Tips To Grow Your Small Business

Posted on by Roshan Leave a comment

Are you looking to grow your small business? What you need is a solid growth strategy. To get on the road to success, here are a few tips to help.

1 . Improve your branding

All of the most successful businesses have stellar branding. Your brand is essentially the personality of your business. As The Branding Journal describes it, ‘Branding is the process of giving a meaning to a specific organization, company, products or services by creating and shaping a brand in consumers’ minds.’ Your branding is shaped by your logo and graphics, your voice, your content, your interactions, and your culture.

If you want to grow your small business you’ve got to build a brand that’s engaging, memorable, and relatable. You’ll need a brand story that evokes emotions, and shows your audience who you are. Start off by improving your market research, to gain a deeper understanding of your audience. Understanding your ideal customer is the key to building your brand.

2. Fantastic marketing

It’s impossible to grow your business without a fantastic marketing strategy. To help you devise one, it’s important to keep up with the latest marketing trends. There are so many ways to create an effective marketing strategy, including:

  • Work with influencers to boost your visibility.
  • Create standout video marketing content (whether it’s how-to videos or traditional ads).
  • Host webinars or live online events.
  • Get your customers to make CSR content.
  • Use social media ads to target the right demographics.
  • Your blog content can help you to engage users and boost SEO.

3. Expand internationally

If you want to grow your business you might consider expanding from your domestic market into international markets. Before you embark on this process you must conduct plenty of target audience research. You’ll need to figure out the demand in these new markets, and how you might need to adapt. Research your competitors, as well as the laws and regulations for international trade. You can simplify trade with a customs broker. Customs brokers can help you to meet the legal requirements of international trade, and avoid penalties.

4. Invest in your culture

Growing your business is about investing in your company culture. Creating a positive company culture will help you to attract and retain the best talent. Without talented staff, it’s impossible to grow a successful company. To improve your company culture today, consider these starting points:

  • Offer attractive company benefits, whether it’s healthcare or pension schemes.
  • Create an inclusive culture.
  • Support your team to bond, arrange social events, etc.
  • Provide training and development opportunities.
  • Regular check-ins with your staff, and help them to set goals.

5. Keep an eye on competitors

All businesses need to keep a close eye on their competitors. When you understand your competitors, it’s easier to beat them at their own game. Assess the quality of your competitor’s products, look at their content, and their customer service. Use your insights to make improvements, and set yourself apart. The important thing is to establish what makes you different. Why should customers choose you? If you don’t know the answer to that, you can’t expect your customers to know!

6. Collect feedback

Collecting customer feedback can help you to gain so much useful info. You can use your feedback to improve your products and content and keep on growing. Many customers are willing to offer their insights. If you’re struggling to collect feedback, you might like to offer your customers an incentive. There are plenty of advantages to collecting feedback, including:

  • Can build your brand to encourage trust and empathy.
  • Improve the customer experience.
  • Helps customers feel valued.
  • A great way to improve your products.

7. Use forecasting 

If you want to scale your business, forecasting is a great process to use. Business forecasting means making predictions about company outcomes, based on metrics. Making predictions can help you to prepare for the future, and make sound financial decisions based on the market. 

To support the process, there are several forecasting software options that you might like to use. Check out Vena, Prophix, and Oracle Planning cloud. Running your business can be challenging, but tools like these can make it easier.

The takeaway

Growing your small business can be difficult, but with the right plan of action, it’s easier to make it happen. The key is to improve the efficiency of your operations, making it much easier to save time and money. To make progress fast, start using these pointers today.

Four Signs Of A Good Business Owner

Posted on by Roshan 2 Comments

Becoming a business owner is something that not everyone wants to do is capable of achieving. It takes a certain person to be a business owner, and you also need to have the right business idea in order to get your company off the ground. Here are four signs of a good business owner to see if you have what it takes.

You Listen To Your Staff

A clear sign of a good business owner is someone who doesn’t have any trouble with listening. Being able to listen to your staff is important because it ensures you are taking everyone’s opinions in and you’re being present for them in their time of need. Being able to listen, rather than to simply talk over people is important, and it can help in many situations in business. By being a good listener, you’re showing respect and appreciation for everyone you deal with, no matter what their role or influence may be. Try to embrace being a better listener where you can, and if you’re finding it hard, then you need to acknowledge where you’re going wrong. You might be someone who talks too much that it’s hard for anyone else to get a word in edgeways. Try to pull yourself up on that where and when you can.

