Tips for Small Business Success
The new year is just around the corner. It is time to begin to lay the groundwork for your upcoming success in 2020. If you own a business you probably realize the importance of planning. Here are some simple tips to help any business owner achieve greater success in 2020.
Create a Business Plan
As a business owner you should consider creating a business plan each year. This plan should be very specific and include both long, and short-term goals. When you are ready to work in and on your business, a plan will direct, and help you prioritize. When you have detailed day to day objectives determined, weekly, monthly, and yearly goals written out, you will more likely achieve the desired outcome.
Your business plan should clearly state where you are going, and what the detailed steps are to accomplish your goals. Good questions to ask are, who is responsible for each objective, and can any projects or tasks be outsourced? Many small business owners have a very general business plan. When the plan is general there is an increased probability that mistakes or derailment can happen. It is worthwhile to add as much detail into your business plan to help prioritize your days, weeks, and months. Your Business plan should be a working document that is modified and added to regularly.
Set Goals
Setting Goals is something that only a few people actually like to do. This exercise can be both exciting and daunting. The difficult part of setting goals is that you can go too high or too low. Not setting goals is a way for some to avoid accountability, however people who write their goals down are more successful. We should all be asking ourselves if our goals are measurable, clear, and concise. A few questions to ask are: How you will reach your goal? What is your plan or process? Do you actually know your goals? We will be going more in depth on goals and goal setting in January’s blog post.
Do Your Market Research
You need to know your market, your clients, who and what your competitors are doing. If you do not know this information, it is necessary to find it out immediately. In order to serve your clients, it is important that you know their needs and wants. It is also important to know what your clients are saying on Social Media and how you rank on the web compared to your competitors. When you are active on Social Media and sharing informative posts, this will help bolster your customer base and keep you front of mind. The statistics on your customer base are easily trackable through Social Media platforms and Google.
Who is your competition, what are they doing to gain clients? Being unaware of what your competitors are doing puts you in a compromising position. You cannot compete in the market unless you know exactly what your competitors are doing and how they are gaining clients and market share. You will not have the ability to gain as many new clients, if you do not know what your competitors are doing. Knowing this information will give you a good insight on what you need to adjust to be successful.
Create A Structure
Creating a structure sounds more difficult than it actually is. It is simply creating a process for everything you do in your business. You should create a checklist and come up with a process for everything so nothing is forgotten or neglected. This works for your own list as well as for employees. It also builds in natural accountability for others and yourself. The key is to follow through.
Outsource
What can you outsource that is taking too much of your time? There are very simple things that you may need to outsource that you may either not be good at, or perhaps there is a need to focus on other aspects of your business. For example, you could outsource accounting, and taxes, maybe human resources. Do you have a team that you can delegate projects, and outsource items that are necessary, but time consuming?
Hopefully you found these tips useful and will be able to utilize some of them for your success in 2020.
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