The new year is the perfect time to dust off your business operations manual and give your company a spring clean to hit the ground running in January. This guide will help you refresh your small business operations and increase staff and customer engagement in the new year.
Review existing ops and procedures
First things first, review your business as it stands now. How efficient are your current procedures? Is there anything that seems outdated or not working as effectively as you’d hoped? Consider if equipment needs a revamp or whether new specialised equipment has become available?
Take some time observing the efficiency of your staff. Perhaps further training would be helpful to increase productivity to make sure that all employees are working to the same standard?
Identify any increases or decreases in sales revenue – don’t forget Square Point of Sale helps to measure sales records. Knowing your current performance will help you set measurable goals for the new year. Use these goals to measure how your upgrade has affected your overall business success.
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Adopt the best technology
Your customers deserve the best, but so does your business. Enter the new year with a bang with fresh technology. State of the art technology can help your business reach its goals with faster and more efficient processes that can save you precious time. Square Point of Sale technology makes it easier to manage your business from one device. Sell to your customers anywhere – online, in-store, over the phone, on social media, or even on the go.
Efficient till systems and payment processes, like Square Register and Square Terminal, make customer transactions easier - leading to increased sales. Square Reader is one of the fastest and most efficient card readers on the market – get ahead of the competition and provide your customers with the best for only £19 + VAT.
Invoicing software can streamline the running of your business and make sure you’re paid on time. Square Invoice allows you to send and track invoices, accept payments 24/7 and manage your business from one convenient platform.
Staff training and engagement
You’ve hired great staff – now you need to make sure you can keep your employees happy – there’s nothing more important than a strong workforce. Extra staff training could reap your small business rewards in staff engagement and loyalty. Keeping staff motivated is essential – highly engaged workers result in a 17% increase in productivity.
Similarly, employees that are engaged and attached to your business are 89% less likely to leave. Retaining employees is more effective for your business, not to mention cheaper in the long run, by avoiding the cost of retraining staff from scratch.
Employee performance is also enhanced with an engaged workforce – 20% of employees perform better when they are engaged and strive to work more effectively, help each other, and volunteer for extra responsibility.
Resolve minor issues
The smallest issues can sometimes be the ones that fall to the bottom of the to-do pile. It may sound simple but resolving any little problems your business has is a big step in the right direction.
Address and improve staff relationships to ensure that your team are working together. Reexamine all processes to check if any need an upgrade to help improve your business operations. Is there a customer complaint that you haven’t gotten around to addressing yet? Tackle any existing issues with a spring clean, ready to hit the ground running in the new year.
Consider new trends
One of the most exciting things you can do as a business in the New Year is trying something new. Not only will this motivate employees with something different to work on, but it’ll also create buzz around your brand and get customers talking about you.
As a business owner, it’s important to be on the ball with current trends in your industry to stay relevant and compete with competitors. Why not take a leap of faith and start a brand TikTok channel? Increasing your social media presence will exacerbate brand exposure.
If you own a hospitality business, shake up your menu with some on-trend flavours to get your customers talking. Take inspiration from competitors to see what their customers love.
Find new ways to engage your customers_
Branch into email marketing with the help of Square Marketing software to attract new customers and grow your business. Create engaging marketing campaigns and track their success with Square.
The new year is a great time to expand into a new avenue. Consider selling gift cards to your customers to increase sales and attract new customers to your business. Square Gift Cards are easy to set up and track from your Square account.
Loyalty programmes are a great way to reward your customers whilst simultaneously encouraging repeat purchases and consumer satisfaction. Treat your customers in the new year with a personalised experience and money off your product or service. Square Loyalty can help you track sales and measure the impact of your loyalty strategy.
Get feedback from customers
Feedback from customers is one of the most influential business assets. Find out first-hand what your customers love, or don’t love, about your products or services. Identify their pain points and plan on how you can address them.
Square Feedback allows you to have direct communication with your customers, making it easier to fix any issues in private. Track your feedback using the dashboard to see if your business is improving customer relations.
Use customer feedback to plan how to upgrade your business operations. What do you need to be doing better? How can these customers have a better time with your company? Turn feedback into goals for the future and work on making your business the best it can be.