Business Growth And Development Made Easier

Julie Starr • Jun 08, 2021



When running your own business , you may find it hard to look beyond the task at hand or your day-to-day operations. However, it’s incredibly important that you are able to be forward-thinking, and lay down plans ahead of time that will support your growth and development if you want to succeed. After all, if your company does not continue to grow and develop, customer satisfaction will decrease as you fail to keep up with consumer trends and habits.

With that in mind, here are some top tips and tricks that you can use to grow and develop your company. 

Take good care of your staff. The right employees can sometimes be the difference between a successful business and one which fails to take hold. Therefore, it is important you treat your staff with the appropriate care and support. To begin with, this means that you should ensure that your workplace maintains the highest health and safety standards in all areas. For example, if your employees will be spending a lot of time behind the wheel you should ensure that they are complying with drivers hours rules and regulations. Taking care of your employees means that they feel more appreciated in the workplace, and as a result, will likely complete their job to a higher standard – making business growth easier than ever. 

Update your environmental policies. If you’re looking for a way to expand your customer base, you should ensure that your environmental policies are up to scratch by avoiding common sustainability mistakes , being transparent about the products/materials you use, and reducing your carbon emissions . This is due to the fact that studies suggest that customers are more likely to purchase products or services from companies with strong environmental protection policies. As a result, refining your policy is a great way to grow your business, while taking care of the planet. 

If improving your environmental credentials is costly, then you can investigate the use of a credit union small business loan to bridge the cost. 

Boost your productivity. If you want to run a successful business, you need to ensure that you are as productive as possible. By boosting your productivity at work , you’ll be able to improve both the quality of your work and the amount of time it takes to complete certain tasks. Thankfully, there are many ways in which you can boost your productivity in the name of business growth and development. For example, you can outsource staff to tackle all of your administrative duties, as opposed to spending hours performing these tasks yourself. 

Get online. Changing consumer habits and the COVID-19 pandemic means that online shopping has reached new heights. This means that businesses without an online presence will struggle to grow beyond their current customer base or local area. Therefore, if you are looking to grow your business, you should start by developing your online presence. This means far more than giving your website a little update, you should also think carefully about curating a strong social media presence. Having an active social media account, complete with quality content, will help you reach a global audience and increase your revenue significantly.

Fresh Content: Where Do You Get The Green For Your Green Business?

By Julie Starr • 19 Apr, 2024
If you’re looking to start up a business that puts environmental responsibility at the forefront of how it operates, or that aims to offer new eco-friendly products and services to the market, then you need to make sure you have a plan for it. In part, you need to think about where the money is going to come from to help you get the business up and running. Here, we’re going to look at a few examples of places you can get the funding your green business needs. Finding like-minded investors A lot of capital in the startup spaces comes from investors who will take the time to look over a host of prospective businesses that are looking to get their start and will choose those that best align with their goals. Finding an investor isn’t always easy, so start by networking in the right professional spaces, especially those that might built specifically for entrepreneurs and business owners in the green sector. There are websites that can help pair your business up with investors, as well, but this can be a fairly competitive space. You want to have the room to be able to talk to potential investors about the profitability of your business, as well as the values and dedication to eco-friendliness that drive it. Getting hold of some credit The other traditional means of funding any business is to get a loan that can allow you to cover all of the necessary upfront costs, and running costs until you’re able to get yours up, running, and making money. Banks were the typical method of borrowing money like this, originally, but as banks got bigger, they lent less to smaller businesses, and as such, commercial funding solutions rose up to take their place, to some degree. If you’re going to try to borrow money, then you need to ensure that you are completely prepared for the application process, which can necessitate a business plan, which is designed, in part, to help show the viability and path to profitability to any lenders. Finding green grants and other financial incentives The push towards greener businesses and more sustainable industries isn’t something that’s only on the minds of a few business owners. There are always state-funded and non-profit-funded initiatives that aim to help those with green businesses on their mind get their start. You should take a look at the range of green business grants and other funding options set up, be it locally, in your state, or federally. Some of these funds and grants will be set up for businesses tackling climate change, ecosystem change, and environmental waste in specific ways, but there are always more grants to keep an eye out for, so make sure you learn how to write a grant proposal well. Finding those who are like-minded, either in seeing the profit potential in your business, or in getting behind the values of it, can help you not only get the funding you need, but it can lead to very advantageous relationships in the future, as well.

4 Ways to Make Sure Your Business is as Safe as Possible

By Julie Starr • 17 Apr, 2024
If there’s one thing that all business owners have in common, it’s that you want to have a successful business that rakes in the profits. However, some business owners then start to ignore the importance of safety in the workplace. Having a safe business is integral to the health of your employees which in turn, affects the success of your company. And, when it’s overlooked or not implemented properly in your business, you’re actually risking how well your business functions. Not having the right business safety protocols in place can and will affect productivity, cause injuries, cause losses, and even put you at risk of major action being taken against you in a courtroom. So, if you want to make sure that doesn’t happen to you, take a look at these safety tips that you should implement into your business. Have clear equipment safety procedures If you run a business within an industry that uses machinery for things like manufacturing and construction, then it’s so important to make sure you put in place some safety guidelines to govern the use of that equipment . Make sure that the safety guidelines are clear and very easy for everyone to understand, and without the risk of any confusion from anyone on your team. And remember to make sure that the machinery is only used for its intended purpose. Doing that can help you avoid any operational misuse that could end up in someone getting hurt. Also, there are lots of pieces of machinery like forklifts that need the user to have special training. So, if you allow someone to use machinery without the necessary training, you’re putting their health and safety at risk, not to mention the lawsuit that could be filed against you. That’s why it’s important to make sure your equipment and machinery safety procedures are clear for all to see at all times. Make sure there are clear safety rules Alongside making sure that your machinery and equipment safety rules are always in clear view, you will also need to make sure you publish important business safety rules. You’ll need to think about everything, from safety compliance to health, and you’ll need to make sure all of those rules are alway available to your employees. If you’re unsure on what’s compliant in your industry, or you simply want to make sure you’re not missing a trick, you can use isnetworld compliance assistance to make sure you’re running things how you should be. And, where necessary, these rules should be placed in multiple locations of the workplace to make sure all employees and any visitors are aware of your safety procedures. You should also make sure you’re regularly reviewing and updating these rules and procedures and let your team members know what changes have been made, even if they’re only minor changes. Make everyone accountable for each other’s safety While it’s important for you to make sure you, your team, and anyone else that visit’s your business location are safe at all times, there’s only so much you can do. Everyone needs to be held accountable for their own safety, so it’s important for you to create a culture of awareness in the workplace. You’ll need to start by encouraging them to follow the rules you’ve put in place, and you can do this by giving them the equipment and materials they need to work in a safe manner. You should also encourage everyone to be accountable for others safety as well, and this can be done by making sure safety equipment is left in the right place, or by making sure things are cleaned after use to prevent any damage. For example, making sure knives in the kitchen are cleaned well and not left somewhere that could be dangerous to the next person in the kitchen, such as the sink. Provide first aid training Finally, if your business uses any type of machinery or equipment where someone could get hurt, you should always have someone on hand to provide first aid if needed. That’s why it’s a good idea to make sure everyone has first aid training in case something does happen. There are loads of first aid training companies out there that can come in and teach your team members as a group, and they will certify them afterwards to show they’ve learned what they need to. It might be a cost you don’t particularly want to front, but it might just save the life of you or one of your workers.
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