Willing To Take Risks

With all business owners that are successful, they take risks. From senior care franchise owners to owners of a retail stores, if you’re not willing to take risks for the sake of the company, then you might never grow or develop in the way you were hoping to. Risks are always going to be a matter of accessing the pros and cons of taking that risk and then trusting your gut. Some risks don’t pay off, but some could certainly do a lot for your company.

Good Communication

Communication is always going to be an important part of your business, and you must be willing to communicate effectively not only with your staff but also any suppliers or clients you have. Good communication is good to really pay off when it comes to getting things done, and sometimes a lack of communication can cause mistakes. These are mistakes you definitely don’t want to be having when it comes to your company because it could hinder how well your business does in general.

You Can See The Bigger Picture

Being able to see the bigger picture is important. Knowing where your business is going and where you want it to be in the next five years is an example of that, and so you have to be willing to adapt and change with the times. It can be hard to keep up with how much industries can change within the space of a few years, but it’s all relevant to stay reputable and within the spotlight.

Your business needs a good business owner and leader. That’s something that takes certain skills and criteria, so work at it if you lack it in some areas.

Finance Tips For New Businesses

Posted on by Roshan 2 Comments

Working as a business owner for the first time can be a huge change of pace and will likely take a lot of getting used to. As a business owner, you now have the responsibility to manage your own finances and a whole empire.

Managing finances for a business is a lot different to your personal finances and it can be difficult to keep afloat. As a new business owner, we want to share with you some of the top tips you need to take on board to stay financially sound this year.

  1. Plan payments in your calendar 

The most important thing to do when you begin managing your finances is mark out the dates each month that bills leave your account. Every bill will leave your bank account on a different day of the month and you can record this to ensure you never find yourself without money. It is important for you to record every payment as well as direct debit, and this will allow you to stay alert every month.

  1. Record, record, record 

As well as recording payments that will leave your account due to bills, you also need to record any small purchases you make from your work account. Whether it be a small coffee in the morning, lunch with a client, or travel to a meeting: receipts should be kept and recorded so you always know where your money is going. This is a crucial part of finance management because you will otherwise risk falling behind on your bills and making less profit due to higher spend.

  1. Offer easy payment methods 

As a business owner, your aim will always be to reach as many people as possible. It is important for you to offer as many payment methods as possible to your customers when process payments online. This means as well as debit card payment you should offer credit cards, PayPal, and Apple Pay. By offering as many payment methods as possible you can reach more people, make more sales, and therefore more profits.

  1. Keep business separate 

As an entrepreneur it can be difficult to separate your work life from your home life; and many of us when starting out manage business from our personal bank account. However, to keep your business as well as your personal life safe, make sure to open a new account for all business operations. This will ensure that you never spend too much on your business and come in short for your home bills, and visa versa. Keeping these separate entities is safer and allows you to gain a clearer view of what money you actually have to play with.

  1. Be smart about procurement 

If your business involves manufacturing products, one important thing to consider is how to reduce the cost of making the products. One way to reduce costs when making products is to be smart with your procurement of supplies. When looking for supplies and materials to create products you can save money by buying secondhand, in bulk, or eco-friendly products. Be sure to do your research and you will be able to find some great bargains online.

  1. Create a budget

The most important thing to do when managing your finances for a business month is create a budget. First of all look at your incomings and outgoings and take out your bills, this will leave you with money to play with for your projects and operations. Always create a budget that is less than you have in your account, this will provide a buffer if you ever have a slow month of sales.

  1. Hire remotely 

Why hire people in-house when you can hire remotely and save a ton of money? One of the biggest benefits of technology these days is that outsourcing and remote working is easy. Instead of renting out an expensive office space and paying for an employee’s pension and benefits, you can spend money on people who will work from home on a freelance basis.

  1. Cut costs 

As a small business owner it is important for you to cut costs any way that you can. There are a lot of ways you can cut costs as a business owner, such as hiring remotely, smart procurement, and more. Find ways to save money on services such as free online tools, bulk buying items for the office, and more. Ensure that you never spend more than you absolutely need to, and it will make a big difference to your business.

4 Ways To Use AI To Improve Your Marketing Strategy

Posted on by Roshan Leave a comment

In the past few years, we’ve seen artificial intelligence cropping up everywhere in the business world. From AI chatbots for recruitment to AI generated product descriptions. It’s no surprise that AI can help businesses to improve their marketing strategies. If you’re wondering how you can facilitate this, start off with these four options.

