There are no shortcuts to running a business. The general upstart can be rough, and even when you think you have a handle on things, management gets tougher with increased popularity. 

It’s not easy, but it can be.

The best way to run a successful business is by developing a plan for your growth. With a business growth plan, you can keep your thoughts organized and build a strategic road map for your business.

This article will tell you what a growth plan is, why creating one is essential for your business, and how to make a business growth plan.

What Is a Growth Plan?

A business growth plan is an ideal vision for your business’s future. It is where you would like it to be in the next year or two.

With a growth plan, you can plan out the company’s goals and objectives and the strategies to get there. There is also room to lay out strengths and weaknesses and how to go about them.

Ideally, the growth plans don’t take too long to draft as it’s focused on a 2-year timeframe. It may take some time to list out all future objectives, but the payoff for an efficient business plan is worth it.

What Does a Business Growth Plan Look Like?

A business growth plan needs to be focused and clear for anyone to read. It should cover strategies to improve sales, quarterly financial goals, expansion opportunities, and a breakdown of the staffing’s needs and responsibilities.

Other details that could fit into a growth plan include:

•  Marketing aims to focus on the target audience and the number of new customers gained by the end of the operating period.
• Financial forecasts to predict upcoming profits, losses, cashflows, sales, and audited accounts.
• Operational information detailing the location of your business, suppliers, and any additional equipment needed.

Why Is a Growth Plan Important In Business?

Who should prepare the business plan? There are several benefits that prove why planning for your business is critical.

Small, new businesses would need a plan that prioritizes their resources and know the right direction to take their company. It can help strategize ways to increase sales revenue and weed out paths bad for business.

More mature companies could write out a growth plan to keep track of their progress and analyze possible flaws in their current workflow. With years of experience under its belt, an older company can still find ways to improve growth in the business.

Developing a business growth plan is also great for investment opportunities. Having a solid idea of running your business operations will go well with investors and place more trust in management.

Team-building can also come from working on a growth plan. Not just the head managers, but the entire team can put their heads together to bring out some creative and productive strategies. An employee might carry a different perspective from the managers that could breathe new life into the company.

What Are The Types of Business Growth Plans?

There are no restrictions on how you should draft your growth plan, but they generally fall into 1 of 4 categories:

Market Strategy

This business growth strategy is one of the most common reasons to create a business growth plan. Companies will outline their next course of action to understand the trending demographic and ways to attract more customers to the product or service.

The plans in this category include marketing campaigns, target demographic research, and following up on the latest trends that attract potential customers.

Product Strategy

The plans in this strategy are focused on the products and services themselves. If it sells well enough, more customers will flock over to the desired item and generate popularity around it. When this happens, the growth plan will outline how to capitalize on this growth.

Some examples of this strategy include possible upgrades or service deals and collecting surveys, reviews, and other feedback about the product.

Development

Development plans usually deal with finding new ways to transfer your product or service into a new market; The focus is on finding new ways to branch out into different markets, if possible.

Diversification

This strategy expands beyond the current market and creates new products for different audiences. This business path gives your company a good image and, if successful, opens new growth opportunities for profit. 

How Do You Write A Business Growth Plan?

Whether you are just starting your business or in the thick of it, writing out a business growth plan maintains the same steps for any stage. Here are the steps that will help you write the best growth plan.

Specify Your Ambitions

Before writing down your ideas, think about what goals you are trying to achieve with the plan. Brainstorming will be the most time-consuming part as you will need to look at your company from all accounts. 

What’s not working at the moment? What areas could be improved?

It would be easier to focus on setting and achieving small incremental goals for yourself. You can also list long-term goals with a checklist of subgoals to accomplish.

Determine Your Metrics

How will you define your measure of success?

If the plan is to increase sales, you’ll be more focused on the profits earned quarterly. If your aim is towards the marketing aspect, then the follower count or views will determine the impact of the product.

Understand the value you will attach to success and build a plan around it.

Set a Timeline

All good plans have an end goal, and it helps to know how long it’ll take to reach your objectives.

If your goals will take longer than a year, plan out the necessary steps to stay on track. What’s important is to remain dedicated to the deadlines and try not to slack.

Use a Template

Microsoft and Excel have made it easier to create a business growth plan with templates that outline all the information you need. 

You can find one that fits the needs of your business or treat them as examples while you draft your own.

Final Thoughts

Building a growth plan does a lot of good for your business. It will keep your ideas organized and offers more opportunities to advance. 

Whereas many businesses focus more on customer acquisition, customer retention is equally important. Customer retention is your business’s ability to make your customers come back for a given period. It is also how to survive inflation as a small business.

When you retain your customers, that indicates that your product or service pleases them. Your customers don’t see the need to turn to your competitors. So, how to boost client retention?

Why Is Customer Retention Important?

You spend a lot of resources to get new customers, so you wouldn’t want your efforts to go down the drain. Customer retention is a vital aspect of business strategy and helps your business gain a competitive advantage.

Customer retention is how to adapt to inflation and aims to maintain your business customer base and improve loyalty. You can also learn how to use marketing during a pandemic. Other benefits of customer retention are:

• Loyal customers give positive reviews and recommend your business to other people.
• You get a higher RPI from repeat customers than first-time customer acquisition.
• Return customers spend a lot on your business over time and increase profits.

5 Successful Client Retention Strategies

With inflation, prices rise, and your customers want to cut costs. You can deploy various retention strategies to retain your customers when inflation happens. If you’re wondering how to increase customer retention rates, here are five strategies on how to boost client retention.

1. Appreciate Your Customers

A customer who feels valued by your business will want to come back repeatedly. Your customer’s loyalty increases when what you offer goes beyond the usual product or service.

For example, handwrite a customized thank you note to customers. You can include something specific like your customer’s name to create a sense of personal touch.

Other customer retention examples are discussed below.

Add a Package Insert to an Order

Your customers yearn to open the box and see or use the product. How about you increase your customer’s delight with a gift that isn’t part of the original order? For example, if you sell cakes and bread, you can add a packet of coffee to your customer’s order.

Then, attach a note to let your customer know that the package is not a mistake but a gift.

Offer Coupons

When a customer makes several purchases from your store, give a coupon for the current or next purchase.

