What are the various effective ways and strategies for reviving a dead or dying business?
Many businesses start on a very good note, but within a few months or years, they are either dead or dying.
There are some that don’t even survive the first six months. What are the reasons behind this pathetic trend, and what can be done to forestall this, and ensure the longevity of businesses?
Let’s delve in.
Lack Of A Solid Business Foundation
A business is like a House. Just as every house needs a solid foundation, so does every business. No house can survive the storms and test of time if it’s not properly built on a solid foundation.
You don’t just wake up and start putting up a structure without first taking time to lay a solid foundation.
Sadly though, a lot of people venture into starting a business without having taken time to lay a strong foundation for the business. And inevitably, the business collapses within a few months or years.
At this point, you may be forced to ask what actually constitutes a business foundation.
Let me make out time to explain to you the components of the foundation for every successful business.
What are the components of a successful Business Foundation?
√ Research.
Before venturing into any business, there must be a strong and thorough research into that business. You do not venture into a business simply because you heard it’s a lucrative business.
To succeed in a business, time, money, and effort must be invested into researching the business, and gathering all the necessary information about the business.
What are the information to gather through the research?
a. The Profitability of the business.
b. The suitability of the location for the business
c. The challenges of the business
d. Study the competition: how are they packaging their business, who are their customers, and how are they getting the customers?
e. What’s their pricing?
These and many more are the information you need to gather before venturing into any business.
√ Capital
Every business needs capital -both financial and human capital. Some people have made mistakes while establishing a business simply because they were told by some motivational speakers that they do not need money to start a business. Yes, there are some businesses that requires very little or no capital. You can start it, and make some cool money from it in a few months. (Please read this guide on the kind of business you can start with very little capital and make big money as profits).
So if you do not have enough money, go for those kinds of business. You have no business venturing into a multi-million dollar business when all you have in your account is a few thousand dollars.
√ Experience
After conducting feasibility studies(research), gathered your capital, the next step is to look at what experience you have to run the business. Running a successful business is more than having the capital to start it. You need to be experienced. You don’t become a medical doctor simply because you have money to build a hospital. You must train for it. Same thing with starting and running a successful business. Learn the business, understand it, before venturing fully into it.
√ Planning
There is a saying that if you fail to plan, then you are planning to fail. You need to have a detailed business plan, and follow it up. You do not just venture into a business anyhow. You must spend time in planning the business from conception to execution.
Having learnt what constitutes a business foundation, let’s look at how to revive a dying or dead business.
Reviving a dead or a dying business takes hard work and committment. In fact, the work you put into reviving a business is more than the work you put into starting a new business. Little wonder some people abandon their business when it’s dying to start a new one. But this is a mistake on their part. If you want to succeed as an entrepreneur, you must learn and master how to revive your business. This is what makes you a master entrepreneur.
So What Are The 6 Steps For Reviving A Dead Or Dying Business?
1. Evaluate the management and staff.
Whether you’re consulting for a company, or you’re managing your company, when the busineas starts dying, in order to revive it, you MUST evaluate the management and staff. The success of a business depends to a considerable extent on the management and staff. They are the ones running the business.
I’m a Business Consultant/Developer. And mostly, when my clients call on me to help revive their businesses, the first thing I do is fire some, if not all of the old staff. Yes, if your business must succeed, you must learn the skill of hiring and firing. I fire them. Then I recruit a new set of staff. Thereafter, I carry out management training for the management, and staff training for the staff.
Sometimes, the management feel they are doing the right thing. But a careful analysis of their method and operational systems will show the opposite. Their methods are either inefficient or completely outdated. So we sanitize and re-orientate their minds.
I would rather work with 5 competent staff with the right attitude, than work with 20 incompetent ones who don’t know what they are doing. In hiring, always look out for competent hands, even if it will cost a bit more to hire them. It will pay you in the long run
2. New Ideas: Ideas rule the world.
Some business people feel that what they need to revivie a dead or dying business is more capital. As a result, you see them running around looking for loans from individuals and banks to re-invest into the business. And after a few months, same cycle repeats itself: business starts dwindling, nothing is working, and inevitably, another closure is facing them in the face. Some entrepreneurs have actually committed suicide because the business they borrowed money to establish wasn’t doing well, and there was no way for them to pay back the loan they borrowed.
