Reginald Chan

Tag: small business

  • 7 Essential Tech Solutions for Small Businesses

    7 Essential Tech Solutions for Small Businesses

    Technology can always improve businesses and their daily activities, streamlining every step to save time, effort, and money. Implementing tech solutions can empower your employees, making them work harder and focus better. 

    If you’re thinking about taking your business to the next level, then read on to learn more about seven essential tech solutions that can be beneficial for you and your company.

    1-Artificial Intelligence (A.I) 

    One of the most effective tech solutions that any business should utilize is artificial intelligence (A.I) because it effortlessly streamlines every task. Implementing it will transform small businesses and help them compete with bigger corporations. The benefits you gain include machine learning, which means processing large amounts of information, tasks, and data quickly. Automation protocols that finish trivial and repetitive tasks quickly, giving your employees a chance to finish their important duties. A.I should be managed and set properly to ensure that it continues to minimize mistakes for you, eliminating human errors that can be easily missed.

    2-Cybersecurity

    Small businesses need defense protocols against malicious digital attacks and using cybersecurity solutions can keep their data protected. Having the right software programs and the professional IT specialists that can manage it is key, allowing you to prevent cybercriminals from penetrating your system. Kansas has several major companies that can be targeted by hackers and cybercriminals, making protective software programs a necessity. Advice from several digital specialists and IT support in Kansas City suggests that threat monitoring tools that protect networks should be easily managed to eliminate IT frustrations. This means that the right program that is simple to use and effective in protecting data can be worth the cost to have complete digital security.

    3-Electronic Timesheets

    Utilizing electronic timesheets can increase productivity levels significantly in your business. This type of tech solution allows you to monitor the progress of each employee, project, timestamps, history data, and reports. One of the best advantages of timesheets is that it can be customized to fit your business needs and requirements, allowing you to create custom fields that don’t require manual entries. It reduces time and effort, allowing every supervisor to monitor and oversee each project and every department effortlessly. Electronic timesheets allow you to see which project is progressing right and which ones aren’t profitable. The perks of monitoring each task this way will always improve productivity and success levels in any small business. 

    4-Customer Communication Tools

    Another way to improve your company’s practices is by having customer communication tools that make it a hassle-free experience for both your customers and employees. Increasing satisfaction and retention levels should be one of the main priorities of a small business because customers can elevate the company to gain more success. 

    Your business should have systems that allow clients to open a line of communication with you through live chat systems, emails, or virtual assistants. You could either hunt for a pre-made system for that specific purpose or have one custom-made by a programmer. However, make sure you know the right way to find a programmer for your start-up.

    As a result, problem-solving protocols will be easier and customers will be happier, increasing your brand recognition levels significantly.

    5-Employee Collaboration Tools

    Implementing software programs and digital tools that increase employee collaboration can improve productivity levels. Staff members will be able to communicate easily and in real-time, sending important documents or data to each other effortlessly. Team leaders can use these tools to coordinate between every employee, ensuring that everyone is on the right track. Communication and collaboration can streamline your small business and allow it to succeed a lot more.

    6-Cloud Systems

    Cloud systems are quite useful for storage and protection, making the process of saving and sending data a hassle-free experience. Backing up your data on the cloud will always protect your company from system failures or cyberattacks. Even if your main servers and data were compromised or got deleted, you will have the essential backup to ensure that your client and project information isn’t lost.

    7-Mobile Applications for Payments

    Companies can use mobile applications for payments to speed up the process, making it easier and better for both the business and the customers. The idea is to incorporate a tech solution that allows customers to pay using their smartphones, getting funds directly and quickly from them without waiting. Mobile applications will streamline the payment process and save a lot of time because credit and digital payments are easier for the customer.

    Business owners and entrepreneurs must utilize tech solutions for the sake of survival. Customers and clients will appreciate a company that uses technology to improve their experience, increasing your customer retention levels tremendously. When your employees don’t waste time on trivial tasks and finish important activities quickly, productivity levels will skyrocket beyond your expectations. Undoubtedly, technology will always improve and elevate any small business and help it expand for more success.

  • Five Ways to Make it Easier for Customers to Purchase from your Small Business

    Five Ways to Make it Easier for Customers to Purchase from your Small Business

    Five Ways to Make it Easier for Customers to Purchase from your Small Business

    If you’re struggling to make your small business becoming a large, booming business, you have to start at the basics. It can be easy to get caught up in the minute details without seeing the forest for the trees. Yes, all those details matter, but what matters most is turning potential customers into paying ones. Let’s go over five of the top ways to make sure that your business is set up to be a successful one with these next tips. 

    ​Five ways to make it easier for customers to purchase from your small business

    1. ​Have an online payment option that is obvious

    Even if your business is predominantly a physical store-front, there’s no reason to not make purchasing easy. Make your payment option simple and easy. One option is to have an online option; with options like Payanywhere, there’s no reason to not accept virtual payments. This way, your customers can browse at their leisure, and you can accept credit card payments right from your computer. If a customer calls you up after they’ve left your store intent on buying something they saw earlier, the last thing you want to say is, can you come back in to pay for it? By that point, you’ve lost the customer, so make payments simple.

    2. Maintain your website

    If you offer a physical product or service, ensure that your website is up-to-date with contact information. Have an online presence that covers the basics of your storefront or service, including commonly asked questions so that customers spend less time trying to figure out exactly what you do. At the very least have a phone number, hours of business, and, if you offer a more seasonal service, the average lead time. 

    3. Remind the customer of your expertise

    If you operate solely with an online presence, make sure that your website is detailed and thorough. The last thing you want is a potential customer wavering between purchasing your service and not; by giving them all the information up-front, you’re reassuring them that you are an expert in your field. 

    4. Provide good customer service

    This may seem obvious but check your voicemails. This seems silly, but many businesses get so caught up with everything they need to do each morning that they forget one of the obvious things – to follow up with customers reaching out to you. Whether that’s via an online portal, email, or voicemail, make sure you give those customers a bit of time each day so that you’re turning potential clients into payments.

    5. Offer subscription services

    A customer who needs something repeatedly is unlikely to stray and try another store or website if they can rest assured that what they’re needing is going to show up at their door front each month. If you run a software-as-a-service, you likely know the importance of repeat customers, and the easiest way to turn one-time customers into recurring ones is by offering a subscription. This is true for physical goods as well; if you run a business that has customers returning to your website or storefront every couple of months, offer them the option of having something delivered each month to them. 

    There you have it: Five simple ways to make customer purchases easier for your small business.  Put these five tips to use and notice as your conversions increase over the next several months.  

  • How To Market On Facebook As A Small Business

    How To Market On Facebook As A Small Business

    You have definitely heard about Facebook and the number of people who spend their time there every single day. Well, it means that it is a perfect place to get your marketing done.

    However, things are not that simple.

    As you have probably expected, even something like social media requires a lot of understanding, especially once you start to put some money into it. Of course, the more time you spend on it and learn, it becomes clearer. And since everybody has to start from somewhere, this article is a perfect place to begin your journey.

    Start with the Profile

    Every Facebook page needs to have an optimized profile. This becomes even more important when you are running a business. Everyone usually starts with a profile picture and the cover.

    After that, be sure to fill in all the blank information on the business page, such as the website, location, working hours, and so on. The more effort you put into it, the more professional everything looks.

    Content with Intent

    When you start posting, make sure that it is not some random text that makes no sense or serves no purpose. Every single message that you share with your followers needs to have a meaning behind it.

    Moreover, there will come a time when you will have to boost these posts with money to reach more people. The sooner you become accustomed to such content, the better.

    Recommended read: Facebook Business Manager Guide for Beginners

    Insights

    Understanding the demographics and whether your fans are truly the ones that would be interested in the business is important.

    Luckily, Facebook has its own version of insights, and it provides all the information that the page owner would like.

    Taking notes every day is probably overdoing it, but you should at least keep up with what is happening at least every week or so.

    Schedule the Posts

    Image source: Pexels.com

    Depending on what time you post, you can expect more or less engagement. These things take time to test.

    Do not expect to make a conclusion in a week’s time since the difference between posting on weekdays and weekends is also there.

    Automation tools are perfect if you want to try a timeframe that would be impossible to check otherwise.

    Facebook Stories

    Facebook has recently introduced a new feature of stories. It serves as a way to diversify the content and share more trivial things with your followers. Of course, it serves more if you are trying to run a marketing campaign.

    It is worth checking out the Facebook Stories: The Complete Guide for Businesses in 2019 on Oberlo’s website. It has all the information every business owner needs.

    Encourage Your Audience to Join

    Image source: Pexels.com

    This serves two purposes. One is to get a stronger relationship with your followers, and the second one is having a different type of content to post.

    The whole thing is pretty simple. Announce that you will share a picture that they take, an article that they will write, a video that they will make, and so on. Such incentives do wonders if you want to stand out from the competition and look more appealing.

    Giveaways

    No post will have as much engagement and reach as the one which offers something for free. You have probably seen plenty of contests on Facebook where the page asks to share, like, comment, tag, etc.

    Some individuals like to exploit it and run fake giveaways, not giving the prize to the winner after the whole thing is over. However, these things tend to reach daylight, and you can forget about having any positive reputation afterward.

    Facebook Groups

    Another method to diversify your business and expect user-generated content is by creating a Facebook group. It is a place where everyone can share the information, invite others to join, and so on.

    The biggest advantage of a group is that organizing a discussion is much easier. Similarly, you should consider creating a subreddit. Reddit is one of the most popular websites on the internet, and while it is not considered social media, it is still a good place to advertise yourself.

    Continue to Learn

    Image source: Pexels.com

    Just like any other thing on the internet, Facebook will continue to evolve and change. In order to not fall behind the competition, you need to be at the top of the game. Therefore, make sure that you are up to date with any changes or new features that get implemented.

    As things stand right now, Facebook is without a doubt one of the best websites on the internet when it comes to running a marketing campaign. Even if a page might not seem like a direct business technique to regular users, you, who is behind it, should understand the pros and cons of it.

    And following these tips makes everything much easier!

  • Dealing With The Stress Of Running A Small Business

    Dealing With The Stress Of Running A Small Business