As a small business owner, your head is likely swarming with new ideas, to-do lists, reminders, and other ways to elevate your business.
Owning a business can be extremely rewarding. But it can also be exhausting, a feeling like trying to keep your head above water.
The day-to-day tasks can quickly become routine, with no time to think about how to grow and elevate your business.
If you find yourself relating to the feeling of being stuck in your business, overwhelmed with tasks, and looking for ways to take things to the next level, you’ve come to the right place.
Below are several helpful tips to keep in mind as a small business owner.
Engage with Your Customers
Depending on your business, keeping in touch with your customers or clients is a critical component in elevating your business.
Customer engagement is a way to get to know your customers on a more personal level.
The benefits of doing so are twofold. First, your customers will feel as though you’re a loyal small business owner who truly cares about them. This drives revenue.
Secondly, as an owner, the better connection you have with those supporting your operation, the more likely they are to return and help elevate your business.
How do you engage with your customers? Social media is an excellent resource in the marketing aspect of a business.
Utilize all social media platforms and the capabilities of each, such as polls, questionnaires, posts, and stories.
Engagement can also mean reviewing your business’ feedback, quickly responding to messages, or sending out weekly emails to subscribers.
Manage Your Small Business Finances
Managing the back-end of your business or the finances is often a business owner’s least favorite part of their job.
However, it is arguably an essential aspect of any business owner. Organization is vital when it comes to managing the money within your business.
Many small business owners are in the beginning stages of trying to grow their business and can’t hire a business financial advisor.
Consider using a spreadsheet to track your income and expenses for the year.
Be sure to print out all your important paperwork and save a copy in a safe place.
Printing using a desktop inkjet printer can get expensive, So consider going with a black only laser printer.
Purchasing the right small business printer for your volume needs can be cost-effective.
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Not only is this tactic a beneficial way to prepare your business for tax season. But, it’s also a way to look back on your business and reflect on growth.
Having the finances written down makes for a visual representation of how your business is evolving.
You can use that information to reflect on what works well within the company and what needs to be changed.
Balance Business and Personal Financial Stability
Along with managing your business finances comes the responsibility of knowing how to utilize the money.
As you begin to find success in your business and have the ability to improve your personal way of life, it’s important to balance personal financial stability with that of your business.
The more your business grows, the more opportunities you’ll have to, say, upgrade your car, switch to a better car insurance company, or buy a new home.
Being a small business owner is often challenging and overwhelming but try not to lose sight of things like budgeting, paying bills, or building your credit score.
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When you prioritize financial tasks, it opens doors for both your business and personal way of life.
Take this for an example: you’re at the point in your career where you’re able and looking to buy a home.
A lender will want to review your finances and ensure you have the minimum credit score needed to buy a house.
If you have approached a lender for your business, this should make the personal side of the process even easier, at the very least, when it comes to managing your credit.
Paying your bills on time plays a huge role in that number. The little tasks that are so often lost in the chaos of running a business are the building blocks of your future successes.
Make it a priority to be financially stable, and your business will, in turn, reap the benefits.
Keep up with the Trends
Marketing is an essential piece of running a small business. Social media isn’t just an excellent tool for engaging with your customers; it’s also used as advertising.
Think of it as the new word of mouth. In particular, video marketing is a great way to promote and tell people about the product or service that you’re offering.
A quality video can effectively educate your audience, especially those who prefer video over informational reading and increase social media engagement and product sales.
Marketing through video impacts the viewer’s emotion which could bring interest to your small business.
Trends are a funny thing: they are constantly evolving, whereas the need for customer engagement is constant.
Because trends are constantly changing, sometimes what was old and outdated ten years ago might be trendy again.
For instance, try running a promotional event online. Giveaways are always trending, and it’s a great way to market your brand and engage with your audience at the same time.
Even methods such as sending out flyers and newsletters, hosting local events, or sending holiday gifts to your most loyal customers can help you advertise your latest projects.
Who knows, if it’s a hit, your more traditional forms of marketing might end up on TikTok and start a new trend.
All that said, it’s still important to set aside time every now and then to keep tabs on what’s new and exciting.
Take that information and adjust your business as needed to entice your customers to come back to your website for more.
Small business owners are often juggling more than they should but are left with no other choice.
It’s important to periodically reassess where you are in business and go back to the basics. Refer to this list of tips whenever you need a refresher.
The Future of Hybrid and Virtual Events Trend
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Worried About Holiday Tech Shortages?
If you are concerned about the chip shortage and supply chain disruptions making it difficult for you to purchase tech items as gifts?
See the infographic below to get a better understanding of the supply chain issues and what you can do about them.
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Originally published August 29, 2021. Republished October 20, 2022, to add infographic. Updated March 16, 2023, to add infographic
As a Visual Digital Marketing Specialist for New Horizons 123, Julie works to grow small businesses, increasing their online visibility by leveraging the latest in internet and video technologies. She specializes in creative camera-less animated video production, custom images, content writing, and SlideShare presentations. Julie also manages content, blog management, email marketing, marketing automation, and social media for her clients.
All sound tips here.
I want to add: always be in expansion mode. I mean basically meeting highly-targeted, new people daily by publishing quality, targeted content and by being truly helpful across a wide range of channels. This is not easy. Actually, it’s quite uncomfortable sometimes because you need to keep testing the limits of what seemed impossible in your mind. But it is the quickest way to elevate your business. This I know from personal experience with my blogging business.
However, I shied away from the technique for a bit to experience far more modest growth. Point blank; that’s on me. Lesson learned and now I am going the distance with this one moving forward.
Hi Julie, I love your point about paperwork not being dead. I still love using it to stay organized for my business. I do better with a handwritten to-do list and yesterday made a website plan with paper and pen.
I also had to invest in a new laptop this year, my last one made it 7 years but was getting slow, and could no longer work effectively that way.
Hi Lisa,
Yes, definitely. We are in deep trouble if we don’t save a copy of our paperwork and something happens to our computer.
Hi Ryan,
Continuing to provide value is key. It seems to get more challenging as time goes on to reach your target where they are, with new technologies and channels emerging every day. However, this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. Maybe it isn’t so bad to pull back a bit at times and stop to smell the flowers. Or enjoy the exotic locations from where you blog.
Definitely; in a way, relaxing is expanding. Sometimes, business is perceived as work when it can be fun, pulling back, relaxing, helping and not trying to get anything from each interaction. When business becomes fun and relaxing versus stressful and taxing, not only does growth occur but it is like sitting back, smelling the flowers, loving the journey and as an added bonus, reaping business success. However, changing the mind to see ***everything*** as relaxing and fun in life is challenging Julie LOL! Slowly but surely, getting there.
Hi Ryan,
I think you are on the right track given your many travels. Ah, fun and relaxing – that’s a great outlook and job if you can find it. Trying…