A coupon makes your customer feel the care and value you place on clients. If you provide a coupon for the next purchase, your customer will want to come back and use the coupon to get a good service at a lower price.

Give Surprise Upgrades

Be generous about customer elevation, no matter what business you are in. Surprise upgrades could make a customer’s day, boost self-esteem, and make your customer come back.

For example, if you have a restaurant, surprise a regular customer with special table space at no extra fee. Surprise upgrades shouldn’t be costly, so you don’t have to worry about losses.

2. Leverage Customer Feedback

Always have a platform where you can get views-appreciation, complaints, suggestions-from your customers. You strengthen the customer-business relationship when you get direct information from your customers about your goods and services.

Once you learn how your staff can make or break the customer experience through feedback, you can also re-engage a customer who plans to give up on your business.

Be there any complaints, catch the pain points and adjust to satisfy your customers’ needs. A customer who complains is ready to stay if you work on the complaints.

You wouldn’t benefit if a customer walked away and you didn’t know why the departure occurred. Through complaints, you understand any defects in your goods and services.

3. Frequent Communication

Keep in touch with your customers to boost trust levels and eliminate post-purchase doubts. Even if your customers don’t reach out with feedback, be proactive with the communication.

Also, monitor those customers who haven’t communicated in a while to reestablish the relationship.

Invest in a communication calendar tool to keep track of customer communications and manage customer engagements. With a calendar, you receive alerts when a customer reaches out and when repeat customers haven’t interacted with you for some time.

Also, when you inform your customers about your processes, your customers feel valued and important.

4. Build Trust and Good Relationships

Your first tactic toward a relatable brand is to build trust with your customers. If there is no trust between you and your customers, you won’t establish a solid customer base.

So, use your customer data to explore your customers’ needs and offer a positive experience. Once you build trust, you don’t have to convince customers to buy your product or seek your services.

Your customers are human and love when you understand and treat them right. When you know your customers, you make rational decisions to cultivate the relationship.

So, improve your business based on customer feedback to understand and give the best experience to customers. Many customers who trust you will stick with you and recommend other people to your business as an added advantage.

5. Educate Your Customers

Invest in your customer base with customer education services. For example, you can have a self-service portal and then train customers to find solutions before contacting your support team.

Let your education program extend beyond your products or services to other fields that interest many customers. Areas that may not be directly about you include sales and entrepreneurship.

Educational programs position your business as a resourceful brand. Customers will stick to your business if you can offer solutions to problems.

So, create content that answers questions to your customers’  life puzzles. If you aren’t sure what to educate your customers about, do a survey and use the results for inspiration.

How To Survive Inflation as a Small Business

The basic counterpunch for your business to survive is to increase the prices of goods and services. Whereas most of your customers wouldn’t want a price increase, you can’t acquire goods at a higher price and retain the selling price.

Nonetheless, you can raise the prices of products that have a higher impact on your margin or that are likely to help most customers easily adjust.

Even though customers are price-sensitive, most don’t always read the fine print. So, if the price rise doesn’t sit well with you, use the shrinkflation strategy. Shrinkflation is when you leave your prices unchanged but reduce the number of products in each package.

For example, you can reduce a box of biscuits from 16 to 14 ounces and retain the price.

Conclusion

Customers are your business’ foundation because you can’t succeed without business strategies for high inflation. So, learn how to boost client retention after you use resources to obtain the customers.

An effective way to do so is to use the strategies discussed above. Also, inflation is bound to happen, so always be ready to take the necessary survival steps.

Confusion usually follows when discussing marketing and sales. Marketing and sales do differ, but they still work together hand in hand. Knowing the difference between sales and marketing will help your business form coherent teams that tackle your business issues while improving your marketing and sales efforts. 

What Is the Difference Between Sales and Marketing?

The difference between marketing and sales lies in their goals and focus. The marketing team focuses on the company’s image and spreading brand awareness. Their overall focus is to get people interested in a business product. 

The sales team in the contract doesn’t necessarily focus on the image of the product or business. It focuses on closing deals with prospects to turn them into customers. 

Sales and marketing examples typically show the dynamic of how both teams come together. For example, a prospect sees a billboard advertisement and calls the number they see on the ad. Then a representative closes a deal with that consumer, that representative being part of the sales team. 

What Is the Most Important Thing about Marketing and Sales for Your business?

The most important thing for your business’s sales and marketing strategy is synergy. Working correctly with the sales and marketing team allows your business to capitalize on sales and marketing trends. 

It’s arguable what is truly important, but if the sales and marketing team don’t work together, there will be inherent problems acquiring new customers and closing deals. 

Without the marketing team understanding their core audience and who is buying their product, they won’t be able to effectively target and adjust their marketing efforts to capitalize on reaching new prospects. 

Similarly, the sales team will be unable to close deals if the marketing team hasn’t appealed adequately to the prospects. This dynamic is crucial to the success of a business and why it’s vital for marketing and sales in your industry.

The Best Sales and Marketing Techniques for Your Business

As the years go on, consumers start to value different things from companies. You, in turn, have to think about how to change your marketing strategy to ensure you’re getting the maximum value from your efforts. 

Currently, sales and marketing trends for 2022 have emphasized the importance of dominating the online environment and staying agile in an ever-changing world. While there are numerous techniques for businesses to utilize for sales and marketing, essential ones apply to most businesses. 

Content Marketing

It’s become common for consumers to research products and services independently. Since this practice has become common, businesses need to start promoting and writing content to help make a better case for their product or service.

The question for many becomes how to grow your business with content marketing, but as vague as it may seem, it comes down to a basic SEO and keyword choice formula. 

Targeted Advertisement

Businesses must take advantage of targeted advertising. With numerous agencies’ data collected and sold, targeted advertising has become more accessible. Taking advantage of this marketing method is vital to reaching new prospects while not wasting funds and efforts on people that are naturally not going to be interested in your product or service.

Company’s reputation

Customer service today may be more important than anything else. Today, if someone has had a bad experience with a business, several mediums can help that particular customer express their dissatisfaction. 

Unfortunately, there will always be a consumer who isn’t necessarily pleased with how your business operates. Getting on the wrong side of one customer can lead to a chain reaction of potential prospects boycotting your product off the word of one or two people.

