5. Explore New Distribution Channels
In many cases, businesses begin to invest in developing new products once they believe they’ve maxed out sales of their existing products. And that makes sense. New products offer a means of increasing sales and even widening your customer base. But they’re not without risk.
Developing new products means spending money. And if a new product isn’t successful, the initial investment is lost without creating any meaningful bottom-line benefits. That’s why it’s often a much better idea for businesses to instead look for new distribution channels for their existing proven products.
An excellent example of this in action is the recent expansion of Allbirds into the physical retail space. They began life as an online-only sustainable footwear brand—a market that they’ve dominated in recent years. But they soon realized that their surest path to growth was to offer their products in retail stores in addition to their online marketplace.
The move allows them to expand the sales of their core products by exposing more people to them than they otherwise could. And it also helped them to drive more sales among existing customers, with the brand reporting that shoppers who visited their online and physical retail outlets ended up spending 1.5 times more than shoppers that only visited one or the other.
Using a combination of channels is the best approach. By analyzing data on the business’s target market and their interaction with the product or service, an optimal distribution channel can be chosen before investing. One growing avenue is mobile, with 90% of internet users connecting via a mobile device, an accessible and responsive mobile website is key to expanding a company’s revenue as mobile usage continues to increase.
The bottom line here is that finding new ways to distribute already-popular—and therefore, proven—products is often a less risky way to create growth. And when executed well, it can become the cornerstone of a business’s continuous growth strategy.
Final Thoughts
At the end of the day, no business venture can survive for very long if it can’t find a growth path. But there’s a difference between achieving growth and achieving continuous growth.
It doesn’t take much to achieve the former and sometimes, it’ll even happen naturally. But achieving that latter takes careful planning and a whole lot of effort.
The five strategies detailed here all offer a path to continuous growth. But they’re best used together. That way, they make for a comprehensive plan to convert a business into a growth engine with limitless potential. And when executed to perfection, the sky’s the limit!
