Community News C
IDEAS TO GROW YOUR BUSINESS IN THE NEW YEAR
By Dean Swanson, volunteer Certified SCORE Mentor and former SCORE Chapter Chair, District Director, and Regional Vice President for the North West Region O ne of the most common goals for the new year by small business CEOs is the need to grow your business. But, when it comes to settling on realistic strategies to make that happen, they really need some fresh ideas. We have found that one can learn a lot from other businesses. Brett Farmiloe, Founder & CEO of Markitors, a digital marketing company that connects small businesses to customers through organic search is one of SCORE’s content partners. As he has done in the past, he has come up with some good suggestions when he asked business professionals and leaders for their insights “How can you grow your business in the new year?” Here are some of his responses. Invest in Quality SEO Content. Organic search is a channel that produces a reliable and sustainable flow of trusted leads at a low cost. The trick to getting organic search to work is investing the resources to create content, build backlinks, and address any technical issues presiding on the website. If a business is looking to grow in the year ahead, organic search is certainly a long-term strategy to build a marketing funnel. Keep in mind that when hiring an SEO expert, a campaign may take between 4-12 months to see results. However, once the campaign produces results, a business should enjoy a steady stream of new clients and revenue. -Brett Farmiloe, Markitors Utilize Existing Customers. If you’ve got a long list of satisfied clients, try to utilize them for referrals. A satisfied client is a grateful client, and they’ll likely be happy to recommend you to others. As an interior design firm, there is already a lot of demand for our services. However, that doesn’t stop us from making the most of our relationships with our clientele, so we get a fair number of referrals. -Alisha Taylor, Alisha Taylor Interiors
Make Use of Social Media. It might sound cliché at this point, but social media is the future of business growth. So, you need to make the greatest possible use of social media. Everyone has a smartphone in their pocket, and social media platforms are amongst the most-used apps on those phones. If you set up your social media business page, advertise products, enable any shop or product promotion options, and regularly interact with your followers, you’ll set yourself up to see significant results in the new year. -Vicky Franko, Insura Capitalize on E-commerce . If you haven’t been getting the most out of the e-commerce boom, now is the time to capitalize on it. There’s a market for practically everything online, from services like insurance to products. However, if you don’t have an online presence that can capture customers’ awareness or interest, they’re going to find it elsewhere. Make sure you have an up-to-date website and social media. These are the key ingredients to growing your business in the new year. -Brian Greenberg, Insurist Fill an Untapped Niche. Look for niches in need of being filled. You might think you have all of your bases covered, but untapped opportunities are waiting for you. Once upon a time, offering loan services specific to small businesses was an underutilized market, but we’ve gone on to help others, and ourselves, thrive. Start the year off by making a plan to look for opportunities and stick with it. -Allan Switalski, LendThrive To read more, visit SCORE’s website at https://bit.ly/3lC7k6d
Advantage Magazine | 17
February 2022
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