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Small businesses are always growing and evolving, but riding the wave may not be your best bet for scaling profit. Approaching business growth and development with a smart strategy and even a small budget can shift things in the right direction and boost your bottom line. Before exhausting all your marketing budget on lead generation, check out this advice from TopOut Group and work on overhauling your small business for a bigger impact.
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Nowadays, as part of your marketing strategy, online engagement is crucial for both online and brick-and-mortar businesses. Getting more users to your website or social media pages means more sales, and there are countless ways to heighten a brand’s online visibility.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is one way of increasing online engagement for small businesses that includes a variety of strategies. SEO is a way of getting search engines (namely Google) to recognize your website as an authoritative source of information (or products/services). The more authority you have, the more likely users are to find your site.
Business owners can begin optimizing independently, but outsourcing SEO services is an option, depending on the budget. Either way, small changes to keywords can help customers find you so that you can solve their problems with a product, service, or information.
A revamped social media strategy can also improve online engagement. Social media can be complicated, especially for a new business owner, but taking time to research, set goals, and create a posting strategy could earn a massive return on your investment.
Social media outsourcing is also possible, but keeping an authentic voice in all your content and offering value to your audience are two must-do steps. TopOut Group can help with SEO and social media strategy, so check them out as a possible resource.
In today's digital age, content is everything. It's the language that speaks to your audience and captures their attention. Unfortunately, managing content effectively can be a daunting task for many businesses. With a content management system (CMS) in place, however, businesses can streamline their content processes, making it much easier to manage and scale. From drafting, publishing, and tracking engagement to making updates, a CMS provides businesses with a one-stop hub that takes the guesswork out of content management.
Well-designed CMS solutions can significantly improve a business's online presence, boost engagement rates, and increase ROI. If you're serious about growing your business, implementing a CMS is a sustainable investment that can significantly impact your bottom line.
Before investing time and money in services to boost customer experiences, it helps to know as much as possible about your audience. The data speaks volumes when you use a customer data platform (CDP). A CDP brings advanced insight into your customers' identity, how they behave online, and what they want. This allows you to tailor your marketing campaigns to boost engagement, improve audience retention, and, ultimately, see a better bottom line.
Understanding your customers better also allows you to develop more products or services, improve training for your team, and even adjust prices. With the help of a CPD, you get real-time feedback that impacts business decisions down to the minute. This can help you avoid costly mistakes and reinvest in specific (higher-return) areas.
If you want to understand the data you gather from the CDP and put it to use, consider returning to school or taking a course for a degree or certificate in data analytics. Data is a key to success if you know how to use it, so giving yourself that knowledge can be a huge boon for your business. Plus, online programs allow you to pursue your degree without interrupting your business management.
Improving customer satisfaction can be simple, free, or involve more work and money. One smart option is to solicit feedback from your audience, which allows you to scope out ways to improve customer satisfaction. A simple (free) survey form could start important conversations.
Sending your team (or going yourself) on a “customer journey” is another low-output way to determine where to make changes. Walking through your customer’s steps, such as searching for products and completing an online purchase, can highlight issues you wouldn’t otherwise see. A regular customer journey map highlights glitches or technology issues and helps avoid customer headaches.
According to Titan Technologies, wasted time can cost companies up to $1.7 million per 100 workers. All business owners and managers are well aware that saving time saves money and can reduce frustration on the consumer side (and likely your workers’, too). How you streamline to improve efficiency depends on your industry, products, and team, but taking a closer look at tasks and processes could reveal a wide range of surprises.
Hive recommends a multi-step process to examine trimming down processes, beginning with a look at best practices for your industry. Figuring out multiple methods for a process highlights which is most effective (and cost-saving). Holding a team vote is a helpful pre-implementation step for new processes, but flexibility over time is equally important.
Proper training on any new process is a must, too. Failure to fully understand the impact of steps can lead to wasted time, money, and energy. Be sure to demonstrate, teach, and practice each new technique and action to ensure operations run smoothly upon implementation.
Developing your business doesn’t have to cost a ton of money, especially with the help of smart tools like a customer data platform and social media. But the payoff can be significant if you invest time and possibly some cash into improving the customer experience, streamlining operations, and boosting consumer engagement.
Trust the team at TopOut Group to develop marketing strategies that enhance your brand and scale your business.
