Communication is an incredibly important part of running a successful business. You need to be able to effectively communicate with your target customers and the members of your own team. But doing so requires a lot of skill and strategy.
This week, members of our small business community share tips for targeting your ideal customer, creating effective communication in the workplace and more.
Read on for a full list of valuable resources.
Use These Questions to Target Your Ideal Customer
In order to target your ideal customers, you first need to find out who he or she is. In this post, Brittany Taylor of See Britt Write shares a long list of 80 questions you can use to find out who your target customers are.
Create Effective Communication in the Workplace
If you want your business to succeed, you need to make sure that your team can work well together. And to do that, you need to create a system of effective communication in the workplace. Kelly Riggs of Business LockerRoom discusses the importance of effective communication at work, along with some tips for creating such an environment.
Make People Fall in Love With Your Online Store
Running an ecommerce business means you have to convince customers to fall in love with your store if you want them to shop with you again and again. Vanhishikha Bhargava of Exit Bee includes some tips for doing just that. And BizSugar members also share their input on the post here.
Make the Most of Marketing Automation
There are so many different services and processes out there today to help make your marketing tasks easier. But marketing automation isn’t a magic solution. Stacy Jackson of Jackson Marketing Services shares some tips to ensure that your marketing automation actually increases the effectiveness of your overall marketing plan.
Add These Must Haves to Your About Page
Your about page is an important part of your website because it tells visitors and potential customers who you are and why they should want to work with you. This post by Crystal Rice of PixelSmith includes three must-haves to include on your about page for contractors, but most of the points are relevant to other industries as well.
Get Over These Self Publishing Obstacles
People come up with all kinds of excuses for not writing or publishing their own books. But self publishing is now easier than ever, thanks to platforms like Amazon Direct Publishing. Vinay Kachhara of Aha!NOW shares some reasons why you should get over those obstacles. And members of the BizSugar community also discuss the post here.
Check Out This Guide to Local SEO
When marketing a local business, it’s important that you make it as easy as possible for local customers to find you via search engines. If you’re starting a local business or just want to improve your local SEO strategy, check out this guide to local SEO by Chris Babajide on WP Site Updates.
Create a Call to Action That People Actually Click
So you’ve added a call to action on your website, but it’s not getting any results. There can be several reasons why your CTA isn’t getting the results you hoped for. This post by Nicole Dieker on KlientBoost includes some potential problems your call to action may have, along with ways to fix them. BizSugar members also share thoughts on the post here.
Keep Both Your Body and Your Biz in Shape
To have sustainable success in business, you also need to take care of your own health. And since January is a popular time for people to renew their health goals, this post by Nellie Akalp of CorpNet includes some tips for keeping both your body and your business in shape.
Don’t Be Fooled by Prior Business Models
When you’re running a startup, it can be easy to fall into the trap of thinking that a business model will work simply because it has worked in the past. But that isn’t a great strategy, as this post by Martin Zwilling on Startup Professionals Musings points out. You can also see discussion about the post in the BizSugar community.
If you’d like to suggest your favorite small business content to be considered for an upcoming community article, please send your news tips to: sbtips@gmail.com.
Communication Dice Photo via Shutterstock
Thanks for adding a mention of my post on marketing automation to your article!
Annie Pilon
You’re welcome! Great post!
You must use simple words. The truth is that everyone cannot be on same page when it comes to vocabulary. Hence, to be effective in communicating with your target audience, and/or team members, you should always use words that can be easily understood. When ambiguous words are being used, then there will come a point that you could be misinterpreted.
Aira Bongco
This is true. You need to speak the language of the customer to really get through to them.
Annie, thank you for including SeeBrittWrite in your post! I’m so thrilled to see more people in the small business community discussing the importance of finding and listening to customers–and then going out and doing it! /applause
Jason Quey
Boom! Great roundup Annie.
Thanks for including Klientboost in your list :).
Aira Bongco
It is important to look at all of your marketing messages and see if you are talking to the right audience. This will keep your messages laser targeted to your target audience.
Aira Bongco
With technology, communication has definitely changed. It is important to tap into these new technologies in order to maximize outputs.
As someone who spends their waking hours convincing would-be clients to devote resources (time and money) to producing video content for their brand and their products and services, would you add messaging through video into your recommended mix of communication tools?
Thanks for the great content!
The attached resource will help everyone to get targeted customers