How do you know if you are ready to grow your revenue?

A good value proposition isn't enough - even if you really want it to be.

An example of this is a business I knew that had a great value proposition - but it was struggling. The value proposition? It upgraded the clients’ facilities and the client paid for it out of the savings over time. The client would literally get a free upgrade and save money from year 1!

But the business wasn’t growing. The truth was, it wasn’t ready to grow.

The basics of sustainably growing a B2B business are not rocket science:

• Keep your existing clients

• Grow your existing clients

• Win new clients

• Have a good reputation in your target sector/s

However, knowing what to do is not the same as doing it!

How do you identify where you have a "think you are doing it" / "know you are doing it" gap? I've seen many businesses think they are doing certain growth actions, only to find with further probing that they aren't really and it is an anchor on their revenue growth.

The graphic below gives you a series of questions to work this out. The answer will be in the granularity with which your teams are able to answer them. With each answer go further with two questions:

• Can they show you they are doing it? i.e. if the answer sounds like “this is the process for that....” - how do you know it is being followed and results in action?

• Could they be doing it smarter / better / be more aligned?

And what happened to the business at the beginning of this article?

It listened to the prospect feedback and changed its target client definition. It then changed the questions it asked and who it asked them of - and ultimately increased the value of the engagement to the prospect. In so doing it found the right prospects and won them as clients, transforming its revenue growth and ultimately leading to a successful trade sale in later years.

A good value proposition isn't enough on its own - but without one it is really tough!