Blog Archives
How to Build a Great Small Business Team
According to the Albion Growth Report survey of 450 SMEs, 62 per cent are anticipating growth. But how do SMEs put the right teams in place to make sure growth is profitable and sustainable?
1 – Identify strengths and weaknesses
For SMEs moving into uncharted business waters, analysing your team’s current strengths – and weaknesses – is vital. “We encourage people to be upfront about what they are good at and what they are less good at,” says Kate Oakley, Ten Lifestyle Concierge’s director of people and performance, “so the whole team can make sure that each person is playing to their strengths – and asking the right person for support when they need it.
“My advice is, as a leader, start by telling people on your team what you are not good at – this will help them open up.”
2 – Be systematic
A technique employed at software development company Haufe-umantis, among others, is “swarming”, which allows staff to choose which projects they work on based on where they feel their skills are most needed. It lets staff thrive (or not) in unfamiliar areas and also helps identify knowledge gaps.
Whatever technique you employ, John Hackston, head of research and development at workplace psychology organisation OPP, says that a systematic evaluation of individual strengths and weaknesses is the foundation of good team building.
3 – Unearth your hidden gems
According to the Albion Growth Report, 33 per cent of SMEs are planning to recruit as they build the teams that will facilitate growth. But Phil Seymour, network manager for Approved Garages – who advises more than 500 independent garage SMEs nationwide, says that the best teams often evolve together.
“When growing a business it’s sometimes better to look to people who know the culture of the organisation,” he say. “Think about training and developing good internal candidates and don’t ignore the temps, freelancers and contractors who may have worked for you in the past. For instance, I hired a student as a temp data inputter, and when it came to growing the team I knew that he had absorbed the way we work. He is now a full-time programmer.”
Giles Slinger, director of Concentra, which produces the HR tool OrgVue, also believes in unearthing hidden gems, especially when expanding an existing team. “These can be the people who are the real driving force behind the business,” he says. “Ask the question: who are the people who make things happen? Who removes blockers? Who improves things for customers?”
4 – Define clear goals and roles
Once you have people in place, clarity of purpose is key.
“Ensure everyone understands the team goals implicitly,” says business coach and mentor Penny Davenport. “Make sure they can recite it forwards, backwards and sideways. I find that when a team is united around an objective, and has a clear role in meeting it, issues of personality and fragmentation tend to disappear.”
Map roles and responsibilities for each team member. A focused, clear-eyed team is a harmonious one.
5 Promote a collaborative culture
On top of well-defined responsibilities, building a successful team also means instilling the virtue of collaboration. A team that works well together, grows together.
“It’s the role of the team leader to define and facilitate a collaborative culture, encouraging trust and open communication among members,” says Jody Goldsworthy, director at global advisory company CEB.
Online graphic design marketplace 99designs promotes collaboration and cooperation by allowing team members to spend periods working in any of its four global offices, but with less geographically spread SMEs it might be regular team meetings, social outings, even the dreaded Outward Bound day. Building a team means building a team spirit. Communication should flow freely and naturally.
“Make sure that the organisation’s skills and resources are known to everyone, and the path to leveraging them is clear,” says Giles Slinger. “Transparency and collaboration are the key.”
How SMEs can get ahead and recruit and retain first-class
SMEs are five times more likely than larger businesses to be taking on extra staff this year, according to CIPD Survey. This is positive news but it also brings challenges. There is no doubt that hiring the right people will help your business flourish and grow, but getting it wrong can cost money and adversely affect staff morale. To help small businesses make the right people decisions, and hang on to good talent, here are my top tips:
Look beyond technical skills
Look for recruits who not only have the skills your business needs but who, more importantly, have the right attitude and values to help your business grow. It’s particularly important to get this right in a small business because people are your lifeblood and making a wrong hire can have a very noticeable impact on your company culture and productivity.
Technical skills can be taught but values can’t, which is why it’s critical to find people who are the right fit for your business from the start. Managed hosting provider UKFast, for example, looks for applicants who can demonstrate what they call the “paper round gene”. These are individuals who have shown a willingness to work hard, take responsibility and earn some money from an early age – whether it was through child-minding, car washing or a paper round.
Be clear about your employer proposition
To attract the best talent, applicants need to know what it’s really like to work for your business. Highlight what is special about your company and why it is such a great place to work, but also be honest about what people can expect if they join you. This allows candidates to make an informed decision and avoids them leaving after a few months if they find the job is not what they expected.
It can be difficult to compete with larger companies with a strong, established brand, but there are ways to let potential employees know what you’re about. You might want to consider, for example, having a section on your values on your company website, or posting up a podcast or a video of an employee talking about what it’s really like to work for you.
Choccywoccydoodah, a Brighton-based chocolatier, openly looks for employees who want to work in an unpredictable, fun environment and who thrive on thinking on their feet. The company purposefully communicates this ethos through its website and social media channels.
Ensure consistency in your recruitment
In the early days of the business, the founder typically does most of the hiring. But as the business grows and typically hiring is devolved to multiple line managers, there needs to be a system for ensuring a consistent approach across the business. For example, is everyone recruiting in line with the company’s values and do they know how to conduct an interview effectively? This might be as simple as writing down processes and procedures so that everyone knows what they are and can follow them.
Recruit for the future
When you are hiring it’s important to think beyond the immediate needs of the business. This means considering not only the skills you need today but also the skills you will need to help your business develop and grow in the future. When recruiting, especially for junior roles, you should ask yourself whether these people have the potential to grow with your company and develop their career with you.
Make learning part of your culture
Get the best out of the people you do hire through offering training and development opportunities. Your business is more likely to retain star performers if you’re offering continuous development – especially if you’re small and can’t offer upwards promotions. Training doesn’t have to cost the earth.
MJF Cleaning, for example, actively encourages staff to shadow more experienced employees, and to cross-train, learning the roles of other team members so they can cover for them if required during holidays and absence. The business also offers staff the opportunity to work towards NVQ qualifications in cleaning and support services at no cost to them. Fifty per cent of staff are currently enrolled on the course and it is now actively introduced to new starters as part of the recruitment process.
These are just some of the ways that small businesses can approach the essential business of hiring and retaining staff. Above all, recruiting new people is a major decision, one that shouldn’t be rushed. Taking the time to consider the skills and attitude you need, and identifying the right person for your business, will pay dividends in the long-term.
How to Deliver a Successful Business Pitch for SME’s
Television programmes such as Dragons’ Den have done little to quash the fears of pitching novices, with the TV show delivering sweaty-palmed hopefuls into the investors’ lair each week. Pitching is the Marmite of the business world – some people thrive on the buzz, but many hate the thought of being in front of an audience. If you want to grow your business, though, pitching might be necessary to win the support you need.
Luckily for small business owners, going on TV isn’t the only way to deliver a memorable pitch. Here are a few ways SMEs can present a convincing pitch:
Keep it brief
Sir Richard Branson has seen and delivered his fair share of pitches. “You need to stand out from the crowd,” explained the entrepreneur at 30:30 Vision, a recent Virgin Media Business event in London for small businesses and social enterprises. “To do that you need to keep it really short, as short as possible. And do it with a smile if you are good at cracking jokes.”
He added: “The most important thing is to be concise. My own feeling is that a good idea can be written on the back of an envelope.”
Tim Mills, an investment director at Angel CoFund, which was established to support the development of the UK business angel market and provide investment for high potential SMEs, agrees that keeping pitches short and sweet is essential.
“There’s nothing quite so disheartening as seeing a 100-page business plan. A nice two page, very crisp, clear overview is a great way to introduce the business,” he says.
“When you are making that first pitch, all the rules of marketing and advertising apply. It’s about being able to get your message across clearly and having a call to action of some sort.”
Know your numbers
One thing Dragons’ Den makes clear is that if budding businesses don’t know their numbers, they will be in for a hard ride. Cheryl MacDonald, founder of YogaBellies, was awarded £50,000 on Dragons’ Den, and had her figures nailed down.
“The first thing for pitching is you have to know your numbers, you can’t go in and not know them,” she says. “We were very, very prepared. We knew the business inside out, we knew the figures inside out, we don’t have any business debt and it is a profitable business from day one.”
MacDonald advises pitchers to take in a copy of their key figures with them if they struggle to commit them to memory.
Investors will also want to be reassured that risks have been taken into account as far as possible. Mills says: “Fundamentally as an investor it is all about pricing the risk. Anything that can give you comfort that the risks are mitigated makes it more appealing.”
Team spirit
Investors aren’t just interested in great ideas, they also want to be confident that a business has the right team for the job. Mills typically encounters companies that are past the startup phase and on to their second or third round of funding. He says that at this stage the impression your team makes is hugely important.
“What you are really looking for in a pitch, initially, is to feel confident that there is an opportunity there, that you have a team that can execute against that opportunity,” he says.
“One of the challenges is that they start with the solution, which is obviously the most exciting bit, and they tend to be good at talking about the opportunity, but probably the area they are weakest is articulating why they as a team can execute against that opportunity.”
Finding the right partner
Although cashflow is traditionally the biggest concern for startups, pitching to investors should not be purely about pound signs. Ross Fobian, who recently raised £4m through venture capital for ResponseTap, a call-based marketing automation business, says: “One of the key things for us was finding the right partner. Getting investment isn’t just about the money. You get a lot more value when you get someone who believes and understands and has the right network behind them.”
Fobian adds: “Investors don’t necessarily invest in the business, especially first stage investors. They are actually investing in the founders, seeing what they have done, their drive, their passion. Obviously they have to have a company behind them that makes sense, but if they don’t like the founders they won’t invest.”
ResponseTap went through two rounds of venture capital funding, and Fobian says there is a marked difference between each stage.
“The main difference between the first and second round is the first is very much about the founders and our passion for the business,” he says. “With the second round we had a lot more numbers and rather than it being about us, although they still have to like the founders, it was very much a case of being focused on the numbers.”
For the first pitch, focus on your story as a founder and don’t focus so much on the business, says Fobian. “It is quite important that you have some concept of market size. If you are going for venture capital they are looking for big returns and for something that could be big.”
SMEs neglected in big business contracts
Big businesses are still reluctant to issue major contracts to small suppliers, despite mounting pressure from the UK Government.
While two-thirds of large businesses work with small to medium-sized contractors, the majority award less than a quarter of contracts to smaller players, according to a new study of nearly 150 corporate supply chains by consultancy IFF.
Just 12pc of the procurement managers in the survey, take on behalf of supply chain risk-management firm Achilles, said that they plan to increase the number of contracts issued to small firms.
Reticence was attributed to the perceived “financial instability” of SMEs, the study said, together with fears over non-compliance with standards and regulations.
Adrian Chamberlain, chief executive of Achilles, said: “SME suppliers must be prepared to do their bit in terms of raising standards, delivering value and putting themselves in the best possible position to win work.”
However, big businesses admitted that there were benefits to working with smaller companies, saying that they were more in touch with customer needs, more flexible, efficient, and better located.
Construction firm Balfour Beatty has committed to spend more than £1bn with SMEs in the UK during 2014, a 33pc rise on its 2013 spend. The Government is in the process of introducing a raft of new regulations aimed at encouraging big businesses to work with more SMEs.
Under new rules from the EU, public sector and regulated businesses will no longer be able to favour large firms. They will only be able to specify that suppliers have a minimum turnover figure up to two times the value of the contract. Corporates will also have to explain why contracts were not split up into smaller lots, effectively shutting out SMEs.
The Government has set a public sector target of awarding 25pc of all contracts to SMEs by 2015. Last year, the Federation of Small Businesses found that 78pc of SMEs had never tried to sell to a public sector body. However, 55pc of the SMEs that bid for public sector contracts were successful.
SMEs and how to use social media better
Social Media can seems daunting and at times give SMEs an inferiority complex. Things are going seemingly well with a Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn profile, and then you notice that your tally of followers is overshadowed tenfold by the mega brands in your industry.
Without the dedicated team that many large brands have working on their social media output, it can seem like an uphill struggle. However, following a few simple guidelines can soon bring results for those who are willing to put in a little time and effort to immerse their SME in the right circles of social media.
Once social media influence is gained, and built on, companies will find they are in the enviable position of having direct access to their customers, prospects, suppliers and future talent pool at the click of a mouse.
1. Get it kickstarted
There is an inconvenient truth associated with social media. You can follow the advice of every “guru” or “ninja” (some social media experts really do use this term) but if you only have a handful of followers, your wonderful content and messages are unlikely to have much impact.
“The good news is LinkedIn, Facebook and twitter all now allow companies to set small budgets of just a few pounds per day to advertise through suggested posts, recommended followers and so on.
“You can tap in the type of people you want to reach by where they are and what they’re interested in, and you normally only pay when they click on your advert. It’s a very fast and effective way to start building a following.”
2. Treat it like a friendly local pub
Engaging with people through social media is simple so long as you remember a golden rule, says Penny Power, who advises the government on digital marketing, authored the Digital Business Britain Manifesto and founded the Digital Youth Academy. SMEs, she advises, should treat social media channels like they would their new local pub.
“If you’d just moved in to a town or village you wouldn’t open the door of your new local pub and shout that you’re a plumber or an architect and people should come over and give you business,” she explains.
“You’d join in with what was going on around you, chat to people and get to know them and let them know what you do, so they know about you when they need your service, or can recommend you to a friend. It’s exactly the same in social media. Look up Facebook pages, LinkedIn communities and Twitter hashtags for your area and expertise and get involved in conversations to build up a following. Don’t just keep saying how good you are and how everyone should buy from you – it’s very off-putting.”
3. Be expert and small
Never be concerned by mega brands having millions of followers while you only have a handful. By researching people who have influence in your business sector and who are interested in what you do, the universal truth is that 1,000 engaged users are worth more to you than 10,000 who have simply liked a big brand to enter a competition.
“Don’t try to compete with big brands, because if you concentrate too much on the competition, you’ll never get anything done,” advises Iona St Joseph, social media account manager at A Social Media Agency.
“If someone is already dominating your sector on certain social networks, you just need to find another way to stand out. They might be first to break news on their giant corporate blog, but by updating your accounts and blog in a friendly, humorous way, you’ll begin to stand out as a more personable business that people can engage with.”
4. Monitor to improve
The very simple rule that all social media experts would pass on to any SME is that if you are going to submit a post, offer, picture or video make sure it is interesting, informative or entertaining. If it does not tick at least one of these boxes, think long and hard about posting something that does.
This golden rule will help social media followers feel appreciated, says Rhian Farnworth, social media manager at online marketing agency DBD. However, businesses should not stop there. They need to continually be improving, and that comes from constant monitoring.
“The best way to make sure you’re engaging properly is to monitor, monitor and monitor,” she advises.
“You can do this by keeping an eye on mentions and conversation surrounding your brand online. There are plenty of free tools to track when your company is being talked about. Try Google Alerts to have new results delivered to your inbox as they appear, Socialmention.com to monitor content from across the web talking about your brand and set up Hootsuite to see live streams of content and conversations from top social networks that mention your company, brand and relevant keywords you want to monitor.
“This is the best way to identify what’s working and what’s not. By continually focusing on techniques and content that is successful, you’ll grow your audience and create a big social buzz around your brand.”
5. Treat it with respect
Do not leave social media solely to the intern or young person in the office who “gets” the internet.
All accounts should be set up under the SME owner’s name and email so a member of staff leaving can no longer remotely post and does not take passwords with them.
Similarly, all marketing messages should be approved by senior members of staff, and all interaction online should be handled responsibly and professionally, no matter how strong the temptation may be to tell a third party they are acting inappropriately.
How small businesses are making the most of social media to grow
For SMEs with limited resources, social media has been a blessing. Free social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube have been adopted enthusiastically by businesses for marketing, publicity, customer relations and market research purposes.
But the sheer number of tools available can be daunting. The challenge for a business is to strike a balance between focusing too narrowly on limited social networks and spreading itself too thinly by adopting too many.
Dani Booth of Jelf Small Business says his company focuses on the “big four” of Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+ and advises others to keep their efforts manageable and their accounts active.
“There are few things more embarrassing than a Twitter account that was set up and forgotten with only one lonely tweet present,” he says. “Twitter is filled with people who have set up an account, said ‘hello’ and then abandoned said account because no one replied. Don’t be that guy.”
One business owner who has decided to focus their efforts is Maria Bateson. She set up a Facebook page for her silver charms business, which helped it to build up a loyal following. Now most of her customers come via Facebook. Bateson first turned to Facebook while living in Ukraine and found it was the best way of getting her designs visible to customers in the UK. Now based in London, she finds Facebook groups devoted to crafting are a good way of get her designs showcased.
Another Facebook fan is Alison Howell, the founder and managing director of the 10-year-old travel company Foottrails who came to social media relatively late. She made the decision to focus on Facebook and Twitter because of limited resources and has used both networks since 2012. “Social media does take time,” says Howell, who takes on most of the responsibilities for social media herself. “I think it is best to focus on just a few networks and regularly update those.”
Anna Lundberg, a digital marketing consultant at Crocus Communications, says Facebook and Twitter represent a good starting point. She advises considering a target market’s age, gender and interests before widening social media efforts. “YouTube is useful if you have video content and Google+ for search engine optimisation reasons more than anything else,” she adds.
But there are risks involved in focusing on only one or two platforms, as Maria Bateson discovered.
Bateson says she unwittingly received a temporary ban from Facebook Groups, adding that the episode made her explore alternatives to Facebook, including Twitter and putting paid ads on craft blogs. While the situation was quickly resolved by Facebook, it made her aware of how vulnerable social media content can be. “You hear horror stories of Facebook deleting pages,” she adds.
While Facebook and Twitter are often the first social media channels that businesses turn to, Pinterest, an online tool for collecting and organising images, has become important for some, particularly designers. Wedding dress designer Lillian Mayro says she has found that Pinterest is her most powerful tool for capturing new customers and business.
“We use Pinterest to make the connection with the brides extra special and very personal to them,” she says. “We see how much thought goes into women planning their weddings, from gathering inspiration from many sources or simply traditional old school tearing pages out of magazines.
“Pinterest just makes it so easy to collect inspiration and ideas in one place. It’s also a really fun way to have a dialogue with the ladies.”
Architects Feilden Fowles has found Pinterest useful for collaborating on projects with their clients. The business fills its Pinterest account with inspiring images from the built and natural world and creates “boards” linked to projects which they work on with the client. Edmund Feilden, a partner and architect at Feilden Fowles, says architectural drawings are not always the most engaging representation of designs. “By using images of spaces that actually exist you can draw people in,” he says.
And this strategy has led them to win work. “Our last two residential clients have come to us after seeing our work on Pinterest,” says Feilden. “We often get approached because architecture blogs have re-posted our content.”
Nicholas Swift, the joint managing director at DirectBlinds.co.uk, uses social media to increase brand awareness and create social media opportunities. He says he key to a successful social media strategy is to understand your audience and choose the platform that suits them best.
Content is also an important consideration. Mayro says she spends five hours each month solely on content creation and holds a monthly meeting brainstorming content and deciding what to adopt.
Chloe Hall, who shares social media responsibilities with her two colleagues at Newcastle-based Jewellery Moments, says businesses should invest time in creating content to populate social networks, including strong images. She says the photo sharing network Instagram is Jewellery Moments’ favoured network.
“What I have tried to do is tie products in with imagery,” she says. “We watermark the image by adding some text like ‘Mothers’ Day coming up …’ and mention the name of the business. It’s a double whammy, we are presenting information in an aesthetically pleasing way.”
Once networks have been established and content posted, most businesses try to monitor how much impact that content is having against their goals. For some businesses, a successfully implemented social media strategy is measured by engagement and media mentions or simply by the number of customers social media activities bring to the business. Swift says positive and negative sentiment is a key factor in measuring the effectiveness of DirectBlinds.co.uk’s social media.
“We set ourselves high targets and use tools such as SimplyMeasured, TweetReach and Facebook Insights to evaluate our progress monthly,” he says.
DirectBlinds.co.uk also found that Facebook posts that linked back to the website received minimal engagement. The social media team responded by creating content that gives the user the option to choose which image or product they prefer, using a multiple choice method.
“We have also started using low-value competitions that encourage ‘likes’ and comments to help boost our engagement and to increase our page reach,” adds Swift. “Following this method, we have seen a steady increase in our Facebook fans.”
Social media can offer many benefits to businesses, although the possibilities might seem mind-boggling to anyone unfamiliar with these tools. Digital marketing consultant Anna Lundberg advises small business that low-cost resources are available to help them to master social media. “Even if you don’t get expert help there are lots of resources online and free conferences you can go to,” she says. “There’s a wealth of information available to you depending on what you want to achieve.”
British business starting to address digital skill shortage
Digital skills are at the core of the current economic debate in the UK. Youth unemployment is unacceptably high, wages are too low and employers complain of a skills shortage. Most economic commentators agree that innovation and technology are the future and that there’s a need to create a better skilled workforce. But how should this be achieved, how big is the challenge ahead, and are we doing enough to meet it?
Digital is impacting every sector of the economy and is doing so at rapid pace. This is a challenge for employers, educators and young job seekers who are all struggling to keep up with the changes. Also, demand for digital skills is rising. The Future Digital Skills Needs of the UK economy report states that the UK will need, at a minimum, an additional 745,000 workers with digital skills by 2017, with over 169,000 being young people.
Tech startups across the UK complain about the lack of developers and programmers available. Regional businesses have to compete with London, but even in the capital startups have to compete with the likes of Google and Twitter nearby, as well as other European tech hubs and, of course, Silicon Valley. If this country is to create its own Twitter or Facebook it will need more top coding talent.
One of the most troubling observations made by entrepreneurs in different cities is that universities are often not training students in the right things, resulting in students discovering, upon graduation, that their skills are out-of-date or unwanted by employers.
“It’s an issue,” says Dan Kirby, founder and chief executive of TechDept, an online technology agency based in Sheffield. “If I was going to pay £40,000 for an education I wouldn’t be best pleased with the skills I was getting. Students aren’t being taught what’s done in the market, so we have to retrain people when we take them from university. In our experience, lecturers aren’t up to date with the latest tools. In my world practices are changing every six months and so they lose their cutting edge.”
Kirby advises students to check carefully the content of their courses and also to use their time wisely to make themselves more employable. “If you are into tech and coding you shouldn’t think that universities are the fountain of all knowledge. You have to build your skills and develop an entrepreneurial mindset yourself,” he says.
There does seem to be a chasm between education and employment which is exacerbating the skills gap. This is something which Adam Ball recognised when he set-up Coding Cupboard, essentially a “matchmaking service” for businesses and computer science students. Through his site employers can offer short-term freelance projects to students who can help them solve problems while earning cash and improving their CVs. “Rather than stacking shelves during university a student can be working with a business and creating something for their portfolio,” says Ball.
It also gives students and businesses a chance to get to know one another and this has led to full-time work for some. “Finding the right person is a struggle for businesses and many feel there’s risk with hiring students. Students often have great skills but don’t know how to sell their skill sets to businesses,” Ball says.
But the lack of digital skills are being felt right across the economy – not just among the programming sector. The media, marketing and creative industries are also having difficulties finding “oven-ready” employees and there are calls for more training from employers in the public sector and retail, too. A number of initiatives have been launched in an attempt to plug the gap, and it’s likely there will be more in the future.
D-Day
The British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) now runs the Digital Day challenge where schools are paired with digital agencies to create a project for their community with digital design, social media, apps or coding. About 4,000 young people from just over 100 schools took part last year, and more are expected for 2014. Ostensibly, it seems to be a great way to improve awareness and interest in the digital industry. It is also a way for employers to interact closely with schools and build bridges to entry.
However, BIMA’s own research into the participants from 2012 suggests a serious lack of awareness among young people of the nature of the industry and the job roles within it. Of those surveyed 75% of school children said they had “never seen any information or been taught about the digital industry.” Indeed most (63%) were unaware of the variety of job roles, many thinking the digital industry was for people with highly technical skills prior to the competition. The report suggested this might be an intimidating factor for young people.
What to do?
Businesses are struggling to recruit talent and are putting projects on hold until they do. There’s at least an acknowledgment from industry that the problem needs to be tackled, but without substantially more resource, awareness and commitment it’s hard to argue that the UK will overcome this issue in the near future. Yet courses and online resources are available for individuals and businesses that want to skill-up. The UK as a whole might struggle with its digital skills gap, but entrepreneurs determined to sort out their own shortcomings can often do so.
Courses
Codeacademy
Codecademy offers free and interactive tutorials in all main computer languages which can take a novice through to competency via a series of baby steps. Beautifully simple.
Digital High Street Skills
The Association of Town and City Management and the National Skills Academy for Retail have teamed up to deliver a series of training days across the country with the aim to train up 3,000 business owners this year.
The Codeplayer
Provides free walk-through videos that allow you to watch the coders at work without missing a keystroke. The growing site has a range of topics mostly in HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript.
W3Schools.com
Provides both tutorials, references and resources for all main majority computer languages, useful for both beginners and the adept.
How to introduce a smarter working strategy into your business
Written by: James Caan
From planning with precision to hiring an extra helping hand, there are simple steps you can take to incorporate smarter working practices into your business.
We hear a lot in business about ways to cut corners and make everything quicker and easier. Of course, there’s no way you can truly do this, because you will always be compromising on quality or potential at some level.
However, there is something to be said about working smarter and finding creative ways to get the best out of limited resources and focusing on productivity. The faster you learn to do this, the better it is in the long run. As someone who has been in business for over 30 years, I know this only too well.
Let’s take a look at some ways in which you can adopt a “work smart” attitude and apply it to your business.
The first and arguably most important step is planning. This isn’t just knowing what meetings you have in the day; this is about prioritising and ranking tasks and projects by their level of importance. This is critical to streamlining your thought process when making business decisions. It can seem impossible to gather your thoughts and create clarity in your mind when you have a lot of work to get done. As a startup this is especially true as you juggle the conceptual, admin and financial sides of a business all at once. You understand your business better than anyone so make things easier for yourself by being organised from the outset. Eventually all of the preparation will help you make better thought out decisions – leaving less space for mistakes.
As a new business, you will be strapped for cash, so initially you will be doing much of the work yourself. However, in order to grow as a business, you have to focus on your business model to refine it. One key area that will help you is hiring extra resource to share the load. They may be a full or part-time person – you will know what’s best for your business. Remember you have to be able to justify the cost of bringing somebody into the business. I have spoken in a previous piece about hiring at the right time – if your workload justifies it and you can find someone that really adds value, then you know the time is right to make a hire.
If you can find a specialist in an area that is key to your business, you will reap the benefits of delegation by saving your time, while working with individuals who have the expertise to help your business grow.
Of course, the caveat of delegation is just as former United States senator Byron Dorgan stated – you can delegate authority, but you cannot delegate responsibility. Ultimately, as the business owner, all the good and bad decisions will come down to you, so to ensure that accountability doesn’t drive you out of business, you need to make the right decisions when delegating. Communication also plays a big role here – something I learned early on in my career was that when things went wrong, it was probably because I hadn’t explained it well enough. Communicating tasks clearly to the right people will ensure they get done just as effectively as if you did it.
Now, things don’t always go well and there are businesses that fail. However I truly believe that failure is one of life’s greatest lessons, and will teach you a lot about yourself and the market. I myself have failed in business before, but the key is to pick yourself up because a true entrepreneur is resilient. More than this, admitting to failure earlier rather than later will save you both time and money. Even at a smaller level, if a decision in your business isn’t working for you, abandon the idea before you are in so deep that you have to abandon your own business.
The benefits of working smarter are undeniable. Not only will you have a better work/life balance, but you will be more satisfied with the performance of both yourself and your business. You can focus on the areas that matter most, and this can only be of benefit to the overall growth of your business.
How to build your business as a Freelancer
The freedom and flexibility of freelancing can be very attractive. One of the biggest challenges is finding a steady stream of projects that enables you to build your business. Embrace business development as an ongoing part of your independent enterprise. Those with a real passion for working towards their next project are invariably the most successful.
When working as part of a large team, it’s easy to assign someone to manage business growth, or delegate potential markets to employees. In contrast, when you’re on your own or managing a new small business, it can be a big challenge to devote time to your own marketing. It’s important not to overlook it though, as a few months down the line, it could have a detrimental effect.
When putting together your business plan, ensure a section of it is devoted to how you will identify and target your potential customers. List the number of markets you will specifically target and identify the ways to communicate with people working in these sectors, in case they might need your services.
This can then form part of your work planner as it’s an ongoing process. In the same way that you set aside time to manage your accounts, allow yourself a few hours every week to promote your business and engage with potential customers in some way. There are a number of methods and the dreaded cold call doesn’t even have to come into it.
1. Network
Network by attending local business and industry trade events or through niche groups. Don’t go in with a heavy-handed sales approach. Look at it as a long-term way to make professional relationships that could lead to introductions further down the line. And if you hate networking, as many people do, then the best tip is to simply ask other people questions. But keep going back, as that’s how relationships are built.
2. Use Social Media
A number of clients can come through social media. It is not to be underestimated. At the very least, ensure your LinkedIn profile is as detailed as possible – essentially it’s an online CV. Twitter meanwhile should be used for conversation and to engage with other businesses and people in your field or location. Social media thrives on visuals so mix up business messages, news and conversations with some lighthearted content too. You can bring the likes of Facebook, Google+ and Pinterest into play, but ensure your target audience uses these networks. Social media can be time consuming, so use the time effectively and drive everything back to your website.
3. PR
Local newspapers and business websites are quick to support startups and SMEs if they have a good story to tell and they often run business profiles. You will need to have a story for the media, so do look at the kind of things they cover – growth, new appointments, new clients and new premises are all good positive local business stories. The trade media is likely to run regular editorial features that include comments from third parties. Ask the editorial team for a features list to see if there is anything that might be relevant to you. Again, drive everything back to your website.
