How Automation Can Help Your Business to Get Better Reviews
Apr 18, 2022
10 min read
If you believe that automation means that large corporations will replace human employees with high-tech robots, you are mistaken. The chances are that you already use some kind of automation in both your professional and personal lives, which means that you're a business owner.
Use of time-saving applications such as Google Suite, Zapier, IFTTT, Hootsuite, or other similar tools to save time and get more done is a good indication that you are already benefiting from the power of automation.
Increased agility, lower costs, better productivity, fewer delays, fewer mistakes, and better customer satisfaction benefits from using automation technologies in your business.
An automation strategy enables you to systematically implement the appropriate tools to maximize these technology solutions' value while simultaneously increasing your bottom line. So here, we will discuss how automation can help your business get better reviews.
Benefits of Business Automation
Utilizing automation in your company will necessitate an initial investment in information technology to set up the advanced technologies and standardize the processes. To successfully prioritize resources, you must first identify how automation can provide the greatest return on investment for your organization and help your business get better reviews.
Market Adaptation
As demand changes or order volume increases, you don't have to hire new workers. This gives you the ability and flexibility to deal with these changes as they happen.
For example, in the cases of inventory management, order processing, and payment handling, automation can save you time and money by eliminating the need to recruit and train new employees to handle a spike in order volume, inventory levels, and process orders handle payments. Increase your ability to keep costs down and make sure customers get their orders as quickly as possible.
Source: Unsplash
Less Labour Cost
Many small businesses spend a significant portion of their budgets hiring workers to fulfill tasks that need more labor and take more time while also adding little value to their overall operations and profitability.
Lowering your overhead and increasing your profitability by automating these processes allows you to reduce the number of staff needed to complete these tasks, lowering your overhead. It also allows you to focus just on the quality of your employees instead of the quantity of them, allowing you to hire people with good skills to fuel your company's growth.
Less Human Error
Many business operations can be made more accurate through the use of automation. It is possible to eliminate costly errors associated with manual procedures, such as re-keying data from one system to the other. This applies to billing and accounting to order fulfillment and inventory management.
Using shipping software, for example, can help ensure that you're printing the correct labels for delivery. In contrast, scheduling software can help reduce errors in people management, and an efficient inventory tool can eliminate the need to count items manually.
Source: Unsplash
More Happy Employees
According to the company, automation helps streamline the employee experience while also ensuring that their needs and requests are met quickly.
For example, it can help fill out forms for vacation requests, absence management, travel remuneration, expense repayment, and more. Additionally, one can use technology to expedite new hires' onboarding so that employees can become fully productive and so that you can have hiring expertise that will assist you in acquiring and retaining the most qualified candidates.
Consistent Customer Experience
Automation can help you provide a consistent buying experience that can elevate customer satisfaction and foster trust. It can help you standardize marketing, order fulfillment, shipment, and post-sale support procedures.
The process also enables you to collect data and good processes by streamlining the customer experience and acquiring and retaining customers while driving more sales and profits.
Customer Support
Services that automate customer support, such as help desk software, a searchable knowledge base, and chatbots, can reduce response times, increase self-service capabilities, and increase customer satisfaction.
Customer service chatbots, for example, can answer some basic questions and provide links to useful information without the need for a human agent to be available. As a bonus, they can screen questions and help customers find the right person or department to help them.
Collaboration
To guarantee the effectiveness of complex projects, you must keep track of each team member's responsibilities and ensure that information and communication have properly flowed throughout the project.
Automatically tracking project progress, communicating key dates and milestones to team members, and keeping team members up-to-date with the latest data, files, or project status allows for more seamless collaboration and collaboration tools.
Improve External Communication
The ability to integrate the processes of external suppliers and partner organizations with your platform will allow you to streamline your distribution network and procurement, ensure prompt exchange of information, minimize delays, and lower the number of errors.
Consider automating the purchasing and invoicing processes or integrating your inventory management system with the supplier's system so that new items are placed quickly. You don't run out of stock and cause important projects to be delayed.
Source: Unsplash
Leverage Remote Workers
Many small businesses benefit from the growing use of remote workers, which allows them to access the talent and expertise they require while reducing their overhead. Also possible is the recruitment of the most qualified individuals to work on the projects at hand without incurring the expense of employing many full-time employees.