Treating your customers with respect, fulfilling your promises, and working with them to ensure that their experience with your business is one of the, if not the best experience they ever had, will prove vital in marketing your business to the world.

Communicating Intent

An essential aspect of marketing is for businesses to communicate intent properly. Currently, the trend for many companies is building a connection with their consumers. People are more willing to listen to companies with good intentions. 

Public opinion matters a great deal when earning people’s trust. The majority of people won’t easily purchase or use a service from a business they don’t believe is competent or backed up by the public. Companies that emphasize their good deeds and what they do for the community have a better public opinion than a business that doesn’t. 

Personalized Content

Consumers are now expecting advertisements and products to cater to them specifically. Over the years, we’ve seen companies try to personalize each consumer’s sales, marketing, and product experience.

Media content such as YouTube videos has become a popular way for marketers to advertise to prospects by evoking strong feelings towards specific individuals. These prospects are more inclined to check their product or service out of curiosity or relatability. 

Influencer Endorsements

Currently, marketing teams have been following a trend to use influencers’ audiences to reach out to communities that would usually be out of their grasp or hard to obtain. Trust is one of the critical factors in making a sale, and in 2022 trust may be one of the most important things for consumers. 

Influencers bypass a lot of the trust-building stage as they have already earned the trust of their following and, in turn, promote their audience to trust your product or service. 

Affiliate Programs

Marketing and sales are no longer limited to internal and outsourced teams. Through affiliate programs, businesses can take advantage of the vast audience of influencers and other individuals to expand their audience and increase sales.

This sales and marketing method utilizes a commission-based system that rewards the affiliate, the person making the sale, and the business providing the product or service. 

E-Commerce

The future of sales coincides with online shopping. Businesses are no longer tied to physical locations. Companies are starting to rely on their online stores to sell their products worldwide. 

Relevancy

Marketing doesn’t just help generate sales by attracting new customers. It also helps continue your relevancy by reminding your current customers that your business is still the best at what it does. 

Today, it’s become more challenging to retain consumers’ attention in the digital space. If your product or service has competitors willing to go the extra mile to maintain their image, your business may fade into obscurity. 

Fortunately, while it has become harder to maintain consumers’ attention, it’s also easier to reach them through the digital space. Through proper content marketing, most businesses can continue to provide support to their consumers while still attracting new customers.

Evolution in the financial sector is happening at an unprecedented rate. Consumer behavior and how we manage our money are changing, shaped by technological advancement and access to information. Collaboration for fintech companies is key to success in this rapidly changing landscape.

In the past, traditional financial institutions (FIs) have been the primary financial services providers. However, with the rise of digital-first companies and the ubiquity of mobile devices, a new generation of financial technology companies has emerged to provide innovative solutions to customers. Let’s look at how to monitor competitors and some of the reasons why collaboration, not competition, is key for fintech companies.

What Is Fintech?

Fintech is a broad term that encompasses any company that uses technology to provide financial services. This can include everything from mobile payments and money transfers to investment management and personal finance.

While fintech companies are often startups, they can also be divisions of larger tech companies or traditional FIs. There has been a surge in fintech companies in recent years as consumers become more comfortable trusting technology with their money.

However, while fintech offers a lot of potential for innovation and customer service, it’s important to remember that these companies are still subject to the same regulations as traditional FIs. This means they need to partner with established financial institutions to provide their services.

Collaboration vs. Competition

What Is Collaboration?

In the context of business, collaboration often refers to partnering with other companies to create a new product or service.

There are many benefits of collaboration for Fintech companies. It allows companies to pool their resources and knowledge to create something greater than the sum of its parts.

What Is Competition?

In the business world, competition refers to companies fighting for market share. This can take the form of advertising wars, price wars, or simply trying to outdo each other in customer service.

While competition can be healthy for business, it can also lead to a race to the bottom in terms of prices and quality.

Understanding how these concepts apply to the world of fintech is key to understanding why collaboration is so important.

Why Collaboration Is the New Fintech Model

The old competition model between fintech companies and traditional financial institutions is no longer sustainable. For fintech companies to succeed, they need to partner with established FIs. This brings Fintech from disruption to collaboration.

There are a few reasons for this shift:

Regulations

While fintech companies are often lauded for their innovation, they are still subject to the same regulations as traditional financial institutions. This means that they need to partner with an established FI to provide certain services.

For example, fintech collaboration with banks requires a partner with a licensed bank or credit union to offer banking services. This allows them to offer their customers the same services without obtaining a banking license themselves.

Access to Customers

Another reason fintech companies need to partner with traditional financial institutions is access to customers. FIs already have established relationships with their customers, which gives fintech companies a foot in the door.

Traditional FIs have local branches and ATM networks that fintech companies can leverage to reach new customers. This is especially important for fintech companies that are just starting. They are also getting involved in local business events and have established relationships with other businesses in the community.

Resources

Finally, fintech companies need to partner with traditional financial institutions because they have access to resources that startups don’t. This includes everything from capital to experienced employees.

For example, when a fintech company partners with an FI, it can tap into the FI’s customer base and distribution channels. This allows them to scale their business much faster than they could on their own.

Types Of Fintech Partnerships

There are a few different types of fintech partnerships:

Equity Partnerships

In an equity partnership, the fintech company and FI take equity stakes in each other. This type of partnership is often used to fund joint ventures or new products.

Debt Partnerships

In a debt partnership, the fintech company and FI provide loans to each other. This type of partnership is often used to finance joint ventures or new products.

Revenue-Sharing Partnerships

In a revenue-sharing partnership, the fintech company and FI share the revenue from joint ventures or new products. This type of partnership is often used to fund marketing initiatives or expansion plans.

Benefits Of Collaborating With Fintechs

Collaboration between fintech companies and traditional financial institutions offers several benefits:

Increased Innovation

When fintech companies partner with traditional financial institutions, they can bring their innovative products and services to a larger customer base. This increased exposure can help to drive the adoption of new technologies.

Relationship Building

Another benefit of collaborating with fintech companies is that it allows traditional financial institutions to discover how your relationships today can create opportunities for tomorrow. This can help FIs stay ahead of the curve and better serve their customers.

