The Ultimate Guide to Upgrading Office Space on a Budget

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Office Space|The Ultimate Guide to Upgrading Office Space on a BudgetWhile there are several appealing benefits of upgrading your business’s office space, you may be dreading the high costs of renovating and investing in new office equipment. However, even though you will need to spend on certain items, there are effective ways to upgrade your office without spending a small fortune in the process. Therefore, before you start replacing printers and moving furniture around, here’s how you can upgrade your office space on a restricting budget.

Focus on Functionality

When it comes to evaluating your current office equipment condition, you should consider functionality and quality as primary factors. Instead of opting for the most affordable printer, scanner, copier, or any other essentials, you should evaluate printing solutions that offer multifunctional devices. You can find duplex scanners and multifunctional printers at brother-usa.com that will streamline processes and help you save substantially in the long run. Quality is a factor that will ensure you don’t have to spend extra on replacing devices regularly over time. Upgrading the equipment in your office will be the main cost when improving your office space.

Decor Details That Enhance the Atmosphere

Professionals won’t be as productive and happy if they work within a space that feels cold, concrete, and suffocating. Therefore, upgrading your office space can be done by making small changes to the decor details. Adding a few vibrant plants, painting offices, and putting up a few canvas prints can truly transform any space. You don’t have to spend a fortune either, as decorating on a budget is a widespread practice.

Adjust the Spatial Arrangement

The spatial arrangement of equipment and furniture will have a massive impact on your office’s overall appeal and productivity. Therefore, merely adjusting your office layout is a method of upgrading that won’t cost you anything other than effort. When changing your office space’s spatial arrangement, it is best to draft a layout design on paper, which will enable you to give each employee adequate space and privacy while also determining each item’s best place to enhance productivity and overall functionality.

Promote Modern Workplace Culture

Modern workplace culture focuses on ensuring employee needs are met. As a result, ideal work culture can improve productivity and motivation by enhancing employee positivity. To achieve a modern workplace culture, you should focus on improving employee engagement and ensuring your team is comfortable enough to move around the office freely. Fostering collaboration and communication are also crucial components in creating a modern work culture. This office space upgrade also won’t cost you anything as you will be making changes that improve the atmosphere within your business. Empowering employees is another way to achieve a modern workplace culture that boosts productivity to fuel business growth and success. Because your employees are at the core of business functions, caring for their needs and enhancing the environment to create an ideal working space should be a priority for all businesses.

Keeping Your IT Systems Safe

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StrategyDriven Risk Management Article |IT Systems|Keeping Your IT Systems SafeBoth small businesses and large corporations are vulnerable to data breaches and cyber-attacks. Small businesses are more vulnerable because they don’t have enough resources to set up high-tech security systems to keep their data and IT systems safe.

But there are ways around this. If you are on a shoestring budget and cannot afford to get a security system for your business, here some practical ways you can protect your data and keep your IT systems safe and secure.

Keep your remote collaborations secure

Team messaging apps have become an integral part of our day-to-day business operations. They have simplified the way people transact businesses by providing intuitive collaboration tools that make communication and information sharing easy. Messaging apps like Slack and Mattermost are at the forefront of remote collaboration. These apps enable companies to manage projects and internal teams easily and effectively.

As for security, when you compare Slack vs Mattermost, the latter offers an array of features to help protect your business from data breaches. Mattermost is an open-source app that you can install on an on-premise server giving control over who can access information. Since it gives your complete control over your information and data, this can help minimize the risk of data breaches.

Use strong and unique passwords

Make sure all your employees use strong and unique passwords. Don’t use your name or date of birth as a password as they are easy to guess. Create a password that has a combination of letters, symbols, and digits, and make sure it has more than eight characters long.

If you are going to find it difficult to remember the password, write it down in a notebook or use a password manager.

Secure your Wi-Fi

Many small businesses don’t have the necessary resources to secure their network. This makes them vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

To minimizes the risk of external entities hacking into your network, make sure that every device you use at work for connecting to the internet is secure. This includes routers, smartphones, laptops, and tablets.

Install an antivirus

Antivirus software can help prevent data breaches and protect your computer systems from getting hacked. Many antivirus programs come with free plans, which offer some level of security for your data. It would be advisable to pay for a premium plan, as it includes advanced security features that keep your data and systems safe.

Control access to systems

You need to control who has access to your data and information. If you are a large company, you need to limit access by department. You cannot have employees from different departments accessing all the company data, as this can lead to data breaches.

If you are a small company, you can limit access to specific individuals. It is also important to make sure that if someone no longer works for you that you disable their access to all your electronic systems.

Takeaway Point

Securing your IT systems ensures that all your company data is safe. If you cannot afford a high-tech security system, take other steps to ensure that your systems are protected from outside attacks.

