Looking to scale your hustle? Four ways to go about it

The Business Coach met up with Abraham Mbuthia, the founder of Uza Point, immediately after the business was crowned the second runner-up in the Total Startupper challenge. Abraham bagged a cool Sh1 million.

And while you might think this was just one more feather in the cap of an entrepreneur who’s enjoyed progressive growth, you’d be thinking wrong.

Abraham’s entrepreneurial journey has seen him experience both highs and lows at different stages. He’s won numerous awards and attracted investment, but he’s also had his whole team desert him.

Through it all, however, he’s remained committed to his vision. Uza Point seeks to revolutionise the retail space through a point-of-sale solution aimed at helping retailers track and monitor their business performance using tech, rather than relying on management via kitabu.

While the solution has made in-roads in the market, it’s been a struggle scaling it. The Business Coach got Abraham in touch with Hilda Moraa, the founder of Pezesha, for insights on how to go about this.

Hilda exited from her previous company, Weza Tela, by selling it for an estimated Sh100 million, and has managed to scale Pezesha. Here are some of the tips she shared.

1. Join an entrepreneurial community

Incubation hubs provide you with the network you need to grow and scale a business. Through an incubation hub, you’ll not only meet a team you can hire for your business, but you’ll also have access to investors and mentors who can prove pivotal to your business.

2. Develop your sales skills

Business development is the heartbeat of a company. It’s vital that an entrepreneur sharpens their sales skills as it will enable them to grow their business. The more sales you register in the business, the higher the probability of growing it to scale.

3. Bootstrap your business through its early stages

Bootstrapping calls for one to minimise costs and only spend on the essentials of the business. Through bootstrapping, particularly in the early stages of the business, you’re better able to maximise on profits, which comes in handy at the point of scaling.

4. Hire a team smarter than you are

A business will perform at the level of the team it has. As an entrepreneur, strive to build a team that’s smarter than you are so you can get insights that you otherwise wouldn’t have access to. This leaves you with the time to work on the business, concentrating on how to achieve its vision and leaving the team to execute the day-to-day tasks, and keep operations efficient and effective.

 

[The Business Coach airs on KTN Home on Mondays at 7.30pm.]