Improved Customer Service

Fintech companies often have customer service teams dedicated to providing an excellent experience. This can help to improve the overall customer service of the financial institution.

Increased Efficiency

Fintech companies often have cutting-edge technology that can help increase the efficiency of traditional financial institutions. This can free up employees to focus on other tasks, such as providing better customer service.

Improved Risk Management

Fintech companies often have sophisticated risk management systems in place. This can help to protect the financial institution from potential losses. Collaboration with a fintech company can help improve the financial institution’s risk management.

What are Examples Of Fintech Companies?

There are many different types of fintech companies, but some of the most common include:

Payment Processing Companies

Payment processing companies provide the infrastructure that allows businesses to accept payments. Some examples of payment processing companies include Stripe, Square, and PayPal.

Lending Platforms

Lending platforms connect borrowers with lenders. Some examples of lending platforms include Prosper, LendingClub, and Funding Circle.

Investment Management Platforms

Investment management platforms provide tools and services to help investors manage their portfolios. Some examples of investment management platforms include Wealthfront, Betterment, and Personal Capital.

Financial Planning Services

Financial planning services provide advice and guidance to help people make financial decisions. Some examples of financial planning services include Mint, Wealthfront, and LearnVest.

Conclusion

Collaborative partnerships between fintech companies and traditional financial institutions can offer many benefits, including increased innovation, improved customer service, increased efficiency, and improved risk management. These partnerships can help both parties better serve their customers and stay ahead of the curve.

What ways do you #collaborate? Share with me on Social! Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram

Female leaders bring skills, expertise, and relationship-building skills that elevate company culture. Every professional is different, but women will lead differently than men through ethics, respect, and compassion.

Why We Need Female Leaders in Business

There are several reasons why we need female leaders, including:

• Women value balance between work and life – many women business leaders balance family duties, kids, and extracurriculars, in addition to their regular workday. Therefore, women leaders will know how to prioritize initiatives, multi-task, and favor work-life balance.
• Women leaders show empathy – empathy is critical for building and maintaining relationships in business. Women leaders will be skilled at understanding employees and then implementing change to boost morale and productivity.
• Women have strong critical thinking skills – women leaders assess and address crises effectively. Organizational growth and change will demand a level head, where women leaders thrive.
• Women are excellent written and verbal communicators – leaders must communicate well with all personality types and employees. Effective communication will also ensure that cross-functional teams and stakeholders are on the same page.

Women business owners possess powerful traits that allow them to excel in leadership roles. They have what it takes to weather a company through a storm, but they also know how to communicate and empathize with others. A women leader who values balance will also create a strong workplace culture that retains its employees for the long run.

Factors and Challenges Affecting Female Leadership

So, what are the main challenges for women business owners? In the last half-century, female professionals have made impressive strides in the corporate world. Even when the conditions were tough, several women advanced to leadership roles. However, there are still several factors affecting female leadership, including:

• Sexism – inequal work environments, sexual harassment, and subtler comments involving sexism
• Stereotyping and gender bias – because women are less assertive on average (considered weaknesses of female leaders), employers might lean more toward men for leadership opportunities because of their aggressive, strong, and direct demeanor.
• Weaker leadership networks – because men historically dominated the workplace, they might have more established leadership networks. Women do not enjoy this same access, which could delay their quest for future leadership positions.
• Responsibilities with the family – professional women will typically share a big portion of household activities, including caring for family members. Balancing these traditional responsibilities with leadership aspirations can be challenging.

Leadership Tips for Women Business Owners

There are millions of women business owners who overcome these challenges and excel as meaningful business leaders. There is no universal path for rising the ranks. However, below are five strong behaviors and tips for women to rise as leaders in business.

Find a Mentor

Mentors and business coaches are essential because they guide you through unfamiliar territory. A true mentor has walked in your shoes before. Because mentors gain skills and experience, they can provide advice for female leaders. You might not follow the same path as a mentor, but your journeys should be filled with similar obstacles.

A mentor can be someone you meet with regularly. You can update them on your leadership journey and seek feedback in times of need. A mentor is someone you can trust with all your hesitations, fears, and successes. They should be a reliable resource for you as you navigate through the corporate ranks.

Join Networking Groups

Networking groups are an effective tool for expanding your relationships. These groups meet every week, month, or quarter to engage with each other and share value. The people you meet here are like-minded individuals who want to maximize their careers. You will learn skills from others, but you could also make connections that eventually turn into future leadership opportunities.

Ask for Feedback

If you look to advance at a current company, seeking feedback can be critical. You might have a viewpoint or self-assessment of your leadership capabilities. But how do other people see you? Asking meaningful questions can uncover valuable things to improve upon.

Seek feedback from people you engage with regularly. This feedback could come from direct reports, cross-functional stakeholders, or people in upper leadership. Being a better leader for other people will allow you to rise through the ranks quicker.

Display Confidence

Showcasing confidence in yourself is something that every leader needs. Every interaction is a chance to strengthen your brand. displaying this confidence in yourself can happen during presentations, performance reviews, and everyday conversations. Your confidence should instill a belief in people that good things happen when you are around. confidence is also infectious and will elevate the company culture.

Learn How to Delegate

One of the essential steps in female leadership development is through delegating. The best leaders know what they are great at, but they also know the areas in which they struggle. Knowing who in the organization can assist with your weaknesses will be critical. Identify the strengths and capabilities of your team members, and then assign them projects that will help them grow.

Advice for Female Leaders from Successful Female Entrepreneurs in 2022

Some of the best mentors in your life might be people you have never met. Studying the behavior and words of established leaders is also another effective tool for growth. Below are some inspirational quotes and advice for female entrepreneurs.

• “Whatever it is that you think you want to do, and whatever it is that you think stands between you and that, stop making excuses. You can do anything.” (Katia Beauchamp, Co-Founder, and CEO of Birchbox)
• As a leader, it’s a major responsibility on your shoulders to practice the behavior you want others to follow.” (Himanshi Bhatia, Founder, and CEO of Rose International)
• “The difference between successful people and others is how long they spend time feeling sorry for themselves.” (Barbara Corcoran, Real Estate Mogul and Investor from the television show “Shark Tank”)
• “Surround yourself with a trusted and loyal team. It makes all the difference.” (Alison Pincus, co-founder of One Kings Lane)
• “Leadership is the ability to guide others without force into a direction or decision that leaves them feeling empowered and accomplished.” (Lisa Cash Hanson, CEO of Snuggwugg)

Share you leadership tips with me on social using #leadership Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram

Client relationships are the key to long-term success in any business, and they take time to build.

