4 Tips to Grow a Successful Bakery Business

/in /by

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.

Want To Outsource? Here’s How You Could Do It!

/in /by

When it comes to your business, you push it as hard as possible to do well and make a profit. You’re working early mornings and late nights and the days seem to run into each other without stopping. While this is wonderful, and you can see the dollar signs rolling as the profits come in, the better you are the more in demand you are – and this means more work to keep up with.

Outsourcing pieces of your business to others to lighten the load from you isn’t a bad idea to combat that extra workload. Taking the right approach to outsourcing your marketing team or your invoicing to an accounting service is important. You need to be able to trust the people you’re handing a piece of your business to, and so it’s important that you know the advantages of outsourcing and why you should do it.

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Want To Outsource? Here's How You Could Do It!

Advantages of Outsourcing

Outsourcing is going to help you to combat the growth of your business. You want to be able to manage and control your business growth so that it goes in the way you hope it goes. You want to ensure that the time is right for your outsourcing, and if you know that it’s going to lower your costs and regain your focus properly, you’re going to do very well. On top of this, you could use outsourcing to develop your talent. A knowledgeable workforce is going to boost your bottom line and this will lead to even further growth. Now that you know the advantages of outsourcing with your business, let’s look at a few ways you could do it!

  • Know what to outsource. Before you do anything, you need to know what you should outsource. Look at your business functions and choose where you are weakest. If your social media marketing could use a boost, you know that choosing the right agency is the way to go. The same can be said for your IT, accounting and even your administrative tasks. You can check with your employees and your profit bottom line to know whether you need to outsource a function in your business.
  • Time it right. Sometimes, you can jump the gun and outsource too soon. You need to look at your long and short term needs and if you need help in the short term to help the long-term goals of yours, you’re going to do well. Once you have done this, communicate with your employees so that you can time this exactly right.
  • Cut ties gracefully. If you start outsourcing with an external company, you are more than within your right to cancel any agreements you have with them. No one enjoys firing a company, but you have to find the right provider to work with.
  • Communicate with your team. If you plan to outsource at all, you should consider talking to your team first. They will be able to tell you what they need and you can then decide whether to go ahead or to go another way. Communication is key and this will help you to get what you need for your business.

How to Ensure Your Business is Legally Sound in 2021

/in /by

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Legally Sound Business|How to Ensure Your Business is Legally Sound in 2021There are plenty of things to concern yourself with as a modern business owner, and one of the key ones is making sure you have legal protection. This is something that you have to make the most of right now, and there are a lot of things that play a part in achieving this moving forward. Having a company that is legally sound is essential for continued and long-term success, so this is something you have to make the best of right now.

Try to focus on what you can do to make the right decisions here, and understand what it takes to improve the company and make sure you focus on this as much as possible. Do what you can to make the right choices, and there are a lot of elements that can help you improve your company moving forward right now. Here are some of the best ways to ensure legal protection as a company right now.

Hire the Right Lawyers

Hiring the right lawyers can make all the difference when you’re trying to protect your company, and this is certainly something you’ve got to think about in the future. There are business attorneys out there who can help with the day to day running of the company, but there are also a lot of niche lawyers as well, and they can play a massive role in helping protect your business as much as possible. For instance, a truck accident lawyer can become essential if you have a fleet of trucks that is jeopardised by an accident.

Avoid Issues on Social Media

Social media is wonderful in so many ways, and there are a lot of things that you need to make sure you focus on when you are trying to navigate social media. There are so many factors that are important to get right in this respect, and there are a lot of things that you need to try to focus on as much as possible. Come up with ideas that will help you when it comes to making the best business decisions here, and try to use social media in the best and most effective way you can. There are so many legal pitfalls you need to try to avoid on social media and this is essential for building success in the future.

Get the Basics Right

Getting the basics right is so important, but it’s also something that a lot of people seem to overlook too much these days. You have to try to come up with ideas that are going to allow you to make the right choices that will help you in this respect. But getting the basics right as a company is something that can protect you so much in a legal sense, and it’s something that is so often overlooked.

Making the right decisions to help your business be legally sound is really important in 2021, and this is something that you need to try to make the most of as much as possible. There are a lot of ideas that are going to help you when it comes to ensuring longevity and success as a business owner, and this is something that you need to make sure you get right.

Finding Specialist Suppliers for Your Unique Business Needs

/in /by

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Specialist Suppliers|Finding Specialist Suppliers for Your Unique Business NeedsDoes your business do something unique or different? If so, then you’re probably doing it for the sake of standing out, to improve your products, or to get your brand noticed. This is an excellent strategy when starting a business for the first time. First impressions matter, so doing something unique and different can help you stand out.

