Let’s admit it. No one would want to be in the position of having to resurrect a failing business. Yet, if the inevitable has happened to you, and the iceberg has struck your Titanic, don’t shout, “Abandon ship!”, just yet.
Businesses walk into all kinds of pitfalls, especially in the early days of opening shop. Maybe you’ve invested in the wrong places. Perhaps, your prices are too high.
This could mean that your products don’t bring enough revenue to sustain. Or, it is also possible that you have done everything you can and your survival is still threatened.
If you happen to be in such a situation, here is what you can do to turn your fortunes around.
Reevaluate your business goals
One of the many reasons why businesses fail is because the founders set their sights too narrow. Many founders make the mistake of focusing just on their product-centric vision. Such businesses get ousted by others who can make your product obsolete.
Craft a long-term vision that is not entirely product-centric. It will then be easier to break it down into smaller, short-term objectives. It also makes it easier to assign responsibilities to your team members and make them more accountable.
Also, this way, you can measure progress in tangible terms when your team has specific targets to chase.
Consider rebranding
How your target customers perceive your brand determines whether or not they wish to associate with it. The brand name, colors, logo, ambience (in case of a physical outlet), customer service can all play a part in building a brand identity.
If your existing brand has a neutral or negative reputation attached to it, consider going back to the drawing board and reworking your brand experience.
With rebranding, you provide your business with a new, distinct identity. It changes the way customers look at your business. Over time, this new identity helps you create a loyal following that can help turn your business around.
Grow through organic traffic
Paid advertising and influencer marketing help bring new customers to your business. However, this can be an expensive way to build a customer base. It is a lot more sustainable to acquire customers through organic marketing tactics.
Optimizing your website with SEO techniques will help you achieve that long-term loyalty from your audiences online. It is also a good idea to stay away from ‘blackhat’ techniques that may provide you with a temporary jump in traffic, but is harmful to your business in the long-term.
Most importantly, organic traffic acquisition methods do not cost a lot of money. They are hence ideally suited for loss-making businesses.
Automate your outreach process
Failing businesses all have one thing in common – a fairly inefficient work process. Automating your business processes can help you in two ways.
Firstly, it enables you to scale your operations up without a commensurate increase in operational expenses. Secondly, it helps you raise your margins without having to increase your prices.
Every single component of your business can be automated – right from your outreach process to product procurement, distribution and even customer support.
It is however worth pointing out that automation does not come for free. You must be ready to find the processes that deliver the maximum returns through automation and must invest in them.
Bring down the overhead costs
When your business is failing, your priority needs to be on stemming the outflow so that your business can survive even with minimal revenues. This would mean cutting down on all the overhead costs that your business does not really need.
For example, physical product sellers may do away with a warehouse and instead rely on dropshipping channels to fulfill their orders. If you own a brick and mortar store, you may consider leasing it out and start selling on Amazon which is significantly cheaper.
This way, you bring down your overhead costs and increase the chances of your business surviving the rough times.
Conclusion
Businesses that keep track of their performance, both in the short and long-term, stand a better chance of correcting their course before it is too late. Measure your progress at frequent intervals, identify strategies that worked those that didn’t, and gauge customer sentiment at all times.
Listen to what your key stakeholders have to say – your customers, investors, employees and even your competitors, and use these insights to build a resurrection plan.
Latest posts by Aakash Patel (see all)
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Thank you for sharing some totally excellent and extremely
practical advice Aakash!
You have shared, several proven, and extremely practical
proactive growth and cost cutting strategies.
Which will definitely help any struggling entrepreneur, not only move
forward. But in the process, given enough time.
They could actually become and remain profitable.Sadly, far too
many start up entrepreneurs, do not initially grasp, your overall common
sense approach to being or becoming successful in business and commerce.
