This week’s edition of Let’s Talk, our experts weigh in on when it’s actually the right time to expand, and how to do it without stretching your business too thin.
This week’s edition of Let’s Talk tackles a question a lot of growing SMEs eventually face: how do you expand into a new city or region without overextending your resources?
Whether it’s opening a second location, entering a new state, or testing a new customer base altogether, expansion can just as easily break a business as build it. We put the question to our panel of experts and business owners to find out what actually separates smart growth from a costly overreach.
Let’s Talk!
Nick Martin, APAC GTM Lead, Remote
“Expanding into a new city or region does not have to begin with an office or a large local team. A lower-risk approach is to start with one or two strategic hires who can test demand and build customer relationships before committing significant capital or resources.
Remote’s recent global survey found that Australian business and HR leaders expect 31% to 40% of new hires to be based outside their primary country of operations by the end of 2026. A further 88% said they would increase international hiring if it were as easy and low-risk as hiring domestically. There’s a growing appeal for distributed hiring, but employing people across jurisdictions can be more complex than it first appears.
Each jurisdiction has different employment laws, payroll requirements, and tax obligations. Trying to build this infrastructure from scratch, from registering entities, setting up local payroll, and retaining legal counsel, is a slow and capital-intensive process that can result in losing talent before you’re ready to hire.
Instead, Employer of Record allows businesses to tap into an existing hiring infrastructure, providing the speed and agility to hire where the best talent is, whilst reducing heavy operational overhead. Providers such as Remote help lower the risk of non-compliance by managing local employment contracts, payroll, statutory contributions and benefits, providing a faster and more resource-efficient way to build an in-market presence.
The most sustainable approach is to treat employment and payroll as core infrastructure, giving the business the flexibility to test a new market before making a larger investment.”
Elise Balsillie, Head of Thryv Australia and New Zealand, Thryv
“Expanding into a new city should feel less like a leap and more like following a trail your customers have already started.
Begin by identifying where genuine demand is emerging. Look at where enquiries originate, which suburbs are visiting your website, what local search terms are bringing people to you and where customers are referring others. AI-enabled marketing insights can connect these signals, helping reveal geographic opportunities before you commit to extra staff, premises or equipment.
Next, test whether your business can be found and understood in that location. Create a region-specific landing page with relevant services, local information, frequently asked questions and a clear way to enquire or book. Strengthen local SEO by using the language customers are searching for and keep service areas, contact details and opening hours consistent across search engines, maps, directories and social platforms. This also helps AI search tools understand where you operate and when to recommend your business.
Give the market an opportunity to get to know you. Run a targeted local campaign, publish content that reflects the community or offer selected service days before establishing a permanent presence. Reviews and referrals from customers in or near the region can build valuable local credibility.
Treat the first 90 days as a conversation. Every search, campaign response, enquiry and booking pattern provides marketing intelligence. AI can help identify recurring themes, compare audiences and messages and show which services are gaining traction. These insights can shape your offer, pricing, service hours and marketing investment before costly decisions are locked in.
Behind the scenes, keep customer records, bookings, payments and follow-up connected. Automated responses and reminders can nurture early interest while giving the owner a clear view of what is converting.
Expand in stages and let search demand, campaign performance and customer behaviour determine what comes next.”
Jay Patel, Founder & CEO, Vrinsoft Technology
“Go where the demand is, and it will reduce the resources you need. I always stand by this point, and we have expanded across multiple locations while serving clients in 28 countries. Think about it. If you are entering a city where you are already receiving enquiries, referrals, repeat business, and website traffic, you are already overcoming one of the biggest issues, brand awareness. If you follow this path, you will be expanding into a region where people have already heard about you or are looking for the services you offer.
Expanding to a new city is basically extending your services to an existing market. If you overthink this by worrying about customer acquisition costs and resources, you will not succeed. Start serving customers remotely and build relationships with local partners. I remember our first expansion for Vrinsoft, but in the end, it worked because of the market’s potential rather than assumptions.
Grow in stages so you don’t overextend yourself. It will give you enough time to adjust your costs while giving you the flexibility to respond if the market behaves differently than expected.”
