Despite of the size of your business, you need to find and follow the best ways of working in order to achieve the objectives of your business. In the industry, these best ways of working are referred to as best practices. As a business organization you can adhere and follow best practices through different areas. That can be aligned with your business functionalities or modules. You can simply start with the followings to improve your team collaboration and enhance productivity.
- Inspire innovation
- Keep individuals organized
- Ask the team to share their story
- Implement effective task management
- Encourage open communication
- Align their interest
What can you gain by implementing best practices for small businesses?
If you are running a small business, now the time has come to grow and compete with the giants in the industry. By implementing best practices for small business, the following benefits can be achieved. The benefits cannot be restricted to an exact list because as a small company you can enjoy a wide range of benefits indirectly if you adhere to the best practices properly.
- Reduce cost and save more
- Be productive and more effective
- Increase the security of data
- Become more competitive in the industry
- Increase sales and develop new markets
- Improve the skills of your workforce
- Use the latest technology more effectively
- Reduce waste and improve quality of work
- Respond more quickly to innovations in your domain/ sector
If you are a small business who is already following best practices keep it up and add improvements when needed. Because continuity leads to success. If you haven’t thought about best practices, then start it by today itself.
Identify best practices corresponding to the nature of your business
Depending on the nature of your business the best practices can be vary. So, the business call should be made wisely by considering all environment factors. Since you are a small business now you need to understand the fact that growth means more customers, more revenue, more inventory, and more success. With all these success factors there’s risk. So, in order to minimize the risk and lead to success, you should wisely choose and follow best practices.
Implementation of best practices is a continuous flow not a single step
There is no standard process defined in the industry for best practices, but the steps given below can be useful to practice best practices in your small business.
- Identify one business process or service to improve.
- Look for one metric to measure.
- Find competitors and companies within your industry and outside your industry.
- Collect information on the successful, best practices of other companies.
- Modify the best practice for your situation.
- Implement the process then measure the results.
- Remember to survey companies of all sizes not just small businesses. And the time to complete a best practice study doesn’t have to take months. A few weeks of literature research and telephone interviews are often enough for small business.
- Borrowing best practices from other businesses and industries can dramatically improve your small business. Take the time to learn the ingredients of success and your business will excel in good times and bad.
According to the State of Small Business Report, 42% of small businesses plan to increase their IT spending in 2017. Today’s technology is helping small businesses better handle aspects of their daily operations.
If you are looking forward to blend with best practices, you probably need to go with productivity and collaboration tools. With so many tools to choose from, finding the right fit for your business can seem daunting. In this article, we’ll explore some key features of Microsoft-365 (M365) which will increase your productivity and streamline the business processes while protecting your business. It is a single solution which covers all your requirements such as collaboration, communication, data security, secure access, planning, customization and automation. No matter that you are a small business M365 offers attractive plans for you. You can choose the right flavor for your business. The main key features provided by M365 are listed below:
- Desktop versions of Office apps for PC & Mac
- Web & mobile versions of Office apps
- Teamwork & communication
- Email & calendaring
- File storage & sharing
- Security & compliance
- Support & deployment
- Tools to build & manage your business
Under each feature M365 provides applications and services to enhance your productivity and collaboration. Few of the key applications and services are given below:
- Word
- Excel
- PowerPoint
- Access
- Outlook
- Exchange
- OneDrive
- SharePoint
- Teams
Moving towards e-Commerce
Even the small businesses are now moving towards e-Commerce trends. Then as a small business why not to try e-Commerce best practices trending in the industry.
- Have a Mobile-Friendly Interface
Most consumers are moving towards online shopping. For that they are likely to use their smartphones or tablets. Having this in mind, having a website that is mobile-friendly is a must because it can help you to increases the chances for sales aneamd new customers. When your website is easily accessible through their smartphone, they’re more likely to stay, browse, and purchase from your business.
- Minimalism is the best
While images are always a good choice, you also must think about what images you use, how many, and their layout. A good rule of thumb to remember is that a minimalist, clean design goes a long way. In the perspective of a good user experience minimalistic designs are the best.
- Always remember that the content matters
Show your customers that you can answer their questions and provide useful information by creating useful web content. Keep in mind, however, that not all kinds of content belong to your site. As a small business growing in the industry choose your content wisely. Then it will help you in the process of developing a good marketing strategy.
These e-commerce best practices can really make a difference for your small business as time goes on. Use them and watch your business grow faster day by day.
At the end of the day it should not be all about productions, operations and marketing. As a small business you need to be aware about your security. When it comes to data and information, security is a critical topic. As small business you might think that you are too small to be a target. You are wrong even a small business can have security threats. Beforehand you need to get rid of two common myths. They are the fact that small businesses believe that they have enough security in their place. Other thing is that they think spending on cyber security is a very complex and an expensive process. Once you understand the fact that small businesses do need security you can try out few of the security best practices given below.
- Stop using common passwords
- Segmenting your business network
- Securing every entrance
- Define, educate and enforce policy
- Awareness on security
- Usage of encryption
Protect your small business with the good choice of following best practices. Not only as a business you will succeed as individuals also you can level up your careers.
