You’re a small business operating with larger, more established competitors all around you. You may feel overwhelmed, intimated, or inhibited. Your products and service are just as good as those of your larger competitors, but you feel it’s unfair they get all the attention.  Stop the pity party!

Most successful businesses, large, medium, and small, started out small to begin with! It’s how you go about positioning, marketing, and operating your business that will determine your success. Think small and act small, and you’ll stay small. Think big and act big, and you’ll eventually get to the size you want to be. Harvard Business Review published a good article on acting big and the fine line between swagger and substance.

The best way of acting bigger than you currently are is to align yourself with business partnerships that enlarge your business offerings and operation. You don’t need a lot of investment to do this. Nor do you need to employ a person in every function in order to have that function working for you. You don’t need to build or create all the products/services internally in order to offer those products/services. What you need to do is to partner with the right businesses that do what you don’t and, that together, make your business more complete, more competitive.

It’s been long recognized and highly touted to focus and invest in your “core” – those products, services, and functions that define your business and brand – and outsource the rest. As a small business, your “core” will be much smaller than a larger business. But, nonetheless, you have a core and need to put as much money, focus, and effort to it as possible.

For many small businesses, having consumer financing programs as a way for consumers to pay over time is important. But, it’s not the core of your business. You can, and should, outsource this function to third parties that focus on this, and only this, in order to have the best possible offerings. This will enlarge your capabilities relative to consumer financing and enable you to compete with your larger competitors.

Think big, act big.

~ David Weyher