Ecommerce, business management apps, social media, The Cloud… the list of technological advances keeps growing. While the sometimes bewildering slew of new technology might make some business owners want to return to the days of the abacus, ignoring it won’t make it go away. Not only can using technological tools help you in your business – they can also be instrumental in your success.
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Ease of communication
Communication is crucial to any business, so it goes without saying that any technology that makes this easier is a no-brainer. I use Skype to chat with new clients and to communicate with my operational manager and any writers. I use Dropbox to make sure that my ops manager and myself work off of the most recent versions of any documents. And then of course there’s email. I don’t know what I would do without these tools, especially as I travel a lot.
When it comes to communication for marketing, think about a business’s potential to communicate with the world today. You launch a new service or product and put it out all over the social networks, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+ and so on. Within minutes hundreds, thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people are exposed to the brand, giving you endless possibilities for growth. Best of all, it costs you nothing.
Without the internet, your ability to grow goes back to the Stone Age of billboards, radio and TV, which cost a fortune.
Having fresh blog and social media content out there on your different business profiles not only gives you a boost with SEO (Google loves feasting on fresh new content – the fresher the better), but it can also show any potential clients what you are up to – it helps to “legitimise” you in a way, especially if you aren’t meeting people face-to-face. Adding credibility is one of the things which is essential with an online-only business.
Robot wars: should you automate?
Take a look at your business process — how much of it is done manually? These days there is an app or some sort of technology that can automate pretty much all the important processes within your business to ensure you can focus on what’s important: making money.
I run an online copywriting company, but even traditional bricks and mortar companies benefit from digital technology today. And if you make sure to educate yourself, continually, on the best tools to use, the options are just going to get better. Tech companies are working every day to improve how our lives are run by technology. They even go as far as monitoring our sleep now. SleepCycle app for iPhone and Android can detect your sleep quality and decides when to wake you based on how deep a sleep you’re in. If they are doing that for someone’s sleep, just imagine what they’re planning for business.
Currently, there are business management apps that let you track time, manage workflow and communicate with teams. The list of available systems is long; small businesses can take a look at Asana, Basecamp and Trello for workflow, and Insightly and PipelineDeals for sales. You can get your books in order with accounting solutions like Xero.com or Bluubin.co.za. I also use programs like Hootsuite for my social media stuff to schedule content on a monthly basis, so all I have to do is go and check-up on the one interface instead of three different ones. WordPress is similar, in that you can upload a batch of content and then just schedule it over the course of a month.
Technology undoubtedly makes things easier, but it’s important to choose the right tech for your business or it will cost you a lot of money and, worst of all, time. What you choose depends what type of a business you are. The crucial thing to determine before hunting for a solution that helps you is to know what outcome you want from the system. What are you hoping the system will do for you? If it’s not going to simplify your process then stay away.
Business on the go
Using the internet and cloud technology to run your business allows you to work from anywhere there is an internet connection. Overheads are less, because you can pull “staff” from anywhere, and you can have a more flexible office environment in terms of hours kept.
In fact, without the internet my business wouldn’t exist, not just in what I’M selling but also logistically. Technology has created a need for online content and the internet as well as technology has allowed me to have a system which is “always on” so it doesn’t matter where you are in the world or what time it is, you can come to the site and order your content.
Build-your-own system
A few years ago I read The 4-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss, and I liked the idea that your time spent on work didn’t have to be directly proportional to the amount of money you made. I wanted a system which could manage part of the load, making my life easier. I also didn’t want to dedicate my life to a job, but where the possibility of making money was still there, even if I wasn’t. So I created a custom-built system which allows people to place content orders and pay, while allowing writers to pick it up on their side and complete it. The system basically helps with my whole business process, making it streamline and most importantly, allowing it to scale if necessary.
The system was a team effort with Adrian Fitchet, who specialises in custom-built systems, and myself. We basically just looked at my briefing templates and the processes I’d put in place before the system, rounded the edges and made it relevant to online and then tested and tested and tested. As with any online system as massive as this, there will always be little bugs which crop up, but for the most part I feel that we’ve found something which is user-friendly and makes sense to the person placing the order, easy to use for the writer and makes my life and the life of my operational manager exponentially easier when it comes to processes.
I believe that any business not efficiently running with the right technology to support their business is doomed to fail. So if you’re unsure about new technology, it’s time to stop hiding away and embrace the brave new world. It’ll be worth it.
