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There are many businesses ignoring their Google Business Profile. Google is still the world’s most-visited website. The site currently holds more than 92 percent of the search engine market share. It’s the first place people go to find out information on your business. What type of message are you sending if all your info is outdated or just plain wrong?
If you have a shop, store, restaurant, or small business, you need a Google Business Profile. Set it up now. If you set it up more than six months ago, you need to go and manage it now. Things have changed. Your Google Business Profile shows up on Google searches as well as Google Maps. It’s your one-stop spot where customers can find info about your business, hours, specials, discounts, photos, reviews and more. According to Google, potential customers are 2.7 times more likely to trust your company if you have a complete profile. It will also make it easier for Google to match your business with the right searches. Google uses the information in your profile to determine your search ranking. This is based on relevance, distance, and reputation. The more information Google has, the better your score. Keep in mind the proper keywords when filling out your description. If you’re having trouble, visit Google Trends or Keyword Planner. Use discretion here - - you don’t want to use all the keywords. Too many will cause your ranking to drop and thus fewer search results. Find one or two keywords and gently weave them into your company’s description. Do not skip out on updating your profile. And don’t set it and forget it; that’s a mistake. If you own a retail store, update your page with discounts and promotions. If you own a restaurant, update your menu, and let customers know about upcoming events. The more you update your profile, the more Google will trust your company and elevate your Google ranking. Current photos and videos can also show customers that you have what they are looking for. Respond to Reviews (Good and Bad) Responding to reviews can elevate your business’ visibility and show that you openly engage with your clients, which will build trust in your brand. According to a survey by Google, customers are 1.7 times more likely to trust a business that responds to reviews. This can also be an opportunity to address customer concerns and invite them back to your business. If someone had a negative experience, be upfront and address their concerns. Maybe even invite them back with a special or discount. Get in the practice of asking customers to leave a review. Send them an email or text and then include a link inviting them to highlight their experience. The more reviews you receive and respond to, the better your Google score will be. A word of warning: Don’t use spam tactics or fake reviews. Google is very good at identifying them and may completely erase your profile. It’s okay to get negative reviews. Customers are more likely to trust a business with an average rating of 4.2 - 4.5 than a 5. No business is perfect. A perfect score will raise suspicions. Take Advantage of the Features Google has built in some pretty effective tools. Make sure to alert customers of events, promotions, new products, and social posts. This is also a great way to share blogs. The key is updating regularly. Remember, Google runs the search world. Make sure you are being found.
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You’ve put in the hard work building your business from the ground up. And it’s finally starting to pay off. The only problem: now you have more work than you can handle. Growth is always a good problem to have. But it does come with its own share of challenges. If you’ve made it to this point, you have two options. The first is to let new business opportunities pass you by, ensuring you don’t take on more than you can handle. The second option is to lighten your load by hiring someone to help.
Should I hire an employee or independent contractor? If you need help building your business, there are two ways to hire an extra set of hands - adding an employee or signing an independent contractor. While there are pros and cons to both, it’s important to understand the difference. Employee: An employee is hired to work for your company on a full- or part-time basis. This means you, as the employer, have control over how, when and where they do their job. However, this control comes with added responsibility. When you hire an employee, you’ll need to withhold payroll taxes and report their income, in addition to abiding by other federal, state, and local employment laws. Then, there are additional benefit considerations – like offering vacation, sick time, and health insurance. These are just some of the basic responsibilities that are tied to having employees. Independent contractor: A contractor is a self-employed worker who is hired for specific services. According to the IRS, that means the payer only has the right to direct the result of the work - not how, when, or where it’s accomplished. Contractors can also perform work for multiple clients at the same time. When hiring a contractor, you still need to report their income using the appropriate tax form. But they are responsible for their own taxes and benefits. Contractors can be a great option if you need additional work that doesn’t have to be done at your location in the time you require. They can bring their specific skillset to the table, without the long-term commitment of hiring an employee. When is the right time to hire an employee? Every business is unique. So, there’s no right answer to when the best time is to hire an employee. Instead, you’ll need to find the right balance for your situation. Too early: The biggest challenge to hiring your first employee is typically a financial one. Hire someone too soon and you’ll run the risk of encountering cash-flow problems. Or if you don’t have enough work to support a team member, you could be paying someone who doesn’t have enough to keep them busy. Too late: However, if you start hiring too late, you may miss out on opportunities to grow your business. Or you could get in over your head and risk disappointing your current customer base. Either scenario is less than ideal. That’s why it’s important to plan ahead. Decide in advance when it’s a good time to bring on an employee – like when you hit a certain sales goal, or at a time when an employee can perform work that will significantly increase your revenue. Remember, it never hurts to interview employee options and also speak with a contractor before deciding which one works best. You can also speak with a contractor and use that option in the short term before hiring someone. What changes do I need to make to my business before hiring an employee? One big obstacle to hiring your first employee can be the logistics. The truth is, that hiring an employee means you’ll have a lot more rules to follow. If you have specific questions about your business, talk to an experienced lawyer for legal advice. I always suggest using your CPA not only to answer all the financial questions but as a sounding board as they usually have worked in these situations with other clients. Generally speaking, before you make your first job offer, you need to:
How do I find the right candidate for the job? A good company reputation doesn’t happen by accident and it’s a valuable commodity. A good reputation can promote referrals. Let’s say you heard from half a dozen people about how great the food is at a local Italian restaurant. Even if you never ate there, you’d probably recommend it to someone looking for an Italian restaurant.