Internal processes are made more efficient through automation, eliminating the need for employees to be in the same location to collaborate seamlessly. Some businesses can even operate entirely online, resulting in significant cost savings (e.g., rent, office equipment.)
Increase Return on Investment
Marketing automation can assist you in maximizing your budget while simultaneously improving results. There are numerous low-cost tools in email marketing, customer relationship management and sales, digital advertising buying, viewer targeting, and e-commerce solutions (e.g., product recommendations).
Automating, collecting, analyzing, and organizing large amounts of customer data allows you to implement customization strategies, which will be critical in improving marketing and sales results over the next few years.
So, these are some of the benefits of Business Automation. I hope you understand how Automation can help your business to get better reviews.
Types of Business Automation
Ecommerce Automation
Automate your marketing and eCommerce operations by collecting and processing customer data. This will help you determine how to deliver the right information at the right place at the right time while also providing valuable assistance to improve customer retention. Email marketing software, customer relationship management, and chatbots are examples.
Chatbots
Low-cost solutions in the Rs. 2000 per month range is available for purchase. In addition, by implementing a chatbot, your business will be able to provide 24x7 customer support, access information instantly, increase efficiency, and, most importantly, provide the best customer experience to your customers.
Inventory Management
Product information transfer to your eCommerce website is made easier by integrating with your supplier's system to add automatically, edit, and delete products and transfer product information. It allows for good product data and availability updates, which helps to cut down on backorders and cancel orders and make the shopping experience better for everyone.
Conclusion
Numerous new tools are being introduced regularly. It is easy to fall prey to the "bright shiny object syndrome" if you don't have a clearly defined strategy to guide your execution. Make a clear distinction between your short-term and long-term business goals to identify the key areas in which you should concentrate your efforts and resources. We hope that this blog will help you understand how automation can help your business in various areas. For more details about business automation, reach out to our experts
Looking Into Your Customer's Mind - What Happens Between Deciding To Buy Something And Buying It?
Customer behavior is always out of the blue regardless of the industry and chances are that it can be influenced by the slightest change in the service you render. Marketers must know what do you think about their brand, the way your thoughts are aligned, and what affects your purchasing decisions in the present. It is because with this information they create a personalized way of communicating with you and present their products to make you take a firm purchasing decision. Realizing your customer’s behavior and offering them as per their desires is what is considered necessary to sustain as a credible brand in this competitive market. Many companies strive to know about their target audience’s habits and preferences over a certain product line by investing a lot of money in customer relations and behavioral researches. By getting to know what kind of products or features your customer is fascinated by, your brand can make use of the search advertising methods to connect with them and display relevant information related to their recent searches. The websites they have visited on search engines like Google, Yahoo! help your business to obtain data from cookies and pull up those ads that match with their search queries. In this way, companies showcase the real information that their customers want to have, like discount coupons, special offers, etc, and increase the overall engagement. Looking into your customer’s mind allows a business to fully understand the factors basis which he or she makes a rational purchasing decision. These factors can be personal like price value and choice of product, situational factors such as the supply and demand in the market, and social factors like community fondness towards a particular product/service. Stages Of Customer Purchasing Decisions Consumer purchasing decisions are affected by numerous factors and the overall process comprises a handful of steps that are essential to go through. A standard purchasing decision includes realizing the actual wants, searching for it over the internet, opting for suitable sellers, evaluating the cost benefits, and then finally making an offer. The following is the detailed information on each step of the process: Realization Of Needs The primary step of making a buying decision is to contemplate the wants that require a purchase of a product. These consumer wants come from a problem, for instance, a customer will buy a new pen if he loses his old pen. The problem here is the loss of a pen, which leads to the creation of a need to buy a new pen. Needs also arise due to other factors such as captivating discounts, attractive offers, and advertisements. Therefore, a business must understand the needs of a consumer from your product and how they can be fulfilled by a consumer’s purchasing decision. Search Analysis Once the purchase needs are identified and jotted down, the next step is to get over the internet to find suitable searches for the product. In general terms, they shall try to find possible solutions for their problems. Searches could be from online sources like search engines, social media platforms, and offline sources could be from flyers, advertisements, and word of mouth. Here, marketers have to portray the products’ information in a way that is easy to understand and feasible for every potential customer. Product data ought to be mentioned so the customer can make an informed decision, it may include a descriptive feature list, blog posts, customer reviews, etc. Assessment Of Alternatives After a customer has considered several product options, the next step comes of evaluating those options basis the needs it will satisfy. However, apart from the needs, the ultimate product option that a customer will choose depends upon its qualitative attributes, such as relevant features, cost, durability, brand image, etc. Since the market is flourished with a variety of products and its alternatives, a customer has a lot of options to choose from, and as a marketer, you need to ensure that your product stays unmatched by the rest of your competitors. If you want their choices to be in your brand’s favor, match your product’s features with the customer’s needs. Ultimate Purchase Decision After inspecting a set of options and matching your desires as per the product features, as a customer you have arrived at the final stage that involves the purchase decision. Now, the process includes the role of both the customer and the marketer. As a marketer, the role would include reminding the target audience about the product’s features and business offers. Targetting and retargeting the customers impose the need to make a purchase. Source: Unsplash How To Understand A Customer’s Mind? Relevant consumer purchase-decisions studies show that even before a customer acknowledges a particular product, he or she explores its market availability and reviews from previous customers. As a customer, you can explore and evaluate the available options to find the right kind of product for you. The information related to these products is subject to resemble your needs and anticipations, thus remaining product-focussed. Apart from the marketing techniques and distinctive advertising approaches, it is also perceived that customer behavior is affected by the shop’s ambiance, the expertise offered while indoor shopping, and the overall time it takes to make the payment for the purchase. If the complete process runs smoothly, it counts as an added advantage to the brand’s image. However, these factors exist only in offline stores, since E-commerce platforms govern via enormous choices of products and options that attract the masses. With the introduction of numerous online platforms, the power is now in the hands of the customer to decide at the earliest. Online shopping allows them to get benefits such as a saved-cart facility, express delivery, item comparison, etc. Inspect other’s liking and fondness related to a product, often it is observed that customer decision is majorly influenced by what others think about a product and their observations. It is important to generate genuine and useful customer reviews from your target audience to increase your recommendation rate. Eventually, a customer will most likely choose a product if it already has a couple of good ratings. That is why marketers strive to gain five-star reviews from their customers in the initial stages of shopping to ensure that the future shopping experience is positively affected. Time and again marketers make use of content blogs and expert how-to reviews on the business website to gain a professional edge over its competitors. Saffron Edge helps to influence such customers who rely on our expert recommendations and consider your opinions as to quality benchmarks. If you want to know more about the same, please click here. ...
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Saas Competitor Analysis: A Complete Guide for Your Brand
The SaaS industry is experiencing significant growth yearly, with impressive statistics highlighting its expansion. In 2021, the United States alone has approximately 15,000 SaaS companies, collectively serving around 14 billion users globally. Additionally, as we progress into 2024, the global count of SaaS companies continues to rise, indicating a broader expansion trend across borders. As the quantity of SaaS companies continues to grow, so does the level of competition within the market. If you are a SaaS Company and want to survive in the market, you must use a SaaS competitor analysis strategy and enterprise SEO SaaS. This blog will guide you on "How to do competitor analysis in SEO." We'll cover why it's essential, the benefits, key aspects, and the best tools to help you in this process and improve your saas marketing strategies. What is SaaS Competitive Analysis? SaaS competitive analysis is a strategic process, including competitor analysis for SEO, that involves in-depth research and evaluation to understand how your company or product compares to others in the Software as a Service (SaaS) industry. This comprehensive examination involves identifying direct competitors and meticulously scrutinizing their strategies, campaigns, and operational practices, including SaaS keywords research. Engaging with a SaaS marketing agency can provide valuable insights and expertise to enhance your competitive analysis and refine your market positioning. The purpose is to gain valuable insights, enabling your company to identify and capitalize on opportunities. While the primary focus is on direct competitors, it is also advisable to recognize potential indirect competitors that may pose a minor threat but could become competitors in the future. What are the Advantages of SaaS competitive Analysis? The advantages of conducting step-by-step competitor analysis in the SEO provide invaluable insights and strategic benefits for businesses in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) industry. Here are six key reasons why undertaking such an analysis is a must: Building a Strong Unique Value Proposition (USP): When someone questions why your product is better than a competitor's, a competitive analysis gives you the ammo to answer convincingly. Whether it's a superior user experience or unique features, knowing your strengths helps shape a compelling Unique Value Proposition. You can then translate these insights into attention-grabbing landing pages. Stay Relevant in the Market: Regular competitive analysis keeps you in the loop about what's working now. If your competitors implement a new strategy, you can spot the gaps and create better content or features. Getting Ahead: Whether your competition is a big or a small company, they probably have some weak spots. Their SaaS content marketing strategy may be inconsistent, or their website content may be irrelevant. You can swoop in and offer what they can't by keeping tabs on this. It is about turning your weaknesses into your strengths. Identifying New Opportunities: Avoid copying and pasting what your competitors are doing to keep things fresh. An excellent competitive analysis helps you see if there is room for improvement in your product or marketing strategy. Find those gaps and turn them into your chance to outshine. Customize Sales Strategies: Whether you are a startup or testing different strategies, competitive analysis helps you pinpoint what works best. It's not just about refining existing strategies but also discovering new approaches that can supercharge your conversions and sales, giving you a competitive edge in the market. Understanding Your Customers Needs: Your customers need change. Dig into reviews for your competitors' tools. You get direct insights into what customers love and what is lacking. Use these insights to tweak your product. Ready to Grow Your SaaS Business? get in touch Define Your Competition And Industry Landscape Before you can outsmart your rivals, You have to know who they are. Start by pinpointing your direct competitors, those offering similar products. Then, consider the indirect ones targeting the same customers but with different products. Next, take a good look at your industry’s big picture. Consider its market size, how fast it’s growing, who your customers are, and any obstacles for newbies trying to join the game. Now that you’ve understood the market, it’s time to take stock of the strengths and weaknesses of your SaaS marketing strategies, backlinking strategies and Saas marketing customer journey. Look at what they’re selling, how they’re selling it, at what price, and at the customer reviews for their products. This will give you an idea where there is a chance you can thrive, differentiate and excel. And that’s why really knowing your competition and industry will bring you the most amount of success in the SaaS world. It’s finally clear to you where you fit in, where you can grow, and where you can best shine. How to do SaaS Competitor Analysis? Here are some steps to get you started with competitor analysis: 1. Identify Your Top Competitors When analyzing your competition, the first step is to figure out who they are. Here are two practical methods: Use search engines: Go to Google and enter the main keywords for your industry. For instance, if you are working for your business related to SEO tools, search for "best SEO tool." The first page of results usually features tools in your niche and articles listing the "best SEO tools." Incorporating SaaS marketing SEO strategies into your search can help identify top-performing solutions and competitive insights. Check SaaS review websites: Explore platforms like G2, Capterra, and TrustRadius. Search for your industry, and you'll discover competitors you might have overlooked during regular searches. This approach helps you get a more comprehensive view of the competition. 2. Research Their Offerings and Services The value of any SaaS business lies in its product. During your competitive analysis, look at the features and functionalities of their product. Evaluate the user-friendliness of their interface and SaaS pricing page. Can someone use their product easily without needing tutorials or demos? Also, check for any bugs or downtime issues in their tool. This in-depth examination will help you understand what makes your product stand out, showcasing the benefits of opting for your solution over your competitors. 3. Evaluate Their Marketing Strategies Target Keywords: Once you have gathered the list of competitors, use tools like Ahrefs to research keywords your competitors are ranking for. Conduct a keyword gap analysis to identify those golden keywords. Ahrefs' Site Explorer Tool is your go-to here, allowing you to filter through keyword difficulty, traffic, position, and volume to spot high-impact keywords likely to convert. Investigate the backlinking strategies of your competitors using Ahrefs. Backlinking Gap Analysis: Backlinks showcase a website's authority, and tools like Ahrefs, used by top SaaS marketing agencies, can help you identify the backlink profile of your competitors, helping you spot the gaps. Understanding which websites are linking to tools similar to yours provides insight into valuable backlink opportunities your competitors might be overlooking. Content Marketing: Content marketing works as a powerful asset for SaaS companies. Take a closer look at your competitors' high-traffic posts and those holding solid positions on search engine results pages (SERPs). Identify the unique elements that make their content stand out, such as its tone, calls-to-action (CTAs), examples, and content formats. Pay attention to how they seamlessly introduce their tools within their articles. Additionally, dig into their SaaS email marketing strategy, and scrutinize how successful campaigns incorporate these elements to enhance engagement and drive results. User Experience: A slow-loading or confusing website can drive visitors straight to your competitors. Make sure your website delivers a top-notch user experience by crafting a straightforward navigation structure and prioritizing fast speed and device accessibility. For example, Trello enhances user experience with features like a search button on its blog, making it easy for readers to find what they need. 4. Customer Engagement, Reviews, and Feedback Examine how your competitor engages with customers on social media. Analyze their approach towards addressing negative reviews on external platforms. Gaining insights into these aspects is crucial. For instance, discovering dissatisfaction among your competitor's customers regarding their user interface prompts further investigation into potential UI shortcomings in your product and whether similar issues exist. This examination provides valuable information for refining your strategies and effectively addressing customer concerns. 5. Identify Strengths and Weaknesses It is essential to be aware of your SaaS company's strengths and weaknesses, but equally critical is understanding those of your competitors to refine your communication strategies. For example, when creating a listicle on the "best SEO tools," having insights into how your tool compares to competitors allows your team to craft the content more effectively. This knowledge also benefits your sales team, allowing you to contact potential customers more effectively and increase conversion rates. 6. Replan Your SEO Strategy To refine your SEO strategy, it is beneficial to analyze the effective tactics employed by your competitors and dig into their SaaS seo checklist. Leveraging insights from their research can save you time and resources while steering your strategy in the right direction. Invest wisely in proven strategies to maximize your marketing impact. When researching your competitors' SEO, use tools that offer concrete data on "how to do competitive analysis in SEO" to guide your decisions. This practical approach ensures a more informed and effective adjustment to your SEO strategy. Ready to Grow Your SaaS Business? get in touch 5 Key Elements to Cover in Your SaaS Competitive Analysis 1. Competitor Research: Begin your SaaS competitive analysis by identifying at least five direct competitors. Consider potential indirect players that could emerge in your niche if direct alternatives are scarce or offer alternative solutions. This comprehensive overview sets the stage for a nuanced understanding of your SaaS tool's competitive environment. 2. Highlighting USPs: Setting your SaaS product apart from the crowd is essential. Do a competitive analysis to identify distinctive features, user interface, and overall user experience that distinguishes your tool. For example, ClickUp communicates its unique selling propositions on comparison-based landing pages. 3. Strategic Keyword Research: Research and find the organic keywords that prominently position your competitors. Attention to search volume, keyword difficulty, current rankings, and associated URLs. Explore competitors' content strategies for each keyword, including creating content clusters around specific terms. This in-depth keyword research, aligned with the SEO competitor analysis checklist, lays the groundwork for enhancing your tool's visibility in search engine results. 4. Marketing Strategies: Break down the marketing strategies embraced by competitors. Evaluate whether they predominantly rely on blogs or diversify their content with lead-generating ebooks. Identify the social media platforms where they actively engage and scrutinize their email marketing initiatives. This detailed examination of their marketing approach provides valuable insights into effective strategies for connecting with your target audience. 5. Market Share Analysis: Evaluate the current market share held by your competitors and discern trends in its trajectory. Investigate whether market share fluctuations are linked to introducing new features or other factors. This analysis enables you to identify strategies contributing to market share expansion, presenting opportunities to strengthen your SaaS product’s competitive position. Additionally, consider integrating SEO benchmarking to further develop your understanding of the market dynamics and optimize your product's visibility in search engine rankings. 3 Competitive Analysis Frameworks Porter’s Five Forces This framework allows us to measure focus in a segment with five elements. With these insights, you can understand your competition and improve your brand identity. New entrants Purchasers Suppliers Alternatives Intensity of growth Growth-Share Matrix This type of framework involves products that are seen against the market competitiveness and landscape. Once these products are integrated, they can be assessed for growth potential and market share. This approach enables more effective product evaluation and facilitates business expansion. Perceptual Mapping Perceptual mapping involves visualizing your product or brand’s position relative to competitors. This framework allows you to assess your product’s positioning compared to others and understand its place in the minds of your target audience. Top Tools for Conducting SaaS Competitive Analysis SEMRush SEMrush is an extensive marketing tool that covers various aspects, including competitor analysis, keyword research, search engine optimization, and PPC management. It allows users to uncover the keywords their competitors target, assess organic and paid traffic sources, analyze content and social media strategies, and explore diverse advertising approaches. Furthermore, SEMrush provides a complete market analysis feature, helping users evaluate their market position effectively. Ahrefs Ahrefs provides features similar to SEMRush, allowing users to conduct comprehensive SEO competitor analysis services. Users can scrutinize competitors' websites, traffic, and strategies through the Site Explorer tool. By entering a competitor's