Running a small business successfully is, in many cases, a matter of maximizing what you have and creating networks of assistance to help you with what you don’t. If you can do that, there is no reason you shouldn’t compete with giants and find a place in the industry.
With that in mind, let us take a closer look at four of the most important small business trends today.
IT Management and Data Outsourcing
As a starting entrepreneur or small business owner, one of the best and most valuable things you can do for your organization is minimize IT expenses. It is especially true if you are not an enterprise specializing in information technology but rather a firm in another line of work such as manufacturing, trade, food, or general retail. Among other things, this will help you save essential financial resources either as company in-house capital or for future investments in the growth of your business.
To do this, you can outsource IT management-related tasks, data processing and storage, and even the amount of bandwidth you possess for day-to-day operations. Nowadays, quality data and colocation centers are equipped with the latest technology in big data oversight, server room UPS systems, and high-end HVAC cooling mechanisms that ensure vital company information is as safe as it can be.
Content-driven Marketing Strategies
At present, arguably the most useful tool buyers in all industries have at their disposal is access to the right information. With the advent of 5G technologies and the exponential growth of the internet, whatever it is that you are looking for, chances are there will be several websites talking about it. And if by any chance there aren’t, there’s bound to be someone on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook who knows it.
From a small business perspective, this highlights the importance of content, especially that which relates to your field of work. Any self-respecting corporate website must include a blog that promotes its own products and services and provides the requisite knowledge for visitors to make well-informed decisions.
In addition, your business should also have at least one or two social media accounts where you can engage in two-way communication with potential and existing customers, not to mention allowing your clients to share information among themselves.
Intelligent Global Recruitment
A few years ago, unless you were a giant like Apple, Coca-Cola, Nike, or Google, the vast majority of your staff would be hired locally. Furthermore, in most cases, around 80 to 90 percent of all employees were full-time workers. This has changed.
As the CEO of a small or medium-sized enterprise, you probably think you can not have people working for you all across the globe. After all, you don’t own the infrastructure such an endeavor entails or the money to pay somebody in American dollars, another in Japanese yen, and the third in British pounds or Chinese RMB. But luckily, you don’t have to.
Hiring with intelligence entails two very specific things. The first one is recruiting on a need or project basis. If your firm doesn’t require a marketing manager all year long, there is no reason to have one. The second is looking for this person wherever you can find him. This is accomplished by making use of all the tools available to you.
Alternative Sources of Funding
One of the main points in the presidential platform in Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection bid was the need to increase the number of small businesses in America and find ways to help them flourish. But while these premises sound wonderful, they beg the question; how can they happen? Where do regular folks like you and I get the money to join the ranks of the entrepreneur?
Enter alternative sources of investment capital and corporate funding. In 2021, there are more ways to borrow money than ever before. Aside from the continued growth of crowdfunding platforms like GoFundMe, Patreon, and StartEngine, there are also numerous microloan services for that injection of money your small operation so desperately needs. And if that doesn’t work for you, the traditional methods of business angels, government grants, and venture capital are still there for people with great ideas but missing the resources to make them come to fruition.
As we have seen, there are four clear small business trends currently at the forefront. The first is outsourcing IT management tasks and the storage of your corporate data. The second is marketing strategies founded on quality online content. Coming in third is intelligent hiring. Finally, the last one is taking the time to find the best possible source of funding for your organization.
For small business owners, there has never been a better time for their organizations to prosper and compete with the well-established multi-national corporations of the past.
