How to push the boundaries of your business’ growth
A common misconception that I have seen during my time in growth strategy consultancy is growth being considered solely a marketing play. I won’t deny that marketing has a seat at the table — but there is so much more to consider when thinking about and building your plan for growth.
Let’s start with an easy one: make use of what you’ve got
Businesses have historically accumulated content, offers, discounts and other assets that can be packaged up quickly and bolted onto the existing offering. Small, incremental enhancements can be a super effective way of improving the value proposition, which increases customer acquisition and retention and therefore drives growth. It doesn’t need to be big, ground-breaking steps. Take the New York Times, for example. It saw high engagement across its recipes and puzzle content so launched standalone apps where people could subscribe to access this content specifically. Just one great example of a business using what it’s got to capture new growth opportunities.
Rethink the customer experience
The way you interact with customers and the experience (or should I say the perception of the experience) that they have is absolutely critical for your brand image. A great customer experience has a seamless sales journey — from awareness through to conversion — and builds engagement after the point of sale to keep customers coming back. Data is absolutely crucial here and for me, Nike is by far the leader in this space. It is obsessive over capturing data at each touchpoint, whether it’s in-store or online, and uses a free membership model that incentivises you to hand over your data through free delivery, exclusive offers and discounts. It then uses this data to personalise all interactions you have with them and create a better customer experience.
Identify new propositions to supplement your existing offering
Perhaps one of the biggest (and most exciting) keys to unlock growth is building new products or services that drive greater value for and from your customers. This requires businesses to take a step back and do some critical reflection on their target market — what do they truly want, need and value? And how could you deliver this for them? This often means looking beyond your core market and into the wider ecosystem, for example, Uber expanding into food delivery or SheerLuxe the online magazine launching a podcast series. This growth strategy opens up new revenue streams and can also introduce a new business model, e.g. adding subscription revenue from app downloads to traditional magazine sales. Both of which secure long-term sustainable growth of the business.
Turn your advocates into members
The best brands have legions of loyal customers that shout about their products and services to the world. Often these high-value advocates want to get more from the brand. To do this you can design a membership proposition that creates a compelling value exchange around a community. This allows them to connect more closely with the brand (a bonus for them) and allows you as a business to a) collect more data, b) build greater and more targeted engagement and c) open new revenue streams. Consider Strava’s new subscription proposition. By creating a feeling of connection and intimacy among its “premium” members it increases brand loyalty and grows its network of promoters for the brand, not to forget the added revenue from the subscriptions. Everyone’s a winner.
The key to unlocking growth is ultimately building long-term, valuable relationships with consumers through better products, services and experiences. To do this requires collaboration across the organisation — bring together product, tech, marketing and strategy teams to brainstorm how to drive growth. Having these people in the room allows you to push the boundaries of what’s possible without forgetting what’s feasible. I encourage you to think big, be bold and find growth where you didn’t think you could.
Maddy Meacher is a Client Manager at Manifesto Growth Architects. As a strategic consultant, she is passionate about helping companies to unlock their growth potential and is inherently curious to explore innovative approaches to growth.
