What to Do When Your Business Is in a Slump: 5 Steps to Get Moving Again

Growth Strategy

Oct 22

The short answer: When your business is in a slump, don't panic and don't cut blindly. First confirm it's a real trend, not a blip, and diagnose the cause. Then get a grip on cash flow, go back to your best customers, protect your core offers while cutting the noise, and overcommunicate with your team and clients. Melissa Franks of On Call COO calls this "stirring the pot."

If sales calls have dried up, cash is tighter or orders have slowed, you're probably not sleeping well. Most founders in a slump feel panic and a strong urge to hide it. But hiding doesn't fix a slump, and nearly everything that does requires talking to other people about what's really happening.

I'm Melissa Franks, founder of On Call COO, former Fortune 500 COO and host of The Optin Podcast. I've been through slumps myself, including one this summer I didn't see coming. In this episode, I share the five things I recommend when a slump hits, plus how I stirred the pot to get leads moving again.

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How Do You Know if Your Business Is Really in a Slump?

You know you're in a slump when you have evidence, meaning a specific number has changed and you can't predict that it will return to normal on its own. A single bad week is not evidence. A sustained shift in a key metric is.

Every business has a slow season, and some owners don't know when theirs is. This summer was the first time On Call COO was placing COOs other than me in client businesses, and I didn't yet know summer is slow for us. Before you sound the alarm, check for a blip. Earlier this year, one client saw sales fall about 80% below average in a single week and assumed they were in a slump. Our advice was to wait. About four weeks later, revenue was back where it belonged.

A real slump shows up in a number you can name: fewer new leads, fewer booked sales calls, lower email open rates, less website traffic or fewer product purchases. These are lagging indicators that tell you a pattern has changed. You should be able to say, "This number is usually X, and now it's Y."

What Should You Do When Your Business Hits a Slump? The 5 Steps

None of these steps require you to reinvent your business.

1. Diagnose Before You React

Diagnosing before you react means finding the actual cause of the drop before you change anything. First ask: did we do anything different recently? I've seen leads drop right after an ad budget change, and email open rates fall when a company started sending three to five times as many emails. If you changed something, stop, go back to how things were and wait. If the numbers recover, the slump is resolved.

If nothing you did explains it, figure out which problem you have:

Demand: Fewer people want what you offer. If they stopped clicking your ads, you may need new creative or copy. If referrals dried up, you may need paid advertising or outreach.
Pipeline: Interest is there, but people aren't buying. Find where they drop off. In service businesses, buyers who once said yes quickly often need more follow-up, and it isn't happening. Keep following up until you get a yes or a no.
Retention: You still sell to new people, but nobody comes back.
Cash: You're spending more than you bring in.

Founders who react instead of diagnosing cut the wrong thing. They slash the marketing budget that brings in leads, or reduce the team when the real issue was fulfillment, and the slump deepens.

2. Get a Real Grip on Cash Flow

You need two documents: projected revenue month by month and a budget month by month. It isn't fun, but it forces you to be honest about what's coming in and going out. If the cash doesn't cover your spending, you have to cut.

Your goal is to tighten the gap between when money goes out and when it comes in. Incentivize clients to pay upfront, tighten collections if people pay late, and audit your spending. In a recent budget audit, I found a client paying for four tools that did the same thing: $500 a month for something that should have cost $100. We canceled the extras and moved the team onto one.

Cash discipline may not end the slump, but it ensures you still have a business when it ends. It also gives you a target. With $100,000 coming in and $90,000 going out, your cushion is $10,000. Set a goal to grow it to $20,000 next month, then decide what mix of new business and reduced spending gets you there.

3. Go Back to Your Best Customers, Not New Ones

Chasing net new demand during a slump is slow and expensive, because you pay for ads and the sales cycle is longer. Warm sources are faster and cheaper.

The fastest path to cash is upselling current clients, because you know they're happy. Build it into your process by deciding at what milestone you offer an upsell. Then reach out to past clients by email, text or phone. You know their results with you, which makes re-engaging them far easier than winning a stranger, especially for product businesses where someone who bought once is likely to buy again. Even if they aren't ready, they may refer you or buy your product as a gift.

4. Protect the Core and Cut the Noise

In most businesses, roughly 20% of what you sell produces about 80% of revenue. That concentration is your vulnerability, which is why we review it quarterly with clients.

