Scaling up your business is often the inevitable next step once you start meeting or exceeding growth expectations. Small and midsized businesses (SMBs) can experience growing pains if they fail to properly scale up their operations to meet their growing needs.

Whether demand for your business’s products is outgrowing its production capacity, or you foresee expansion in the future, knowing how to scale up your business in the most cost-efficient manner will save you time and money, improve your brand and keep your business operating smoothly.

Own Your Brand 

Are you ready to make changes to accommodate growth? Now may be the perfect time to re-evaluate your business’s identity.

Where is your business now? Where do you want it to be? Does your brand send the right message to customers on your newly expanded horizon?

Every business owner aspires to be financially successful. Or maybe you want to be positively remembered for the product/service you offer. None of that can happen overnight. When you consider your future desires, develop smaller, more manageable goals that will help get you there. It is good to dream big, but baby steps are key.

Reflecting on your business’s image and what your brand means will help you map the path forward.

Scaling up may pit you against new and bigger competition. Ask yourself what makes your business different than others? What do you offer that they don’t? Many successful businesses have a niche. Meeting the needs of the customers within your niche allows you to focus on the core of your business. This builds a strong foundation for unimpeded growth.

Be your brand. If you are true to your brand, know what your customers want and are sure you know how to deliver, you won’t waste money on unprofitable ventures.

Time and Money

Time and money; two of the biggest problems that get in the way of progress and growth.

Most business owners intuitively know when it’s time scale up. You’re familiar with your own business’s capacity and limitations. You will hopefully recognize an approaching inability to meet demand before the need to scale up becomes an emergency.

Scaling done right enables your business to operate efficiently without suffering a gap in service or capacity shortfalls. It’s a problem when outdated technology is an impediment to getting things done on time or getting your products to your customers. The timing of business scaling is about necessity and foresight. It is best to consider how to scale your business before bottlenecks start to manifest.

There are scenarios where you simply couldn’t have predicted a sudden surge in demand for your services. When that happens, look for partners like MAC6 that provide immediate turnkey solutions that allow you to increase your business’s bandwidth.

Every business must use their funds wisely, but SMB owners must be especially cost conscious. Come up with a budget and allocate funds by order of necessity.

Online Presence and Marketing

Marketing and growth often go hand in hand for SMBs. An effective campaign can be the catalyst for scaling up, or you may want to increase your marketing footprint and range to coincide with your business’s increased capacity.

Have you modernized your campaigns? Do you have the right mix of marketing products? Search advertising, social advertising and search engine optimization (SEO) all play important roles in immediate lead generation, improving reputation and increasing brand visibility.

Make sure you are managing your social media platforms wisely and utilizing your online presence effectively.

Managing Growth: Staffing, Tools and Space

Every business must have the logistical and technological structure to support increases in production, product diversity and services. Do you have enough staff, enough space and the right tools to support growth?

Skilled and qualified employees are arguably the most important asset of any business. Not hiring properly can hurt a business. In many industries, fewer employees can accomplish more when they’re equipped with the right tools.

Long-term commercial leases and real estate has the potential to hinder an SMBs attempt at scaling. Getting locked into a long-term lease that penalizes you for leaving early can impose constraints that stunt your growth. At the same time, you don’t necessarily want to lease a bigger space than you require early on just because you may need to scale up in the future.

If you need to hire more employees, consider utilizing a Phoenix or Tempe coworking space.

When you are looking for new office space, consider the:

  • Monthly rent
  • Potential maintenance costs
  • Utilities
  • The cost of internet
  • The hassle of moving
  • Additional fees for use of common areas in some office buildings

The average cost of renting space per employee ranges from $300 a month to as much as $14,800. In the highest cost commercial districts, such as New York, it costs some businesses up to $15,000 for each employee per month.

Your business may be able to save thousands of dollars a month by opting for more flexible shared workspaces. If you’re hiring a handful of new team members you can start as low as $129 a month per worker for Desk+ spaces at MAC6. Those workers will have access to top-notch amenities without you having to deal with the hassles of leasing a new office.

Employers looking for an affordable way to house a team without shelling out thousands of dollars per month on amenities like kitchens and workout rooms may also want to consider MAC6’s Enterprise solutions for as little as $1,999 a month.

MAC6 even offers flexible shared warehouse space for light manufacturing and storage.

Make your office work for you, rather than spending money on an overpriced new lease in a commercial building with fewer, lower-quality amenities. Schedule a tour or contact us to see how you can decrease your expenses by scaling your SMB with coworking space.

Scaling Up Small to Medium Sized Businesses

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