Why? It’s got a good reputation. That said, creating that reputation requires sustained work overtime. You must deliver on multiple fronts again and again. What are some specific things you can do to build that good company reputation? Offer Excellent Customer Service Excellent customer service is something that many companies claim to offer and most fail to deliver. This failure comes at a cost. Most people consider quality customer service as simple respect. Never forget that the customer is the one spending money with your business. Listen when they give you feedback and respond accordingly. If you can, fix things when they go wrong. If you can’t, immediately find someone who can. After all, we live in a time when customers can spend 10 minutes just trying to navigate a phone menu before getting put on hold. A little respect and some good faith efforts can leave you looking like a rock star. Know When You Should Say No Sooner or later, almost every successful business faces a dilemma. The company gets offered work that everyone knows it shouldn’t take on. Sometimes, the business just can’t muster the resources to do the job well. If you’re already working at close to capacity, taking on more work is a recipe for failure. Even if you somehow finish the job, it won’t prove to be the best quality. You end up with an unhappy customer who will almost certainly complain. And when someone is dissatisfied, they are more likely to tell people and post on social media than when they are pleased. Other times, the work just isn’t the right fit for the business. Maybe the client works in an area that the business doesn’t understand well, or there could be a difference in values and practices. Saying no isn’t natural for most businesses. It certainly looks bad from a financial perspective. Yet, you risk doing substantial reputation damage when you take on work you know you shouldn’t. Watch Out for Online Reputation Killers If you’re in business today, you cannot escape the internet and social media. At a minimum, you’re running a website and a couple of social media profiles. Starting with your website, make sure your hosting service guarantees 99 percent uptime. A website that goes down all the time alienates your customers and damages your search engine rank. It also makes your business look unprofessional. There are other, more damaging online threats to your company's reputation. One of those is bad reviews. You can’t stop people from posting bad reviews, but you can comment on them. Take advantage of that option and explain the steps you took to resolve the issue. Always be apologetic. Most people won’t hold the review against you if you respond accordingly. Some people will take things one step further and get into online defamation. That happens when someone specifically says false things about you or your company. Examples: Bad review: “They overcooked my steak and the potatoes were cold. Also, my waiter seemed more interested in his phone than doing his job.” Online defamation: “The staff at this restaurant sits at the tables playing online games and the owners are sitting somewhere stuffing their mouths with bonbons while we eat their old, stale food.” Obviously, you must deny these allegations, but depending on the severity of the comment, it may also provide grounds for legal action on your part. Develop Quality Content Putting out quality content is another way of cementing a good company reputation. What is quality content? Quality content must hit three essential points:
Maybe even more importantly, it’s all those things for your intended audience. An article about new technology being used in virtual reality might prove interesting, but it’s not useful or relevant if you run a bakery. On the flip side, someone working in robotic prosthetics probably shouldn’t offer advice on making cheesecake. Assuming your content does hit all those points and it’s for the right audience, you get some real benefits. It demonstrates your mastery of the topic. Customers and peers will start trusting your opinion. This increases the odds they’ll think of you when someone asks for a recommendation. Quality content can draw in customers from unexpected sources: Let’s say that Larry reads my article about good company reputation because someone shared it on social media. He passes the link along to Jane, who currently received a negative review online and didn’t know what to do. She needs someone to maintain and market on her social media platforms. Ta-da… maybe she hires me. Stranger things happen every day. Establishing a good company reputation isn’t a fluke or an overnight process. You must work at it over time. You must deliver excellent customer service. Businesses that fail at customer service damage their own reputations and cost themselves money. It means saying no when work comes your way that you can’t do well. If you lack the resources or it’s a bad fit for any reason, recommend a company you think can do it well. You’ll end up looking good for not wasting someone’s time and money. Having great partnerships with complementary services can go a long way. Don’t passively accept online reputation killers like downtime or bad reviews. They’ll just ruin your reputation if you let them. Produce solid content. Relevant, interesting, useful content proves your knowledge. That encourages referrals and can lead to unexpected opportunities.  Starting a new business can be extremely challenging, but if you push