Until, their Titanic, is all but sunk! Still, you have done a fabulous job, trying
to help them avoid that from happening, as often as it does.And definitely will continue to!
nice post to get good business result all time in the technology times.
prakash singh would love you to read ..Building an E Commerce Website in 8 Effortless Steps
thank you for sharing your knowledge, I also started a business without market evaluate, and somehow I was not able to fulfill the customer desires, then finally found out the loophole in my business strategy, after hard work on that I saw the better result.
Ajeet Singh would love you to read ..RISK MITIGATION
Hi there,
Pretty interesting post. Most often people don’t understand why their business is dropping, and they don’t understand it is important to constantly evaluate and improve it either. I also heard that owners of a business in failure tend to reduce advertising costs in order to make more profit, what I think is a mistake as well.
Thank you for your article, keep going.
Chris
Chris would love you to read ..CTA en redes sociales: ¿Amigo o enemigo?
Hi Chris,
Yes, that is definitely true. When a business is struggling, pulling back from advertising only compounds the problem.
Gail Gardner would love you to read ..5 Tips to Launch a Successful Digital Marketing Career
GREAT ARTICLE!!
Written with good practical knowledge.
I am also working on this and got to learn new things:)
Hello Prabhat,
Are you aware that browsers are now warning people not to go to your site because you haven’t implemented https, yet?
Gail Gardner would love you to read ..5 Tips to Launch a Successful Digital Marketing Career
Thank you for this wonderful tips. I am presently facing some problems in my business, I hope these tips work for me.
Eniola
Eniola would love you to read ..CBN Recruitment 2019 Application Form Portal
One of the many reasons why businesses fail is lack of fund, yes I think this I the min cause. Any way, really helpful article, thanks for sharing
You mention SEO that is almost free. That is true, it doesn’t cost a lot. But it costs in precious time because it takes a long time to work.
The solution is to go all out wiith SEO and make it work in reasonable time frame.
That can be done, but one has to consciously choose SEO as a primary growth channel
If you choose two things to try or three- you-re done.
Hi, I found this article the best because
I loved the way you express your thoughts and information, keep sharing
Thanks for the article
Your tips is good. now i try to rebuild my bussiness..
thank you
I like the way the article has been written, and practically most owners I have seen are keen on reducing their overhead cost and sometimes this has been the core cause of business failure. So I would suggest a careful approach to this overhead cost reduction. And also constant evaluation/review is important for a business to grow as well as stay in the game.
Stu would love you to read ..MATERIALS AND TECHNOLOGY
It is the best blog on failing business. Thank you for sharing such helpful blog!
I like the ideas of rebranding and cutting down your costs before closing your business. I think too many people quit too soon. If they only stuck with it and made a few changes they would have found success with their business.
Lisa Sicard would love you to read ..3 Tasks Your Small Business Should Outsource Today
I will surely follow your tips , actually previously i had a domain which was not keyword rich but now i took name with keyword so i am expecting success this time let see ..
Great article with some practical ideas. I always think when you feel like it’s time to give up and close your doors, sleep on it and see how you feel in the morning. You never know, you might wake up to that big sale that changes everything!
Perfect, this is an amazing article very helpful techniques written in the article. To run a setup or a business this will help a lot many things which we have to concidered before starting a new setup is mention above. I’m running my own business name ICustomBoxes and now from onwards, I will try to implement these techniques
Hello,
This is such an inspiration blog,
after reading this blog I really feel good.
Thank you for sharing this amazing article.
These tips are amazing business can gain profit if done properly.
Brilliant post . !!!
I have found your tips quite amazing .. !
Thanks for this wonderful article.
Keep Blogging !!
Yes..It is really effective tips, thank you so much… It will definitetlly help to grow in business
Shrikant dadhich would love you to read ..Why selecting The Best Email Marketing Service is Important?
I have read this full article. Hope these tips would work for me as well as my business.
Great post.
I think you need a plan and check list everyday
I look forward to reading more from you. And thanks for the mention.
i agree with the statement Bring down the overhead costs