The field of diesel repair is hopping. The United States Bureau of Labor and Statistics estimates the field will grow 9 percent from 2016 to 2026.
This growth only makes sense as businesses continue to grow and need diesel trucks to transport their goods from place to place in our country. Trucks matter so much that writer Stan Mack predicts if the trucking industry stopped for some reason or another, so would the United States economy.
Behind the industry of big rigs and eighteen-wheelers reside the skilled grease monkeys that make them move. Diesel mechanics keep trucks on the road and keep goods moving from place to place.
Keep reading to learn how to start your own diesel truck repair shop.
Truck Repair Shop Or Service Truck?
As you consider the move from diesel technician to diesel truck repair owner, you begin with one decision: truck or shop.
Diesel repair trucks have the mobility that a shop may not, and yet they are still a legitimate truck repair shop business, without the foundation. They’re just a shop on wheels.
A repair truck will serve customers remotely, giving them the luxury of you going to them. Because you do not have a shop, per se, you do not have to invest yet in certain tools, like a hoist.
You also have a limited scope of skills with a mobile shop, but you can offer your services to a fleet versus the average joe looking for an oil change. A service truck works well to service a fleet of trucks, especially if a customer doesn’t care that you’re in their yard.
The mobile shop works well if you want to get your name out there but don’t have the finances for a building yet.
A good mobile shop will have a place for tools, fluids, and parts along with a compressor, generator, welder, floor lights, and potentially a crane. Invest in a good truck because, after all, you’d hate to break down on your way to serve someone else’s vehicle.
If you’re looking at an actual building for your service shop, then consider location first. Look at the potential for a walk-in client with this particular location, which means you want a place with high traffic near a freeway.
What Equipment will the Building Need?
If you opt for a foundation and walls, a building, for your diesel repair shop, you’re going to need specific equipment before you hang your shingle out front. Invest in some diagnostic equipment, a brake lathe, jacks and jack stands, mechanic tools, and vehicle lifts.
Your essential tools will run you around $15,000. Expect to spend approximately $4,000 for each lift and its installation, and know that diagnostics machines and equipment can cost anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000.
This equipment does not come cheap, but you can find high-quality, used equipment if you know where to look. Keep an eye out for brand names, knowing that if you have your own equipment, you will not have to outsource specific tasks.
Keep an eye out for auctions and retiring mechanics. They will have used but quality equipment for much less money.
As you look at the building itself, look for a well-ventilated and well-lit structure. Consider having a shower installed so you and your technicians do not have to go home with the day’s work still on you.
Who Are Your Clients?
As you put together a business plan, ask yourself if you’ll be helping consumers or businesses. Businesses will require more heavy-duty service. Consumers, on the other hand, have a light-duty service.
Businesses often have a less emotional response to the service you give them as the person you’re working for is just an employee of the business and not the truck owner himself. He will be someone working with a budget and paying the bills.
Business work or heavy-duty service tends to generate more revenue, but they also require a specific skill set, so make sure you have the skills necessary to work on heavy-duty equipment.
Business vehicles tend to be more valuable because they do heavy-duty work as opposed to your basic farm diesel truck. These pieces of equipment make money for the business, so the owner values them more. Business diesel equipment also sustains more wear and tear compared to customer’s light-duty equipment.
If you’re going to opt for customers or light-duty service, think farm pickups or off-road diesel vehicles. These typically require light maintenance and do not earn as much revenue.
Will You Have Employees?
When you open your own diesel truck repair shop, you will most likely be the technician and business owner. You need to be forward-thinking, though, and consider if you will want employees in the future or if you want to be a one-man operation.
The majority of businesses are husband-wife teams, and if you’re in this boat, you must ask yourself: can your marriage sustain the stress of a business?
If you plan on having employees, vet the local tech school graduates. Consider offering an internship that may turn into something else.
What Will You Charge?
Labor Rate
Do some research regarding local shops to see what they charge. Then offer a commiserate labor rate or one slightly lower. If you have a slightly lower rate, then a client may preauthorize you to do preventative maintenance like what you can find mentioned in this article.
Parts markup
The common mark up on parts in stock at most diesel truck repair shops is 25% of total revenue. After all, carrying parts costs money, so make sure you have an appropriate mark up for the luxury of having the part in stock. Consider a graduated scale where the markup percentage goes down with more expensive parts.
Insurance
Check your federal, state, and local regulations to see what insurance you will need. The liability for a diesel truck mechanic is large. If the brakes you worked on fail, you are liable.
Do not underinsure yourself. If you have no idea how much insurance you’ll need, consult with seasoned vets that have done the work before you.