Unfortunately, being different in the world of business can be difficult and expensive. So here are a couple of tips to help you find specialist suppliers to meet your unique business needs.

Start by considering your budget and your needs

First, ask yourself how much you’re willing to spend on specialist suppliers and if it’s worth it for your business. For example, if you offer lots of personalisation options but it drastically reduces your profits, then you need to decide if it’s worth sticking with your current business model or if you should go for something more generic at first. Evaluate your needs and keep an eye on your budget to see what kind of suppliers you can work with and which you might need to pass on.

Consider networking at various events to connect with suppliers

Networking is an incredibly helpful way to connect your business with new suppliers. It’s important for you to chat, introduce yourself, exchange business cards, and gossip about the industry. This helps you learn more about different suppliers and could be the start of a lucrative partnership.

Be highly specific about what it is that you’re looking for

The more specific you are, the more likely you’re going to get a fantastic service. Even if the price is a little higher, being specific ensures that you get exactly what you’re looking for, thus reducing the possibility of wasting money and time. For instance, if you’re looking for plastic packaging technologies, then dig a little deeper and find a packaging company that works with the exact dimensions or use cases that you’re looking for.

Speak with influencers and spread your presence

Influencer marketing has become a huge deal in the marketing world, especially if you’re a relatively new and hip company that has a social media presence. Making use of influencers is difficult. You need to focus on building a healthy relationship with them to spread your presence, and you need to work with many different people to spread your reach to different audiences.

Look for a bespoke service that offers flexibility

One of the best ways to build a healthy relationship with your suppliers is to look for a service that offers flexibility. If you find a supplier that just about does what you need, then it’s going to create further complications when you request bespoke services. However, if that supplier already offers bespoke services, then you’re less likely to cause annoyances and delays, and you’re more likely to have your jobs accepted.

Finding specialist suppliers can be challenging, but as long as you do plenty of research and ask around your network, you’ll find your ideal supplier sooner than you think.

5 WAYS TO HELP AUTOMATE YOUR BUSINESS

/in /by

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Automate your Business|5 WAYS TO HELP AUTOMATE YOUR BUSINESAutomation is a process of replacing manual human needed in executing tasks with any form of technology. Automation is an area of business that is of immense benefit as it uses technology to perform business tasks or processes, where human effort or supervision would be otherwise needed. By incorporating automation, business-owners can boost efficiency, minimize operating costs, and ensure near-perfect consistency in business activities.

Although automation is great for business, certain factors must be considered before integration into your business. Areas any business owner should focus on are tasks or processes that are reoccurring, repetitive, algorithms can handle easily or time-consuming. Choosing the right tasks to automate is key to the growth of a business. So, here are five easy ways to help automate your business.

1. Social Media Automation

Social media has become an essential part of any business, especially in small businesses. Social media can help businesses to build an online reputation, raise awareness for their products or services, engage customers and potential customers, get feedback, and demonstrate expertise.

Automating your social media is a great way to help boost productivity, with tools that integrate your social media platforms and schedule posts across various social media platforms. There are several available such as Buffer, Hootsuite, ContenCal, etc.

2. Integration of AI Learning

The capabilities of Artificial intelligence have grown significantly over the last decade. It is now possible to feed AI’s business metrics in the form of data points that allow AI to optimize your business activities like price and digital marketing send. The benefits of Integrating AI are not no exhaustive, as there are constant developments and updates.

3. Automated Updates and Responses

Setting up automated updates and responses is great for reoccurring activities that involve your customers. Such as automated email updates that welcome new subscribers or inform them of recent transactions with your business or business promotions

The automated updates can intelligently respond to basic questions and regular inquiries customers may have, based on pre-set guides.

4. Documentation and Data Gathering

Automation in business is not limited to digital relations alone; it is also useful in areas of data gathering and documentation. Several documents and data are transferred in email correspondence, and keeping track of all the paperwork can be very time-consuming and tiring.

With automation software such as ERP Development, all the paperwork and documentation are automatically sorted according to your pre-set rules.

5. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)software

ERP software one of the best ways to ensure effective business automation. As it is a system that centralizes various aspects of business process management i.e., human resources, logistics, finance, documentation, orders, billing, inventory, customer management, and all that comprises the said business. ERP is basically a business management software.

However, the ERP software is not a generic solution, as it must be developed to suit every businesses’ metrics. Therefore in ERP Development, the software system must be modeled after the metrics of every business.

Conclusively, the first step to ensuring effective automation is to observe the repetitive and time-consuming areas of your business. Also, the development of ERP software will help in centralizing all the aspects of your business.