Why You Could Be Stuck In Start-Up Without Realising

I listened to a great YouTube video the other day which I recommend to any business owner who thinks they are in the growth stage of their business or aren't sure where they are exactly and need some direction.

It came as a surprise to me, that business owners can find themselves stuck in the start-up phase, many years after starting their business, and there are some simple ways to tell if this is where you are.

Whilst we might assume that once a year or two has passed we should no longer be considered a start-up, it turns out, that's not actually true. Let's look at this in more detail and figure out which phase of business you're really in.

GROWTH PHASE

For this blog post, we're just going to concentrate on two phases of business, the growth phase and the start-up phase. If you're in the growth phase, you will know it. The distinction between growth phase and start-up phase is easy to see. In the growth phase, you will have people, systems, processes, and marketing in place. You won't be running the business alone, you will have people or a team supporting you.

In the growth phase your marketing budget will grow, your strategy will become polished, your team will become bigger and your systems and processes more defined. If this sounds like you, well done, you're in the growth phase!

START-UP PHASE

If you haven't yet invested in people who can help grow your business, you're going to find yourself stuck forever in Start-up mode. That's because, without other people in your organisation, you end up in a vicious cycle of trying to grow whilst also trying to wear all the other hats, which means you simply bounce from one to the other without actually ever getting anywhere.

In this phase of your business, you may not have your systems and processes mapped out either. If you're still winging it, doing things manually instead of applying the use of automation, and don't have a process for how your business works, who does what, and a track of all the moving parts, you definitely aren't in the growth phase.

Marketing is HUGE. It's got to be one of if not the biggest contributions to growth your business can have. Without marketing, you're a dead fish floating on the surface of a huge lake. Many business owners in start-up don't have an actual marketing strategy, nothing that's written down in ink or sitting proudly in the cloud. It's more of something you have in your mind, and will probably look like social media posting when you can get to it, a spot of networking and if you're lucky, ￡50 per month on Google ads.

Whilst this is a great start when your business is in its infancy, if you're still doing this 18 months to 2 years in, you need to take a closer look at where you're going wrong. Most often, the number one reason you will find that you haven't yet developed your systems and processes, or thrown more money at your marketing budget, is because 1. you don't have enough time to spend on developing your systems and processes, and 2. Due to a lack of delegation, implementing teams, or skilled people in your business, you haven't been able to bring in more revenue, and therefore, your marketing budget has stalled.

This is a cycle you just won't get out of unless you change something and for me, it always needs to start with your systems and processes. When you start a business, you should document every detail from the start, particularly your onboarding processes for new clients. You want to get to a place where you can outsource all the mundane stuff, and when you do, you don't want to be spending loads of time developing workflows and documents to teach someone how you like things done or how the business works. This needs to be done from the beginning and amended as you go.

Now, you might be reading this thinking, well, I started years ago and I haven't done any of that, what do I do now? The simple answer is, that you're going to have to take the time to do it. Take a day off or commit to work extra over the weekend and document all of your systems and processes, finding gaps for the work you're doing manually that could be automated, and making a plan to either get it automated or find someone like a tech VA who can do it for you.

Once you do that, the next step is hiring someone to help you. I always think a personal assistant is a great place to start, someone who can take away all the admin, invoicing, social media marketing, and everything that just saps your time. Important tasks that have to be done, but that don't need to be done by you. Once you do this, you free yourself up to get calls in the pipeline, prospect, go to more networking events, make connections, and build your business.

As you build your business, more money comes in. Initially, some of that will be reinvested back into your people, but eventually, you can start to increase your marketing budget and develop a better, more effective marketing strategy. So, if you're reading this thinking, I'm years into this and I'm still in start-up mode, it's time to make changes.

Look at your processes and write them down, put them into a graphical workflow, almost like a mind map if you can. Next, think about who you need to take on board to get you to the next phase. That might be somebody to help with marketing, someone who can make your products better, or someone to free up your time. You might feel like taking this leap is difficult, but that's normal. Letting go of full control over your business is hard, it's like a baby you have carried, given birth to, and nurtured and you rightfully want to protect it. But if you don't let anyone in, all you will do is suffocate it. Cost is usually a factor too but we've all heard the phrase you have to speculate to accumulate right? Well, this is an apt time to apply that phrase.

Forget for a moment you will be paying people. What you're really doing is investing in your time, you're paying to get it back so that you have enough of it to do what it takes to grow your business. You HAVE to take that leap of faith and BELIEVE that by doing so you will bring in more revenue and can then afford those people you have brought in. But adding money to the piggy bank to eventually get there will never work.

So, it's time to reflect. Where are you really in your business journey? Start-up or growth phase? Only you know the answer.

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