If I waved a magic wand and granted you double your current sales, could you handle it?
You Don’t Have a Lack of Sales
This is something I hear from clients and prospects daily: “If only I had more sales, I could…”
For many companies, I don’t buy it. Most small businesses couldn’t handle more sales if they were served on a silver platter. In some cases, a jump in sales would put such a strain on resources that the business would come to a halt.
Take, for example, a client of mine who provides a consumer product at a rate of roughly 1000-2000 unit sales per year. While sitting in the airport waiting to go out on vacation, the owner tossed a short video on TikTok of his product production process. He used a trendy song in the background to spice up the imagery and hoped to get the 5-10k views that he usually averaged per post.
When he arrived at his destination, his phone was blown up by texts from friends and colleagues regarding the attention his post had received. In the first 24 hours, he received more than 19MM views, including more than 1MM Likes! If he had thought to attach a call-to-action (CTA) to his post, imagine the orders he might have received. Let’s assume that he received an order from one-half of one percent of those that merely Liked the post. The result would have filled his capacity for the next 3 years!!
You get the point. In this case, it would have turned from a Sales issue to a Capacity issue. Speaking of which…
Let’s explore a few other areas to address before you wish for massive Sales:
- Capacity – We just discussed it. If you cannot fulfill the orders, you need to be careful with the number of sales that you look to bring in. An inability to meet demand can create a highly negative situation where your Reviews, Reputation and Customer Goodwill can be destroyed.
- Finances – Even if you have a plan and resources in place to meet demand, if you have a product that requires upfront investment or COGS, you need to be prepared to meet spikes in Sales. Any financial contingency plan should include funding for temporary resources, storage, and/or manufacturing space.
- Processes – Are your processes scalable at higher levels of delivery, or will things break down and become burdensome when demand reaches a certain level? Many organizational processes will work well at an early-stage small company, but when those organizations grow by 5, 10, or 100 times their original size, new approaches are necessary. Manual processes may be fine when you are small, but realize that if you double in sales, you will naturally need to double your personnel.
- Software – Your applications should scale with your business, and most software is not interchangeable. I am a big fan of QuickBooks Online as a solution for small business, but its simplicity is not designed for a $20MM manufacturing enterprise.
At the end of the day, it comes down to proactivity. As you build your business, you should be thinking a few sizes above where you are today. Build a bigger house and grow into it, not the other way around.
Until then, be careful what you wish for – you might just get it!
- Are you a Jack of All Trades?
- or are you a Master of None?
- or a Master of… One?
- What does your business require, and are you meeting its needs?
- Running a small business is chaos. Your work goes beyond any single role.
- You are a marketer and a financier. A salesperson and head of operations.
- You concern yourself with long-term strategy, but can’t see past the upcoming payroll.