It’s hard to believe that there are only two months left in 2015. The year has flown by! If you haven’t already started planning for 2016, now is the perfect time to start. Even if you think you are where you need to be as a company it is important to re-assess goals and not get stuck in past successes. It is important to keep moving forward. You should look at ways to keep your business expanding and evolving. If you don’t, your company will be overtaken by the competition. You’ll be left in the dust wondering what went wrong. You don’t want to be a company that goes bankrupt from innovation lag. Do you remember Blockbuster, Kodak, or Polaroid? While you may not be as big as they once were, as long as your business stays innovative and interesting, you’ll continue to gain new customers.
Here are some ways that you could be planning ahead and improving your business in 2016.
Invest in Training and Development
Having employees that are well trained and developing a learning organization can go a long way in employee retention and engagement. Remember, the success of your business is reliant on your employees doing their jobs well. Plus you also want to be training future leaders and have a succession plan in place. But to make this happen, you need to implement a training and development program to help your employees learn some new skills.
Sending employees on training courses that will help with productivity, software knowledge and use or customer interactions are popular options. Training and development applies to all sectors and industries. There are always ways to improve upon and help develop the skills of your employees – even in manufacturing and production. Ideally, you want to be using the least amount of energy to make the highest number of quality products. If your products are made out of plastic, one option could be learning all about scientific injection moulding. This is one of the most efficient methods of production and can be a key training component for any manufacturing employee.
It is sad to see that in many organizations, training and development budgets are usually the first to go when there are cut-backs but they are so vital to the success of a company. Look at how you can implement more training and development in 2016 for your employees.
Invest In Marketing
Naturally, if you want your business to stay successful, you have to make sure that you keep the customers that you already have and attract new ones. A big part of this is just making sure that they remember your business and keep it top of mind. To do that, you should invest in some new marketing and promotion of your business. You might want to start by looking into SEO. If your business is expanding it might be time to invest in a Global SEO strategy. This will help to ensure that clients from all over the world find your business online. As well as this, you should consider expanding your social media reach and presence. Try to interact with new customers through social media and keep building relationships with your existing customers as well. Social media is a great way to build rapport and keep clients loyal. You are showing them that your business cares about them and values their opinions.
Gain New Investment And Expand
Lastly, you should think about where your business can go next. You should be brainstorming with your business partners and colleagues. You need to look for fresh and innovative directions to take your business. Do not just settle on offering one service or product. Continue to expand your business and you’ll gain the interest of new customers. You can even think about expanding your company into new sectors of the industry you are already in. Of course, to do this you may need to gain new funding. That probably means that you will need the help of investors. You may want to attend a tradeshow to gain their interest and support. But you will have to make a big impression and show how you hope to maintain the success that you already have while expanding and growing. Developing a good business plan helps and is key in attracting new investors.
These ideas are sure to keep your business fresh and allow you to keep moving forward in 2016.
Photo Credits: Bigstock, Pixabay
[…] attention, and building a website that shows off your work. Start doing this now, and you’ll be all set for a successful 2016! Remember, a good freelancer spends 20% of their time marketing, and growing their personal […]