As a proud small-business owner, you’ve established your company, taken the time to build your finances and discovered what has worked and what has not. Now, you are ready to move onto the next phase of small business ownership: business expansion and growing your profitability. As a leading small business lender in California, Illinois, and Missouri, First Bank can offer helpful advice on creating a business case and ironing out the details of the growth strategy for your business.
While you undoubtedly learned a lot when starting your business, growing and funding an existing business requires a different strategy than financing a startup. These simple, but essential, steps can help you grow your small business and set you up for success.
Expanding your small business
There are several ways to grow a small business. You may be looking to launch a new product or service, expand to a new location, merge or acquire a business, ramp up production, franchise, hire new employees, streamline your processes, license your products, or expand into new markets.
You can also grow your small business through marketing strategies. Aligning yourself with a similar business in the area, expanding marketing efforts, building your online presence, targeting new markets, and winning marketing contracts can all be helpful in increasing your business presence. Your next big move could involve several of these expansion strategies. With multiple business growth strategies in play, you’ll want to ensure your business can withstand expansion and achieve success.
Seek business advice and do your research
Before you embark on your business growth strategy, you may want to seek advice from a trusted business counselor and/or First Bank Loan Advisor.
With the help of a trusted advisor from First Bank, you can discover growth strategies that suit the vision for your growing business and get insight into how to present your business case when seeking funding. With branches in California, Illinois, and Missouri, First Bank’s business bankers offers checking and savings accounts, as well as payroll services for small businesses.
Having worked with a multitude of California, Illinois, and Missouri business owners, First Bank can provide a realistic outlook of the local economy and recommend next steps, along with an understanding of tools to help you streamline operations and the types of funding you may qualify for.
Before moving your business forward, take time to assess the past and current business climate. Timing is everything in business, so if you’re planning to launch a new product line or service or expand into new markets, do your research to ensure there’s sufficient demand before investing valuable resources.
Update your business plan
Return to your original business plan and update it to project future growth. If you’re looking to scale your small business, hire more staff or streamline your processes, iron out your current model to be sure you can grow steadily without sacrificing quality or your core business. Once you’ve worked out the details, update your business plan and outline your expansion.
Update or develop a marketing plan
Once you’ve determined your business expansion plan, consider updating or developing a formal marketing strategy. Growing your business will involve new internal and external audiences as well as stakeholders. Outlining how you’ll communicate with these new audiences, both online and offline, is necessary when change is imminent.
Investing time and money in developing a scheduled marketing plan, with a dedicated budget, is essential. Focus your marketing efforts on the tactics that deliver the highest return on investment and align best with your brand image. You can also run this by your First Bank Business Banking Officer for knowledgeable, trusted feedback.
Seek financing to expand your business
When you are ready to grow your business and have developed and reviewed your business and marketing plans, a First Bank Loan Advisor can help you understand your financing options.
Depending on your goals for small-business expansion, you can consider applying for a variety of funding options, including short-term or long-term business loans, lines of credit, commercial real estate loans, SBA loans, and other small business lending options.
You can trust First Bank to help you find the proper financial solutions and resources to help grow your business. With a team of expert business lenders and years of experience, First Bank is the smart choice to help your business grow and thrive in California, Illinois, and Missouri and beyond. Learn more about our Small Business Loan Program and other business financing resources.
Contact us today to learn more about how we can help support your business expansion and business growth strategies.