Over the last 2 months, my conversations with micro and small business owners have highlighted lack of systems, missed opportunities and utter chaos. So how can you embrace streamline, standardize, and systemize for your business? The truth is it is not overly costly to do, and you will thank your future self when you hit those KPIs and productivity goals.
SYMPTOMS
If you can say yes to at least two of these five items, you should immediately brainstorm your next steps on how you can streamline your business:
- Your daily to-do-list is beyond the space of your daily planner. I will say more than 5 items. How can you be focused on generating revenue and increasing revenue when you are constantly operational?
- You miss getting back to potential clients because the reminder is on a page somewhere on the desk.
- You do not have a clue as to what it costs to manufacture your product or service a client. So, your pricing is a hit and miss.
- Your associates have their own way of completing a task. Therefore, each customer’s experience is dependent on who is selling on the day and what might be said.
- You do not have a clue on your numbers, which clients will close and what numbers they will close at the end of the month or quarter.
WHAT CAN YOU DO?
I speak from a place of personal experience and I can say it is a constant work in progress because as you scale, your business has different needs. My advice is to recognise the gap and get to work on it. Especially during this time as all businesses will need to pivot ahead of life after COVID-19 or as I say, a life with COVID-19 till.
- Document your sales process and tweak over time. Each sales process is specific to your business and industry you operate within.
- Figure out the systems that will help achieve #1; your overall goal should be a total alignment of all processes that it feels almost like automation.
- Create a video log/manual that documents the specific use of systems. This would not only be useful to associates but should you be a solopreneur and require an assistant etc. you will already have a format that works well for your business and can be easily shared.
- Sometimes the task is time consuming and the expertise is not in house. It may mean assessing the opportunity costs. For example, what are the opportunity costs of me trying to figure out my annual taxes versus me closing my next big contract? And it is very ok to have an outsourced Accountant or Sales Consultant!
These are just a few of the solutions that you can incorporate to ensure your business’ efficiency and productivity. Want to learn what can be done for your specific business? Book a free consultation today via [email protected]