Developing and maintaining client relationships requires constant attention to stay on top of potential opportunities and ensure that you provide excellent service at all times.

Most of your sales will come from repeat customers and referrals, so it’s essential to ensure you’re doing everything possible to foster these relationships. This article outlines how to develop and maintain client relationships for business success.

Why Is It Important To Build Relationships With Clients?

Customer relation refers to a relationship between a company and its customers. The company may be a retailer, wholesaler, service provider, or manufacturer. Enlightened businesses know how to utilize customer relations management (CRM) effectively.

CRM is a process of managing customer relationships to build customer loyalty. It can be used by businesses of all sizes, from small local shops to large multinational corporations.

CRM aims at maximizing customer satisfaction through improved communication, increased understanding of customers’ needs, and better personalization of products and services.

In addition, building and maintaining client relationships should be a top priority because it offers recurring revenue, high satisfaction levels, and positive referrals.

Best Practices for Client Relationship Management

To make sure that your business thrives, you need to take care of your existing clients and get new ones on board. Here are seven tips that will help you develop and maintain client relationships.

Prioritize Communication

If you want your clients to stay happy with your services, communicate often. Your communication can take many forms, such as:

• Email newsletters
• In-app Messaging
• Personal phone calls

Whatever medium you choose, keep in touch regularly. In addition to keeping your client base informed about what’s going on with their account, regular communication will help them feel like they’re an essential part of your business.

Make sure that each interaction is beneficial for both parties involved. You don’t want to spam your clients with too much information. Instead, send out valuable tips or newsworthy updates that they might find interesting.

The more helpful info you provide, the more likely your client will continue using your services.

Share Knowledge

Develop a unique knowledge base that helps make you more marketable. Your client should understand your area of expertise and how it can benefit them specifically.

It’s up to you to help them see how your services can solve their problems or give them opportunities they wouldn’t have otherwise had access to.

When you pitch a new project or service to a client, they already know what to expect from you. Your portfolio acts as an excellent resource for people who are unfamiliar with your work.

If a portfolio isn’t available, consider writing an ebook about a particular topic relevant to your business and offering it as a free download on your website.

Create Accountability

To develop meaningful relationships with clients, create a sense of accountability. The more active their involvement with your services, the stronger their commitment.

Set expectations early in your relationship to know what you do, how you do it, and when they can expect results. Then make sure you deliver on those promises.

Your business relationship will grow as both parties see positive results from working together. Accountability builds trust, which is essential for any long-term relationship.

Even if something goes wrong or doesn’t work out, it’s an opportunity for growth and learning to strengthen future client relationships.

Personalize Client Relationships

You want to treat each client as an individual. The key to client loyalty is understanding your clients’ needs, business goals, and unique culture.

Try following up after meetings with emails that reinforce some of what was discussed or writing notes of gratitude on how much you value their business. Simple gestures such as birthday cards will also do the trick.

Clients will always appreciate it when you take an interest in them as individuals rather than just another customer or source of income for your business.

Maintain a Positive Attitude

One of the best ways to keep your clients happy is by maintaining a positive attitude. Seeing yourself as optimistic, conscientious, and able to take charge makes you more likely to succeed in business. So make sure you always focus on maintaining a positive outlook, even in challenges.

When you are upbeat with clients, it goes a long way in building rapport and maintaining that valuable relationship. It will show clients how much you believe in yourself, and it will provide them with peace of mind that they’re doing business with someone they can trust.

Use Project Delivery Tools

Any service-based business needs to have a great project management tool in place. To achieve consistent success with clients, you must have a way of keeping everyone informed, on task, and accountable.

Project management tools are fantastic for making data-driven decisions in every part of your services.

Tracking tasks in real-time ensures that no one falls behind or forgets about a specific piece of work. They also provide file sharing, time tracking, invoicing, expense tracking, and reporting. As long as all parties know what they’re responsible for, it will be easier to maintain client relationships.

Pay Attention to Feedback

If you develop a good connection with your clients, they’ll be more than happy to give you helpful feedback on how you could improve your services. Review sites are also great places to read what other people think about specific businesses.

Keep an eye out for client-specific complaints or praise, and use that information to help better tailor your products or services for future customers.

Take advantage of plenty of online forums where business owners can share their experiences and advice. Responding to reviews is a great way to show potential clients that you care about customer experience.

Final Thoughts

Relationship building takes time, commitment, and consistency. To maintain any relationship, you need to focus on your target client, offer them value, be responsive, and keep an open mind. Establishing relationships with clients is a two-way street that requires both parties to work hard to make it last.

How do you maintain your business relationships? Share with me on social using #businessrelationships. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram

Negotiation is a necessity for any successful business transaction.

Sometimes, the negotiations shape formal affairs with clear objectives. Other times, negotiation in business is a continuous process that develops to suit parties’ business goals.

Strong negotiation skills are essential if you are looking for success as a small or large business. Let us go through the top five secret tips professionals use for a successful negotiation.

Importance of Negotiation for Your Business

Negotiation can elevate your stand on the success ladder, and it’s also an art. Negotiating allows amplification of the value of your work as a business.

However, it does not benefit a single business or person. The negotiation agreements on any cause address important matters or find solutions to long-standing problems. Successful negotiation can help create relationships today for opportunities tomorrow.

What Are the Basic Business Negotiating Strategies?

Before you step into a business transaction, developing reliable negotiation skills is critical. The first offer you receive is often not acceptable. But committing to a robust negotiation process can make the terms sweeter while taking care of your business’s bottom line.

Here are four basic negotiating strategies you should consider.

Aim for a Win-Win Situation

All sides of the bargaining table should leave feeling like they have a win. To achieve this, view your work as a problem-solving role.

Start by asking yourself what the negotiating partners want that you both can have. Next, propose a deal that addresses the needs of both sides for a better outcome.