Corinne Bot, CEO & Founder, Polyglot Group
“Having spent nearly 30 years helping businesses expand into new cities, regions and countries, I’ve learned that the biggest mistake isn’t moving too slowly. It’s assuming you need to build everything at once.
Too often, businesses commit to office space, a legal entity and a full team before they’ve proven there’s enough demand to justify the investment. That’s when resources become stretched and growth starts feeling more like a burden than an opportunity.
The businesses that expand most successfully take a different approach. They test the market first, stay close to customers and keep costs flexible while they learn what works.
One of the biggest shifts I’ve seen over the years is that businesses no longer need a fully established operation to enter a new market. Today, companies can hire local talent and start building customer relationships without first setting up a legal entity or navigating complex employment regulations. One solution I’ve seen help many businesses expand successfully is an Employer of Record (EOR). Through an EOR, businesses can employ people in a new market while the provider takes care of payroll, compliance and employment obligations on their behalf.
Flexible expansion models like an EOR give businesses the freedom to explore new opportunities without diverting significant time, capital and leadership focus away from their core operations.
In my experience, the most successful expansions aren’t driven by the biggest budgets. They’re driven by businesses that stay curious, stay disciplined and invest when the opportunity has proven itself.”
Louis Rogers, Senior Director of Partnerships & Sales, APAC, Leap Event Technology
“When we brought Ticketbooth fully under the Leap name, we were not looking at it as a new market entry. We were combining more than a decade of relationships we had already built in Australia with technology and experience Leap had proven elsewhere. That distinction shapes how we think about growth generally.
Based on Leap’s recent expansion, here are three ways to grow without overextending resources:
• Inherit trust, do not rebuild it. As an example, Ticketbooth had already earned credibility with organisers like Supanova and Art Gallery of South Australia. Rather than compete with that legacy, Leap absorbed it, inheriting relationships instead of manufacturing new ones.
• Lead with connection, not headcount. Expansion for us is about pairing our local knowledge with Leap’s global technology, so organisers get one connected platform and one team to grow with, rather than a growing list of vendors to manage. That is the pitch I make to every client, old and new: fewer relationships to maintain, not more.
• Let the product or platform do the heavy lifting. Ticketing, apps, engagement, marketing, analytics — it is one ecosystem covering the full event lifecycle, so a new region isn’t rebuilding infrastructure, it is plugging into infrastructure that already works.
And resist the urge to be everywhere at once. Operating fully under one brand across a region signals stronger recognition. It is here that consistency will be your best friend.
Real expansion is not measured in how many markets you enter, but rather in how well each one sticks.”
Hamish Irvine, Head of Southern States, Halter
“We treat every new region the same way we approached our mainland Australian entry: one detailed plan, one source of truth, and total clarity on what winning looks like before we move, not a scramble once we’re live. Before we launch anywhere, we map out the key workstreams across product, go-to-market and operations, give the team the context and the goal, then hand each piece to a clear owner and get out of their way.
That’s the real unlock: a genuinely capable team doesn’t need managing, it needs clarity and runway. Speed only works when expectations are unmistakable and people have the room to actually execute, not when everyone’s second-guessing each other.
The lesson for any operator: get the context and expectations dead right up front, hand the region to someone who’ll own it end to end, then trust them to run, but never so quickly you outrun your own foundations. The best expansion strategies are built around customers, and that’s exactly how we work with our Halter famers as we enter new regions.”
Katrina Pilcher, Chief Commercial Officer, Altis Consulting
“One of the biggest mistakes businesses make when expanding is investing too heavily before they’ve proven demand. The key is to grow into a new market rather than bet on it.
Don’t rush into opening a physical office
Win clients first. Once you’ve established a core client base and proven sustainable demand, consider opening a local office. An office shouldn’t create demand, it should respond to it.
Lean into what you already do best
Don’t reinvent your business for a new market. Lead with the products and services you know deliver value. Once you’ve established credibility, you’ll have a much better understanding of whether there’s demand for additional offerings.
Invest in relationships before headcount
Resist the temptation to build a large local team from day one. Instead, focus on developing strong client relationships and taking the time to understand how the market operates. Once demand is established, you’ll have much greater confidence about the people you need to hire and how to grow sustainably.
