September 12, 2024 • 13 mins
Ever wondered if your business is truly ready to scale or if it needs more time to grow? Join me, Jessica Rosario, on the Maximize Your Day podcast as I unravel the essential difference between growing and scaling a business. Discover the five stages of the business cycle—seed and development, startup, growth and establishment, expansion, and maturity—and understand how to use them as a roadmap for your entrepreneurial journey. Too many entrepreneurs jump the gun on scaling without a solid growth strategy; learn why having clear direction and goals is the critical foundation you need before taking that leap.
This episode challenges you to evaluate your current business phase and strategically plan your next steps. I’ll guide you through reflecting on your position within the five stages and provide actionable insights on how to move forward. Engage with the content, share your thoughts, and tag me on social media. Don’t miss out on subscribing for updates on new episodes, and share this invaluable information with friends who are on their own entrepreneurial journeys. Let's work together to build and scale your business successfully!
Now that you've listened to my Maximize Your Day Podcast, it's time to grab some of my client's favorite tools to crush their goals and maximize their results. Start here --> DOWNLOAD MY GUIDE today!
Another way to support the podcast is to leave a review. Your feedback helps us to continue creating valuable content and reach a wider audience.
Thank you for your support!
Jessica Rosario
Certified Executive Coach & Business Consultant
P.S. Want to be a guest on the Maximize Your Day Podcast? Apply here!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello and welcome to the Maximize your Day podcast, a
place for entrepreneurs who arebuilding their business in
pursuit of freedom andflexibility to do the things
they love.
I'm your host, jessica Rosario.
I'm a New Yorker turnedFloridian, who knows a thing or
two on how to effectively manageyour time while juggling
multiple priorities.
I'm an ex-corporate leader whowalked away from my nine to
(00:24):
five-ish to launch and grow mybusiness.
In this podcast, I shareinsights on mindset, business
productivity, habits andstrategies to help you take
control of your to-do list andmaximize your day, which will
help you feel more confident andless overwhelmed and getting
more done in less time.
I'm so excited you're here, goahead, listen in.
I am so excited you're here, goahead, listen in.
(00:50):
Hey you guys, welcome back tothe show.
In today's episode, I am excitedto chat a little bit on growing
versus scaling, growing versusscaling, and so one of the
things that I've noticed is Iattend a lot of networking
events.
I'm surrounded by entrepreneursand other people who are
building a business or buildinga side hustle, and the word
(01:13):
scaling is thrown around veryfrequently, and so, as I begin
to dig deeper to trulyunderstand where they are in
their business, what area.
Is it that they're looking toscale?
How can we go ahead and improvein certain areas, or how can I
support them or provide themtips?
It always comes back to thefact that they're actually not
(01:36):
prepared to scale.
Not prepared to scale.
And so when a company is notprepared to scale, the focus is
to truly develop a clear growthstrategy in order to get them to
that next level.
And so I wanted to chat alittle bit with you guys on why
(01:58):
having a right growth strategyis crucial for building a
business, and so I broke thisdown into about five steps.
But before I share the fivesteps, I wanted to make a quick
note on the five stages of abusiness cycle.
The five stages of a businesscycle is something that I
constantly refer to in order totruly explain to a coaching
(02:23):
client where they are in theirbusiness, and so that they have
kind of like a roadmap of wherethey want to go.
And so the first stage of abusiness cycle is seed and
development.
And that seed and developmentthis is where you're starting to
validate your offer.
You have an idea.
You're not 100% sure on how toexecute it.
(02:43):
You do know that there is aneed, right and you know there's
a need because you've seen theneed, you've heard it.
Perhaps you are your own firstclient in going through this
process which is usually how alot of businesses are created is
because we find a problem andwe start to develop a solution
for that problem, and so thatbecomes our seed and development
(03:06):
stage.
The second stage of a businesscycle is the startup, and so the
startup phase.
This is where you now have aproduct.
You're constantly refining thatproduct.
It's kind of like a continuousimprovement phase where you're
testing, getting customerfeedback, retesting, relaunching
(03:28):
or whatever the case may be.
It is more an opportunity foryou to identify what areas of
your offer you need to refine.
You may not necessarily bemaking consistent income, but
you've made some income, and sothose two are part of the early
stages of a business cycle.
