How to scale your business in 2021 – get improved capacity, clients and conversion

By Chris Ogden, CEO of RubiBlue

Want improved capacity, clients and conversion? You need to scale your business. Yes, even in 2021.

To fully realise the potential of your business, you need to focus on scale. This is not just the box you tick as a high-growth startup or market-leading enterprise, it is a step that every organisation should be taking to ensure sustainable growth and a solid future in a complex and mercurial global market. Scale helps your business to drive leads and improve capacity, it helps you to identify new clients and unpack the value of existing clients, and it helps you to increase your capacity to ensure you can handle what lies ahead.  According to Chris Ogden, CEO of RubiBlue, scale is also the gift that you can give your business to ensure resilience and growth in uncertain times.

“Scale defines the organisation’s ability to grow significantly when it is given the right resources,” he adds. “Yes, 2021 and the aftermath of 2020 doesn’t quite feel like the right time to throw resources at the business, but the reality is that this is the best time to put plans in place and take steps that will ensure your company is capable of handling whatever lies ahead.”

One of the most common challenges faced by companies setting out to scale is becoming over expensed. Many companies are guilty of this and the more revenue you generate, the smaller your real net profit before tax becomes, in real growth terms. This makes the ability to scale incredibly important, not only does it support profit and budgeting, but it helps you to develop the capabilities you need to grow into new markets and take advantage of new opportunities.

“Generate increased profits with the same set of resources,” says Ogden. “From a percentage point of view – the more revenue you generate, the greater the profits you can achieve, but this is not a guarantee. So, look at your business through a magnifying glass to unpack your efficiencies and determine how you can leverage growth and scale off the resources you already have.”

Another step is to focus on improving internal and external processes. If you can streamline processes and manage systems more effectively, then you’re giving someone back more time to do their job and improve their productivity. For example, if you automate a basic process that takes employees several hours to complete each month, then they can use those hours to achieve better throughput. This is not just from the perspective of human resources either, but trickles down into every part of the business.

“Improve and automate heavy operations to streamline efficiencies, then merge roles and lower the management team burden,” concludes Ogden. “Invest into systems that rapidly and effectively educate new employees so they can become more efficient, sooner. And focus on fine tuning operations, strategy and systems so that resources become more accessible and capable. This will give the business the capacity it needs to realise scale at speed, and embed the resilience it needs to handle changing client expectations and markets.”