In our experience helping organisations solve complex business challenges across Australia and New Zealand, growth rarely comes from the biggest upfront investment but from proving your value, building trust and then scaling with confidence.”
Louise Walpole, Commercial Director, Advancetrack
“One of the biggest mistakes businesses make when expanding into a new city or region, whether through acquisition or organic growth, is moving too quickly. Opening a new office, hiring a large team or taking on long-term costs before you’ve proven demand can put unnecessary pressure on the business.
“From our experience expanding both regionally and internationally, we’ve learnt it’s much easier when the fundamentals already work. If your systems and processes aren’t consistent now, opening in another location or integrating an acquired business will only expose those weaknesses.
“Remember not every department needs to grow at the same rate. Before committing to permanent recruitment, consider whether technology or outsourcing can take on additional workload. That gives your team more time to focus on customers, build relationships and make the new location a success.
“With our Accounting Talent Index revealing 79% of Australian accountancy leaders have ambitious growth plans over the next five years, the challenge is about more than simply finding opportunities. It’s about ensuring your business is equipped to support that growth sustainably.
“There’s no prize for doing everything on day one. Growing at a pace your business can support will mean a better chance of long-term success.”
Peter Justin Yu, Chief Marketer, Bebop APAC
“Test for financial intent, not just interest, before committing capital or headcount.
A client wanted to launch a major AI conference in Vietnam with only a six-month lead time. Rather than jumping straight into major venue contracts and local hiring, we advised them to run a low-risk pilot: a webinar and a small local networking event to test demand.
Both events were packed—great engagement, high registration numbers. But when sales followed up on actual conference ticket sales, virtually no one was willing to pay or travel for the main event.
Because we tested early, the client scaled down the full conference before making major financial commitments, saving a massive chunk of budget.
Before touching leases or local hires, design a cheap test that measures willingness to pay, not just willingness to click. Worst case, you lose a small event budget rather than burning through a quarter of runway.”
Fiona Hamann, Principal and Founder, Hamann Communication
“Expansion is always good, but growing too fast can strain cash flow, stretch your team thin or dilute the service you are capable of offering clients.
Before opening an office or announcing a presence in a new city, and the associated cost that comes with that, consider whether the outcome you want (local knowledge, faster response times, credibility in a new market) can be achieved another way.
One approach I have found effective in my own business is building a virtual network of trusted specialists, spread across both geography and skillset. Rather than hiring permanently for every region or capability you might one day need, you assemble a bench of experts you can call on when a client requires it, whether that is a particular industry background, a local market contact or a specific technical skill. This means that when opportunity knocks in a new region or a new sector, you can mobilise quickly without carrying the overhead of a full-time team sitting idle between projects. It also means your clients get access to truly relevant and localised expertise rather than a generalist stretched too far.
For service based businesses in particular, this model offers a practical way to say yes to growth without saying yes to risk.”
Morgan Wilson, Founder and Director, creditte accountants and advisors
“Most owners expand on a feeling. The first location is going well, so the second one should too. That feeling is not a business case.
Before you commit to a new city, soft launch it. Pop up, short-term lease, a trial period, whatever gets you real trading data without a five-year commitment. Run it for three months minimum.
Then look at the actual numbers. What did it cost to acquire a client in that market. What is the average job value. How does that compare to your first location. If the economics do not work at small scale, they will not fix themselves at large scale.
Do not expand because a competitor moved into that city, or because a client asked if you service the area, or because the opportunity feels too good to sit on. Those are reasons to look. They are not reasons to sign a lease.
Expand when the numbers from the soft launch tell you to, not when your gut does.”
Hunter Leonard, Founder & CEO, Blue Frog Marketing
“Whenever you expand into a new market, or a new city or region, you have to take care to do it strategically. What do I mean by that? Making a plan to assess the territory before the expansion. This would include understanding that your niche/segment of customers is available in that region (by doing demographic/prospect surveys), understanding the market dynamics match your abilities/positioning – things such as pricing and other value issues are the same as your current market, and by assessing your ability to deliver on your promises in that market once you do gain customers. This includes supply of product, ability to serve, ability to handle customer enquiries/complaints/issues and returns. Other issues might be legislative differences related to your product.