(03:49):
So when we start to look at thelater stage of the five
business cycles, we start toidentify areas of growth and
establishment.
That's the third stage of abusiness cycle, and so at this
point you're generating aconsistent income.
You have regular customers, newcustomers.
(04:10):
You're not just working withone customer who continues to
renew, but at this point youhave a.
You're starting to prove youroffer.
You're starting to prove yourbusiness model and you're
starting to attract an income alittle bit more consistent not a
hundred percent, but definitelya little bit more consistent.
But now you start to grow andestablish some systems and
(04:32):
processes behind these offers,because now you're generating a
little bit more of a consistentincome, and so that gives you
the room to be able to work onyour business.
The fourth stage of a businesscycle is expansion.
So this is where you trulybegin to start scaling.
This is where you know you havea proven process, you know it's
(04:53):
effective, you know it's beensuccessful.
And so how do I go from one tomany?
Well, how do I go from one toone to one to many?
And so now, at this point, youbegin to scale and you begin to
explore other markets.
And at this point you've workedwith multiple clients, you know
what they're looking for andyou begin to refine your offer.
(05:15):
And so, as you begin to exploreother markets, you start to
experience new challenges, andthese new challenges lead you to
an expansion in your productoffering.
And so, lastly, is the maturitystage of a business.
So those are the five cycles.
The last one is the maturitystage of the business.
And so, in the maturity stageof the business, you're not
(05:35):
looking at perhaps preparing tosell your business, or you're
looking to bring on a partner,or you're looking to exit the
business in some way, shape orform, you're looking to retire
it, right.
And so what does that look likefor you?
This is the maturity and exitstage, and I can tell you, most
business owners that step intobusiness ownership are looking
(05:58):
to grow and scale their businessand eventually exit out, and
that's why an exit strategy ishighly important for clients who
are already scaling theirbusiness, and so I wanted to
define what those five businesscycles are before I share with
you guys a few tips on how todevelop an effective growth
(06:22):
strategy for your business.
So number one is direction andgoals.
A growth strategy reallyprovides clear objectives.
You have a roadmap, you knowexactly where you are, from
point A to point B to point C,and so when you don't have this
type of clarity and this type ofdirection, your scaling efforts
(06:46):
are going to lack, because youhave no purpose, you have no
direction, and so this is whyit's so important to have a
growth strategy before we starttossing around the word scaling.
We cannot scale without aneffective growth strategy.
Number two is resourceallocation, and so understanding
(07:07):
how to grow really helps you inhow to effectively allocate
your resources.
For example, I recently launcheda membership last year and in
the Maximize your Day membership, I wanted to keep my costs low
right, and as I started to putout the membership and try to
figure out what this was goingto look like and go from one to
(07:29):
one to one to many and andcontinue to grow this market, I
realized that some of theplatforms, some of the spaces
that I started to use in thebeginning of the membership,
were no longer serving mymembership at the capacity that
I wanted it to grow, and so, atthis point, I decided to make an
(07:50):
investment on another platformwhere the engagement was going
to be higher, where we weregoing to find much more
community.
The collaboration was going tobe amazing and, honestly,
gamification was not part ofthis decision making, but I have
to tell you that thegamification that it actually
(08:12):
brings this platform has been soincredible to see the
leaderboard and to see who'scompeting towards the new
benefits once they reach a newlevel, and so that's been so
much fun, but I could not havebeen able to do that had I not
truly sat down and taken sometime to truly understand the
(08:35):
direction and goals of what Iwanted for my membership, and so
that's why resource allocationis so great.
And number two of a growthstrategy.
Number three is market fit anddemand.
So a good growth strategyreally helps you ensure that
your product fits the marketdemand.
People are looking for whatyou're selling, and so scaling
(08:58):
your business before validatingif people actually want what you
have to offer will yield noreturns or limited returns, and
so this doesn't mean that whatyou have to offer, people just
don't want to buy it.
It could be a shift in audience.
It could be your messagingmight be off.
(09:19):
It could be the fact thatyou're attracting the wrong
audience into the product thatyou believe they need, and even
though it's the right product,you have the wrong audience, and
so how to shift?
That is critical when it comesto developing a growth strategy.
Number four is wrong audience,and so how to shift.
That is critical when it comesto developing a growth strategy.