Set Offer Expiration Date

Give the negotiating partner a deadline to accept or walk away from your reasonable offer. However, the other person may come back with a counteroffer.

But an expiration date will force the other parties to be serious. As a result, this strategy is one of the most effective ones that skilled negotiators use in various stages of negotiation.

Open Negotiations With Lowball or Highball Offers

As the buyer, you know what you can pay, so start by offering half of the amount. The seller will not accept the offer, but you’ve established a baseline for more negotiation.

This strategy can help you realize a lower price than starting with a more reasonable offer. The strategy also works for sellers. Open with a higher selling price than what you want to accept.

Have a Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement (BATNA)

When all sides hold on to their positions, getting a yes can be impossible. A BATNA helps establish rules for what occurs in case there’s no agreement.

For example, think of a worker who demands a raise and a boss who refuses. A BATNA resolution may call for the worker to continue working for six months at the current rate, and they can leave.

The BATNA features more trade-offs than a successful business negotiation, but it contains concessions for both sides. In our case, the worker gets six months to search for a better-paying position while the employer has six months to find a replacement.

Do’s and Don’ts of Negotiation

Its critical business owners become students of the negotiation strategy. You should pay close attention to these do’s and don’ts passed down by experienced entrepreneurs:

• Do set goals
• Do define your thresholds
• Do follow negotiation etiquette
• Don’t lose your cool in emotional negotiations
• Don’t be intimidated and instead require the other party to support their claims with quantifiable data
• Don’t avoid conflict

Top 5 Secret Tips for Successful Negotiation

Negotiation is a must-have skill in the modern business world. You will benefit from learning a few tips successful negotiators use. These five secrets are the key to conducting successful business negotiations.

Build a Strong Personal Relationship

You’ll likely not believe a stranger who comes to you with a proposal that will make you 30k in a month. But what if your best friend comes with the same proposal?

Positive relationships engage comfortable feelings, including trust. Whether you have a personal or corporate relationship, the positive relationship influences how others believe you. For example, people are more accepting when someone they believe comes with a proposal.

Have a Contingency Plan

Things may not work as you want, so do a what-if analysis for contingency planning. All you do is gather thoughts on the likely outcomes and create responses for each situation. A contingency plan also reduces the number of surprises you encounter during negotiation.

Talk Less, Listen and Analyze More

Listening or talking more can affect a successful negotiation in business. However, consider finding a balance between the two. The most effective strategy is to spend 30% talking and 70% listening.

Active listening lets you concentrate on what’s being said and find opportunities. However, always analyze the facts for better-informed decisions.

Don’t Hurry

Things will not work in your favor in most situations. So don’t panic and hurry to shut down the discussion. Instead, remember there is a tomorrow, and things can turn upside down.

Be Realistic About Your Needs and Wants

Your “needs” are essential goals you should achieve. “Wants” are goals that aren’t so essential for your business.

Distinguishing both goal types will help you during negotiation. While you can compromise on your business “wants,” you can’t do the same with the “needs.”

Bad Negotiation Examples: Mistakes to Avoid

Now that you know the secrets to successful business negotiation, here are six common negotiation mistakes to avoid:

• Failing to prepare
• Not knowing your BATNA
• Assuming something is non-negotiable
• Focusing on price
• Trying to be the “winner”
• Being afraid to offend

Successful Business Negotiation Examples

Now that you have the skills to negotiate, put them to work and do what’s best for your business in these negotiable scenarios beyond your customers:

• Negotiating salary-Over 70% of managers expect salary and benefits negotiations when making an offer to a candidate.
• Lower your bills-If you’re looking to boost your online presence, remember that your internet bills are not set in stone. Negotiate your monthly internet bill and get extra change in the bank account.
• Decrease your rent-Landlords use various factors to set commercial rent, such as the current market price, supply and demand, and property market value. Each factor fluctuates, allowing you to negotiate on rent.

Practice to Get Better at Negotiating

Now that you have the tools to become a master negotiator, it’s important to mention that building the perfect negotiating strategies will not happen overnight.

These tips work best with constant practice. The key is finding your unique negotiation style, and don’t get discouraged if you fail at first-it’s part of the learning curve!

What ways do you prepare for a negotiation? Share with me on social Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram

Expansion and growth are what businesses expect, but when the time comes, most are unprepared. It’s prevalent for small businesses that find success to run into scaling issues, and because of this, they find substantial setbacks and profit losses.

When faced with expansions, businesses begin to double their production at insane costs by buying more equipment and resources, hiring more workers, and expanding beyond necessity. If you want to learn how to scale a business, these tips will help ensure that your business doesn’t falter during times of growth.

What is Scaling in Business?

You may be asking yourself, why bother scaling up a business? Scaling a business means setting a foundation for your business to grow as you continue operation. It’s vital to keep margins as favorable as possible for your business to continue generating revenue.

When people hear the word scale, they associate it with expansion or growth. It’s important to note that a scaling strategy is different from a business growth strategy. While there are similarities when discussing scaling in business, people usually refer to scaling as the ease of accommodating demand during periods of hyper-growth.

A business accomplishes this by increasing its output with little effort and cost. When a company can meet demand and has scalability, growth comes naturally, and businesses can accommodate and capitalize on new customers.

Why You Need to Scale Up Your Business

Staying agile in an ever-changing world is how businesses continue to thrive. It’s vital to understand that more customers will be interested in your product as time goes by. When this happens, you’ll see a demand for your product above your original starting point.

For example, pretend that growing an online clothing business is your overall goal. As your clothing business becomes popular, you’re getting more orders than you typically get. Your business starts to experience material shortages, delays, and a backlog of unhappy customers waiting for their orders.

In this theoretical example, having a scaling strategy becomes crucial to ensure sales continue at a steady rate. Without a plan, expenses may become too much, and orders backlog. If a customer has to wait for an extended period, it’ll reflect poorly on your online clothing business.

Business Scaling Strategy: How to Scale Your Business in 2022

If you are wondering how to scale a business online or at one of your physical locations, here are five tips to help you grow your business.

Prepare for Growth Before it Happens

Scaling a business ensures that growth happens with minimal disruption and cost. The best way to accomplish this is by preparing early. A general scaling strategy allows your business to keep up with demand and growth.

