Michael Levitt's Blog, page 71

5 Benefits of IT Support Services for Your Business

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The business environment is more competitive than ever before. Hence, your business needs to adapt to the fact-changing technology to increase productivity. Moreover, any business, whether small or big, needs the support of IT experts to sustain it.

It would be best to work with IT companies to keep up with trends and have innovative problem-solving solutions. These companies will serve your business's technological demands with top-notch results. Additionally, you can obtain these IT services by outsourcing to freelance companies or drawing up a reputable organization.

Fortunately, your efforts won't be in vain because there are numerous benefits to procuring IT support services from a competent IT support company. These advantages include:

Improved Customer Support

Naturally, better communication platforms simplify all the processes of replying to customer complaints and feedback. For instance, IT support providers can create different channels of communication to reach the business. Consequently, direct contact with customers will create both loyalty and develop trust.

Furthermore, outsourcing a social media manager for small businesses will increase efficiency in other areas because they are already understaffed.

Better Online Marketing Strategies

Content marketing is at an all-time high with the increased popularity of social media advertising. No Wonder most businesses have a website to interact with their consumers- wouldn't you want to be at par with your competitors?

Besides, there are expert SEO strategies that only IT experts can maneuver to expand your business' audience and upgrade the means of payment. They can also conduct extensive market research and analysis on your business's behalf.

Effective Data Management

Data is the most essential yet disorganized part of most businesses. Luckily, the shift towards paperless information storage and processing requires an IT department to sort it out. Additionally, it is relatively easier to retrieve data from a computer than by looking for a file.

Also, data security is vital for a brand since it is its only weapon against competitors. An IT expert can protect this information from unauthorized personnel. Eventually, this data aids in the assessment of the overall business performance and needs, then you can transition into a more straightforward decision-making procedure for the future of the business.

Safety from Viruses and Hacking

An IT company specializes in secure business portals provision to its clientele. Hence you will never have to worry about unauthorized access to confidential business information when you have a team of competent IT personnel. Besides information security, they can also set up a firewall for your business. 

A firewall may seem like an exaggeration to a small business owner, but it is necessary for every business in the contemporary world. If you fail to include it, you are susceptible to copyright violation and intellectual property theft.

Comprehensive Monitoring

As mentioned before, supervision of your business' productivity and performance is essential for strategic planning. The IT specialist can set up a program to simplify many activities' supervision, such as quality control, facility planning and logistics, and internal auditing.

Final Thoughts

In summary, any operational business in this era needs exceptional IT support services to stay afloat. The conveniences of modern technology can reduce the workload for a business owner and increase overall efficiency in other sectors. If your business is still apprehensive about getting expert IT support, better change your mind now.

The Best Tools for Small Business Success

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Tools have advanced as technology grows and has provided small businesses with many budget-friendly alternatives. Tools and software range from money management, performance and productivity tracking, customer service, email marketing, internal communications, and much more. 

The right kind of tools can make a huge difference and benefit your small business in all sorts of ways, for example, by increasing efficiency, collaboration, connectivity, productivity, performance, and decreasing errors and tedious tasks. 

Here are some of the best tools to enable your business to work smarter, evolve, and grow. 

Payments

Functional and secure payment software is important for protecting your company and your customers. While there are many payment options to use, it is best to opt for a company that is well known and has a good reputation. The payment software should make it easy for your customers to purchase while instilling trust in them. The most common forms of payment software used in business are PayPal and Stripe, which offer platforms that can easily be integrated into any website or eCommerce store and accepts all major forms of payment. 

Accounting and Bookkeeping

Accounting and bookkeeping tools and software enable you to create financial records while tracking your income and expenses. This is vital for the success of any business, as it empowers you to accurately forecast and set goals while avoiding critical errors and bottlenecks at the end of the financial year. Xero is used by millions of customers as a cloud-based software that can be scaled as your business grows.

Customer service 

Technology has changed the face of customer service for businesses all around the world. Call centers and customers being left on hold are a thing of the past, while chatbots and ticket systems are being utilized to streamline and automate communications. These forms of communication allow businesses to use real-time reporting to track customer engagement and manage requests efficiently. The most popular platforms for customer service are Zendesk and Help Scout. 

Note-taking 

Digital note-taking is another tool that has completely transformed the way in which businesses are working. It’s no secret that it can be much more efficient to type notes on a laptop than it is to write them out by hand, especially if you are in high-level, fast-paced meetings that require accurate note-taking. There are many platforms that enable you to take notes, share notes and organize all the relevant information into groups, emails, task lists, or integrated into project management systems. Evernote and Todoist are premium and cost-effective note-taking platforms for your small business. 

File Management 

File organization and management are crucial to the operations and collaborations of a small business. Files typically contain important business and customer information that needs to be both accessible and secure. File management tools enable your business to create, store and share all information safely across secure, cloud-based systems that are synced to all connected business devices. Some also allow you to work collaboratively on documents in real-time. The most popular platforms used across all industries, which both offer free accounts, are Google and Dropbox.  

Contract creation and signing 

To support the majority of businesses striving towards a completely paperless operation, there are many tools that have come in handy. One of these being the contract management software that enables you to create, sign, manage and file contracts or other important and highly sensitive documentation that is vital for your business operations. HelloSign and DocuSign provide user and budget-friendly tools that enable electronic signing. 

Communication and Collaboration 

Communication and collaboration play an important role in the way your business functions. Tools and software provide your employees with ways to work together efficiently and communicate effortlessly, all in one place. These kinds of tools can be particularly beneficial if you have teams that are working from home or all around the world, as there is no limit on time or place with cloud-based interfaces. Microsoft Teams is a popular and reputable collaboration tool that combines chat, online meetings, emails, calendars, and file management. 

Learning and Development

Continuous professional development is key in the growth of your business. When your employees are learning and growing, they are also extending the limits of your business. Providing your employees with a platform to expand their expertise can keep them motivated and boost morale. LinkedIn provides a huge platform called LinkedIn Learning which is filled with professional, affordable online courses in a range of industries. 

The right kind of tools that can help your business grow don’t have to be fancy or expensive. By streamlining things like learning and development, accounting, document management, and collaboration, you will quickly see a huge difference in your business operations.

Managing Employees Well Often Means Removing Unnecessary Obstacles

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When we speak of ‘managing people,’ it’s easy to think of someone having to make all decisions on behalf of staff members. Of course, in the macros sense this can be true. You decide where your department’s budget will be used, as well as who will be working where, what skills will be utilized, and how to train people under you. Yet even those descriptors are nowhere near the full totality of how managers have to apply their people-oriented pursuits every day.

Yet it’s also true that for most managers, the ability to help an employee perform their best work without unnecessary obstacles getting in their way is paramount, and sometimes the most important work they’ll do. Note that necessary challenges are useful, unnecessary obstacles are not. The former might involve placing a somewhat new employee on a placement that will test them, the latter is defined by having no toner in the printer, delaying the workflow of those in your office.

So - how can we remove those unnecessary obstacles, and what are they? Let’s consider those points in the post below:

Communication Necessities

It’s true that poor communication can lead an otherwise effective team to be completely unable to function reactively, dynamically, and with confidence. This is why business phone systems are essential not only for customer service necessities, but to make sure your team can speak to one another immediately. For more personal communications, Slack channels or online group meeting rooms can provide the perfect alternative to ensure communication is flowing throughout the day, even on days where some may be working remotely. This is worth your investment, as communication can be its own reward.

Proper Training

The proper training of your employees will be an absolute necessity of course, but how is that training laid out. Public speaking seminars and exercises might help them, of course, but how often do your employees approach this? It might be that investing in them learning the updated understanding of compliance management can be the best way forward, as can giving them time to train on the latest software suites. Proper training means training for the world now, especially at a hyper-competitive time like this. It may be, then, that you pivot your approach, and do all you can to get your employees fighting-fit by considering the needs of the moment, not career-long development strategies right now.