Number four is risk management,and risk management really
helps you develop a solid growthstrategy.
(09:42):
At this point, you areidentifying what are some
potential risks.
What are some plans that I needto develop in order to ensure
that my churn on my membershipdoesn't start to go in the wrong
direction, that people don'tjust join for the first month
and they drop off in the secondmonth?
What does that look like for me?
(10:03):
How do I continue to assess therisk in order to ensure that my
scaling efforts as I continueto grow the membership are truly
robust and they can standagainst any market, regardless
of what the market dictates?
And so number five is asustainable growth strategy.
And so, by establishing yourgrowth strategy, you really help
(10:26):
to create that sustainable pathto help you scale your business
, because having an effectivegrowth strategy is what leads
you to scaling.
And so, while there's no rightor wrong way to gauge what this
truly looks like for differentbusinesses, you kind of have an
(10:46):
idea of is your market growing?
Is your market not growing?
Am I speaking to the rightaudience?
Am I not speaking to the rightaudience?
Am I allocating the resourcesfor this product or for my
business in such a way that I'mattracting quality leads and, of
course, converting at a higherlevel?
(11:08):
This doesn't matter if you havea thousand clients or if you
have 10 clients.
That's why there's no way totruly gauge what this looks like
for a specific business.
I mean, there's so many casestudies out there that you can
research.
If you're in the janitorialindustry, if you're in the
coaching industry, doesn'tmatter where you're in.
(11:30):
There's ways to that.
You can define that, especiallyif you look at some of the
reports with Duns and Bradstreet.
There's a lot of ways that youare able to identify that, and
so truly understanding what thatgrowth strategy is going to
look like is critical for thesuccess of your business, and so
(11:51):
I'd love to get your thoughtson.
What do you think about thisepisode?
What do you think about whereyou are in your business?
Are you growing your business?
Are you scaling your business?
And so having a truly strategicapproach is really what helps
lay that groundwork for you inorder to successfully scale your
(12:12):
business.
So don't forget, I'd love tohear your feedback.
Feel free to take a screenshot,tag me on social media, leave
us a review, subscribe, but Idefinitely would love to hear
what it is that resonated withyou in your business, and let's
talk about where you are andinside of the five stages of the
(12:35):
business cycle, where do yousee yourself and let's have a
dialogue.
I look forward to connectingwith you at our next episode and
I'll talk to you guys soon.
As always, thank you so muchfor listening in.
Don't forget to subscribe tothe show to be notified the
(12:55):
second a new episode is releasedand share with your friends who
believe could benefit fromlistening.
Or, even better, just post ascreenshot of the episode in
your stories and tag me onInstagram or Facebook.
I would love to hear yourfeedback, answer questions, and
I'm always open to your topicsuggestions, so you never know
(13:16):
if your topic will be next.
So then, until next time, goahead, maximize your day and own
it.
Hello and welcome to the Maximize your Day podcast, a
place for entrepreneurs who arebuilding their business in
pursuit of freedom andflexibility to do the things
they love.
I'm your host, jessica Rosario.
I'm a New Yorker turnedFloridian, who knows a thing or
two on how to effectively manageyour time while juggling
multiple priorities.
I'm an ex-corporate leader whowalked away from my nine to
(00:24):
five-ish to launch and grow mybusiness.
In this podcast, I shareinsights on mindset, business
productivity, habits andstrategies to help you take
control of your to-do list andmaximize your day, which will
help you feel more confident andless overwhelmed and getting
more done in less time.
I'm so excited you're here, goahead, listen in.
I am so excited you're here, goahead, listen in.
(00:50):
Hey you guys, welcome back tothe show.
In today's episode, I am excitedto chat a little bit on growing
versus scaling, growing versusscaling, and so one of the
things that I've noticed is Iattend a lot of networking
events.
I'm surrounded by entrepreneursand other people who are
building a business or buildinga side hustle, and the word
(01:13):
scaling is thrown around veryfrequently, and so, as I begin
to dig deeper to trulyunderstand where they are in
their business, what area.
Is it that they're looking toscale?
How can we go ahead and improvein certain areas, or how can I
support them or provide themtips?
It always comes back to thefact that they're actually not
(01:36):
prepared to scale.
Not prepared to scale.
And so when a company is notprepared to scale, the focus is
to truly develop a clear growthstrategy in order to get them to
that next level.
