This is our last blog of 2016 so we thought we’d wind up the year with a list of New Year’s resolutions we think that we and our customers should aim to keep over the year ahead.
1. Start with a strategy
It seems like every month or so “the next big thing” in marketing comes along and the pressure’s on to change course in your marketing plans so that you can be there and be there early. Sometimes whatever it is does turn out to be a major force in marketing, a lot of the time it doesn’t and most of the time the advantage of getting on the scene early is a whole lot less than it’s made out to be. If you’re a small and/or local business, then advertising in your local area needs to be a top priority and generally, the most cost effective way to do it is through leaflet delivery in London. These days customers will typically expect you to have some sort of online presence, give them some help to find it by putting the details on your leaflet. You can update your strategy as the year goes on if there is a good reason to do so but resist the temptation to jump about to accommodate the latest trend.
2. Get engaged with your community
Go to the website of any major company and the chances are you’re going to find some sort of corporate responsibility page and it will probably contain something about the way in which the company is engaging with various communities as well as something about the charity or charities with which they work. Companies do this to make (potential) customers aware that the company gives back to the world as well as just making profits out of it. The irony being that customers often like to give their money to such companies, which helps to make them more profitable. This approach has an impact at a local level too, possibly even more so. Get involved with your local community in some way and make sure that you keep people updated about what you’re doing. For local businesses, this is a great way to build good feeling amongst their natural customer pool.
3. Get (more) organised
We suspect that this one (or variations of it) is going to appear on quite a few lists of New Year’s resolutions and for much the same reasons. Running a small business takes a lot of effort and sometimes we’re all so busy getting on with the day to day stuff that we never find the time to look at how we do what we do to see if we could do it more effectively (and leave more time for other matters). Even if you do already consider yourself to be pretty organised, New Year is always a good time to have a review of the last year (and your business in general) and just double-check that all your systems and processes are as efficient as they can be.
