5 fundamental tips every business should be doing ASAP to get those sales in 2020

Starting a business isn’t hard. Growing it is where the real challenge lies. Having spent time consulting to business owners in several countries, I have seen some common mistakes that entrepreneurs make at all stages of their business. I am constantly amazed at how the basics of running a business in this technological always-on connected world, are skipped altogether and how many companies throw a lot of money at the wrong elements.

So if you have been struggling to grow your business, here are the fundamental building blocks:

5 Business Growth Must-Haves and Must-Do:

Customer Services is NON NEGOTIABLE

How many times have you just wanted to get in touch with a business to get an answer to a basic question? My guess is plenty. There is nothing more frustrating than just wanting to be helped and there is no one to help you.

Focusing on the customer is key and should be priority number one. Ensure your employees attend to customers fast, respond to questions appropriately, and resolve complaints professionally. You want to make your customers feel valued and appreciated. Satisfied customers will be more than happy to recommend your business so go the extra mile to keep customers happy.

In 2020, there is no excuse for not having a decent website with lot of answers to frequently asked questions. Make sure you have your contact telephone, email, store address, opening and closing time. The stuff customers just want to quickly see.

Use ChatBots to automate conversations such as product lookups or delivery status. These can be done cheaply with little to no programming experience.

Just make it easy for your customers.

A satisfied customer tells their closest friends about your great business. An unhappy customer tells EVERYONE about your bad business.

Networking

Businesses are essentially people. People love to connect and grow and so it’s all about relationships. While we do live in an online world, attending conferences, trade association seminars, or local meetups is a must. You never know who you will meet and how you can help others around you and your community. Giving value to a fellow entrepreneur without expecting anything in return is the start of an amazing relationship that can blossom into friendship and of course business when it makes sense.

Don’t be salesy – don’t be the person who walks up to a group of people are tries to sell the second you open your mouth. Listen, engage, offer advice. The sales will come when its the right time.

Use Meetup to find your local gathering, use Facebook Groups to see when they meet. Find related events where you could potentially offer value and attend those too.

Download some event networking apps on your phone so you can exchange contact info and keep notes so you don’t forget to follow up with the people you met.

Whova is an example of such app that allows you to create detailed bios and connect with each other ahead of an event. It also allows you to share digital business cards to build that relationship.

Social Media Is a THING

Its 2020 and I still have to tell business owners to use social media.

Seriously.

Yes, there are many platforms to choose from and NO you don’t have to be at every platform. You know your business’ demographics so find the right platform where your customer is likely to be and focus on that. Teens are hanging out on TikTok and Instagram. Moms and Dads are on Facebook. B2B happens on LinkedIn.

Ensure that you create a social media page for your business, and engage your audience. To increase your business visibility on social media, share info, offer advice, run promos, and read and respond to comments or inquiries.

Social media platforms have analytics tools. Use them to study trends and customer behavior, and use the insight to improve your social media campaigns.

Developing Loyalty Programs

Hundreds of small businesses use loyalty programs to retain customers and win new ones. Create loyalty programs that encourage customers to come and buy what’s on offer. It’s much cheaper to generate more sales from existing customers than to drive sales by attracting new buyers.

Make sure your program has a clear incentive that’s going to make them want to spend money on your products or services. To win the hearts of your loyal customers, ensure that they get loyalty rewards whenever you’re running promotions or offering discounts. Let them know how much you value them.

Be genuine with the promotion as customers are smart. They know when a product’s price was raised in order to run a 50% off discount. Lose your customer’s trust and you lose their business.

There are many loyalty programs for small businesses that you can find online such as Mypointrewards.com or Brandmovers.com. Research each one and pick one that is best for your business.

Funnels and Webinars

Webinars are another effective way of showcasing a product or service to the market. Webinars use automation — so that you can create your system once and then set it on auto-pilot to generate sales.

Understanding Top, Middle, Bottom of the funnel is critical, and knowing about landing pages, conversion tracking, remarketing and email sequencing is non-negotiable. When you set up these funnels correctly, that is where the magic happens!

Check out programs such as Clickfunnels to get an understanding of the power of these systems.

Set your business to automatic and that frees up your time to focus and grow versus sending out spam emails and cold calling that doesn’t work and hard to scale!