1. Content

It’s impossible to improve your content if you don’t understand its current performance. It’s useful to collect content performance insights, using AI. No matter which industry you are in, intelligent content should be your goal. Intelligent content means that the content has been created and optimized for the best performance possible. To help you to create better content, try content tools such as Vennli. This software can help businesses to enhance their relevance for content tactics. With Vennli, companies can measure metrics and gather performance data.

2 . Programmatic advertising

Programmatic advertising means buying digital media automatically, with the use of machines. By using programmatic advertising you can gain intelligence from consumer data and automate your ad procedures. AI integrations can help companies to improve the success of their ads. With these processes, you can design personalized ads, using pattern detection and data analytics. Using artificial intelligence, marketers can achieve the correct timing for remarketing. Doing so will ensure that consumers are not constantly shown the same ads. To improve programmatic advertising further, companies can use AI software to support budget management.

3. Chatbots

Many businesses are now using chatbots on their websites and social media accounts. By using a chatbot, you can offer your customers a 24/7 service by messaging chat. One of the best things about chatbots is that they can serve a large number of people simulatenously. You can also use these bots to gather feedback about your website or app. Chatbots can be programmed to speak in a huge variety of languages, to offer your customers from abroad a better experience.

4. User Experience

AI can be used to improve user experience on your site, for instance, by giving personalized recommendations. You can also use AI to generate personalized emails to customers who visited your site, but did not buy any products. AI tools are further useful to gain data about user behaviour. When you can access information about how people used your website, you can use this data to improve your marketing strategy. UX is one of the most important areas to consider when it comes to your site. To ensure that the site is appealing to your users, it’s best to work with a talented website designer. With so many similar sites competing for attention, it’s worth investing in something bespoke that stands out.

By considering these four marketing options, you’ll stand to enhance your 2020 strategy and gain more leads. As technology advances forward, it’s likely that this is just the beginning for AI and marketing. To stay current and agile within your industry, it’s advisable to keep up with the emerging AI and marketing trends.

How You Can Reward Staff: 5 Unique Recognition Ideas

Posted on by Roshan Leave a comment

When you own a business, you want to ensure that you keep your staff happy. A way of making sure that your business doesn’t stagnate or fail, it’s no secret that upbeat employees = success. Your employees will perform better if they are happy with their work environment, so as a business owner, you should take the appropriate steps to make sure this happens.

And a great way of doing this is through offering them perks and rewards. Of course, throughout the years you can introduce things such as bring your dog to work once a week, work from home days or flexible working. But there are certain rewards that you can implement if they have done something that particularly benefited the business – such as improving sales with a new marketing strategy they created.

So how can you reward them? If you’re unsure as to where to start, here are five unique recognition ideas that you can take inspiration from:

  • Hire a Food Truck

A great (and delicious) reward is hiring a food truck for your office. Whether this is offering tacos, ice cream or another mouth-watering item of food, your staff will love this reward. This is particularly wonderful in the summer months – as you could arrange for it to arrive around lunchtime when the weather is nice, so that they can sit outside and enjoy their treat.

  • Throw A Party 

Everyone loves a good party. So why not throw your staff a party to help celebrate a special achievement? No matter how big or small this party is, your staff will love the opportunity to socialize, eat some food and dance the night away. During the party, consider making a speech in which you thank your staff personally for their efforts.

  • Organize a Fun Day Out

If you really want to treat and reward your staff, why not organize a fun day out for them? No matter what you organize, whether it’s a day at a waterpark, doing a thrilling activity such as paintballing or a simple trip to the local theatre, it will give them that much-deserved break from the office. Taking the time to plan this will show your staff how much you appreciate all that they do for you throughout the year.

  • Purchase Challenge Coins

If you’re looking for something that’s truly extraordinary, consider purchasing custom challenge coins for your staff – or those who have particularly stood out from a company such as Challenge Coins Limited. A unique gift, they can be customized so that your company logo is on there and are incredibly cost-effective. A technique that the military has used for years, it’s something that your staff will love.

  • Give Them Some Time Off

A perfect way of keeping your staff motivated is rewarding them with time off. Whether this is at Christmas or a week throughout summer, it will give them much-needed rest and relaxation away from the workplace. This perk is one that’s bound to be adorned by all of your employees.

4 Ways to Ensure Your Business Doesn’t Stagnate

Posted on by Roshan 7 Comments

A business needs to find ways to diversify their brand, introduce new products and grow their audience. If they fail to do one of these things, they risk becoming stagnant and falling behind the competition. This is never a good position to be in as it can seriously hinder your growth potential.

