We all know that there are only four ways to grow any business. These principles can also be applied to most other organizations in terms of increasing reach. I’m going to briefly talk about them as a group and in subsequent posts will discuss each one in a bit of detail. They are:

1. Sell new products/services to new clients
2. Sell new products/services to existing clients
3. Sell existing products/services to new clients
4. Sell existing products/services to existing clients

That’s it. If you can simultaneously manage them all, then you’re super-successful. Most of us are really good at one or two at time but mastering them all at once is the key to a thriving growing business.

Sounds simple doesn’t it? Four easy rules and that’s it. But it is difficult to do and as a business owner and sales/marketing person, I often analyze why. Here’s why I think it is hard to maintain a perfectly consistent pace in all four areas and what we strive to do to inch closer to accomplishing it.

1 – ‘New’ anything is the shiniest, coolest, most fun.

Whether it is launching a new event or working with a new client, new always seems better.  We all gravitate toward the most exciting and fun part of our job and the vast majority of entrepreneurs have that passion for the next new thing.  It is important to try to have a staff that consists of new shiny-object followers AND those who like to tend and grow and to match the personality to the job that best suits it.   At Lodestar we work on this by shaking up the lead on projects as they age. This gives the person at the helm of that project the chance for something ‘new’ while maintaining the organizational support and history necessary. So while the experienced ‘launchers’ work on the parts of the ‘new’ best suited to their desires and skills, everyone eventually has some experience in a start-up process on some level to understand the company and our projects as a whole. Try that if you need to make older work fresh.

2 – Existing clients have existing issues

Most every business tries to under-promise and over-deliver but even the most carefully crafted events or projects seem to have one or two people or groups who just can’t be made happy. If you are the existing customer’s representative, despite your best intentions you approach the thought of trying to upsell those clients with a bit of trepidation. A combination of intimidation and dread accompanies the dialing of their number or the typing of their email. This is a natural human response but a killer to selling existing or new services to existing clients. One approach is to be selective about whom you approach and make darn sure that the product or service matches the client. Try to approach them with the thought that you aren’t trying to sell them anything, that you’re providing them information that could be beneficial to them. Sending out information about upcoming events, new opportunities for sponsorship and/or early-bird sales to your existing clients a week before you make them public also helps the client feel he is special. Reaching out to an existing client with information FIRST or a deal makes the exchange valuable, timely and a courtesy.

I’ll examine each of these four rules of increasing business individually over the next few weeks.  At the end of the day, every action you and your staff takes should be toward one of these four points or in support of a newly cemented action on one of them.