Yes, to revive a dead or dying business, you definitely need money. But money alone will not work the magic. You need new and fresh ideas. There is a saying that you can’t keep doing the same thing and expect a different result.
Be innovative. Study the market. Things are changing. The marketplace isn’t the same way it was 10 years ago, 5 years ago, or even a year ago.
It might shock you to know that some businesses do not have a website! In this 21st century, if your business is not online, then you don’t have a business! The world has gone digital; it’s a global village. Whatever kind of business you run, you definitely need a website to showcase it to the world.
3. Engage in Aggressive PR & Marketing
Marketing is the live-wire of any business. Most businesses have died from lack of marketing than from mismanagement of resources.
No matter how wonderful your products or services are, if people are not aware of them, you won’t sell. Yes, every business sells something. Either products or services. The success of your business is hinged on how effective and efficient your marketing campaign is. Gone are the days when people sit in their offices and wait for a random client or customer to walk in and demand for their products or services.
You must be intentional about your marketing. You must create awareness and visibility for your business. To revive a dying or dead business, create a budget fo marketing. Here is a detailed marketing guide for every entrepreneur/business person.
While marketing deals with awareness creation and advertising, Public Relations on the other hand creates or obtains goodwill from the public to your company, product, and brand. It influences the way the public sees or perceives your products/brand. Public relations helps create and sustain a favourable perception in the minds of the public about the products or services you offer.
4. Re-brand.
Some companies/businesses die off and disappear from the market only to come back a few months or years later as an upgraded version of the dead brand. Same company, but different identity, and stronger personality.
Sometimes, some companies deliberately kill an old brand when it is no longer accepted in the market, or when it’s reputation has been marred by some kind of controversy or scandal. In it’s place, they create a new one!
They create a brand that is way better and stronger than the former, and ensure it resonates with the market.
How do they achieve this? They simply give the business a new touch, a face-lift or brush-up,and a new brand identity.
Thereafter, they engage in new marketing campaigns, adopt new logo, change the brand colors, and craft a new slogan to create awareness about the change.
They even go as far as changing the vision and mission of the company! That’s rebranding!
5. Re-Invest.
We touched on the aspect of capital above when mentioning the mistakes people make in trying to revive a dead or dying business. Capital is not the ultimate. But it’s very necessary. Re-investing money into a dying business when you’ve not followed the aforementioned steps would most likely result in frustration.
Yes, you need money. Talking about rebranding, marketing, PR, and many others means you will need money. Yes, you need money to carry out all those stuff.
If you asked me, I would say that the money you need for reviving a dead business is primarily for rebranding, restructuring, and marketing. When that is done, you can boldly inject any amount you deem fit into the smooth running of the business.
And lest I forget, try as much as possible to avoid borrowing money to start a new business. Loans are for business expansion, not business startups. Even when reviving a business, try as much as you can to avoid taking loans from companies or banks.
You can sell of some of your properties to raise money. Liquidate them, and pump the money into your business.
Hire just a few hands/staff to start with. As the business grows, you can bring in people who are really needed.
6. Get To Work!
After all said and done, it’s time to make it work again.
The company or business is yours. And if you want it to work, you must work it. You can’t afford to be sitting on your swinging chair and watch your staff scuttle around while you bark out orders. No! You must get up, roll up your sleeves, and get to work.
Time and effort must be invested if you want to see the business fly. It’s not by mere words. it’s not by wishful thinking. It’s by action. You must wake up early and go to bed late. Let your staff see your zeal, dedication and commitment to the task at hand, and they will follow suit.
A motivated team is an energized team. And an energised team is a productive team. It all begins with leadership. Your staff will do what they see you do, and not necessarily what you tell them to do.
Set goals: performance-driven goals. Set targets for yourself and for your staff, and ensure everyone follows through. Reward performance. It boosts productivity level, both for you and your staff.
Meticulously follow these steps, and you will see your business coming back to life and flying to unimaginable heights of success.
My name is Austin Edoho, a Business Coach, preacher, and a digital marketing expert! Contact us today on austinedoho@gmail.com for all your business needs, and we will do our best to help you.