And so I wanted to chat alittle bit with you guys on why
(01:58):
having a right growth strategyis crucial for building a
business, and so I broke thisdown into about five steps.
But before I share the fivesteps, I wanted to make a quick
note on the five stages of abusiness cycle.
The five stages of a businesscycle is something that I
constantly refer to in order totruly explain to a coaching
(02:23):
client where they are in theirbusiness, and so that they have
kind of like a roadmap of wherethey want to go.
And so the first stage of abusiness cycle is seed and
development.
And that seed and developmentthis is where you're starting to
validate your offer.
You have an idea.
You're not 100% sure on how toexecute it.
(02:43):
You do know that there is aneed, right and you know there's
a need because you've seen theneed, you've heard it.
Perhaps you are your own firstclient in going through this
process which is usually how alot of businesses are created is
because we find a problem andwe start to develop a solution
for that problem, and so thatbecomes our seed and development
(03:06):
stage.
The second stage of a businesscycle is the startup, and so the
startup phase.
This is where you now have aproduct.
You're constantly refining thatproduct.
It's kind of like a continuousimprovement phase where you're
testing, getting customerfeedback, retesting, relaunching
(03:28):
or whatever the case may be.
It is more an opportunity foryou to identify what areas of
your offer you need to refine.
You may not necessarily bemaking consistent income, but
you've made some income, and sothose two are part of the early
stages of a business cycle.
(03:49):
So when we start to look at thelater stage of the five
business cycles, we start toidentify areas of growth and
establishment.
That's the third stage of abusiness cycle, and so at this
point you're generating aconsistent income.
You have regular customers, newcustomers.
(04:10):
You're not just working withone customer who continues to
renew, but at this point youhave a.
You're starting to prove youroffer.
You're starting to prove yourbusiness model and you're
starting to attract an income alittle bit more consistent not a
hundred percent, but definitelya little bit more consistent.
But now you start to grow andestablish some systems and
(04:32):
processes behind these offers,because now you're generating a
little bit more of a consistentincome, and so that gives you
the room to be able to work onyour business.
The fourth stage of a businesscycle is expansion.
So this is where you trulybegin to start scaling.
This is where you know you havea proven process, you know it's
(04:53):
effective, you know it's beensuccessful.
And so how do I go from one tomany?
Well, how do I go from one toone to one to many?
And so now, at this point, youbegin to scale and you begin to
explore other markets.
And at this point you've workedwith multiple clients, you know
what they're looking for andyou begin to refine your offer.
(05:15):
And so, as you begin to exploreother markets, you start to
experience new challenges, andthese new challenges lead you to
an expansion in your productoffering.
And so, lastly, is the maturitystage of a business.
So those are the five cycles.
The last one is the maturitystage of the business.
And so, in the maturity stageof the business, you're not
(05:35):
looking at perhaps preparing tosell your business, or you're
looking to bring on a partner,or you're looking to exit the
business in some way, shape orform, you're looking to retire
it, right.
And so what does that look likefor you?
This is the maturity and exitstage, and I can tell you, most
business owners that step intobusiness ownership are looking
(05:58):
to grow and scale their businessand eventually exit out, and
that's why an exit strategy ishighly important for clients who
are already scaling theirbusiness, and so I wanted to
define what those five businesscycles are before I share with
you guys a few tips on how todevelop an effective growth
(06:22):
strategy for your business.
So number one is direction andgoals.
A growth strategy reallyprovides clear objectives.
You have a roadmap, you knowexactly where you are, from
point A to point B to point C,and so when you don't have this
type of clarity and this type ofdirection, your scaling efforts
(06:46):
are going to lack, because youhave no purpose, you have no
direction, and so this is whyit's so important to have a
growth strategy before we starttossing around the word scaling.
We cannot scale without aneffective growth strategy.
Number two is resourceallocation, and so understanding
(07:07):
how to grow really helps you inhow to effectively allocate
your resources.
For example, I recently launcheda membership last year and in
the Maximize your Day membership, I wanted to keep my costs low
right, and as I started to putout the membership and try to
figure out what this was goingto look like and go from one to
(07:29):
one to one to many and andcontinue to grow this market, I
realized that some of theplatforms, some of the spaces
that I started to use in thebeginning of the membership,
were no longer serving mymembership at the capacity that
I wanted it to grow, and so, atthis point, I decided to make an
(07:50):
investment on another platformwhere the engagement was going
to be higher, where we weregoing to find much more
community.
