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customer-engagement

Grow Like You Mean It

“Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.”

Benjamin Franklin

For most small business owners, the day-to-day job duties that you have can be so overwhelming that you may think that you don’t have time to ponder, much less execute, the future success of your business. But, as some have pointed out, “failing to plan is planning to fail.”

Now that 2018 is here, it’s the perfect time to begin thinking about what kind of goals you want to achieve and a strategy to achieve them by the year’s end. Here are some suggestions to help you and your small business achieve growth in the new year.

grow

First, begin to leverage your customer base to understand how your business can improve. Your current customers are often the best tools you have to utilize as a growing business. Talk to them. Ask questions on how you can do better or offer a better product.

Secondly, it’s important to have a clear understanding what type of objectives are realistic so that you can start taking bite-sized steps to get there. If you make too much of a stretch goal, you may end up either using too many resources to achieve an unattainable target or get discouraged when you don’t meet it.

Lastly, it’s beneficial to think about what kind of resources are available to help you achieve your goals. Utilizing the support from other professionals in your community is paramount to the success of your growth strategy. At first, it may seem like a challenge, but using all available systems of support will increase the chances of obtaining your definition of success.

In Support of Small Business Saturday

Local is the new black.

You, as an entrepreneur, understand the importance of investing dollars in local markets and of supporting endeavors such as Small Business Saturday. Now is a great time to be an owner of a locally-owned enterprise.

More than ever, shoppers are aware of the benefits of investing in their neighborhoods. In 2016 alone, the US small business sector was estimated to have an estimated 28 million businesses and was responsible for 54% of all domestic sales.

Between better customer service, benefits to the local economy and direct access to an expert, the opportunities for touting the benefits of local shopping are plentiful. The good news: you don’t have to work hard to encourage consumers to act upon this idea.

business owner

There are available resources and incentives to encourage entrepreneurship here in Charlottesville and in Virginia as a whole.

It is Charlottesville Business Innovation Council‘s mission to “educate, celebrate and advocate for Charlottesville’s technology community” by giving support to the high-tech businesses in the area.

Central Virginia SCORE is a resource that serves the counties of Albemarle, Culpeper, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, Madison, Nelson and Orange by providing mentoring and other assistance for those looking to start a business or improve their existing business strategy.

Central Virginia’s Partnership for Economic Development offers counseling, information, and training to Central Virginia’s entrepreneurs.

BlackOwnedCville is a resource that allows you to look for goods and services sourced from local businesses owned by black residents of Charlottesville.

Finally, the City of Charlottesville’s Office of Economic Development has resources available to women and minority entrepreneurs.

Winning With A Unique Customer Experience

Today I visited a prospective partner and they began to share their standard process for welcoming a new patient to their practice.  This experience included a tour of their office, introductions and a small gift bag.   Small things, but even these little differences can make all the difference.  Today business owners are continuing to look for new ways to differentiate themselves and outshine the competition through an enhanced customer experience.

This reminded me of an article I read recently entitled, “Consumers Just Want to Have Fun” which originally appeared in August’s edition of STORES Magazine.  Excerpts and the link to the full article are below.

“Since consumers can now find what they want through so many more channels, the fresh, new, authentic, unique experience will be the one that wins.”

‘Recreational retail’ transforms staid shopping experiences into memory-makers

Sean Selby doesn’t look at rock climbing as simply exercise — but then, he doesn’t look at retail buildings as spaces to just buy and sell, either. ” READ HERE

21 Important Reasons to Talk to Your Customers

For years I’ve been saying to small business owners/managers that your existing customers make for the best sources of incredibly useful information for helping craft an effective message.  Mainly because they speak from the perspective of the customer – which is a vantage point that is very difficult to see from when you’re running your business.

Stop, look, listen sign on road

Well here is an extensive breakdown drilling down into specifics of the tremendous value in taking time to really engage with these existing customers.  You’ll find yourself quite surprised at what you can learn from them!  All the while you’re cementing these important relationships.  READ HERE