One business we worked with made about $150,000 a month, and a single client accounted for $60,000. When they lost that client, they lost close to half their revenue. The protection is solid deal flow, strong lead generation and reliable pipeline systems, so no single account controls too much of the pie.

Then cut the noise. One product business we worked with had 450 SKUs, and about 20 produced 80% of revenue. If an offer isn't generating meaningful, high-margin revenue, pause or kill it and write it off as an experiment. In a slump, clarity wins: know your best clients, products and offers, and do those over and over.

5. Overcommunicate With Your Team and Clients

Slumps breed uncertainty. Sharing what's happening, what you're working on and where you need help shows you're steady and transparent, which keeps morale up and trust intact. It also creates opportunity: tell clients you have capacity or extra stock, and they may know exactly who needs it.

What Does "Stirring the Pot" Mean for a Business in a Slump?

Stirring the pot is doing something different from what you normally do in order to drive a result. That might mean a networking event, pitching yourself onto a podcast, or calling peers for a virtual coffee.

I learned the phrase from a coach years ago, when I was running an early business that went nowhere. I had nothing anyone wanted to buy, so I had no pot to stir. If you're in a slump, the soup is already on the stove. You just need to stir it. I can't guarantee it will generate sales, but I can guarantee that if you keep doing what you're doing, the slump will continue.

A Real Example: How I Stirred the Pot at On Call COO

When I started On Call COO, I struggled to explain what a fractional COO does. I took feedback to use "buy back your time," ran a weekly masterclass with that title for months and put it on my website. Nobody registered. I changed the copy, got clearer, and eventually calls started getting booked.

This summer, when things slowed, I tried a masterclass again, this time built around operational leaks, something we fix inside client businesses all the time. With a little ad spend, a whole group registered for the first session, and it's bringing in new leads. Sometimes you don't need to change what you're selling. You just need to change how you show up when you sell it.

Key Takeaways

Confirm a slump with a specific number, not a feeling, since a single bad week is often just a blip.
Diagnose whether you have a demand, pipeline, retention or cash problem before cutting anything.
A monthly revenue projection and a monthly budget let you make informed decisions in a slow period.
Upselling current clients and re-engaging past clients is faster and cheaper than chasing new demand.
Protect the core offers and clients that drive most of your revenue, and cut the low-margin noise.
Most successful businesses don't fail; their founders quit before the slump is over.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I know if my business is in a slump or just having a bad week?

A business slump shows up as a sustained change in a key number, such as leads, booked calls, website traffic or product sales, that you can't predict will recover on its own. A single bad week is often just a blip. When in doubt, wait a few weeks and watch the trend before making major changes.

What is the first thing to do when your business is in a slump?

The first thing to do is diagnose before you react. Ask whether you changed anything recently, like your ad budget or email frequency, that could explain the drop. If not, determine whether you have a demand, pipeline, retention or cash problem so you can fix the actual cause instead of cutting the wrong thing.

How can I improve cash flow during a slow period?

Start with a month by month revenue projection and a month by month budget so you can see whether incoming cash covers spending. Then tighten the gap between money going out and money coming in by encouraging upfront payments, tightening collections and canceling duplicate tools or subscriptions. This protects the business so it's still standing when the slump ends.

Should I cut my marketing budget during a business slump?

Usually not without diagnosing first. Marketing is often how your leads come in, so cutting it during a leads problem can make the slump worse. Review your numbers, find the real cause, and cut spending that doesn't contribute to revenue, such as low-margin offers or redundant subscriptions, before touching the channels that feed your pipeline.

When does it make sense to bring in outside help for a business slump?

If you can't pinpoint why revenue dropped, don't have a reliable budget and revenue projection, or depend heavily on one client or a small set of offers, an outside operator can help. A fractional COO can diagnose the cause, build the cash flow and pipeline systems, and give you an objective view of what to protect and what to cut. This is often more practical than hiring a full-time executive while revenue is uncertain.

Need Help Getting Your Business Out of a Slump?

A slump is a signal that something in your pipeline, cash flow, client concentration or offers needs attention. At On Call COO, we help founders diagnose what's really happening, get their numbers on paper and build systems that keep revenue steady through slow seasons. If you want a clear-eyed look at what's driving your slump, let's talk.

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