Startup Growth — 5 Key Aspects
We have summed up 5 key growth aspects that we have found over the years at Potential.vc to be worth while considering.
1) Reward your loyal fans:
Word of mouth between your “fans” can be a powerful way to grow your customer base, as cultivating your already loyal supporters into super fans will enable them as individual marketing machines. Ensuring that you focus on giving your loyal fans a great experience will provide the right word of mouth marketing for them to recruit other keen supporters by sharing their experience.
Do:
Map your customer journey and ensure that all the touch points with your brand are focused on supporting your customers needs.
Check out more customer journey tools here
2) Get to know your audience:
Undertaking some research with your current target audience might help to illuminate some crucial insights to either relieve pain points with your brand or help you achieve that light bulb moment. Understanding their needs and preferences surrounding your brand will help you align your goals to achieving customer retention.
Do:
Conduct user testing and qualitative research with current customers and non customers to understand how to grow your audience and customise your brand to their needs.
3) Get an outside perspective:
This point may sound obvious, however you’ll be surprised at how many entrepreneurs won’t ask for help or get an outside perspective to potential problems. Having outside unbiased advice may help to give you a different take on your approach to a decision.
Do:
Find advisors who care about your space and are prepared to give honest feedback. However take into consideration, some advice from ongoing advisors will require you to compensate them, usually in the form of equity.
4) Get your product out there:
Get your product out there and get people using it! There are risks involved with getting your product/service out there early and you need to take into consideration the cost impact. However giving people the opportunity to engage with strategies such as free trials can boost your brand recognition ten fold and help you gain paying customers if your product truly does what it says on the tin.
Do:
Map the cost implication of giving customers a free trial for your product/service. Two infamous brands who started out this way and continue to give first time customers free trials in order to increase their growth are the likes of Netflix and Graze, who continue to see success!
5) Differentiate:
Differentiation is the key to standing out in a crowded marketplace and helping to attract wondering customers. Offering something different from your competitors, whether it is better customer service or different product features to the norm, successful differentiation is an ongoing process but it will help you to stay above your competitors.
Do:
Keep an eye on the competitor landscape and monitor trends. Also listen to what your customers are and aren’t telling you. Find out what they are telling you through surveys and what they aren’t telling you through user behaviour analytics, then make some actionable changes to stand out!
Doug
Connect and follow me: