This isn’t meant to be a catchall.
But these are things I’ve observed and also things I’ve heard when asking veteran businesspeople.
Most entrepreneurs are looking for ways to improve on a regular basis. Sometimes it’s good to get an outside perspective. When you’re in an industry for awhile it’s easy to get tunnel vision. You see things for the way they’ve always been.
So this is just meant to help spark a little thought so you can dive in and improve your business. Even if you’re doing well, it’s always good to stay on top of things so you don’t miss opportunity.
1. Audit All Costs
I read something funny the other day about cord cutters. They cut cable so they could save that monthly cable fee, but many have traded it for subscriptions to Netflix, Hulu, HBO, CBS, etc. etc. Not just one of those, but all of them. It made me laugh, but only because it’s true.
We have a lot of great monthly services at our disposable these days. Not just for personal entertainment, but for business purposes.
It’s easy to accumulate recurring expenses without even realizing it. You try something for a few months and kind of forget about it.
It’s good to set a reminder to audit all expenses every year. Not just to eliminate those that are unnecessary, but to also look for alternatives to what you have now. It doesn’t mean you switch, but you want to at least explore your options regularly.
2. Eliminate Inefficient Products or Services
Another albatross around the necks of businesses is a service that takes up a lot of time and effort without bringing in a lot of profit. It’s easy to keep doing these things because you’ve been doing them a long time. It’s also easy if you’re a little strapped for cash and you think you need the revenue.
But sometimes cutting an inefficient service can be the best thing for you.
For example, we used to offer guest blogging services. I love guest blogging, but we could never figure out an efficient way to do it. The price we had to charge never made sense to customers and it was inconsistent. So eventually I cut it and it’s been great.
We might go back to it at some point, but for now it’s been a good cut.
3. Identify Key Branding Traits and Double Down
Brand recognition can often be overlooked. Especially in the small business world. Marketers like to talk about organic search and ranking for general industry terms. But there is a different way to think about it.
Say you’re a dentist in your city. You want to rank well for “Dentist” when someone does a local search in your area. But it’s even better if people think about your name when they think dentist. Then they just search for your name on Google and you have no competition.
Branding is a long-term play. It takes effort. Part of that effort is recognizing when there is something memorable about your business experience that you can really lean into.
For example, several years ago there was an airline, Midwest, that made fresh baked chocolate chip cookies on every flight. A simple thing, but people loved it. They would talk about it. They would associate cookies with the brand.
What is a branding trait for your business? Is there a way you can create one?
4. Test Outbound Sales Teams
Inbound is getting a lot of attention. Branding is a big part of that effort. You want to be investing in inbound. It’s long-term, but it’s worth it by a mile.
That being said…you also want to continue to invest in outbound sales efforts. I’ve spoken to a few business owners that have expressed how much their businesses grew after they brought in more salespeople. Usually this happens somewhere around the 10-year mark for the businesses. I don’t know why, but that is a trend I see.
Anyway, it’s good to bring in a couple salespeople if you can. That way you can benchmark them against each other and if one works out you can try to find a duplicate to increase sales even more.
5. Create Content for Long-Term Inbound Marketing
One note on inbound again…you want to be creating content right now. There has never been a bigger content creating opportunity for businesses than right now.
Blogs, podcasts, video and more. You can pick one or multiple. You literally can’t create enough content. The demand is there for as much as possible.
A few words to the wise, though.
First, don’t sell with your content. People aren’t interested in it most of the time. They want entertainment and education. If you’re a lawyer, create a crime mystery podcast series. If you’re a dentist, create a food review blog. If you’re a realtor, create a travel blog.
6. Start Little Project Teams
Change happens in every industry. Eventually a time will come when your business will need to pivot at least a little bit. The big money maker won’t be the big opportunity anymore. In order to be ready for the change it’s good to always have little project teams working on new things.
Most of them won’t lead to anything, but when you need to you can assess the little projects, identify a great opportunity and have the data to know that you can invest big and go for it.
7. Acquire Another Small Business
If you started your small business you know that it simply takes years to get to a good place. There are lots of ups and downs in the first decade. One of the things that many small business owners start looking to do later in their career is to skip that startup stage when developing new products and services and they instead look to acquire other businesses.
You can certainly launch a new service, but before doing that do a little searching and see if you can buy a business that does it already. You get the service for your customers, but you can also offer your current service to the other business’s customers.
Conclusion
These are just a few ideas that hopefully spark a little creative thinking for you. It’s always good to look for ways to improve your company. I’ve heard these from some successful people. I’m constantly thinking of them and I think they can help you as well.