With the world coming to a halt because of the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19), how will a small business survive?
It’s highly likely over the next 30 to 45 days, life as we know it will be completely different. We are already experiencing event cancellations; many universities are extending spring breaks and will resume classes online and schools will likely follow. Small businesses are already experiencing the pinch.
As a small business owner, how will you survive? More importantly, how do you continue to grow? Here are 8 strategies for your small business emergency growth plan.
- Video meetings – Instead of cancelling your meetings, move them online. Regardless of the size of your meeting, it can happen virtually. With software like Zoom, you can hold your breakout sessions as well as a main meeting.
- Make sure you record the sessions. By recording the sessions, you can get permission of the attendees to use portions in your marketing.
- Also, if you don’t get permission, hire a great video editor to splice and crop the video into segments with only your voice and likeness. By sending these videos out in your social media, you stay top of mind.
- Video & Audio Q&A sessions – For small business owners with children, video meetings might not be feasible with everyone at home. Another great way to stay top of mind is by creating video and audio Q&A sessions. When you record them, record them based on conversations you’ve had with your best client. Even though most people change their voice when they are speaking in video, speak just like you would to your best client. This will help develop rapport with your prospects and help you attract others that are just like your best client. These recordings can be used in so many places, such as your social media, a podcast, and a blog.
- Presales & Gift Certificates – During this time where the world is likely to utilize self-quarantine strategies, offer gift certificates and presales. This will help your cash flow as well. This strategy is especially important for businesses that offer in-person services or traditional brick and mortar businesses, like restaurants.
- Automation – By automating as many activities as you can in your business, these activities can continue, even when life happens.
- Block Time for Sales Generating Activities – Remember this crisis will not last forever. After you’ve made sure you and your family are safe, spend a couple of hours per day on sales generating activities. Sales generating activities are activities that generate leads or move leads to sales. Many times, small business owners spend too much time on things that will never generate sales. By specifically blocking time for sales generating activities, you are giving yourself a leg up.
- Telephone Outreach – Your voice holds power! Make at least 10 telephone calls per day about your business to previous clients, current clients and prospects. Before you make the calls, have an outline for the call. Allow for a short time to talk about the current events. This will develop rapport and empathy. However, don’t get distracted. By having an outline or bullet points, you have something in front of you to make sure you’ve expressed what you intended to say. Another great tip is having a script for the voicemail if the telephone call isn’t answered.
- Track, Measure & Analyze – By tracking and measuring what you are doing, you can really know which parts are working and which parts aren’t. Most business owners stop doing processes because they think it isn’t working when it was only a segment of the activity wasn’t working.
- Accountability Partner – It is easy to fool yourself into complacency and become part of the hysteria and fear. Instead, find an accountability partner that will help you re-center your focus on the plan.
Whether you choose to do one or all these things any type of action will positively affect your business. To talk about one on one strategies specific to your business connect with Client Attraction Systems http://bit.ly/TBPautomate