name, a list of keywords for which they rank is generated, and this list can be refined using filters for more precise results. Furthermore, Ahrefs facilitates thorough site audits, addressing issues impacting your and your competitors' websites within the SEO competitor analysis services. Ubersuggest Ubersuggest provides several tools, such as a backlink checker, SEO analyzer, and website traffic checker. They've recently added a feature where you can input a competitor's domain to receive enhanced keyword ideas. With the SEO analyzer, you can discover pages from your competitors that rank well for popular organic keywords, helping you create more engaging and superior content. Moz Moz is an all-in-one tool to meet all your SEO needs, offering a specialized feature for SaaS competitive analysis. Through their True Competitor Engine, you can identify your primary competitors, uncover keyword gaps, and pinpoint content opportunities. Additionally, the tool allows users to access three complimentary reports daily, providing an opportunity for a trial before committing to its use. BuzzSumo BuzzSumo stands out with its specialized feature for competitor intelligence, making it an essential tool for refining your content strategy. If you're seeking insights on how to do competitor analysis SEO, BuzzSumo has the answers. By thoroughly examining your competition, you can get insights into the performance of their content, determine optimal platforms, understand their target audience, and compare the effectiveness of your content against theirs. Moreover, BuzzSumo allows you to pinpoint gaps in your competitors' social media strategies, offering actionable opportunities to leverage your SEO approach. Hootsuite Streams Hootsuite Streams is a powerful tool that simplifies tracking keywords, hashtags, and competitors across all social channels. Its user-friendly design ensures easy navigation, allowing any team member to access the insights they need in one centralized place. With Hootsuite, you can track and monitor your competitors' posts, engagement, social topics, and the trends they follow, providing in-depth insights for your strategic planning. Conclusion As the SaaS companies rise, conducting thorough competitive analysis is crucial. Start your research by exploring Google and potential competitors' websites within your niche. Collect valuable insights and information to inform your marketing tactics. Establish an action plan for your company's marketing strategies and commit to ongoing competitor analysis to stay ahead of emerging trends and be well-prepared for upcoming challenges. Don’t miss keyword research, “Why would you want to run a competitive analysis of keywords?" Understanding competitors' keyword strategies provides valuable insights into industry trends, audience preferences, and areas of opportunity. It ensures that your keyword strategy remains relevant and competitive. For expert guidance, contact Saffron Edge, a digital marketing partner ready to elevate your SaaS business. Ready to Grow Your SaaS Business? get in touch ...
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Tips for Brick-and-Mortar Retailers to Improve Revenue Amidst COVID-19
The arrival of COVID-19 has made all the predictions regarding 2020 go astray. All the businesses that were expecting growth and profit during 2020 have to come up with new survival strategies since COVID-19 has changed many things for most of the industries. You will be surprised to know that about 60% of the businesses from all over the world have been closed because of COVID-19 and this number is going to keep on increasing. Although each and every type of industry has been affected because of COVID-19, the one particular sector that has been affected the most because of the arrival of the virus is the retail sector or what people call as brick and mortar retailers. If you are running a similar kind of store and finding it difficult to keep your business alive then it's high time to come up with new strategies in order to improve revenues. The year 2020 might have turned out to be a big opportunity for online businesses but the same year has turned out to be a nightmare for brick and mortar retailers. But in order to make things easy for you, in this blog post, we will not only discuss possible solutions for retail stores to improve their revenue but also go through the current situations and look at the most common issues. The effects of COVID-19 on the retail sector When the dust will settle and COVID-19 will be gone completely, a new normal will arrive in the market and this new normal will include drastically changed human behavior and habits. One such change in human behavior and habit will be a shift from impulse buying to planned purchase. Window shopping will keep on decreasing and this will lead to reduced sales in retail shops. Another trend that you will see on the rise is crisis spending where customers will be restricted to purchase only essential products because of the economic slowdown. The crisis spending will continue to be a part of the consumer habit even after the end of the virus. Another change that we are currently encountering is focused on individualism. For example, you will see that there is a sudden decrease in the demand for group items since gathering is being completely avoided. Tips for improving revenue amidst COVID-19 Just because the current situation is tough and you will have to go through many changes, this doesn’t mean that you should also belong to the 60% of the business mentioned at the outset of the article. There are many retail shops out there that are still surviving and making improvements to their overall revenue. Source: Unsplash Here are some of the tips that you can use in order to improve revenue amidst COVID-19 Increase customer engagement via various mediums If you are running a retail store then you must be aware