What is Startup Growth Strategy?

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As you know, there are endless amounts of business strategies, that all come in a variety of forms and differ across industry verticals and stages of growth. There have been frameworks, studies, theories, and all of the above published, debated and discussed. ‘Business Strategies’ is a concept that is an ever-changing landscape. Who you talk to, and when you talk to them, will dictate the response that you get.

This makes it extremely difficult, especially for first time founders, to understand and decide which strategies are the best opportunities to pursue.

Good news everybody! There are some similarities to successful strategies that we can draw across the board.

Understanding how to successfully implement these strategies will accelerate your businesses’ growth.

Let’s start by focusing on what we here at Argona Partners do best - business startup strategy. More specifically, growth strategies for startups. Starting a business is much different from running an enterprise, you don’t need us to tell you that. What you’re here for is a clear answer to what’s the best strategy to start and grow your company.

Through this guide, we will help you develop an understanding of how to choose the best business development strategy for startups, and more specifically - for you.

First, let’s talk about growth strategies for startups. The definition according to Webster’s dictionary– Just kidding! Growth strategies simply focus on utilizing the value assets your company excels at to increase market share. I repeat! The important factor to determine the optimal growth strategy for you is to understand what is the best opportunity to increase market share. Startup growth strategy examples include market penetration, product development, market expansion, and diversification.

According to the Strategy for Startups Harvard Business Review, strategies for startups provide a framework that helps entrepreneurs accelerate their growth. If you want to understand how to build a startup from scratch, check out Harvard Business Review startup.

Growth Strategy Framework

Now that we have discussed what a growth strategy framework is, next we need to understand the different startup frameworks. This is an important aspect to determining which growth strategy is most viable to pursue. So, what is a startup strategy framework? Well, there are a few different strategy frameworks that you should be aware of and consider implementing, depending on what your priorities are.

Strategy frameworks include:

Porter’s Five Forces
Ansoff Matrix
Blitzscaling Canvas
Business Analysis Framework
Gap Analysis
Business Model Canvas
Lean Startup Canvas
Digital Marketing Circle
Blue Ocean Strategy
BCG Matrix
Balanced Scorecard
PEST Analysis
Scenario Planning
SWOT Analysis
Growth Matrix
Comparable Analysis Framework

We understand that this is a lot of information, so in order to help you understand what each of these frameworks offers, check out this strategy framework guide offered by FourWeekMBA, and this go-to-market strategy framework HBR article.

Understanding these strategy frameworks will lead you to the next steps for your startup, which include go-to-market strategies and marketing strategies. Try googling ‘marketing strategy for startups pdf’ and you’ll find a vast ocean of ideas, opinions, and content. It might even be how you ended up here. So, let’s dive into some ideas about marketing strategy.

Marketing Strategy for Startups

Marketing a brand new product or service is challenging. So how can you capitilaze on all of the information out there, and develop the best startup marketing campaigns for your business? What’s a good startup marketing strategy example?

Whether its B2C or B2B startup marketing strategy, most begin with low-cost marketing strategies for startups. Which is okay, and can even be a good thing! That means you’re not able to throw money at content development or paid ads and hope for the best. This is what we call engaging in ‘Random Acts of Marketing’ that don’t really teach you anything.

Marketing is scientific. Develop a hypothesis, test, and reiterate. You need to understand who your target audience is, and just as importantly, how to interact with them.

A marketing strategy includes a digital marketing strategy for startups, which includes social media marketing strategy for startups. However, that’s not all you need to understand. For example, will you utilize a multichannel or an omnichannel system?

A multichannel marketing strategy establishes your presence across multiple channels with different offers and content.

An omnichannel marketing strategy focuses on lead engagement and nurturing by providing a consistent experience across all channels.

Which strategy is best depends on your audience!

In fact, in order to generate fundraising, most investors will want you to have already developed your marketing and sales channels. This way, the money they’re providing will be used to ‘fuel the machine’ you’ve built, instead of used to develop the machine.

Someday, we’ll write a marketing for startups book. Until then, make sure to check out our Insight Blogs and Startup Guides! If you’d like a marketing strategies for startups pdf or a startup marketing strategy template, let us know!

Early Stage Startups

To determine which strategies will work best, we need to explain the different startup growth stages. Determining which growth stage you’re currently facing and where you’re headed will prepare you for scaling into the next stage, and beyond.

If you search for a startup development phases pdf, you’ll likely find plenty! However, some will say there are 4 stages of startup growth, some say 5 stages of startup growth, and some say 6 stages of a startup. There is SO MUCH information out there, how the hell are you supposed to know where you are at on this roadmap?!

Stages of a startup business can be broken down into stages of startup funding. Different funding stages help us understand where along the path a company is in development. Funding stages of a startup business include PreSeed, Seed, Series A, B, C - so on and so forth. Early stage startups are made up of PreSeed and Seed, whereas late stage startups can be found at the Series A stage and beyond. Each funding stage has a typical demographic of company growth, and is used as a general understanding of the traction that has been developed at each stage of growth.

Growth Strategy in Strategic Management

Now that we’ve talked about what a startup growth strategy is, let’s now discuss how growth strategy plays a role in strategic management. Strategic management will help you identiy your strengths, weakness, opportunities, and threats - and help your develop your startup strategy plan, as well as the resources required for implementation.

There are numerous strategies that you can learn about, study, and even become certified in. Each one has it’s own pros and cons, and fit into business models in different ways. However, here are five entrepreneurial strategies that can play a role in the strategic management of your startup:

Competitive Analysis
Financial Health
Product Development
Niche Offerings
Lean & Agile Methodologies

You can find an endless amount of startup strategy pdf’s or startup strategic plan templates out there, and because of the plethora of information it can be confusing to wade through, but more importantly it can take time to understand. While these frameworks are extremely valuable, you need to adjust to fit your business’ profile and choose the best strategies that will accelerate your vision, and that is where strategic management comes in.

Startup Growth Rate

A startup growth rate is necessary for founders and entrepreneurs to be aware of because it will help you determine the velocity of growth for your business. In turn, this will help you and your team determine goals and strategies to pursue. So, what is a good monthly growth rate for a startup?

A typical good monthly growth rate for a startup is around 10-15%, or 120-180% Annual Growth. A typical startup growth curve will usually start at +100% in year one, dropping to around 100% in year two, and moving somewhere around 75% for year three. Therefore the typical startup growth curve is on a downward slope.

However, you need to pay attention to your businesses’ average industry growth rate, and more specifically what is a good startup growth rate by industry. For example, what is the average SaaS startup growth rate? What about a tech startup growth rate? Depending on your competition, understanding the growth rates for similar offers and similar growth stages will help you understand the competitive and industry landscape.

In order to develop your own startup growth rate calculator, simply subtract month ‘X’ revenue from month ‘Y’ revenue. Divide the result by month ‘X’ revenue and multiply by 100 for the percentage. Once you have your growth rate, utilize this to determine the best strategy to continue growth.

Startup Growth Strategy Templates

If you’re interested in additional startup strategy examples, check out our Insights Blog and Startup Guides. There you’ll find resources such as investor prep materials and templates, as well as additional templates to help accelerate your business’ growth!

If you’d like to request a specific startup growth strategy pdf, growth strategy template, or business growth plan pdf - just let us know! We will always provide our startup guides and business growth plan template free and business growth strategy template for free!

If you’ve come across some great examples, templates, or pdf’s - please feel free to share those with us. We’re always looking to provide the best resources to help as many entrepreneurs as we can!