through the first few years with passion and dedication, you will succeed. It’s a well-known fact in the entrepreneurial world that 50% of small businesses fail within the first five years. It’s true that this number is intimidating, but there are ways to avoid this fate. You just have to listen to the collective wisdom of those who have succeeded AND your gut. There are important lessons that can be found there. The first step is the most difficult New beginnings are never easy which is why it’s essential to start the right way and set a solid foundation for your business. Once you have your perfect idea, you need to know how to shape it and make it a reality. There are so many things to think about in the process, and they could make or break your business. From assembling a trusting team to finding funding, you need to make sure every part of the puzzle fits perfectly. For starters, you need a solid business plan. When speaking with investors or lenders they will have different expectations from it, and you need to adjust accordingly. There are many details to consider when you’re just starting out so make sure to focus all your efforts on doing everything right the first time. Less expensive ways The first thing you’ll notice when your business starts operating is that your income doesn’t equal your profit. You could easily get carried away by an influx of cash that may seem like a small fortune. However, once you calculate your costs, you’ll see that it will probably take some time for you to reach your break-even point, let alone start making real profit. That’s why you need to be frugal when starting out; you cannot go buying everything at once or making expensive investments. Try to find ways to do everything affordably. The bulk of your finances should go toward your central products and services, and everything else can take some cuts. For example, you don’t need to spend a fortune on decorating your office or getting tons of supplies no one actually uses. Don’t let your business consume your life Trying to maintain a new business is like trying to keep a baby alive and well. It takes a lot of hard work, sacrifice, and dedication. That’s why many entrepreneurs get carried away and sucked in by the everyday obligations of their new business. You need to be extra careful and not let this happen to you. It’s essential to carve some time out for yourself and your family. Your business is important, but that doesn’t mean you should neglect other aspects of your life. A study conducted by the Harvard Business Review has found that those entrepreneurs who are taken by “obsessive passion,” as opposed to the milder “harmonious passion” for their job, were much more likely to experience burnout. It’s essential to find a work-life balance to succeed yet remain sane. Plan for sustainable growth The keyword here is “sustainable.” It’s great if your business starts with a bang but beware of making rash decisions. One of the most common mistakes new business owners make is not giving their future much thought and getting carried away by early success. It’s okay to get excited, but that shouldn’t deter you from making long-term, sustainable plans. Slow and steady progress is much better than explosive growth because the latter is unpredictable and can lead to a fatal crash. On the other hand, if you take time to develop a solid plan, it will take you through many years successfully and help you navigate your way out of rough patches. Perseverance is key Just like it’s extremely easy to get carried away by success, it can be quite discouraging if your business does not immediately flourish. You need to remember that failure is part of success, and if you stay open-minded and learn something, it isn’t a failure at all. Instead of giving up, focus on any negatives and what you can do to eliminate them or turn them around. Your business is your child, and you can get quite emotional about it, but it’s vital to keep a cool head and examine the problems from a rational point of view. When you look at some of the most successful large companies, such as Amazon and Uber, you probably think that their path to success was smooth, but that is far from the truth. Many of these companies were once on the brink of failure. They persevered and now they are staples in their respective industries. What are entrepreneurship characteristics? It’s an important question when you’re considering self-employment. It’s natural to want to know if you have what it takes before you move forward.
Ask yourself these important questions: Are You a Visionary? A primary difference between an employee and an entrepreneur is motivation. Some people are perfectly happy doing the same job or working in the same industry until retirement. They find the consistency comforting, but for others, it’s not enough. Entrepreneurs see new or better ways of doing things and won’t settle for the status quo if it ignores a gap in the marketplace or performs less than optimally. This drive for innovation and change can get them in trouble in a traditional job since their bosses may misinterpret their ideas as criticism. Entrepreneurs are often outspoken, opinionated, and demanding. Entrepreneurs can’t understand why others don’t see their vision and they crave success in many ways, including a better work/life balance.  Printed marketing and sales materials play a crucial role in securing customers for your business. Unfortunately, too many businesses use the “set it and forget it” method of creating collateral. While some pieces can be used for a while without trouble, others might quickly become outdated. We rely so much on our websites and social media that sometimes those materials are forgotten, yet they are being passed around to potential customers all the time. It’s smart for businesses to get in the habit of auditing their printed materials and refreshing them regularly. Even something as simple as your business card may be due for an update! Why should you audit your collateral?
