5 Steps to Geographically Expand Your Business in 2012

Would you like to launch another office or expand your business to an other location when the market is down?

Some say, "NO" because they don't have cash flow now and are struggling to make it in this economy.

Some say, "YES" because they have a profitable model that is replicatable and have funds to invest.  They think, when everyone is scared that is the time to expand and grow.

If the latter is you, then here are the simple steps we learned the hard way on expanding our B2B company into other markets.



1. Find a sales person/force that is highly skilled at opening accounts.

That is different than a farming sales person who can maintain accounts.  This sales force must know how to cold call accounts, quickly process incoming leads from any social media campaigns you have done, and will willing to look for opportunities anywhere.

2. Send your best operations people to the new city to fulfill initial orders.

The worst thing to do is to give mediocre order fulfillment to jobs you are starting.  You want jobs done right so you can leverage referrals and get a positive word-of-mouth going about your company.

3. Hire operations people in the new city and have them mentored by the operations people from step 2.

Get quality people hired, trained and working for you.

4. Hire sales force and have them mentored by the launch team of step 1. 

The launch team knows the accounts they created and are best at coaching the local new hired sales reps the in's and out's of those accounts.

5.  Provide training on farming the accounts that are going while still working to get new accounts.

One of the best training systems we used was Strategic Selling by Heiman and Miller. They will learn how to establish themselves in a large account with strong multiple contacts.

EVERYTHING should be documented in procedures. Before we wrote procedures for our operations people it took 3 months to train them. Now- 2 weeks. In writing procedures I highly recommend Michael Gerbers book E-Myth Mastery.

Analyzing Your Competition

The need to analyze your competitor is the same in every industry.   We usually want tactical ways to get competitive information. First, however, you must start with a strategic plan. 

What is it you need to know about your competitors? 

Probably much more than just the prices. Probably more than just what their features and benefits are. It also depends on your position at your company. A CEO needs to know different things than a IT consultant who is going head to head in a sales meeting. Do you also want to know, how your competitor innovates? How do they recruit talent? First figure out what you need to know. 

Create a Corporate Template or Competition Spreadsheet

This gives you a place to capture data that comes in about all your competitors. This form needs to be available to everyone on the front lines working with clients and prospects. 

Tactical Methods of Getting Competitive Information

1. Best tactical is your converted clients. What do your clients who used to use that competitor say? Why did they convert. Have them tell you everything that answers the strategic things you want to find out. 
2. Of course web research but this is not the best. Web sites written by the competitor are designed to sell. So it is hard to know 1. Is what they are selling out yet or still in Beta and 2. What their weaknesses are except by conclusions from silence. 
3. Personally contact the competitor and ask them questions. Pose as a potential client. 
4. THIS ONE IS KEY: Assign competition champions. By this I mean: if you have 5 competitors, pick 5 people in your company whose job is to keep up with a specific company. Then as companies evolve you have up-to-date information. Regularly have them give up-dates to the template or spreadsheet. If a sales person found out that your competitor is offering a no-risk offer, the champion for that competitor is the person your sales person sends the update to.
5. Interview former employees of your competition of those you hired or those you are interviewing for jobs. Find out what the internal culture is like. Are they excited and growing or are they in panic mode. 
6. Ask targeted questions (from your strategic planning) of your network. LinkedIn is a great source for asking and finding references or concerns about a company.

There is a great article I just read called, 6 Reasons Your Business Needs More Competition.   There is a reason, Capitalism, spawns competition.  To ignore competition is to ignore your competitive advantage. 


After you gather competitive information your next step is to figure out what they will do before they do it.  I address that topic in my military strategy post:  Anticipating Battlefield Events.

Let me know how it works for you and your company.