The collaboration was going tobe amazing and, honestly,
gamification was not part ofthis decision making, but I have
to tell you that thegamification that it actually
(08:12):
brings this platform has been soincredible to see the
leaderboard and to see who'scompeting towards the new
benefits once they reach a newlevel, and so that's been so
much fun, but I could not havebeen able to do that had I not
truly sat down and taken sometime to truly understand the
(08:35):
direction and goals of what Iwanted for my membership, and so
that's why resource allocationis so great.
And number two of a growthstrategy.
Number three is market fit anddemand.
So a good growth strategyreally helps you ensure that
your product fits the marketdemand.
People are looking for whatyou're selling, and so scaling
(08:58):
your business before validatingif people actually want what you
have to offer will yield noreturns or limited returns, and
so this doesn't mean that whatyou have to offer, people just
don't want to buy it.
It could be a shift in audience.
It could be your messagingmight be off.
(09:19):
It could be the fact thatyou're attracting the wrong
audience into the product thatyou believe they need, and even
though it's the right product,you have the wrong audience, and
so how to shift?
That is critical when it comesto developing a growth strategy.
Number four is wrong audience,and so how to shift.
That is critical when it comesto developing a growth strategy.
Number four is risk management,and risk management really
helps you develop a solid growthstrategy.
(09:42):
At this point, you areidentifying what are some
potential risks.
What are some plans that I needto develop in order to ensure
that my churn on my membershipdoesn't start to go in the wrong
direction, that people don'tjust join for the first month
and they drop off in the secondmonth?
What does that look like for me?
(10:03):
How do I continue to assess therisk in order to ensure that my
scaling efforts as I continueto grow the membership are truly
robust and they can standagainst any market, regardless
of what the market dictates?
And so number five is asustainable growth strategy.
And so, by establishing yourgrowth strategy, you really help
(10:26):
to create that sustainable pathto help you scale your business
, because having an effectivegrowth strategy is what leads
you to scaling.
And so, while there's no rightor wrong way to gauge what this
truly looks like for differentbusinesses, you kind of have an
(10:46):
idea of is your market growing?
Is your market not growing?
Am I speaking to the rightaudience?
Am I not speaking to the rightaudience?
Am I allocating the resourcesfor this product or for my
business in such a way that I'mattracting quality leads and, of
course, converting at a higherlevel?
(11:08):
This doesn't matter if you havea thousand clients or if you
have 10 clients.
That's why there's no way totruly gauge what this looks like
for a specific business.
I mean, there's so many casestudies out there that you can
research.
If you're in the janitorialindustry, if you're in the
coaching industry, doesn'tmatter where you're in.
(11:30):
There's ways to that.
You can define that, especiallyif you look at some of the
reports with Duns and Bradstreet.
There's a lot of ways that youare able to identify that, and
so truly understanding what thatgrowth strategy is going to
look like is critical for thesuccess of your business, and so
(11:51):
I'd love to get your thoughtson.
What do you think about thisepisode?
What do you think about whereyou are in your business?
Are you growing your business?
Are you scaling your business?
And so having a truly strategicapproach is really what helps
lay that groundwork for you inorder to successfully scale your
(12:12):
business.
So don't forget, I'd love tohear your feedback.
Feel free to take a screenshot,tag me on social media, leave
us a review, subscribe, but Idefinitely would love to hear
what it is that resonated withyou in your business, and let's
talk about where you are andinside of the five stages of the
(12:35):
business cycle, where do yousee yourself and let's have a
dialogue.
I look forward to connectingwith you at our next episode and
I'll talk to you guys soon.
As always, thank you so muchfor listening in.
Don't forget to subscribe tothe show to be notified the
(12:55):
second a new episode is releasedand share with your friends who
believe could benefit fromlistening.
Or, even better, just post ascreenshot of the episode in
your stories and tag me onInstagram or Facebook.
I would love to hear yourfeedback, answer questions, and
I'm always open to your topicsuggestions, so you never know
(13:16):
if your topic will be next.
So then, until next time, goahead, maximize your day and own
it.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.