures this is what will allow this these tasks to be done consistently without the owner needing to be involved.

#4: Be A Good Money Manager

I think we can all agree, getting paid is vital to the business flourishing rather than always being on the edge.

This means being a good money manager with money coming in… and with money going out.

It starts with good financial systems so a bookkeeper can consistently handle things for you. Later, as you continue to grow, you may designate a billing clerk to do even more daily work on the invoicing and payments but in the beginning a good bookkeeper is key!

But this also means the Owner needs to have a base knowledge of what the bookkeeper should be doing daily, weekly, monthly, as well as the scope of those duties.

This is such a vital element to making sure that the company flourishes and that the owner doesn’t get sucked back into the weeds. Don’t worry. We got you covered. We have both a bookkeeper and a billing clerk package complete with policies and procedures, checklists, templates all the materials you need if your financial business systems are not yet set up.

#5: Sales Business Systems.

Owners, too often you are doing all the sales for far too long. Yes, you might be great at doing sales, but you cannot forever be the only person doing the sales. You’ve got to start building other people up. Whether it’s 2 people on your team that cover for you, or if you hire a full-time client engagement specialist (aka salesperson), you need to have a plan. Part of that plan is having a systematic way for brining clients into the business. By using scripts and templates and timelines that are easy to follow, others can take the load off the Owner.

So whether you’re just getting started or whether you’re more advanced, review these 5 elements, these are all vital business systems to have that strong foundation to allow you to grow.

Use these growth strategies every single day.

Yes! Every. Single. Day.

Work on building one key business system every day, and every week you be building a stronger foundation. And when you don’t have time to do it all, that’s where you can lean into some of the templated packages. They allow you to get the information you need. Processes that have been human vetted and approved and used by thousands of business owners. Processes that are going to shorthand your time, your build, and allow Owners to get out of the trenches and start enjoying their business even more.

So check out some of our Systems Packages. Let us know what questions you have, and tell us below, what is your favorite system that you’ve recently built out? And what’s next on your agenda?