Could "Going Viral" Be Detrimental To Your Business?

In an age where so much of our business revolves around social media one has to wonder, could going viral be detrimental to your business??

Yes, it could - IF you have not done proper Capacity Planning.

Okay. So, here's the scoop.

I'm reading this amazing story about a young entrepreneur who had a great health business idea that went viral overnight. Suddenly, she's interviewing with some of the big news outlets and having her story covered in local media across the nation.

Of course, with coverage and media comes business and inquiries - all of which sounds like great things, right??

Well... If you woke up tomorrow with 873 emails, 213 inbox messages and your online shop overwhelmed with orders would you be able to handle it??

This is where capacity planning comes in.

Knowing how fast your company can scale means knowing, at its current rate of production, how much work your business can viably handle. To handle it "viably" means that the quality of product/service delivery would not be diminished in the process.

Simply put: If you went "full blast" for the next 30 business days using your current methods how much could you produce? What is your max? How quickly can you gather supplies from vendors? How efficiently can your team complete "turn-a-rounds"? Do you currently have the capital needed to handle such a big rush? Would this diminish the quality? Would your shipping or delivery times be affected?

All of these things (and more) go into Capacity Planning