Strategies for Using Technology to Improve Your Small Business

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With much of our every day lives being conducted online, it’s important for current businesses to adopt the latest technology solutions in order to thrive and grow. If you’re seeking a few new ideas, here are six options you can implement to improve your own small business.

Chatbots

Potential or returning customers often have questions for your business and they’re in need of answers as quickly as possible. Chatbots can be a great tool, as they provide customer service 24/7, or when staff is unavailable.

But what are chatbots? A chatbot is a computer program that simulates and processes human conversation, either written or spoken. They can be as simple as programs that answer a quick query with a single-line response, or as sophisticated as digital assistants that learn and evolve to deliver increasing levels of personalization as they gather and process information.

Never allow artificial intelligence (AI) technology to completely override human interaction. It can be helpful for simple queries, or to point customers in the right direction, but can be very frustrating to a potential customer when they can’t reach a human during normal working hours, and can even end in your business losing sales.

Conversion Rate Optimization Tools (CRO)

Customers come to your website looking to fulfill a need, and how they interact is important. While modern surveillance oftentimes go too far in extracting information, there are still several insights that can be useful for you to help optimize your customers’ experiences. To learn about these insights, try these conversion rate optimization tools.

• Hot Jar: With Hot Jar, your business can monitor the behavior of your website’s users. What links are customers click on the most? The least? How far do they scroll down? What do they completely ignore? Using these insights, you can make the right improvements to your site.
• Optimizely: Using this tool you can create A/B testing for your site, which is an experiment where two or more variants of a page are shown to users at random, and statistical analysis is used to determine which variant performs better with your customers.

With the help of these tools you’ll be able to optimize your website and generate more leads.

Information Technology Infrastructure Library Courses (ITIL)

To improve the IT within your business or organization, it’s worth getting an ITIL certification. ITIL will provide guidance and structure to your business, allowing you to be more efficient and effective with all aspects, including communication with your team, and in turn, deliver better customer experiences. For more information, check out ITIL certification online.

Cybersecurity Solutions

All modern businesses need to have, and understand, cybersecurity solutions to protect their business online. Investing in cloud security software, anti-virus software and a multi-factor authentication system are important, as small businesses are often the target of data breaches. Suffering a cyberattack can affect both your reputation and your finances.

Use a Customer Relationship Management System (CRM)

A customer relationship management system is a type of software that allows you to store your customer contact details, as well as their preferences, and previous interactions, thus enhancing your customers’ experience.

Offer Virtual Services

Due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, many customers feel more comfortable with online services. While it’s likely that you’ve already been providing virtual services throughout these shifting times, as restrictions are lifted, it’s best to continue to offer them long-term.

Providing virtual events is a fantastic way to market your business. They are inexpensive (no flights, accommodations, additional travel expenses) and have the potential for high levels of participation. Virtual events will allow you to present your brand to your target audience and also widen your reach with engaging activities that help uplift participants.

These are just a few ways in which technology can help improve your small business, by building loyal customers who will continue to return because you put them at ease and fulfilled their needs.