business Archives - Page 12 of 59

Be The Boss That Employees Love: Communication

There’s nothing worse for an employee than having a boss that remains locked behind their office door, never to be seen among their staff. Being elusive means negative stories and opinions will form about you. Instead, get out and about and meet your team. Have a staff briefing every Monday to set the targets for the week and to motivate your staff. Allow them to voice their concerns, offer up their opinions and listen to them. They will respect you for this. Make sure that you send out an email every Friday namechecking those staff members who have gone above and beyond. This little bit of positive praise shows that you recognise their achievements and that you are willing to share successes.

Invest In Your Team

If you want to be one of the best bosses out there, you need to put your money where your mouth is and invest in your team. Consider implementing something like the EAP from LifeWorks, a scheme that aims to help your staff members if they are facing personal problems. They may be struggling with stress or anxiety. By giving them access to a counsellor, you can play your part in looking after their well being. Each member of staff is a person, not a number, so treat them well.

You could also invest in their professional development. This can be scary as you might worry that providing them with training, funding their qualifications, and helping them to grow as a professional may result in them leaving your company. This is always a risk, but by investing in their development, you are showing a commitment to their skills and talents. This alone demonstrates your exceptional nature as a boss.

Be The Boss That Employees Love: Surroundings

If your office space is looking a little shabby, there are some stains on the carpet and the hardware hasn’t been changed for years, it’s time to step up and make your working environment more inspiring. Make your employees excited to get to work in the morning by painting the walls white, whipping up some local artwork, adding touches of greenery, purchasing some decent laptops and having an open plan environment conducive to teamwork and productive thinking. Your employees will be more like to stick with you rather than look for work elsewhere.

If you are eager to maintain a cohesive team, ensure that you implement these three steps and be the best boss that you can be.

If you run a small business online, focusing on improving your eCommerce offer is probably already pretty high on your priority list. There has never been a better time than now to implement some quick and easy fixes for your business. Some businesses have a little more downtime to focus on those projects which don’t always top the task list normally. That said, a lot of businesses are finding the pandemic has actually increased their sales figures as customers increasingly go online to make their purchases. Responding to this is a great way to continue to adapt to changing conditions and to focus on business growth. Make sure you boost your website during lockdown to cater to the needs of your customer.

Boost Your Website During Lockdown : Improve Your Customer Retention

Acquiring new customers is expensive, time-consuming and a bit of an unknown quantity. Smart small businesses choose to focus on a customer retention strategy as well. Customers who buy into your brand have a higher cart conversion rate, purchase more items on each visit and generate more revenue every time they come to your website. Focus on ways to improve customer experience and cross-sell services or products, or perhaps even look at introducing a customer loyalty scheme.

Boost Your Website During Lockdown: Include Video Content

The data shows that videos are a really useful tool when it comes to increasing conversions on your website. The return on investment for this form of marketing is consistently high, so it’s definitely worth creating some video content which can be hosted on your site and on other external platforms. The format resonates with people and is an ideal way to showcase a product or explain a service in more depth, as well as bring customer testimonials to life.

Put Mobile First

Any eCommerce website is losing out if it doesn’t have a mobile strategy as well. A huge amount of people use their tablets and mobile phones to browse and purchase. 40 percent of mobile users buy from their devices, rising to 65 percent cent of millennials. So if your site isn’t mobile-friendly, you’re potentially missing out on a huge chunk of sales. Customers want speed and convenience when shopping, personalised offers and extra rewards, so sometimes setting up your own app is a good way to tick those boxes. It doesn’t have to be expensive, there are a few options for out of the box eCommerce apps that you can personalise with your branding, rather than having something that is custom-built.

Highlight Your Best Sellers

Customers should be free to browse on your site, but there’s nothing wrong with directing that browsing experience a little. Things like well-structured navigation are of course essential, but equally a category approach showcasing your best selling items is a really good way to focus their journey. When people visit your site for the first time, it can be a little overwhelming, especially if you sell a broad range of products. So showing off your best sellers provides an edited highlight of the items they are likely to be interested in and provides cognitive validation for their purchase. Try to also showcase some products where your profit margins make a good return for the best results.