Find points in your operation that would be expensive or difficult to scale if demand grows. These points will be your main focus during your early stages of business. If increasing production becomes necessary, look for alternative methods or cheaper alternatives to maintain the same input but increase your output.

Automate

Automated processes will prove crucial to your business regarding scalability. Cutting time from marketing email campaigns, online advertising, and invoices frees up employee time to focus on higher priorities.

A good scaling model allows you to continue operation as is, regardless of the size of your business. Automating these processes as your business grows ensures efficient use of time since humans won’t have to send out even more emails or invoices manually.

Technological Investments

Businesses need to acquire any competitive advantage they can. Using technology and keeping it up to date is a sure way to ensure that your business has some semblance of scalability during times of growth.

Technology is critical in scalability because tasks requiring human intervention are limited to time and energy and are subject to errors. If needed, technology can output more than a human and do so globally.

Perfect examples of technology that improve your business’s scalability are accounting, HR, inventory, and marketing software. Having computers and easily upgraded software are great ways to keep up with demand.

Cloud Services

Using cloud services allows you to skip paying for technology upgrades as high-end machines are also available via cloud services. Digital storage also no longer becomes an issue as your business can continue to expand its storage without worrying about physical hard drives and servers.

Outsource

Small businesses will find it easier to outsource expertise or equipment to meet customers’ growing demands. When necessary, outsourcing saves you money and buys your business time to improve your operation to meet the growing demand while not sacrificing anything waiting for upgrades and internal changes.

Fundamental Optimizations

Businesses scale to meet demand. So, you’ll find massive losses if there is no demand for your product or service. It’s important to remember that steps have to occur before proper scaling can happen.

The typical solution when forced growth happens is to try and downscale again to a smaller-sized operation. From that minor operation, you’ll begin to find growth again.

Optimizations such as product or service quality improvement, resource distribution, and getting more out of raw material will improve your output and, in turn, increase your scalability.

Biggest Challenges in Scaling a Business

You’ll find that some of the biggest challenges in scaling a business is that not all companies have a scaling business model. Businesses, such as consultancies that deliver specific expertise, are challenging to scale up.

Being unable to replicate or mass produce a process or service is why scaling a business is hard. Sometimes a business scaling strategy is simple and very effective. For example, you write a book and mass produce that product to sell. Books have natural scalability. It’s a product or resources with natural scalability as it indefinitely meets demand.

Generally, scalability becomes a challenge if your business revolves around providing a service to someone, and a human must provide it. It’s not to say that it’s impossible, but the benefits of scaling a business don’t come easily to some service businesses.

Scaling Business Examples

Now that you know how to scale a business, it’s important to be aware of how it can be done right.

Google is a perfect example of a business that scales appropriately. Google can actively service more customers without increasing their resource usage as much. There are a few reasons that Google can scale better than most businesses, mainly because of its focus on technology.

Google utilizes technology to its full extent to ensure costs stay low, but the number of people they can service will increase. The Google search engine, YouTube, and their telecommunications companies are all services that allow a dedicated team to serve millions without outrageous costs.

Let me know how you’re scaling your business on social. Use #scaling Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram

Networking is connecting with other people, usually for professional reasons. It’s often seen as a necessary evil by many people, but the truth is that networking can be an excellent tool to help you achieve your business goals.

There are countless benefits to networking, such as:

• Gaining exposure for your business
• Meeting new potential customers or clients
• Developing new business relationships
• Learning from other companies in your industry
• Finding new suppliers or vendors

An excellent way to start networking is by attending local business events or joining a business networking group. You can also connect with other businesses online through social media or professional networking sites, like LinkedIn.

The Best Tools for Better Networking

There are various tools that make networking easier and more approachable. Here are some of the most notable tools.

• Social media: Use social media to connect with other businesses in your industry or local area. LinkedIn is an excellent platform for business networking.
• Events: Attend local business events to meet potential customers, clients, or suppliers.
• Business networking groups: Joining a business networking group can help you develop new business relationships.
• Professional networking sites: LinkedIn is an excellent professional networking site that can help you connect with other businesses in your industry.

If you want to build a better network, there are a few things you should keep in mind:

• Be genuine: When you’re networking, be sincere and authentic. People will remember you and do business with you if they feel like they know and trust you.
• Be prepared: When you’re meeting someone new, have an elevator pitch ready to give them an overview of your business. You should also be prepared for any questions they may have about your business.
• Follow up: After you meet someone new, follow up with them. Send people an email or connect with them on social media.

What Does Good Networking Mean?

Networking is vital for all businesses. It can help you find new customers, secure funding, and grow your business. But what does good networking mean?

Making connections is only part of the equation – you also need to nurture those relationships. Gathering intelligence is also essential to better understand your market and what your competition is doing.

Good networking means:

• Creating a solid network of connections
• Nurturing relationships with your connections
• Gathering intelligence about your industry and competition
• Applying what you’ve learned to better your business
• Offering value to your connections
• Asking for help when you need it

Building a better network can help you achieve your business goals. By following these tips, you can start networking like a pro.

7 Better Networking Tips

These tips can help you build a better network and be more prepared for networking opportunities:

Define Your Goals

Before you start networking, it’s essential to know what you want to achieve. For example, do you want to find new customers? Grow your business? Secure funding? Once you know your goals, you can target the right people and groups.

Let people know why you’re interested in connecting with them. If you’re looking for a job, be upfront about it. People are more likely to help you if they know what you’re trying to achieve.

Get Involved in Your Industry

One of the most effective networking methods is to get involved in your industry. Attend trade shows and conferences, join industry organizations, and participate in online forums. This involvement will help you meet people interested in what you do and who can help you achieve your goals.

Build Relationships

The importance of networking is all about relationships. When you meet someone, take the time to get to know them. Find out what they do and what their interests are. The better you know someone, the more likely they will help you out when you need it.

A mutual friend or colleague can also be a great way to introduce yourself to someone new. If you have a mutual contact, ask them to introduce you. This introduction will make it more likely that the person will want to meet with you.

Be Helpful

If you want people to help you, you need to be willing to help them. When you see an opportunity to help someone, take it. Doing this could mean introducing them to someone you know, giving them advice, or simply offering a listening ear.