Using fresh, up-to-date marketing and sales collateral ensures that you accurately represent your brand to customers. These materials should speak to your brand, demonstrate what your business does, and showcase your current offerings. If your print materials are irrelevant, it can cause confusion or frustration among buyers. Depending on how much your branding or your business has changed (think Covid-19), the materials might not even be effective for your target market at all! If your goal is to persuade customers to make a purchase, you want to ensure your messaging is both accurate and fresh. When should you do a collateral audit? It’s a good idea to revisit these materials every three months, or once a season. Not only will this help your team catch necessary updates, but it also allows you to capitalize on seasonal promotions and align with seasonal trends in your industry. There are other times you may want to update, or better yet create seasonal materials you can stock and reuse. Change or add:
Twenty-twenty was a stressful year for many of us. With the arrival of 2021, everyone has seen the need and desire for empathy, compassion, and connection. Now is the time to project optimism and lead with compassion and approach our customers with empathy.
Your customers become your greatest assets and ambassadors when they see you genuinely care about them. Compassionate businesses grow a passionate and loyal community of partners. Here are some key positions for your business to introduce:
Remember, passionate customers are loyal customers. Loyal customers are consistent customers. And consistent customers get us through inconsistent times.  These are tough times and most, if not all, industries are being impacted in some way. The world is frightened and wary. There are many things that businesses must consider when it comes to the Coronavirus COVID-19 and somewhere near the top should be your marketing and sales efforts. While it’s understandable that this is not your top priority, if you choose this time to lose sight of marketing when the virus is over, it will be that much more difficult to recover. It is important to remember in your marketing and sales process that everyone's first thought right now is about their health and their family. After that comes business. Always be sensitive and empathize with your prospects.
Let’s look at how your business can move forward and possibly grow during the virus. Move everything online The most obvious issue with COVID-19 is that we’re not out shaking hands and meeting people, and this may go on for a substantial amount of time. Because of that, local events are all canceled and conferences all around the world are being canceled. People are beginning to worry about business events all the way into the Fall. Companies that rely on in-person interactions to grow need to focus much more heavily on digital marketing and inbound marketing tactics. That means developing a strategy and executing immediately. There is no time to delay here. Inbound marketing can take some time to start showing big results so the sooner you can start, the better. Consider quick-win opportunities As I mentioned, inbound marketing takes time, but there are some quick wins. Start looking into utilizing pay-per-click advertising through Google as well as social media networks like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Paid advertising can produce some quick results while the other inbound marketing tactics are ramping up. You may also want to consider targeted outreach on LinkedIn, especially if you're in the B2B sector. Do some research on your prospect businesses and then connect with the decision-makers or target persons at those companies. TIP: Don't approach your outreach strictly from a sales standpoint. Be helpful and share content that is important to them. If you educate, you can win. Stay consistent online Consistency is one of the hardest things to keep in times like this, but it's extremely important. Google has made it clear that consistency is a big factor in how they rank. That means that if you've been blogging every Tuesday, it's important to keep blogging every Tuesday. When tough times hit, usually marketing is one of the first things to be evaluated and sales often immediately cut. By cutting your marketing budget, you may save some dollars today, but you'll be sacrificing more dollars later. Consistency is key for ranking and if you give up consistency with inbound marketing, you're going to start losing all you’ve worked for. That can mean your website traffic, your authority, your search engine rankings, even your engagement within social media. This may be your chance to find new and creative ways to reach your target audience. Think outside the box. Take advantage of new opportunities While most people are looking at the Coronavirus as a hardship, for some businesses it can be an opportunity. And regardless of how the opportunity arises, it's your responsibility as a business to capitalize. If your business benefits from everyone being home, or keeps people healthy, or keeps kids entertained while they're out of school, or delivers products to people at home — USE THIS TIME! There is a huge opportunity here and people genuinely need your business. Now is the time to double your marketing and sales initiatives and reach more people. I know this may sound thoughtless or maybe even irrelevant to your business, but I beg you to not make any drastic decisions that will still be affecting you after this virus is over. Keep moving forward and set yourself up now for a great finish to 2020. |
Boost Your BusinessMaria NovakI have over 35 years' experience in Marketing Small Businesses. Categories
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