Excellent & Maintained Equipment

It’s healthy to maintain equipment and replace it if necessary. Staff shouldn’t have to deal with broken-down printers, or desktop monitors that do not work, or ergonomic furniture that should be well past its use-by-date by now. Those considerations can often make an office feel as though investment isn’t being placed in the right areas, and that can lead them to feel less-than-appreciated. Keeping your standards high means keeping equipment in great condition, and that goes tenfold when considering safety equipment, too.

With this advice, you’re sure to manage employees well by removing unnecessary obstacles.

How To Create a Customer Experience Strategy

You run your business so you can sell your goods or services to interested clients and customers. Without interested buyers, your business will not last, so customer service and experience are your ticket to success. Here is how to create a customer experience strategy.

Tell a Narrative

You should tell a narrative about your business, and everyone who enters should become a part of it. Be sure that the story you tell is coherent and emotive. The last thing people want is a disjointed sense of mission or purpose that aimlessly changes throughout the store. For example, suppose you run a shop that sells goods from local artisans and agriculturalists. Instead of simply listing the product name, you should create a narrative about the products and where they came from. You could have a feature section where you show off the story of a farm or artisan and why they do what they do. This will engage the customer and give them a memorable, emotional experience with your products they otherwise would not have.

Walk In Your Customers’ Shoes

It may feel silly, but you should walk through your storefront as if you are a customer. There is no quicker way to see the awkward and fun aspects of your store. Think about the layout of your shop. Are the aisles easy to navigate? Can you see and read all directional signage? You should also think about how your shelving impacts customer experience. Are your products readily visible and organized? Take note of all these things and more to revamp your storefront.

Or, if you run a business without a brick-and-mortar operation, you should follow the customer through their digital journey. Act as a customer and call your customer service help desk and navigate online to make an appointment. Remember what went well and what was frustrating or difficult so you can change the experience for your customers.

Train Employees Well

Customer service begins and ends with your people. As a manager or business owner, you only have so much capacity to interact with customers. So, you entrust most interactions and exchanges to your staff members. In order to implement your customer experience strategy, you must train and equip your staff with the knowledge to handle various customer interactions.

Knowing how to create a customer experience strategy will equip you for success. Those who come into your store expect you to put your best foot forward. With this strategy in place, you can do so and win over more loyal consumers.

How to Make Your Retail Business Successful

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Starting a retail store is a huge undertaking, and a lot determines its success. Many perceive the business model as a simple undertaking, but it takes a lot to ensure everything runs smoothly and clients are happy.

Make sure you have the necessary knowledge, skills and are well prepared to run the business. Here are things that can quickly make the retail a success

Invest in a Retail Point of Sale System

A point-of-sale system will take care of the front and back-office tasks such as ringing up orders, managing inventory, tracking revenue, and managing client information. Invest in fully integrated point of sale systems custom-made for your business needs.

This makes it easier to offer quick and better services to your clients. Additionally, you always know when to replenish suppliers and have detailed accounts of day-to-day operations without rigorous accounting processes. 

Keep a Motivated Work Force

Your employees' moods significantly affect the quality of service. Happy and motivated employees will work harder to meet clients' demands. They will work faster, go out of their way to offer clients advice and solutions, and protect the company's image. 

To keep your employees motivated, appreciate the effort they put in, pay them on time, offer rewards, and continually teach them how to treat customers better. 

On the same note, when hiring, make sure that the team is highly qualified with high work ethics and fully explain their duties and responsibilities. Also, look for personality traits suitable for your type of business.

Aim to Offer Fast Services

Many people are looking for fast and convenient services, and a slight delay can make them abandon a sale. Ensure you have enough employees to take care of the customers streaming into the store and quicken the process. Using a digital system enables you to retrieve data quickly, offering faster and more efficient services. 

Don't let customers wait in queues for long or have to wait for their orders to be processed. It also discourages other clients who come in and find long lines. Ensure all your systems are in good working condition and have backup plans to keep smooth operations, reducing customer wait time.

Get Adequate and Secure Space

The first thing clients check when getting into any new environment is their safety and comfort. Invest in a secure neighborhood even when the cost will be higher. Also, make sure you have adequate parking space, and the interiors of the store are spacious, well-lit, air-conditioned, and the floors safe. 

Clients will rarely come back after shopping in a squeezed store that's hot and uncomfortable. Some will even abandon a purchase just because the environment is not safe or comfortable. 