This assistance displays a lack of ego and builds trust, which is essential in networking. People are more likely to want to help you if they know you’re the kind of person willing to help others.

Follow Up

After meeting someone, be sure to follow up. Send an email, connect with people on social media, or invite them to coffee. Keeping in touch will help you stay top of mind and make them more likely to think of you when they need something.

Letting a person know how their advice helped you is also a great way to stay in touch and build a relationship.

Offer Value

When you’re networking, always think about what you can offer others. This offer could be your expertise, connections, or simply your time. If you can provide value to someone, they’ll be more likely to want to help you in return.

Being authentic can also go a long way. People are more likely to trust and help someone genuine and not just trying to sell them something.

Be Patient

Building a solid network takes time and effort. Don’t expect results overnight. Instead, focus on making genuine connections and providing value to others. Over time, you’ll develop a solid network of eager people to help you achieve your goals.

Conclusion

Networking is vital for the success of your business. It helps you find new customers, grow your business, and secure funding. But networking isn’t easy – it takes time and effort to learn how to build a strong network.

It is worth it, though. You can start networking like a pro by following these tips and achieving your business goals.

How does your business network? Share with me on social  Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram.

There are few singular success stories in business where only one person or company was able to gain success without any help whatsoever. Collaboration is behind winning deals and designs, fueling future accomplishments.

The benefits of collaboration are myriad. Examples of business collaboration include how writers, graphic designers, and photographers collaborate on an advertising campaign and how manufacturers work with suppliers to develop new products.

This business-to-business collaboration often brings success that no one partner business would have achieved independently.

Here we examine the benefits of collaboration and cooperation, and answer the question “What is collaboration in business?” and discuss its importance.

Types of Business Collaboration

Among the types of business, collaborations are these examples of cooperation that result in reaching goals together.

Product Development

Often manufacturers and the companies that provide their parts and materials will collaborate on developing a new product. Suppliers then can make the parts needed for the new product, which is an advantage for both companies.

Supply Chain

Reliability in a company’s supply chain is essential. One business may not have the strength to bargain, but businesses working together can secure better pricing and continuity of supplies. Businesses working together can act in the interests of all involved, including their customers.

Outsourcing

Many businesses profit from partnering with specialists to outsource essential business functions. An example of business-to-business collaboration in outsourcing could include a company partnering with a call center firm to provide customer service rather than setting up and staffing a call center of their own.

Businesses will also partner with marketing and advertising firms rather than developing marketing and advertising departments of their own, which provides better results and minimizes the costs of staffing those departments.

Creative Collaboration

When businesses produce advertising campaigns, websites, or publications, they will often collaborate with writers, photographers, and graphic designers who work on contract. This creative cooperation makes publishing possible. The independent contractors may decide to collaborate on other projects in the future.

5 Benefits of Collaboration and Cooperation

Collaboration’s benefits can be profitable for businesses and their company cultures. These benefits include:

Boosts Employee Engagement

Engaged employees are focused on benefiting their team and the company. Employee engagement boosts productivity and customer satisfaction and lowers turnover rates. Collaboration that gives employees a change from their routine leads employees to be more engaged in the business’ mission.

Increases Skills and Knowledge

Collaboration with other businesses can increase the skills your employees have and will boost their understanding of the production process. As collaborative teams work together, team members learn from each other.

Builds Virtual Teams

The trend toward virtual teams – those that work from different locations and communicate remotely – was rising before 2020 and shows no sign of slowing. Collaboration and cooperation among teams whose members are in other locations or time zones can build camaraderie.

Speeds Production

Time is a valuable resource for businesses. Speed in the development and production of new products ensures a new product arrives to market at the best time for profitability. Collaboration through systems where information and documents are shared reduces wasted time and resources.

Instead of one business working to solve a problem, multiple companies can address it for the benefit of all.

Adds to Employee Wellness

Employees who collaborate and feel a sense of camaraderie have higher feelings of peace and well-being, increasing employee health and making good employees more likely to stay with a company. In contrast, competition can leave employees feeling negative feelings of stress and anxiety.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Collaboration between Businesses

Collaboration among businesses has plenty of pros and a few drawbacks that one should consider before moving toward collaboration.

Advantages

The pros of collaboration and cooperation in business include these advantages for greater efficiency and profitability.

Larger Network

Businesses that collaborate and cooperate find that their networks grow larger. Entrepreneurs and small companies benefit from expanding their contacts and building a more extensive network.

Saves Time

Problems can be solved faster by collaboration than through competition. Collaboration among professionals solves problems quicker and speeds up production and supply chains. In addition, the sharing of ideas and information clears the way for progress toward project completion.

Fuels Innovation

Development of new products and technologies is encouraged through collaboration since cooperation among employees can inspire new ways of thinking. Often new ideas are sparked by the thoughts of others.

Disadvantages

Collaboration isn’t always easy, and there can be disadvantages to a collaborative working arrangement. Here are a few considerations.

Conflicts in Working Style

When people from different companies and organizations come together, differences in working styles can create conflicts. An unsuccessful collaboration full of conflict can result in companies being less likely to cooperate in the future.

Groupthink

A danger when collaborative groups are at work is leaning into groupthink. When this happens, the predominant opinion of the group reigns while opposing thought is ignored or overruled, which is a problem when the opinion of most of the group is wrong.

Distance Difficulties

If your business collaborates across time zones and oceans, you may have difficulties organizing meetings.

For example, an 8 a.m. meeting in the central time zone of the United States would be a 6 a.m. meeting for team members on the west coast. When scheduling video meetings, keep this in mind and choose times that work for everyone.

Proprietary Information

Companies might be concerned about sharing information about new products with other businesses. They may also worry that their employees might leave for other companies. Non-disclosure agreements will protect proprietary information, allowing innovation to occur without worry.

Business Collaboration

By this time, you know the answer to “What is collaboration and why is it important?” and understand that, through collaboration, all stakeholders should benefit. Business cooperation will result in greater efficiency, increased innovation and productivity, and happier, healthier employees.

While collaboration does have disadvantages to consider, the advantages outnumber them by far. Companies and employees have far more to gain through collaboration than they have to lose.

How do you collaborate? Share with me on social! Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram.