Six Key Principles for Growing Your Business in 2024
Justin Shaw
Stone Fabricator Elite
As we enter a new year, many of you might be eyeing growth and scaling your business. I feel it’s important to challenge conventional thinking and dispel the myths that can surround growth.
Economic downturns, for example, are often seen as barriers to growth. However, these periods can present opportunities for strategic investments and gaining a competitive edge. It’s important to understand that growth can be intentionally driven, rather than solely dependent on market forces.
In this article I share the six principles we follow for strategic growth. We’ve used these principles both in our own business and when working with our private clients. They include setting bold and grounded goals, achieving growth through incremental steps, sustaining continuous growth, executing rigorously, leveraging measurement as an advantage, and prioritizing capability building.
1. Setting Bold and Grounded Goals
The impact of Covid-19 has significantly influenced business data, making traditional methods of setting growth targets unreliable. It’s important to recognize that the numbers from the past several years may not accurately reflect the future landscape.
Our alternative approach to strategic growth is to base our goals on the fundamental elements of our business that are within our control. Instead of relying solely on external market forces or inaccurate historic numbers, we can set ambitious targets by focusing on factors such as operational efficiency, diversifying revenue channels, product innovation, and talent development. By maximizing these internal strengths and continuously improving upon them, we can drive significant growth.
2. Achieving Growth Through Incremental Steps
While a single, game-changing breakthrough is appealing, sustainable growth in the countertop industry is often achieved through a series of small, strategic steps. We typically start by identifying our key revenue drivers and applying best practices to each. This could involve optimizing marketing strategies, enhancing sales team performance, or developing a partnership to add a new division or revenue channel. The focus should be on stacking up these small wins for a significant cumulative impact.
We also find that we’re able to accelerate our growth when members throughout the organization have ownership over specific outcomes. One of the keys to gaining that ownership, is to have your team co-create the vision and growth goals for the business.
3. Build Your Growth Plan for The Long Term
Long-term sustainable success and the ability to scale consistently, requires ongoing evergreen growth initiatives. We prefer to create three categories to include a mix of quick wins (short term), medium-term improvements, and long-term strategic planning. The goal is to establish a cycle of continuous growth, with each initiative feeding into the next. Quick wins are particularly valuable as they provide immediate financial benefits and boost team morale and confidence—creating momentum from which you can build on.
4. Execute With Efficiency
Well-planned growth strategies will fall short without effective implementation. Here is the process we use to ensure we execute at a high-level and stay on track day in and day out: We break down our long-term growth game plan into an annual plan, then chunk it down into quarterly and monthly plans. We identify the Most Important Tasks (MITs) required on a weekly basis to execute the tasks, initiatives, and projects. We also appoint a team member to be dedicated to act as the quarterback; this person provides playbooks for all key team members on a weekly basis.
5.What Gets Measured Gets Managed
In the context of successfully executing a growth strategy, it is crucial to understand the importance of measurement and management.
By tracking and evaluating relevant metrics, such as customer preferences, market conditions, and the impact of marketing campaigns, businesses can make informed decisions and adjust their growth initiatives accordingly. This data-driven approach enables them to identify areas of improvement, capitalize on opportunities, and mitigate risks.
Furthermore, by embracing digital metrics and industry benchmarks, businesses can gain valuable insights into their performance and compare it to industry standards. This allows them to benchmark their growth efforts and identify areas where they need to improve or excel.
Incorporating measurement into the execution of a growth strategy also helps in setting realistic goals and targets. By having a clear understanding of where the business stands and what needs to be achieved, teams can align their efforts and focus on the most impactful initiatives.
Ultimately, effective measurement and management provide businesses with the ability to monitor progress, make data-backed decisions, and pivot when necessary. It ensures that growth initiatives stay on track and that resources are allocated efficiently to drive significant and sustainable growth.
6. Prioritizing & Amplifying Talent
Talent is often an underutilized resource for countertop businesses. By investing in amplifying capabilities and skills, such as technical and analytical skills, digital marketing, sales strategies, and customer experience, businesses can create more leverage. Practical, hands-on training is particularly effective in building the necessary capabilities. There are industry resources and workshops on software, sales training tailored to the unique aspects of countertop products, or customer service enhancement programs that can help businesses tap into the full potential of their talent.
If you are aiming for substantial growth in 2024 and beyond, you might be a good fit for our signature Growth Engine in 90-Days Program. We will assist you in developing a winning strategy, implementing the necessary systems for sustainable growth, and enhancing your team, culture, and performance. You can reach out to me directly at justin@stonefabricatorelite.com.
Stone Fabricator Elite assists highly motivated and ambitious countertop companies in expanding and growing their business, while also empowering owners to have greater control, profitability, and freedom.