Luck or Repeatability: Developing Businesses Processes to Sustain Growth

In business, when we gain a little traction, it feels like we are out there, “doing big things!”  Especially when we win or first, and even our second contract as a small business new to doing business with the government.  Especially when you consider on average, it takes a new market entrant 18 – 24 months to win their first contract at the federal level.  Unfortunately, the majority of small businesses that experience early success in the federal marketplace struggle to maintain the momentum needed to grow their business through government contracts.

Their success isn’t repeatable, and though they hate to admit it…many of them just got lucky! 

One of the things that separate successful small businesses from those that are not successful is repeatable processes and procedures. Repeatable processes are essential to the growth of any small business, especially in the federal marketplace.  Because repeatable processes create consistency and can be followed day in and day out by anyone else in your company, they help you improve the overall quality of the products and services that your business provides.    

As a new business owner, developing repeatable processes for outreach and follow-up will help you to gain instant traction with potential commercial customers, government agencies, and strategic partners.  Even if your process is informal, developing a “repeatable” way of marketing your products and services will help you articulate (1) who you are, (2) what you do, (3) the value of doing business with you, and (4) why any customer should choose to do business with you.  

Additionally, developing repeatable processes removes any guesswork about what you should and should not be doing to grow your small business. Aside from the relief of the stress of trying to remember what you did or did not tell a potential customer, repeatable processes, once created, are measurable!!!

Once you can measure the success of your business development (BD) efforts, it makes it easier to see what works and what doesn’t for your business and where improvements can be made.   Plus, you will save yourself hours and hours of work each day trying to figure out what you should do next, who you should call, or what opportunities you should pursue.  Unfortunately, most small business owners don’t value the importance of incorporating BD activities into their business primarily because they don’t understand the BD process and the overall impact it has on developing a via sale pipeline and capturing viable sales opportunities. 

When you create clear processes and workflows for marketing and outreach, you set yourself apart from your similarly situated competitors (other startups) that don’t have a clue of what or how to penetrate the government place.  

Your BD process doesn’t have to be perfect..it just needs to be repeatable.  Over time, as you continuously work to improve your BD process, you will be able to identify areas of inefficiency and duplication that routinely hinder your BD efforts.