Keep Your Customers Happy

Most clients want a one-on-one interaction with you where they feel appreciated. Make sure you give your clients enough attention, even when it's just a minute or two to exchange pleasantries. Also, listen when they're talking to make sure you understand their needs, suggestions, and frustrations. 

Most customers who opt to shop in a brick-and-mortar store look for human interactions, assurance, and simplicity they don't find when shopping online. Make sure to meet their needs.

Should You Buy, Lease or Hire Your Business Equipment?

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To run a successful business, you need the right equipment. But just how should you acquire this equipment? There are three main options: buy it, lease it or hire it. This guide details the pros and cons of each one so that you can decide which is the best option for you.

Buy

Buying equipment gives you full ownership of it. This has a number of perks. You can keep onto the equipment as long as you like and you have the freedom to modify it if necessary. You can also rent the equipment out to other businesses, plus you can sell it for cash when you no longer have a need for it. 

You do have to pay for repairs if the equipment breaks. The upfront costs can also be quite expensive when buying equipment - especially when it comes to large or complex machinery. You can buy equipment on finance in order to spread out the cost, but you’ll pay more in the long run than buying it outright due to interest fees. Companies on a tight budget that want to avoid taking on debts often avoid buying equipment for this reason.

When choosing to buy, you have the option of buying brand new equipment or used equipment. Brand new equipment is more expensive to buy, but often more reliable. Another advantage of brand new equipment is that it can often be customized (in cases, where industrial machinery needs to be built exactly to your specs, you may have no choice but to buy brand new). Used equipment is a lot more affordable, but you need to make sure that it’s in good condition. It’s worth using a trusted seller - you can find trusted brands at companies like https://fleetupmarketplace.com/. This can help you to secure the best quality, plus you may have access to warranties or refund policies. 

Lease

Leasing involves paying a monthly fee for a fixed term (usually between 12 and 60 months) in order to rent equipment. It’s a lot cheaper upfront than buying equipment, making it suitable for companies on a tight budget. Leased equipment tends to be relatively new making it an affordable way to access higher quality equipment. At the end of your lease term, you may have the option to upgrade to new equipment or buy the equipment of the lease company for a discount.

Because you’re renting the equipment, you don’t have as much freedom as to how you use it as you would when buying. You can’t sell it or rent it out to others and there will usually be restrictions when it comes to modifying leased equipment (usually any modifications will need to be easily removable so that you can return the item as you were given it at the beginning of your lease). You may also end up paying more in the long run when leasing than when buying - after all, lease companies will want to make a profit on any equipment they’ve bought. 

You should spend your time searching for a reputable lease company. This way, you can be sure that you’re getting good quality equipment. Some companies may be able to pay for repairs for you, however many will expect you to still pay for repairs yourself - this is something to look into. 

Hire

Hiring involves renting equipment for a short temporary period. This could be a month, a week or even a day. This can be useful when it comes to equipment that you don’t need to use on an ongoing basis. Examples could include hiring chairs for a one-off event or hiring a specialist tool to help repair a specific car. 

The cost of hiring depends on how long you plan to hire the equipment. If you’re hiring equipment for a couple days it will usually be pretty cheap. If you’re hiring it for several months, it could be quite expensive (in these cases, it may even be cheaper to buy or lease the equipment for a year). As with leased equipment, you don’t own it and therefore can’t sell it, rent it out or modify it. A benefit over leasing is that you usually shouldn’t have to pay for any repairs that are due to wear and tear. 

You should always choose a hire company with a good reputation. This way, you know that you will be receiving top quality equipment. Some hire companies will be willing to deliver the equipment to you, while others may want you to pick it up - consider which is the best option for you. This post at Quarry Magazine discusses more information on short-term hire of equipment. 

What You Need To Do For Better Online Exposure

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Your website is the heart of your online activities and will remain so for a long time. Many potential customers/clients use your website as their first port of call. It is the runway for existing customers, prospects, people who draw your attention to yourself through activities on the social web and, of course, the goal of all online advertising activities. But first and foremost, the goal is to make them findable or visible. If not, who will be seeing your website, or the great content that you create? A beautifully designed website will help you and it is recommended that you take a look at My Business Venture for further reading.