So what should be done about it?

1. Get on social media

One of the best ways to stay relevant and keep up with trends is to get yourself on social media. Social media will help you keep track of what’s going on in the industry, but also gives you a way to keep in touch with your audience. It’s fantastic for networking as well and you’ll definitely want to focus on creating a presence on multiple social media platforms if possible. The use of social media as a marketing tool is incredibly powerful, but you need to use it in the correct way or else it could have a negative effect on your business.

2. Think outside the box for revenue opportunities

Growing your revenue requires that you think outside of the box now and then. This will ensure that you’re diversifying your sources of income and gaining extra capital to assist in your business’s growth. There are many ways to diversify, such as renting out your employees on a contract basis or even renting out your private land and property to other companies. Companies like Vertical Consultants specialize in the renting of your private land to attract telecom companies who are looking to raise cellphone towers in your local area. The goal is to use your resources in an efficient and effective way in order to create more income streams.

3. Don’t do everything yourself

Make sure you don’t try to do everything yourself in your business. This is a common problem that a lot of entrepreneurs face because they’re worried about the costs of hiring an employee. They might also be fixated on quality control, unable to trust others when it comes to communicating with clients or creating products to sell. This is a bad habit to get into and it’s vital that you open up a bit and consider hiring employees. To start, you could also look into freelancers that help you remote with things such as website and logo design. If you have a specialist business, remember that there are freelancers and agencies focusing on your specialism out there. A good example is that there are professionals working in nonprofit SEO strategy if you run a non profit company. Put a little effort into finding the perfect person for each job you need carried out for the best results!

4. Use modern technologies when possible

The use of computers is essential to be competitive today, but it’s not the only form of technology that you should be looking into. There are plenty of hardware and software solutions that can help you speed up your tasks so that you’re more productive. Even something like accounting can be simplified with the help of cloud accounting software. However, this can quickly become an expensive money sink and it’s essential that you consider how much money you’re spending and how much return you’re getting on your investment. Saving a couple of hours each month could be worth your money as long as the time you save helps you grow your business and generate more revenue.

Precision In Business: The Fine Line Between Success And Failure

Posted on by Roshan 1 Comment

Precision is a word that often gets used in business, but what does it mean, and why does it matter for your business? To start with the dictionary defines precision as ‘the quality, condition or fact of being exact and accurate.’ Does this mean anything to you? It might make sense in science or manufacturing, but in business, how does it relate? There is often thought to be a fine line between success and failure in business and precision could be that line; the only difference that will make the difference between the success and failure of your business. You can use precision though to your advantage and make sure your business is on the success side of that line. Being precise in everything that you do may seem like hard work at the beginning, but like everything else, once you get used to it, it just becomes routine.

Precision Will Get Results

Being precise in your business ‘doesn’t mean you need to use digital flow meters to measure everything (although it depends on the industry). It just means that if you make it best and standard practice to operate with accuracy, quality and precision in your business, from the smallest job to the largest, then you will always be improving and because of that, you will see your performance and sales results improving.

Precision Matters In Your Proposition

Being precise in a proposition means getting to the point, forget the jargon and the business-speak, the BS and all the cliches. Don’t tell a prospect anything irrelevant to try and make yourself sound good, just deliver a precise proposition. It is vital to use simple, precise language and remember that less is more, never expand on your core proposition, as ‘it’s more impressive to hold some things back and reveal the benefits about yourself over time.

Precision Is Key In Your Passion

‘There’s no point faking passion or exaggerating passion. If ‘it’s a real passion, then ‘there’s no danger of overdoing it, but if you still need to harness your passion with precision, then that’s okay. Be precise with the language you use when you become passionate and ‘don’t use too many superlatives like, ”amazing”, ”unique”, ”incredible” and ”unbelievable”. Precise, sincere language works more effectively, and examples help to prove the passion.

Precision In Your Clients

Precision is a critical component for a solid, sustainable customer base. Rather than thinking that ‘you’ll just sell to anyone to make money, the best way to create a dynamic, sustainable pipeline is to target with precision and identify your client target niche and stick with it.

Precision In Your Team

To create a team who are going to deliver the results you need and make your business work successfully and as smoothly as possible, then you need to keep them focused and motivated, and the way to do that is to apply precision in the way you lead them. Make sure you have a precise definition of your culture, the vision and precisely what is expected of them. Also, make sure you demonstrate precision in your leadership and lead by example. If you’re not precise, you certainly can’t expect the rest of your team to be.