In essence, you want to match the new territory to your existing territory and ensure conditions align with where things are working now. It is like certain plants and animals thrive in certain conditions and climates and not others – the only difference is you get to think about it before acting and choose your new territory wisely.”
Beau London, Director and Co-founder, Frasé Skin
“Three years ago we were mixing product in a spare room in Dubbo. This month we put Frasé Skin on a billboard in Times Square. The bit in between is the actual lesson.
We treated Australia as our testing pool, not a template. 40,000 customers and $3.4 million in revenue told us what worked here — but we didn’t assume it would just port across. The US customer isn’t the same customer with a stronger dollar.
So before we spent big, we went where people already shop: Amazon. They already trust the free shipping, the reviews, the returns — we let that infrastructure carry the early risk instead of building our own on a hunch.
Then we got on the ground. Real content, real conversations, talking to actual Americans about why they buy, what they’re sceptical of, what stops them adding to cart. We didn’t scale until the research told us what was landing — then we doubled down on that, hard.
Test small. Research obsessively. Borrow the platforms people already trust before you build your own. Go loud once you know why they’ll buy, not before.”
Michael Russell, Managing Director, Finwave Finance
“The businesses that expand successfully tend to share one characteristic: they treated the new location as a test before they treated it as a commitment.
The most common mistake is resourcing an expansion as though success is guaranteed. New city, new lease, new hire, new marketing budget, all running simultaneously before a single customer has been acquired. That is not expansion. That is duplication of fixed costs with uncertain revenue attached.
Before you commit infrastructure, validate demand. Can you service a handful of customers in that market from your current base, even inefficiently? If yes, do that first. The inefficiency is the price of proof. Once you have revenue and a repeatable acquisition process, then you build the local presence to support it.
Do not assume your existing model transfers without adjustment. Pricing expectations, competitive dynamics, and customer behaviour vary more between Australian cities than most business owners anticipate. What works in Adelaide does not automatically work in Brisbane.
People are the hardest part. Expanding without a trusted person on the ground means managing culture, quality, and client relationships remotely, which works until it does not.
Expand the revenue first. Build the infrastructure to support it second. Most businesses that overextend do it in the wrong order.”
Grant Philipp, CEO & Founder, Office Hub
“Expanding into a new city or region traditionally requires massive upfront capital investment. Businesses needed to conduct extensive market research, sign long-term leases, buy fit-outs, and hire local admin teams before starting their business operations in a newly rented office. For SMEs today, that model is an unnecessary trap.
To scale without overextending your resources, adopt a test-and-tier expansion strategy:
• Test demand digitally first: Run targeted hyper-local marketing campaigns in the new market before securing physical real estate. Prove there is genuine lead velocity and appetite first.
• Use flexible workspaces: Skip long-term leases and setup costs by putting your new team in a flexible workspace or serviced office. These workspaces are fully furnished and include all required amenities, like meeting rooms, kitchens, and breakout areas. With flexible rental terms, you can scale up or downsize your team instantly. The best part is these workspaces allow you to start your business operations within 24 to 48 hours of your final lease signing.
• Keep operational overhead lean: Your workspace provider manages front-desk and administrative support without additional charges. This also saves you the expense of hiring dedicated local staff.
Only rely on long-term infrastructure once the market is self-sustaining. Expanding lean keeps your balance sheet protected, allowing you to scale up your business with minimal risks and budget.”
Alex Cappy, CEO, First Table
“Having grown 67% year on year (June 2026), and recently expanded into Darwin, there’s several critical steps.
• Think about where you have an existing network first. Before hiring a new team or building city-specific infrastructure, look at what you already have: supplier relationships, partners, or an engaged customer base that can act as a bridge (and referrers) into the new market.
• Build content and systems once, reuse everywhere. Create scalable content, marketing assets, onboarding flows, and training materials that are easy to localise, rather than rebuilding from scratch each time. This keeps your cost-per-city low as you scale.
• Develop a repeatable go-to-market playbook. Rather than reinventing your launch strategy for every region, create one proven GTM model, the same sequence of partner outreach, marketing push, and customer acquisition and simply plug in local specifics. Test continuously and optimise. This turns expansion into a formula, not a fresh project each time.