To be optimally found in the search engine Google (and ideally also on BING and Yahoo) is therefore an important goal of your marketing and online strategists. It is crucial that you are placed on the first 1-3 pages with the key terms of your core topic. Positioning on page 4 or even further back means that your website is as good as invisible to most searchers. It has become almost impossible for businesses in the hotel industry to appear in the first 10 places in search terms such as “Hotels in London”. There are just far too many. If you take a small, unknown town, let’s say “Hotels in Arad, Romania”, you are likely to hit the first three pages, because the town is small. 

The first goal is therefore to optimize the visibility and findability of your homepage.  Here are some tips to make your website more easily found on Google:

1. Google likes technically flawless sites.  

Google likes technically flawless sites that offer unique content. Make sure that different Internet domains do not refer to the same content. The risk that these domains will appear on the Google index for duplicate content is great. And that is not good.

2. Interesting domain names

It is really good for findability if your Internet domain (address of your home page) and subdomains (addresses of your chapters and subpages) are meaningful and contain the most important search terms for the respective page.  Of course, a friendly URL alone is not enough. Oh, the content of the page must deal with the topic in a qualified and unique way. The generation of such addresses is possible with modern editorial or content management systems.  

3. Responsive design is a must

Millions upon millions of smartphones are bought every year. A responsive design of your own website and the associated booking software should be tackled as soon as possible. Google rarely shows pages that are not optimized for mobile devices to visitors who use a smartphone or tablet. "Responsive design" means that your website automatically adapts to the size of your visitor's display. The maintenance of the mobile page, including the mobile booking engine, should be done automatically, and the maintenance of the mobile or responsive website should be part of your content management system. You can use a company to assist you with this.

Leveraging the Right Competitive Intelligence Tool to Stay ahead of the Pack

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Every business fights to get ahead of the competition, but in today’s marketing environment, this is difficult. As a business owner or manager, you face new challenges and competition from different areas. How do you ensure your business performs better than the rest? Competitive intelligence (CI) is an invaluable tool to help you stay ahead of the pack. You can leverage this innovative technology to get the market insight you need and become a market leader.

If you want to rejuvenate your marketing strategy and gain a competitive edge in your niche, it’s time to use the best competitive intelligence tool. Read on to find out more about CI software and how it can boost your business.

A Breakdown of Competitive intelligence (CI)

If you can learn more about your competitors, it would become easier to make the right moves. Competitive intelligence technology offers extensive market research with a focus on the competition. With this software, you can systematically collect and analyze data from multiple sources about products, services, tactics, strategies, and other business processes in relation to what the competition is doing.  

In a fast-paced business landscape, the competition poses the biggest threat to your business. Traditionally, it was easy for a brick and mortar business to track and monitor its competition. However, things are more complex in the digital marketing landscape.

The aggressive competition in a highly volatile market will keep you on your feet. You never know what new company will come for your loyal customers or which product is in the pipeline to eat a chunk of your target market. For this reason, you need to put out your feelers and keep discovering.  

It might be cliché but in modern business, the maxim information is power is more relevant than ever before. The business that carefully monitors the competition stays one step ahead. Learning everything happening around you is a daunting task. This is where competitor intelligence software comes in handy.

Using Competitive Intelligence Tool to Revolutionize Business

With so much already on your hands as you grow your business, manually monitoring your competition might not be possible. With the right competitive intelligence software, you have everything in control. The best CI tools work in the background but deliver tailored results in real-time. This is the information you need to decide on the fly.

Some benefits of competitive intelligence tools include:

 Assessing competitor strengths and weakness

Discovering new market trends such as artificial intelligence 

Giving you information to anticipate competitors’’ next moves

Providing invaluable insight on your customers

 Access to accurate about your industry

Enhance your time-to-market with reliable data

Promote your decision-making process  

Identifying gaps in the market based on competitor’ actions

Pick the most effective marketing techniques in your industry

Predict competitor behavior

Versatile application across industries from technology, healthcare, manufacturing and industrial sector, pharmaceuticals, to FMCG and others

Flexible and customizable tools from monitoring competitor banner ads, tracking competitors’ mentions, to monitoring changes in your competitor’s traffic, there’s so much you can do with competitive intelligence tools

Running a business today is not for the fainthearted. It requires a lot of effort and creativity to stay ahead. There are new threats emerging every new day and with these competitive intelligence tools, you can predict trends in your industry. The right tool could be your trump card to succeed even in the most competitive industry.

