Have you heard of Slack? It’s a widespread messaging tool that facilitates business communication. We at Corefy use it daily, same as other 12 million active users across the world. In January 2021, Slack was acquired for $27.7 billion, and in 2012, it didn’t even exist.
Isn’t it astounding to understand that many of today’s most renowned, profitable, and globally omnipresent businesses started as pet projects not so long ago? The journey they made has been primarily facilitated by the possibilities of the internet combined with well-crafted business expansion strategies.
For this article, we’ve carefully analysed numerous cases and studies to derive the best business expansion practices, gathering them into one blog post for your convenience. Here, you’ll also find statistical data on why businesses usually consider expansion, critical indicators of expansion preparedness, and challenges occurring while expanding. And in the end, there are recommendations on taking a shortcut and accessing new markets faster.
Why expand?
Many companies believe that entering a new market would unveil new opportunities, help attract more customers, and earn more money. According to a survey by VelocityGlobal, more than half of tech businesses in the US and the UK named growing their customer base as one of the main reasons to enter new markets.
For some, taking their operations global is a must to remain competitive. Scaling up and acceleration of operations is the second most crucial factor for the majority of companies.
Besides these reasons that are on the surface, numerous others are not that evident. For instance, expanding to access talent is also a common practice in the tech field. Interestingly, this reason was mentioned by American companies 10% more often than by British ones. In today’s uncertain time, some businesses plan expansion to diversify their portfolio and alleviate the risks, namely the threat of trade barriers. Merger and acquisition deals account for a considerable share of respondents’ answers, too.
Let’s summarise by saying that businesses believe access to foreign markets would make them more successful. That’s what 73% of senior decision-makers confirmed in GoCardless research.
However, not every business is ready to go global, as it requires profound preparation and specific settings.
5 indicators that you’re ready for expansion
There’s plenty of signs indicating it’s time for you to conquer a new market or increase your share of existing ones.