4. Marketing and advertising
Depending on your business, direct marketing and advertising can work really well. This takes a budget as well as time, so ensure you are spending your money in the right places. Have professional adverts and leaflets created by local agencies and supplement any advertising or marketing activity by promoting it through your social media and PR.
These tactics are all part of your growth strategy so need to be maintained. It’s also very important not to rest on your laurels once your business gains momentum (which is, of course, when you start to get most busy). Your success stories – growth, case studies, milestones – can be used to further promote your business and help it grow to the next level. Put your client case studies on your website and write blogs about what you have been doing. Offer advice on other sites, always driving traffic back to yours. Continue networking and always look at the longer view. Momentum is key and by setting aside a little time a week, you can ensure your company messages are continuing to reach the right people.
SME’s – Social Media and Innovation
Social Media platforms have huge potential to foster innovation in businesses of any size. They offer a space in which companies and individuals can benefit from having access to creative clusters of professionals who are willing to share their ideas.
However, this creative stock of ideas is very difficult to properly exploit, because there is also a huge level of fragmentation: the conversations are going on everywhere, all the time, and it can seem that you need significant resources to explore these virtual spaces properly.
However, small businesses can adopt some strategies learned from large corporations, in order to benefit from social media innovation.
Be in the right places
Big companies have the resources to invest in having a broad presence in the social media sphere. SMEs start from the opposite perspective, of working with fewer resources.
The best strategy in this case is to focus your attention on the social media spaces in which interesting content is more likely to appear, either from current and potential customers, or from other conversations. Instead of trying to be everywhere, an SME should start with cultivating a community in one or two social media channels at the most.
The company should investigate where its current and potential customers are, and design a strategy to reach them. A company which sell services to other companies, or small consultancies and professional firms, for instance, may find it is easier to connect using LinkedIn as the main social network.
The company should focus on matters that interest audiences. Big companies have realised social media is a space for marketing, but people become very tired of marketing-only interactions. Time is a scarce resource on social media: there are so many things to be seen and read, so people become selective about the conversations they wish to engage in. The only way of really engaging people is to start conversations which are in their interest. High quality, relevant content, from the perspective of a particular audience, is necessary to attract people to the virtual space, in order then to encourage their participation and for innovative ideas to emerge. People need to perceive a direct benefit of being connected to that particular space.
Cultivate customer communities
In addition to sharing interesting content, it is necessary to go a step further to benefit from the innovative ideas given by customers and potential customers.
Ideas come organically in any healthy community. In addition, companies may encourage the generation of ideas, for instance, by posting questions about the areas they believe it is possible to foster development. A simple question to the community may trigger an interesting discussion, bringing innovative ideas to the fore.
People give contributions when they believe their opinion matters, and when they believe their ideas will benefit themselves or others in some way. Translating these aspects into action, companies should keep up the dialogue with contributors. When a suggestion comes, the company always should give feedback, motivating the same people and others to participate.
Competitions and polls are also interesting ways of benefiting from the engagement with virtual communities. Polls are a more straightforward method for discovering particular opinions when the company already has an idea about the options to be tested with customers. In general, a poll offers a closed set of questions, thus it only works when the company wants to ask specific questions.
Competitions are more open, mostly starting from a problem to be solved, which allow contributors to bring a larger variety of ideas, from different perspectives. For instance, an SME may open a competition to choose a new logo or a new slogan for the company.
Additionally, companies should give a sort of reward to those customers who have given useful ideas. A straightforward gift (money, products or services) may be an easy solution, but is not always appropriate or possible. Especially in competitions, a gift reward may be the best option. In any case, the contributor should be praised publicly for the benefit the idea has brought to the company – and even better to the whole community – improving the quality of a product or a service. Some big companies even keep track of the best contributors, and regularly call them to networking gatherings. This is a good idea: invite the best contributors to an event, to share ideas and feedback with the company and other contributors.
Be prepared for the downside
Big companies know very well that social media can also damage their reputation. This may also happen with SMEs. Any space of interaction can bring great ideas for innovation, which may be utilised. It may also bring to light strong criticisms. Thus companies should be prepared to cope with both, with a high level of professionalism. In addition, companies need to be very diplomatic in coping in a sensible and sensitive way with those vocal contributors who have not much to say.
SmallBizContent 