Feeling the January slump? The post-holidays lull is actually a great opportunity to set yourself up for success this year. Here are a few places to channel your extra time:
Make some goals
If you haven’t already, work on setting New Year’s resolutions for your business. Talk to your business partners and trusted employees about what you might aim for next year. You could also use a SWOT analysis to help you identify strengths and weaknesses. Once you’ve nailed down a few concrete things to strive for and improve, get started on detailed action plans.
Streamline, streamline, streamline
Saving time is the name of the game here — and Square can really help. Square Point of Sale is equipped with everything you need to run your business in the most efficient way possible. Having trouble managing your inventory? Square Inventory’s tracking tools can help you get organised. Always finding yourself underneath heaps of paper invoices? Get set up with Square Invoices and send invoices straight from your phone. Automating and simplifying things will go a long way toward running business more smoothly.
It’s a great time to try new things. Maybe it’s a new service, a daily-deals-type campaign, or gift cards. Remember that your customers are likely setting themselves some New Year’s goals — so framing new efforts around things that hit at self improvement is a good strategy.
Analyse some data
Take some time to look at the data in your Square Dashboard. What’s your busiest month? Week? Day? Hour? Who’s your top salesperson? This information is instrumental to making crucial business decisions like staffing and planning inventory.
Learn about your customers
What do you hear most from your customers? Talk to the customer-facing members of your team to learn more about what people are saying. Then spend time reading both online reviews on sites like Trustpilot and the notes in Square Feedback to glean more insights about areas where you need to improve.
Spending a little time on any of these things now will help you to hit the ground running once business picks back up in a few weeks.