• Test small, validate fast, then commit. Soft-launch with minimal resourcing to confirm demand before pouring in budget, this protects cash flow while still proving out the new market. Use lightweight mechanisms like waitlists or email capture to test demand in different locations before going live.”
Muthukumar T, Partner, Befree
“Geographic expansion is one of the most exciting decisions a business can make. It is also one of the most resource-intensive if not structured carefully from the start.
The businesses that overextend usually make the same mistake: they scale their revenue ambitions into a new market before scaling the operational infrastructure to support it. The result is a stretched internal team, slower turnaround times, and compliance gaps that compound quietly until they become expensive.
A few principles worth holding onto:
Separate market expansion from operational expansion: You don’t need a full internal team in every location you operate. With the right back-office structure in place, you can grow your client base and service delivery in a new region without needing to proportionally grow your internal team.
State-specific compliance adds up quickly: Payroll obligations, WorkCover, state taxes, and BAS reporting multiply when you cross a border. The cost of fixing compliance errors at a later stage almost always exceeds what it would have cost to set things up correctly from the start.
Your finance function needs to scale without a proportional hire: Adding a new entity, a new payroll, and new reconciliation volumes to an already stretched internal finance person is a common breaking point for growing SMEs.
Back-office functions built to scale independently of headcount are what allow SMEs to expand into new markets without a proportional rise in operating costs. At Befree, we help Australian SMEs scale their finance and accounting operations across locations without the overhead of building internal teams at every step.”
Marissa Candy, Founder and CEO, The Marketing Factory
“Expanding into a new city or region doesn’t mean replicating your entire operation from day one. Start by proving there is genuine demand, then establish the minimum resources needed to serve that market well. Before committing to premises or a large local team, assess customer demand, local competition, acquisition costs and the resources your existing operation can realistically support. Test the market through targeted digital campaigns, a local landing page, strategic partnerships or a limited service area. Set clear performance targets so you know when the market is ready for further investment. The next step is to create a repeatable expansion playbook covering marketing, sales, customer experience, systems and reporting. Keep your core strategy and brand management centralised, while allowing your messaging and activity to reflect the local market. The biggest mistake is expanding based on opportunity alone. A staged, measurable approach gives you the evidence to invest confidently, protects your cash flow and allows you to strengthen the model before entering the next region.”
Scott Capelin, Founder, inLIFE Wellness
“One of the biggest mistakes businesses make is expanding before they’ve perfected their operating model. Growth doesn’t solve problems – it magnifies them. At inLIFE Wellness, we’ve expanded across multiple Australian states before entering the USA and New Zealand. Rather than trying to launch everywhere at once, we’ve focused on proving one market before moving onto the next. Each new region becomes a blueprint that can be replicated.
It’s also important to ensure your systems can scale without relying on you. Before entering a new city, ask yourself: ‘Could someone else run this successfully using our documented processes?’ If the answer is no, you’re probably expanding too early.
Finally, be selective about where you grow. We use demographic data, property analysis and market research to identify locations with the highest likelihood of success, rather than simply choosing the biggest cities.
Sustainable expansion isn’t about opening the most locations as quickly as possible. It’s about building a business that can deliver a consistent customer experience, no matter where the next location opens. Scale what works, not what you’re still trying to fix.”
Nick Dimopoulos, Chief Executive Officer International, SPC Global
“Expanding into a new city or region is always tempting, particularly when there is clear customer demand. However, growth can quickly become a strain if you move before the business is ready.
The first question I would ask is not “can we enter this market?” but “can we serve it well?”. That means understanding the customer, the channels, the cost to supply, and whether the opportunity genuinely plays to your strengths.
At SPC Global, we are focused on deliberate and sustainable growth. In practice, that means being selective about where we invest, prioritising markets where we can build strong partnerships, leveraging our existing capability and creating a clear path to profitable growth. You don’t always need to build everything from scratch. Working with the right local partners, distributors and customers can help you test demand, learn the market and scale with more confidence. It also reduces the risk of tying up too much capital too early.
