Proven Strategies to Scale Your Business Fast

In today’s competitive marketplace, scaling a business is no longer an option, but a necessity for long-term survival and success. As businesses grow, they must expand their ability to serve more customers, improve profitability, and innovate constantly. Fortunately, there are well-defined strategies that can help any business, regardless of industry, scale to new heights.

1. Going Upmarket: Targeting Bigger Fish

What it means: Going upmarket refers to moving from serving small customers to targeting larger, more established businesses or organizations.

Take Salesforce as an example. They initially targeted small businesses but eventually scaled by selling their solutions to Fortune 500 companies. Similarly, if you’re a service provider catering to small businesses (like hair salons), scaling could mean moving your focus to multi-location chains or franchises. This strategy increases deal size, reduces churn, and creates more stable revenue streams.

Advantages:

• Larger deal sizes
• Customers are more stable and sophisticated, leading to fewer payment issues.

Challenges:

• Deals take longer to close (sometimes up to 18 months).
• It requires more effort to sell to these larger customers.

To succeed with this approach, your company needs to deliver exceptional value to meet the higher expectations of larger businesses. As Hormozi points out, "If you increase the quality of your customer, you increase the quality of your company."

2. Going Downmarket: Expanding to Smaller Customers

What it means: Going downmarket involves targeting smaller clients or even individuals, typically those at the early stages of their journey.

For example, instead of selling CRM systems to established small businesses, you could sell affordable tools to aspiring entrepreneurs or freelancers. The key to this strategy is focusing on the sheer volume of customers. There are always more new entrants, and you can cast a wide net.

Advantages:

• The market is endless. New customers emerge every day.
• Smaller customers are easier to reach with well-targeted marketing efforts.

Challenges:

• Payment issues and churn are higher, as these customers are less consistent and financially stable.
• Products may need to be simpler, and your offerings may not be as profitable as serving larger customers.

To make this approach work, businesses must be masters of marketing and sales. Downmarket customers tend to make emotional buying decisions, so your product needs to appeal to their aspirations, even if they’re not seasoned buyers.

3. Going Adjacent: Tapping into Similar Markets

What it means: Going adjacent means expanding into markets that are similar but not identical to your current market. This strategy works best when the new market has similar customer needs or desires.

For example, if your business serves hair salons, an adjacent market could be nail salons or aesthetic spas. The underlying promise remains the same—beauty or self-care—but with slight adjustments to your product or service offering.

Advantages:

• It allows you to grow steadily by tapping into familiar markets.
• You don’t need to reinvent your product; often, slight tweaks to your marketing and delivery will suffice.

Challenges:

• It requires specialized knowledge to make sure your offering resonates with the new market.
• Growth can be slower because you are expanding one vertical at a time.

Hormozi suggests bringing in experts from the adjacent market to help you make a smoother transition. For example, if you’re expanding from hair salons to nail salons, hiring someone with experience in that niche will help bridge the gap.

4. Going Broader: Expanding Across Multiple Markets

What it means: Going broader involves generalizing your core offering and scaling across multiple verticals that share common problems.

For example, a company serving hair salons could go broader by serving the entire beauty industry, including nail salons, spas, and aesthetic clinics. Instead of focusing on one niche, you target all verticals within a broader category.

Advantages:

• You can scale quickly and dramatically increase your total addressable market (TAM).
• A broader approach allows you to appeal to a larger audience with a more generalized message.

Challenges:

• It's harder to provide the same level of value to a broader audience.
• You’ll face more competition from businesses already dominating their specific niches.

This approach often works best once you’ve proven success in specific niches. It’s about taking what you’ve learned in smaller verticals and applying it across the broader industry. However, Hormozi warns against going too broad too soon: “You widen your pool, but you also compete against a lot more fishermen.”

5. Going Narrower: Refining Your Target Audience

What it means: Going narrower focuses on drilling down into a more specific, qualified segment of your current market. Instead of targeting "small business owners," for example, you might focus on small businesses that generate $30,000+ per month and have at least two employees.

This strategy is about increasing the quality of your customers without necessarily targeting bigger clients (upmarket). It’s a matter of precision and efficiency, not just scale.

Advantages:

• You can charge higher prices because you’re providing more specific value.
• Fewer customers mean less competition and lower servicing costs.
• It’s easier to build strong relationships and loyalty with a well-defined group of customers.

Challenges:

• Fewer people to sell to, which could limit market size.
• Requires in-depth research to understand which customers provide the most value and how to attract more of them.

Hormozi highlights the importance of a fractal analysis in this strategy—understanding which 20% of your customers bring in 80% of your profits and focusing your efforts on attracting more of them.

Conclusion: Choosing the Right Path for Your Business

Whether you choose to go upmarket, downmarket, adjacent, broader, or narrower, the key to scaling your business lies in consistent, data-driven decisions. Each of these strategies can unlock new revenue streams, expand your customer base, and ultimately lead to sustainable growth.

In summary:

• Upmarket brings bigger deals with more stable customers but requires more time and effort.
• Downmarket offers an endless supply of new customers, though they’re less consistent.
• Adjacent markets allow you to expand into related areas without reinventing the wheel.
• Broader scaling accelerates growth by appealing to multiple verticals but comes with increased competition.
• Narrower scaling maximizes profits by focusing on your best customers and attracting more like them.