Summary of How to Grow Your Business So FAST it Makes Your Accountant Nervous

Summary of "How to Grow Your Business So FAST it Makes Your Accountant Nervous"

The video, presented by Alexi from acquisition.com, focuses on diagnosing and solving the core growth constraints in businesses by distinguishing between supply constraints and demand constraints. Alexi explains that every business’s growth bottleneck falls into one of these two categories, and understanding which constraint applies is critical to effective scaling.

Core Concept: Supply Constraint vs. Demand Constraint

Demand Constraint: The business has enough capacity but not enough customers. Examples include empty restaurant tables, unsold products, or unused appointment slots.
Supply Constraint: The business has enough customers but insufficient capacity to serve them all. Examples include long waitlists, turning away customers, or inventory shortages.

Key Diagnostic Test:
If you doubled your marketing (ads, outreach, content), would you double sales or just create chaos?

If chaos, you have a supply problem.
If sales double, you have a demand problem.

Strategies for Supply-Constrained Businesses

Raise Prices Significantly:
- Increase prices by 50-100% or more rather than small increments.
- Even if some customers leave, overall revenue and profitability improve, and workload decreases.
Increase Service Delivery Ratio:
- Shift from one-on-one to one-to-many or group services to serve more customers with the same time.
Hire and Train More Staff:
- Expand capacity by adding qualified personnel.
Use Technology and Training:
- Implement tech to increase individual productivity.
- Train staff to improve efficiency and quality.
Operational Improvements:
- Streamline processes to maximize output from existing resources.

Strategies for Demand-Constrained Businesses

Invest in Marketing and Customer Acquisition:
- Increase ad spend, outreach, content marketing, affiliate partnerships, and referral programs.
- Optimize conversion funnels and landing pages to capture and convert leads better.
Optimize Sales Process:
- Identify and fix leaks in the sales funnel (e.g., low demo-to-sale conversion).
- Target the correct decision-maker or customer avatar.
Avoid Over-Improving Product When Not Needed:
- Sometimes product is already “good enough” and further improvements don’t drive growth.
- Focus on letting sales and marketing drive customer acquisition.
Pricing Adjustments in Demand Constraint:
- Raising prices can still help by increasing profit per customer, enabling more marketing spend.

Specific Business Examples & Lessons

Consultant Fully Booked (Supply Constraint): Raising prices drastically, shifting to group services, or hiring more consultants can increase income and free up time.
Software Company with Great Product but Low Marketing (Demand Constraint): Focus on increasing marketing spend and customer acquisition rather than building more features.
Restaurant with Weekend Waits but Weekday Lulls (Mixed Constraint): Use differential pricing (higher on weekends, discounts on weekdays), allow paid line-skipping, or extend hours to balance demand and capacity.
Online Fitness Equipment Store During COVID (Supply Constraint): Sell intangible add-ons (warranties, affiliate products) to generate cash flow to improve supply chain and inventory.
Home Services Business (Plumber) with Thin Margins (Supply Constraint with Sales Issue): Teach technicians simple upselling scripts to increase revenue per customer without adding more jobs.
Enterprise Software Company with Low Close Rates (Demand Constraint with Sales Process Issue): Focus on improving closing rates and targeting the right decision-makers instead of hiring more salespeople.
Online Course Creator Breaking Even (Demand Constraint): Raise prices significantly and create high-end offers to increase revenue per sale, or improve ad quality and conversion tactics.
Mobile App with Slow User Growth (Demand Constraint): Optimize app store listing, invest in paid user acquisition, and build referral programs instead of focusing solely on product development.

Overarching Insights

Businesses often switch between supply and demand constraints as they grow.
Solving the wrong constraint wastes resources and can worsen the business.
Regularly diagnose your current constraint to allocate effort and investment effectively.
Pricing is a powerful lever for both supply and demand constraints.
Improving sales skills, operational leverage, and marketing effectiveness are key levers.
Sometimes the best growth comes from “better customers” (higher value) rather than more customers.

Diagnostic Checklist for Business Owners

Can you serve more customers at your desired quality?
Are you turning away customers or have waiting lists?
Are your most profitable slots or products always sold out?
Do you run out of inventory or have long shipping delays?

If yes to any: Focus on supply-side solutions (pricing, capacity, operations).
If no:

Summary of How to Grow Your Business So FAST it Makes Your Accountant Nervous