Most importantly, identify the right channels in your selected markets. You don’t need to be everything to everyone. Being selective not only enables you to build proof points for your proposition, experiment and learn, it ensures that you are growing in the channels that are most aligned to your portfolio and growth strategy.
The businesses that expand well are usually the ones that take a staged approach: prove the opportunity, build the right relationships, then scale when the fundamentals are strong.”
Jake Cush, Chief Commercial Officer, IMA B2B
“Expansion is a 90-day sprint, and it’s not about spending more, but investing with precision.
Start with small-scale tests to validate demand before you commit, as the goal is to see if you can generate real revenue quickly. Pair this with research: understand the competitive landscape and its density, get a clear picture of local search volume, and analyse your existing inbound inquiries. Only then look at staging your expansion in pace with your growth. Experience the new market first-hand yourself, then employ local contractors until you’re comfortable enough to commit to a permanent team on the ground.
Marketing plays a critical role throughout. This is the one thing you can control. Use it to position your business as the most attractive partner for your target market. Identify the top 50 target decision makers and get your brand directly into their hands. Adapt your case studies to work in the new market, as sector relevance always carries more weight than geography.
Above all, protect the core business. New business costs much more than organic growth. Don’t lose focus on the existing core during the expansion.”
Loveth Ochayi, Founder, Fayl Tales
“I’ve run Fayl Tales Live events in Sydney and Melbourne without living in either city, so this is a question I’ve had to practically answer.
Here’s what I’ve learned and what’s worked for my business.
You need to get your value proposition razor sharp first. Starting with this is so important because everything else rests on it. If someone met you, or landed on your LinkedIn, would it be obvious what your business does, how it’s unique, and why that matters to them? If the answer isn’t an immediate yes, a new city will only make that unclarity worse. You don’t have your usual context or reputation to lean on in a new market, so the work you put into being clear at home is what travels with you.
You also need to respect the market you’re walking into. I’ve met so many founders with brilliant products who simply didn’t understand the market they were walking into. That’s the trap. Expanding into a new city is not logistics, it’s entering a new market, and it deserves the same respect you’d give launching a new product. Spend time understanding how that ecosystem works before you commit resources to it and your chances of success grow significantly.”
Dan Hastings, CEO, Christie Spaces
“If you’re expanding into a new city, the real risk isn’t going too small – it’s going too big, too fast. Too many businesses lock themselves into long, expensive leases and glossy fitouts before they’ve proved demand.
Start with flexibility and footprint. At Christie Spaces we effectively run a three-spec model in one building space that behaves like traditional long-term tenancies, project spaces as well as co-work. The same thinking applies to expansion – use flexible arrangements to test the market, then deepen your commitment once the numbers support it.
Design for function over form. Don’t sink capital into ‘on-trend’ amenities that don’t move the revenue line. What lasts the test of time is a great location, reliable infrastructure and space you can reconfigure quickly to what your employees actually need. Then let the data lead you – occupancy, pipeline, churn. If the trend lines are strong, you can scale quickly; if they’re not, having flexibility means you can pull back.
Expansion should create options, not constraints. The businesses that grow most successfully are often the ones that stay agile, preserve capital and adapt as the market reveals itself.”
Mark Khabe, Co-founder, PRIME BPM
“One of the biggest challenges when expanding into a new city or country is ensuring every new location operates the same way as the rest of the business.
At PRIME BPM, we’ve approached growth differently. Rather than relying on larger teams to support every new market, we’ve built our business on a strong operational foundation. Across our business, our core processes, procedures, governance, and best practices are documented, standardised, and centrally managed, giving us complete visibility into how we operate. Every successful way of working is captured, governed, and accessible.
As we expand into new markets, we focus on effectively implementing proven best practices rather than repeatedly transferring knowledge or starting from scratch. We use AI to leverage that operational foundation and replicate proven ways of working across new regions while maintaining consistency.
This allows our people to spend less time on repetitive operational work and more time applying their expertise to building customer relationships, making strategic decisions, and enabling growth.
Our experience has shown that scalable growth starts with operational excellence. When your processes, knowledge, and best practices are already documented and governed, AI can be leveraged to replicate that operating model faster, more consistently, and with far fewer resources. That’s how we’ve been able to expand into new markets without proportionally increasing team size.”
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