Coming Up With an Alternative Business Model

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StrategyDriven Strategic Planning Article |Alternative Business Model|Coming Up With an Alternative Business ModelRight now, a huge number of people are looking for new jobs. This is pretty understandable. At the end of the day, we’re in the midst of a worldwide pandemic, where coronavirus and Covid-19 are spreading at a rapid rate and we’re doing the utmost we can to slow its transmission. Governments around the world are requesting that people work from home, reducing their contact with others and minimising fatalities and the burden on healthcare services. This means that countless companies have collapsed, had to make redundancies, or are asking staff to work for a reduced rate or reduced hours. On top of this, many people have spent time away from their current job while the company gets back on its feet and have realised that the role and career path just isn’t for them. If you fall into either of these categories and are looking to pursue something new, the good news is that you can go ahead with it! Sure, it can feel daunting to start your own business in these difficult times where established companies are visibly struggling. But if you have the right idea and there’s demand for what you’re providing, you could actually experience profound success. There are businesses out there that are flourishing and profiting right now. If you are going to take this path, you are going to have to work to stand out from the crowd and consider an alternative business model though. Here are some suggestions that can help you to achieve this!

Consider What You’d Really Enjoy Doing

All too many people simply look where the money is when starting a business. But this isn’t all you should consider when choosing what you want to do and sell. Sure, it’s important to provide something that has demand. But you also need to make sure that your business is based around something that you’re genuinely interested and invested in. This will make each and every working day easier and will see you put more effort into the venture. Commitment and positivity are more likely to drive success.

Remember You Don’t Have to Do the Same as Everyone Else

You also need to remember that you don’t have to stick to the flow when it comes to setting up your own business. There are some business models that are more popular than others, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are better. For example, selling products often proves to be more common than selling services. But you could find that during times like these, where people are looking for support, setting up a coaching business and using services that can revamp your coaching business for the current times could prove pretty successful!

Make Things Easier for Yourself

You should also make things as easy as possible for yourself. Chances are you aren’t going to be committing to hiring full or part time staff straight away. These are unprecedented times and many business owners don’t want to commit to paying out salaries at the minute. But that doesn’t mean you have to bear the weight of every aspect of your business’ operations on your own shoulders. Remember you can outsource.

Running your own business right now is going to be a challenge. But it is possible! Hopefully, some of the steps outlined above will help you along the way!

4 Ways Social Media Marketing Can Benefit Brick & Mortar Retail Stores

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StrategyDriven Online Marketing and Website Development Article |Social Media Marketing|4 Ways Social Media Marketing Can Benefit Brick & Mortar Retail StoresBrick & mortar retail stores are a vital part of the communities in which they exist. By having an established storefront, they’re able to interact with the people who pass by on a daily basis. This interaction makes it easy to improve engagement, as people can stop in when they’re walking by or once they get off of work, walking in to see what this small business is all about or to purchase a product out of support.

Yet, having just a physical location only goes so far. While some small businesses might be staunch about avoiding the digital realm, to the point of being labeled a Luddite, there is a lot to be gained by entering digital spaces. Social media has particularly changed the way that small businesses sustain themselves. In some cases, it has allowed these small brick and mortar stores to survive, as they’ve been able to develop digital audiences that support them in times where the storefront isn’t performing. The benefits are far-reaching, too, where social media marketing techniques like influencer and affiliate marketing measures help to improve the success of business. Interested in how you can start? Here is an explanation of social media platforms and four ways social media marketing can benefit your small business.

The Main Social Media Platforms Simplified

For brick and mortar establishments unfamiliar with social media, here is a basic breakdown of the major platforms and how they can be beneficial to your business:

  • Facebook – For small businesses like brick and mortar retailers, Facebook is the perfect platform for basic marketing and advertising opportunities. If you can develop a following from your local community, you can transform your business’s page into something of a blog, where you can keep local consumers in the loop about products, sales, events, and more. The platform’s “Live” feature also allows you to capture footage from around your storefront, letting you interact with customers by showing off staff and everything going on.
  • Instagram – If your company is more based on aesthetic, Instagram might be the place for you. You can curate a feed where images with a specific color scheme and look can be shared, letting consumers know what products you have to offer, all while hinting at the lifestyle your brand represents.
  • Twitter – Looking for a way to communicate with customers? Twitter can be a good avenue, where the site can be treated as a form of customer service, helping you stay in touch with customers throughout the day.
  • YouTube – If you’re looking to show off the look of your brand, it might be best to move from Instagram photography to video. Minute-long videos can make for great content, where you keep followers in the know concerning your business. You can even take it a step further and film 10-plus-minute videos where you review products or provide educational information to viewers.

StrategyDriven Online Marketing and Website Development Article |Social Media Marketing|4 Ways Social Media Marketing Can Benefit Brick & Mortar Retail StoresKnowing which platform is right for you will involve studying your business to better understand what it wants to say to the community, and on which platform your audience is most likely to be found. But, with all of this in mind, here are some of the essential ways that marketing on these social media platforms can benefit your brick and mortar business:

1. Utilizing the Internet to Build a Digital Relationship

One of the greatest things about creating social media profiles for your business is that it allows you to develop digital relationships that can transcend to real-life transactions—if you’ve never had a website, this isn’t likely to happen, so that’s something you should do sooner rather than later.

