🚀 If you were to double your current customer base, could you handle it?
🔧 If not, where would you break?
This is one of the first questions I ask potential new clients.
It does two things:
🚤 1. It frames marketing in terms of a growth engine, rather than a plug to fix a leak in the boat.
Too often people hire marketing consultants to fix broken operations. Sorry Doug*, no matter what the ROAS is on our new campaign, it won’t keep us afloat if we continue to get 5% breakages in shipping, production is already maxed-out, and we’re back-ordered on boxes from China.
💰 2. It looks ahead and forecasts what infrastructure is needed to support 2x,3x, and beyond.
🕺 I know you’re really excited about the 100 new followers we got on TikTok last week, and want to take advantage of the latest trends to go viral, Doug*.
☠ But, without an in-house content creator, that can get expensive real fast! And if we do happn to “go viral” on a new marketplace, do we have the inventory on-hand and a breakdown of the fees, to make sure we don’t bury ourselves?
✨ Mostly, I like that this question asks, “If this works, are we positioned to succeed?”
🏘 Which, I think is important to ask before hiring any outside help or adding on to any department. Otherwise, you’re just building a new room on top of rotten foundation.
*This is a fictitious Doug. No Dougs were harmed in the making of this post.