Why You Should Invest in Merch for Your Business

Are you considering selling merchandise for your business? It may seem like you need to sink a lot of time into the process at first, but the effort is worth it. Merchandise can be extremely beneficial to a business of any size, so here are four reasons why you should invest in merch for your business. You might be surprised to discover just how profitable it can be for your business!

New Marketing Strategies

Starting a line of merchandise for your brand or company opens doors to new marketing strategies. Your team can come up with new ways to promote your merchandise on your website, social media, in-person, and more. Social media is very effective at promoting your brand and potential merch. If you’re unsure where to start, try running a promotional giveaway of some of your merch to bolster your following.

Budget-Friendly

Brandable merchandise can be surprisingly inexpensive if you know how to shop right. If you buy in bulk through a wholesale source, you can save money on merch and still sell it to your customers at a fair price. In fact, investing in branded merchandise can be one of the more budget-friendly forms of marketing and brand awareness for your business.

Source of Extra Income

Because it is so cost-effective, adding merchandise to your online or retail store is a great way to add a source of income to your business. While you probably won’t make a substantial amount off a singular piece of merch, over time merchandise can net a nice profit.

Brand Awareness

Merch has the potential to be extremely popular, especially with some of your loyal customers who would love to support your business through buying merchandise. The great thing about T-shirts, hats, and other items carrying your brand’s logo or slogan is that they work as a mini-billboard for your business. Your current customers can help spread the word of your brand simply by wearing your logo and creating that talking point for new customers. This helps bolster your brand awareness and can even bring in some new customers.

These are just some of the reasons why you should invest in merch for your business. If you were thinking about taking the next step in merchandise marketing for your brand, consider how these benefits might be able to help your business.

Keep Your Business Connected in 2021

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There is no question that the past 18 months have been very tough on a lot of people, and businesses have been no exception to this. Many companies have taken hits and suffered during the global pandemic, and many have had to find fresh ways of being able to adapt and improve as businesses and keep up with the changes that have happened in the world as a result.

You have to think about the best ways of keeping your business connected over this time, and what you can do to achieve this moving forward. Due to the number of people working from home these days as well as the fact that certain businesses are still facing operational restrictions, it is important for you to come up with ways that can help to keep your business connected in 2021.

Video Meetings

Video meetings have become par for the course for so many business owners and their staff in recent times. You should be looking to do as much as you can to focus on what you can do to improve this dynamic, and hosting regular video calls helps keep you all connected as a business. This is one of the best things you can do, and there are a lot of great options that will help you with this. Choosing which virtual conference platform is best for your next online event is a great place to start, and it should be something easily accessible 

Check up on Your Staff

Checking up on your staff now and again is really important, and there are a lot of ways in which you might look to achieve this. One of the key elements of this process involves making sure everything is okay with them, and doing what you can to improve employee wellness where possible. Get in touch with your members of staff individually to see how they are doing, and if they need any help or support during this difficult time. 

Keep Your Finger on the Pulse

The world is changing very quickly these days, and the values and ideas that matter to us as a society are also changing significantly. As a modern business, if you are serious about success, you need to keep your finger on the pulse of what's going on. People are changing their belief systems, as well as what they want to see from businesses they get involved with, and this needs to be reflected in the steps you take. The last thing you want in a post-COVID world is for your business to be left behind, and this is something that you have to think about when you are considering these changes in the future. 

As you can see, there are plenty of factors that play a part in helping you to keep your business connected as much as possible. This is something that you have to make sure you get right in your life right now. There are so many evolutions the company will have to make, but these are necessary if you want to adapt and survive in a post-COVID world that is going to be very different from any we have seen before.