The best part about starting out is that you don’t have to do much, in terms of marketing and advertising. Rather, work to start following other businesses and begin communicating with fellow social media users. On top of this, start posting content that is going to develop a following on its own: Post pleasing pictures to Instagram with relevant hashtags; follow other local businesses on Facebook to start growing a local community that can grow from there.

Once these relationships are established, you can begin moving onto more complicated features of the apps, all while your initial community continues to provide you with long-lasting engagement.

2. Using Referral Marketing

When starting out, one of the best ways you can get yourself up and going is through the help of referrals. Technically known as affiliate marketing, this is the establishment of relationships with other businesses, where a company/person is paid to endorse and promote a business.

This can be an essential way to get your feet on the ground as a new social media user, as you can utilize influencers and fellow businesses to your advantage, having them promote your business’s page to their own larger audiences. In turn, this will hopefully lead to new followers and potential site visitors, helping you gain traction and a digital following of your own. The best part is that this can still be done even once you have an established following, as there will always be room for growth in the digital world.

3. Posting Content That’s Relevant and Eye-Catching

One of the most important things to gaining a following online, and remaining relevant, is posting content that people want to see. Your posts shouldn’t just be pictures of your products followed by a description of what they do. Rather, a story should be told.

StrategyDriven Online Marketing and Website Development Article |Social Media Marketing|4 Ways Social Media Marketing Can Benefit Brick & Mortar Retail StoresIf you’re a local business, you can talk about how your community’s character is a part of everything you do. If you’re promoting health and wellness products, you can craft a story related to how this product is intended to improve a person’s life by developing a healthier daily routine. The options are endless, but you want to find something that will resonate with social media users, as that’s what is going to entice them to follow your business and stick around.

Ideally, you need to make sure that your content isn’t just creative, but is also professional looking. This means building your own skills in photography through photography online courses and honing your creative writing abilities through creative writing courses and workshops or it means using the skills of a professional and expert third party, such as a professional product photographer and a professional copywriter.

4. Making an Inviting Website

As mentioned before, you need a website if you don’t currently have one. While you can rely on getting business in-store from local followers, that won’t translate to the national or global market. Instead, you need a website that is reflective of your business—a place where social media users can be directed to make purchases with your retail store. This will be essential to your business’s longevity, as it will allow you to create a profitable digital audience, giving you an extra level of protection if anything were to ever happen to your storefront.

Improve Your Business’s Security with Social Media Exposure

The methods you explore when developing a social media presence, from affiliate marketing to website development, will vary, but they’re all intended to improve the security of your business going forward. Think about the ways social media can help your business, and begin posting sooner rather than later.

 

4 Tips to Grow a Successful Bakery Business

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Bakery Business|4 Tips to Grow a Successful Bakery BusinessAre you currently in the bakery business? Have you experienced modest success but want to push on to the next level? Maybe it’s a market you are planning to enter in the near future? Whatever your situation is, you will understand that growing a successful bakery is far from easy.

Yet, if you get it right, it is an industry that can supply some rather lucrative financial rewards. According to the American Baker’s Association, bakers are responsible for over $153 billion of the country’s GDP.

To ensure you get a sizeable nibble of that $153 billion, read on for four tips on how to grow a successful bakery business.

1. Settle on a niche

When you start a bakery business, you may feel it’s necessary to offer as many products as possible. After all, if there’s another bakery in the area that is offering, say, 50 different food items, why would they visit yours that only has 25?
However, there are multiple reasons to avoid a large menu. Firstly, you may fail to have the financial strength to sell a large assortment of food items at once. The product quality could suffer, and you may also struggle to forge an identity.
The latter point is particularly important. Instead of being just another regular bakery, you should zone in on a specific niche. You could specialize in unique doughnuts for example, or be known for serving the best variety of bread in town. The more distinctive your business is, the easier it is to market and gain customers.

2. Use a unique, eye-catching logo

Every business should have a high-quality logo, and bakeries are no different. This logo will be your store sign. It will be featured on your business cards, website, leaflets, and other advertising materials. If it has an amateurish appearance, this isn’t going to form a strong first impression with your audience.
Fortunately, it is easy to find a professional graphic designer who can produce a unique and remarkable logo for your bakery.

3. Use local online marketing

Online marketing is more important than ever for local businesses. Whether they’re searching for bakeries in the area or your business specifically, you need to make sure your company appears in all the relevant queries from your target market.
The only problem is that, for an effective local marketing strategy, a lot of time and effort is required. This is why it makes sense to enlist the services of a marketing agency. Bubyli is a local SEO Essex company for example, and they are experts in everything from Google My Business to designing a keyword-rich website.

4. Offer a delivery service

To maximize sales, you need to provide a local delivery service in this day and age. You can add your bakery to one of the various food ordering platforms like Uber Eats, or go that extra level and create a unique online ordering app.

If you do decide to go the delivery route, however, make sure you are prepared for the extra responsibility it demands. Slow delivery times could be detrimental to your online reviews, which could harm your bakery on the whole.

As previously mentioned, according to the American Baker’s Association, bakers contribute significantly to the country’s GDP, so be sure to follow these tips to ensure that you don’t miss out.