of the fact that only 20% of your customers produce 80% of your revenue. Since these customers will always remain important for the survival and growth of your business, it is crucial for you to pay special attention to these customers, especially during the current situation. The loyalty of these customers will keep your retail store alive during the pandemic and this is why you can’t ignore them. Whether it is emails, blogs, articles, or newsletters, you will have to use all the mediums possible in order to stay connected with these customers as they should be your main focus, especially when you are struggling to survive. If you succeed in illustrating that you are there for your loyal customers during a tough time, you will be able to nurture your loyal customers. Identify your loyal customers and start making changes to your current strategy. You can follow down on the path of focusing your investment towards marketing efforts and build a presence online. This will help your customers connect with you more easily and you will be able to boost engagement. It will also help you target new customers who are looking for viable options. Localizing your digital marketing strategies will enhance the chances of people finding you and it will eventually bring in business. Leveraging social media Social media engagement has increased multifold over this past year. If you own a brick and mortar retail business, it becomes essential for you to garner an audience for yourself. You can also leverage the platforms in educating the masses about latest trends that you follow or the sanitization process you use to keep you customers safe and whatnot. If you are having trouble bringing in business, do not get disheartened and work towards building a brand. You need to think long-term and set up a digital base for yourself. No matter how local your brand is, you would need to establish a presence digitally to survive what this pandemic has brought on you. Gift cards This might look like a marketing tip from the 90s but you should know that it works really well even during the current situation. Gift cards provide all the different types of retailers with an immediate injection of cash and in addition to this, it also improves repeat purchases among customers as well. You should know that gift cards are an amazing way to stay in front of the audience and it can also be helpful in acquiring new customers as well. Even during the current situation, you can easily send digital gift cards to all your customers and make them feel special. But your digital gift cards shouldn’t be limited to your customers only as you can use them even for your prospects. Enhance your digital presence by structuring your messages The importance of messaging has increased by many folds just because of the current situation. All the firms out there now need to be more sensitive when it comes down to customer’s needs and this can only be done when firms will start reworking their marketing and advertising strategies. If you were running a campaign that included the gathering of people, you will need to make some changes to those campaigns as you will need to show the reality of the current situation through your marketing campaigns. You can’t keep using the same marketing campaign if it doesn’t fit according to the current situation. But this doesn’t mean that you will have to completely change your core branding message as all that you will need to do is to make sure that your campaigns fit like a glove in the current situation. Instead of being opportunistic, you will have to stay authentic during these tough times. Common and regular mistakes in your marketing campaign will mean that customers are less likely to interact with your company. This would be the best time to invest in making your marketing efforts more aligned. You can even get your digital marketing outsourced to save up on the extra expenditure. Working on shipping cost If you are planning for any type of cost-cutting then you should consider your shipping department for such a purpose. If possible, you should start looking for fulfilling your orders manually and you should never forget including local shipping features. If the customers that you are serving are close to your firm then you can offer them a local delivery option in which the local rates will be applied to selected zones. You will have to align the shipping cost according to the current situation. The NEED to move online You should know that because of the shift in consumer behavior during the lockdown, most of the consumers have moved online to purchase goods. There are many countries out there that are still going in for a lockdown because of the second wave of the coronavirus and this will further fuel the growth of online usage. Even people who restricted digital platforms in the past are now moving to it because they have no other options. When the dust settles, people will get into the new normal, the usage of the online platform will keep on increasing. Because of this you will have to shift to the online platform and it doesn't mean complete closure of your brick and mortar shop, it just means having another platform for the consumers to buy your goods. You can simply start by choosing a website developing company and get your website built in a professional manner. There are maximum chances that the website developing company may provide SEO services through which you will be able to rank up in the search results and this will further boost your digital presence. Soon after the shift to the digital platform, you will witness a robust growth in your revenue. Get ready for the new normal because even after the end of the pandemic as consumer behavior and habit will continue to evolve. Now, if you are ready to step ahead and evolve with them, connect with Saffron Edge now! ...
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