7 Ways You Can Use Technology To Grow Your Business

Every business owner would agree that business growth is an essential goal. All marketing strategies, whether digital or traditional, come down to growing your business. Fortunately, there are many ways in which this can be achieved.

But before you start implementing specific growth tactics, it’s vital that you have a strong growth strategy—that is, one that will empower your employees to work effectively and productively while your business scales in size.

With this said, the center of your business growth strategy should revolve around technology.

Building growth around technology

In the modern business world, technology—or digital transformation—is one of the keys to long-term growth. This is because technology, and all the associated innovation that accompanies it, can help expedite numerous business processes, manage workers, and automate routine tasks, ensuring that you remain in control. In fact, businesses that embrace technology are three times more likely to create new services and products, which is a mark of innovation. Additionally, one statistic shows that 85% of successful small business owners agree that the use of technology is one of the keys to their success.

So, if you’re curious as to how you can incorporate technology to facilitate your business growth, read on to learn more:

• Encourage productivity

The market for productivity software has significantly grown. Experts project this industry to reach USD$75 million by 2022. Additionally, the annual growth rate of productivity software is 5.32%, which means that the market volume will be around USD$92 million by 2026. With this promising statistic, it shows that you’ll find it easy to select and appropriate project and task management software that’ll help your employees stay on top of their daily duties, allowing them to work productively.

To take one example, suppose you are in the pest control niche for instance and are looking to expand. You can incorporate scheduling and invoicing software like that offered by Jobber to stay on top of your daily tasks. Not only will it help give your team clarity on the tasks that need to be done by a given deadline, but you can also communicate more quickly with customers, provide them with fully customizable quotes and invoices for transparency, schedule appointments with ease and track jobs all from one platform.

Software such as this has been developed for nearly every business niche so do your research to find the one that works for you.

Don’t forget to also utilize free online document management systems to share, find, and save important files. These effectively eliminate the need for paper, which won’t only help save costs but also time since your employees will no longer be scrambling to find the relevant paperwork when they get in touch with a client, and should anything need to be refined or edited, the online version resolves any issues with version control.

• Find the right employees

Of course, one factor that is imperative to the growth of any business lies the skill sets and work ethics of you and your employees. Connectivity is now such that it is easier than ever to find people with the experience you are looking for. Since the pandemic, many more people are working remotely so it is less essential that they live within a certain local vicinity. Technology is the key to helping you find the right people to support your business growth. 

• Effective digital marketing
  

Digital presence, or an online share of voice is a measure by which a company can gauge its success. Without it, a company may find it difficult to survive in the modern climate where customers largely search for products and services online, and increasingly so from their mobile devices. In fact, the lack of a digital presence is one reason why small enterprises fail in their first five years. This can be tough for small businesses with a limited budget––but effective digital marketing strategies don’t have to cost a fortune – they just need to be carefully considered, creative and smart.

No-matter your budget – invest the time in putting together a thorough digital marketing plan to include your strategy, objectives, tactics, and measurement of performance and success. Without this, it is difficult to have a direction and a purpose, and a lot of time can get wasted on doing things that don’t add immediate value to the business.

The investment of an optimized, mobile friendly and user-friendly website will take you very far. Your audience will be able to find you and be guided through your sales funnel to result in conversions. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that if it looks nice, it will perform well. There is a science to getting a website right.

Social media can help you achieve your growth strategy. Since there are over four billion active users on any given social media channel, you can rest assured that you’ll reach your target customers, especially if you’re active on popular ones like Facebook and Instagram. Also, by having a strong social media presence, you’re on your way to building lasting relations with your customers and promoting brand loyalty (more on this later).

• Utilize mobile marketing

Millennials are important in the digital age as they’re the leading users of mobile devices and will likely be able to help you grow your business, so don’t ignore this demographic. They spend at least 4 hours on their phone per day, meaning that if you want to reach them immediately, your best bet is via text message marketing. If your website is mobile-friendly, search engines will reward you for it by making you more visible in the search engine results pages (SERPs). Also, by having a mobile-friendly website, you’re able to improve user experience.

Here are some simple tips that will allow your website to be mobile-friendly:

• Get a responsive theme
• Check your font size
• Use only high-resolution images
• Improve your website’s speed
• Use simple navigation
• Add a viewport meta tag

• Improved cusomer service

Other than leveraging technology to advertise your products or services, don’t forget the importance of excellent customer service, which can contribute to you doubling your revenue. Prospects want to conduct business with a reputable brand. One way to show how credible you are is to have excellent customer service. This will generate positive feedback which you can collate and use to your advantage in testimonials to show your audience and encourage new customers to purchase from you.

By utilizing technology, you can set up an online help desk to handle any customer issues. You can even use artificial intelligence (AI) such as chatbots to help clients schedule appointments easily. To improve user experience, you can share questionnaires or surveys with your clients, helping you to get any feedback on areas that might need improvement.

• Use social media

Since the beginning of Facebook in 2004, plenty has happened in the world of social media. For one, it’s clear that social media channels are able to greatly influence how brands develop and grow over time.

Some experts project that the number of active social media users will be around 4 billion this year, doubling the amount compared to 2017. With this, you can safely say that social media is a gold mine for marketers.

To tap into these billions of prospects, the first step you should take is to have a compelling and robust social media presence. By doing so, you can use social media to:

• promote your services and products,
• engage with your existing customers,
• attract new customers, and
• boost customer service.

Ideally, you want to use at least three social media platforms, the ones that the majority of your audience is using. You’ll need to conduct research into which platforms your customers use if you don’t already know. If your business is on these platforms, there’s a huge chance that interested prospects will see what you have to offer, even engage with you if you are able to produce quality content and bring your brand to front of mind when they come to need what you offer. 

• Means of security

Lastly, technology can be an effective way to protect data security and prevent hacking. This is important since there was a 118% rise in ransomware attacks during the first quarter of 2019. Fortunately, by using the right technology, you can prevent any breaches of your business security, guaranteeing your important data is secure.

Ensure to have encrypted passwords and active firewalls. Also, don’t forget to always be on top of your cybersecurity by hiring an IT professional.

Takeaway

As you can see, the days are gone when having a mere brick-and-mortar store would suffice for business growth. Since people are now becoming so reliant on technology, regardless of the kind and form, it’s in your great benefit to use it too for your business growth. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to leverage it for your advantage.

For instance, you can use various software programs to boost your company’s productivity, helping to boost your profit. Second, since there are billions of people who frequent the digital space, you can tap into this market by having a strong social media presence. Customer experience can also be improved with technology.

Essentially, using technology for your business growth is no longer an option for businesses these days. With the ways and benefits discussed in this blog post, it should be an integral part of your journey toward growth.