4 ways to ramp up your business in the new year
The holidays have passed, you’ve survived the most intense shopping season of the year, and it’s time for New Year’s resolutions.
However, instead of watching the ball drop in 2015 and making a half-hearted personal resolution this year, start planning now how your business will reach new heights of success. Here are four ways to ramp up your business and get excited about the upcoming 52 weeks of brand new opportunities.
1. Revamp your thinking
Whether you had lots of successful ideas and strategies in 2014, or if you had a difficult year, changing your thinking to ramp up your business can make a huge difference. Instead of getting down on yourself or employees for ideas that don’t succeed, try a different approach. A business culture that views failure as an expected part of the path toward success results in an even better solution in the long run. As you go into the New Year, whether you’re self-employed or have a small staff, don’t beat yourself up over failures. Adopting a positive mindset is key to helping your business reaching its full potential, and that mindset starts with you.
2. Smart tech investments
The eCommerce world is saturated with different types of emerging technology, particularly since it’s also one of the newest industries worldwide. Everything moves as a lightning fast pace, but there are some pieces of equipment that every online business owner needs to own.
One such essential piece of equipment you should invest in for 2015 is a mobile credit card reader. Even if you conduct the vast majority of your business online, there are times when you might want to go on the road. Some common examples are attending a trade show, an industry fair, or even running a pop-up shop. Whatever the situation, having mobile technology that can accept plastic is necessary in a world that’s growing increasing cashless.
3. Keep new customer relationships going
The holiday season pushes new customers toward businesses that they’ve never shopped at before, often due to a particularly enticing promotion or discount, and that includes yours. You shouldn’t let these potential new customers slip through your fingers, though. Internet Retailer advises that continuing customer relationships by pushing brand loyalty using outreach methods such as e-mail and social media alerts is a good way to hold onto new customers after the holiday season. This also provides more information about what the new crop of shoppers want, which is essential to achieving a long-term retention rate.
Pay careful attention to how you interact with your potential new customers during the beginning of 2015. Try to engage them directly by offering special discounts for new customers on goods and services. Get their feedback about their experience with the product they originally purchased from you during the holidays. A business that seems to genuinely care about customer feedback will win loyal customers quickly, especially in a world of automated customer service lines and form emails.
4. Up your social media game
Social media is undoubtedly the name of the game, and it’s only increasing in its influence. Be prepared in 2015 to ramp up your business with your social media strategies. If you don’t have a strategy, then make sure you get one.
Understanding how social media works and how it can serve your business is absolutely essential, and that’s just keeping up with the crowd. If you want to go the extra mile, start analyzing what kind of content that you offer shoppers is effective, versus what’s ignored. For example, if you have a blog, killer headlines for your posts are absolutely necessary to engage visitors with your content.
According to Business 2 Community, the most successful types of headlines use specific adjectives and provide a clear picture of what the reader will get if they click a link. If you’re working on an eCommerce platform like Shopify, it’s simple to track your analytics. In other words, check out what’s getting you hits, versus what’s being ignored. If you have twice as many clicks on one particular blog entry than others, get to the bottom of why.
Being able to analyze your social media data in a meaningful way based on hard numbers is just as important in being creative enough to come up with content that people actually want to see and share. Make sure you always make your social media content shareable, too, and if you haven’t, make it a priority for 2015. Customers that share content are one of the most effective forces you’ll encounter when it comes to boosting sales and attention.
Going into the New Year with an ambitious mindset for your business goals will help you ramp up and achieve even more success. As eCommerce trends continue to grow, it’s an exciting time to be in the industry. Make this your best year ever and be ahead of the game by planning your strategies early. By focusing on a few key goals, you’ll be able to refine essential aspects of your business that will lead to better productivity all around.
