Scaling and Getting Ahead
This article is written by Milambo Kabeleka, a Contributor Author at Startup Turkey.
Eamonn Carey is the Managing Director at TechStars London. He was previously MD at Techstars Connection in partnership with AB InBev in New York, and has been a long-term mentor, advisor and angel investor in Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and the US.
One of the greatest advantage for a business in an industry is the ability to scale. Scaling means getting more customers, producing more and getting more revenue. This is the dream of every entrepreneur. Some of the methods you can use to scale the business are partnerships and getting your business in the media.
PARTNERSHIPS
Partnering with other companies can help you scale your business. are amazing and can do wonders for you company. You can partner with a company in a different country which can automatically break the language and cultural barrier, bring you more users and revenue.
The right partners already have scale and can bring their users to your platform. Don’t look at big corporate companies and be intimidated to propose partnerships. A lot of them are desperate to work with startups because they are looking for ways of being innovative and they know startups have the innovation they are looking for, therefore they are always more than happy to partner with startups. They need you as much as you need them.
MEDIA
Using media to get the word out there can be such a powerful tool when used right. This could be radio, T.V, social media or blogs. Getting in the media can be unbelievably valuable because you are guaranteed of someone listening or reading which will spread the word about your product and drive people to your site faster.
Make sure your adverts are targeted, you can start with figuring out what kind of media you need to use for your business whether its tech media, mass media or trade media, you will have to make sure that you use the media that your target market uses. Getting into specific media will pay off, just identify were you want to go and who will get you there.
One thing that can help you get into the media is being nice to journalists; they have a lot of influence on what information gets to the masses. Journalists are not there to just soak in our information and then spread it. Being kind and building a relationship with them can help you figure out how to pitch to them.
You don’t want to be like the general noise that journalists get every day, so do your research and refine your pitching skills. When meet a journalist, try to engage, be personal, a compliment or two wouldn’t hurt just don’t be annoying. When it comes to pitching to journalists, friendliness and flattery can take you a long way.
In the event that you choose to use email, be brief and friendly by introducing yourself, add a personal touch to show that you actually would like to build a relationship. Suggest a meeting were you can pitch the rest of your business and say goodbye. Journalists are used to people sending them a lot of emails, so you need to make sure you don’t bore them with too many details.
These are some of the methods you can use to put your business on its way to getting funding that can scale your business.
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