Traditionally
there have been four major business growth strategies. However, I expanded on
the existing framework to include a few more. So, here are seven specific types
of business growth strategies that you can use to fuel growth for your brand.

 

        1.Market development (market penetration)

Market penetration strategy (or market development) is a business growth strategy in which you attempt to sell your existing products into untapped markets. This involves identifying new markets that would be a good fit for your current product line.

Market development is a common growth strategy because it allows you to move beyond your existing customers. As a result, you’ll expand your share of the market. This type of segmentation may involve targeting a new industry, new demographic, new corporate department (e.g., going from HR to finance), or new geographical location.

Bain & Company studied growth-driving moves by 1,850 companies to determine how successful companies achieve sustainable, profitable growth. Here’s what their research revealed:

        2.Market disruption

Market disruption involves coming into a well-established industry that is usually dominated by a few legacy brands and proceeding to do things completely differently than everyone else. There are a number of ways you can potentially disrupt a market, including:

 

      · Using a completely different business model, as many DTC brands have done

     · Utilizing   innovations, such as  when Salesforce offered a totally cloud-based CRM

      · Offering significantly cheaper or better quality products

      · Providing something totally new, such as Slack replacing traditional email

      · Think of how Dollar Shave Club disrupted the male razor market with a direct to consumer model. In a sign of capitulation, Unilever acquired them roughly five years later for $1 billion.

       2.Product expansion or diversification

Developing new products or adding new features to existing ones can be a highly effective business growth strategy. Product development opens your brand up to new audiences who weren’t interested in your brand before.

Semrush is an example of a company that started with a rudimentary SEO and paid search platform. The company launched new features over the years, and it’s now a comprehensive software suite. Although the target audience never changed, new functionality appealed to a wider segment of that audience.