The 4 major shifts that a startup needs to make, in order to be successful for the scaling-up journey. 2nd Shift is from focusing on only Sales to developing a Differentiated Strategy for sustainable growth.
If growth is not consistent, even with the BEST "sales" operations, then maybe your strategy is not CLEAR, RIGHT or ALIGN. Are you just a "better" company or are you doing something "different" for a unique and valuable position in the market?
Watch this short 4mins video that talks about this shift...
TRANSCRIPT:
Today i wanna share with the 2nd Shift: from focusing on only Sales to drive revenue to working on a differentiated Strategy.
Sales, is only one of few executable functions, of your strategy, like marketing or customer service, sometimes, revenue is not growing even if you have the best sales operations because your strategy is not right, clear or aligned.
If revenue growth is not consistent, even if you have the best sales team, then your strategy might not be right, clear or aligned.
Let me clarify, when I says “sales fn”, I meant the team who are responsible for acquiring the customers, because depending on the business model, that function might have a different name.
The Output of a Strategy, is your position in the market. A great strategy will give you a unique and valuable position within a space. It's always market focus and in relation to other players. And, you could be in a declining market, an emerging, or a fast growing one. And The most exciting companies create new products and services that create new categories or space. Because the market is not static.
Therefore, Developing your strategy is an evolutionary and iterative process of a key central idea, and unless you are doing something different, that position won't be unique or valuable. And if that market does not exist yet, then you will also need to design the category/space that the company is in.
If you can't distill your strategy into one sentence, then it is not clear.
If your proposition or promise is not important or valuable to your ideal customer, and your team are not excited, nor have the competence to deliver it, then your strategy not right.
If you are clear on yr strategy, and the customer needs your proposition, but they don't experience it after they buy, then your strategy is not aligned within your operations.
Sales only solve one part of the formula, it is absolutely necessary but not sufficient, and you can have a spike in sales because of a marketing campaign, a price reduction, a new feature/prdt, or an improvement in customer experience journey.
A spike is a still spike, it's not a sustainable growth.
Generating fake growth with aggressive tactics, offering freebies, or price discount, (like we have experience in the food delivery category) is just that, not real or sustainable growth.
It might get you some temporary relief in the short term, but the pain will come back again.
The faster you get out of denial, the more time you have to put your attention to work on the Right Strategy for long term success, you don't get a quick fix from strategy, just like your health, you don't get healthy overnight. Its applying the consistent right diet for your body type and the right exercise that you enjoy so that you keep exercising...
But, if you are in a critical condition, intervention and quick fix to survive is necessary but lets face it, you will never get to peak health from intervention. (necessary but not sufficient)
As a scaleup, the important but not urgent task of clarifying your strategy and iterating it over a period of time needs to be a new habit.
Because Unless you get clear, all other decisions have no criteria or anchor point to evaluate on, it's about stepping back and making that few important decisions that take care of the 100’s small ones.
If you don't make them, you will most probably become a just another “better” company that spiral into never-never land. Because who remember “better”?
So, ask yourself, is your strategy clear, right or aligned?