Consider the Cost, Then Take the Plunge
Once you’ve evaluated the decisions you need to open your very own truck repair shop, you can take the plunge with some knowledge. You can go to your local banker and then realtor with the full understanding of what you’re getting yourself into.
To read more interesting articles about business strategies, check out our blog.
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Most people are motivated in life by their own needs and wants. There are also those who dedicate their lives to noble causes and improve the world around them. Fortunately, there is a way to do both; ensure that you live a long and happy life while contributing to the lives of others. Generosity is extremely valuable, especially now that the human population is at its largest. It’s the perfect time to step up and discover a career that leads you to better your own life and help people around you. Here are a few examples of career paths that can help to make the world a better place.
Politics
The current political climate all over the world has become unpredictable. Divisions between people seem to be growing wider despite the fact that we live in one of the most accepting times in human history. Although politicians have a bad name, working in politics with a view to bettering the living conditions of people around the world is an honorable endeavor. Following your convictions and attempting to improve the world isn’t easy, but it is worthwhile.
Health
The world can never have enough doctors, nurses, surgeons, and researchers. Scientific advancements throughout the ages has led humanity to a point where people can live long lives with previously deadly diseases. Of course, doctors are very respected within society but there are other career options for people who want to take an alternative route. Mental health is extremely important and choosing a career that strives to help those with mental illness is hugely commendable. Take a look at the National Counselling Society for more information on how to get involved.
Entrepreneurship
It’s not uncommon for the business world to be portrayed as cutthroat and brutal, particularly through TV and movies. However, not all businesses can be lumped into this cold category. People who develop new technologies or create new inventions that serve the world are important for the healthy continuation of society. Designing to solve a problem or creating a business that brings care to people in need is a great way to make a positive difference through your work.
Education
The only reason the world has reached these heights of advancement and collective understanding is through the gradual improvement of education throughout the generations. Children are built to absorb information and being able to bestow knowledge upon them is a great way to plant the seed for a better future. Who knows what good that child might do when they grow up? Becoming a teacher makes you the jumping-off point for potential greatness.
Emergency Services
Thinking ahead and planning for a better future are excellent ideals to have for a potential career. However there are jobs that exist mainly to keep the world safe in the present. By training to become a paramedic, police officer or fire fighter you are transforming yourself into someone that can take care of other people when circumstances are dangerous. Protecting the world is just as important as improving it.
https://www.strategydriven.com/wp-content/uploads/caucasian-3390232_1280.jpg8531280StrategyDrivenhttps://www.strategydriven.com/wp-content/uploads/SDELogo5-300x70-300x70.pngStrategyDriven2019-07-30 07:00:422019-07-30 01:35:43Make A Difference in the World with Your Career
Starting a business can often be quite daunting. When you’re not a natural entrepreneur or you’ve not had much business experience, you can be fearful of it. But you needn’t be. There’s a lot about business that you can learn as you go along, and this definitely applies to marketing. When you start a small business, you really don’t have to be an expert of professional in order to get results. You just have to be willing to learn and grow. Because as you’re starting to absorb different ideas and tactics, you can try them all out for yourself. Most of the time, you just need to drop the fear and have fun with it instead.
Yet, even when you know you need to do this and you feel willing to step up, you won’t always know how to get started. And that’s only natural – because you’re brand new. So, you’re not expected to be a marketing master right now. But you can be soon. You just need to try out some different ideas, work with different tactics, and get creative too. And you really do need to let it be fun. So, take a look at some of these ideas and see what works for you.
Set Goals
To start with, you need to make sure that you have goals in place. We all need goals. And you need them for different parts of your business – but you definitely need them for marketing. So, ask yourself – what do you want to achieve with your business? What do you long to create? When you write this all down, you’ll find that it’s easier for you to come up with the most suitable campaigns.
Know Your Audience
But then also, you need to make sure that you know your audience incredibly well. Because you have to remember that your business isn’t about you. It’s about them. Serving them, creating something for them. And if you’re going to be able to promote what you do and market to your audience effectively, you’ll need to know your audience well. So make sure that you know exactly who you’re talking to, and what they need.
Do Some Research
From here, you then need to make sure that you’re doing research – and enough of it. You don’t have to spend weeks and weeks on this, however. The aim is to just get enough knowledge of the areas of marketing that you know nothing about. You don’t need to become an expert, as you’re going to learn a ton as you go along.
Consider Working With Professionals
Next up, you may want to think about working with different professionals to help you here. Maybe you don’t want to do it all alone, or you feel as if you could use the help of experts in your industry. Whether this is finding a specialist PR person, a team that knows franchise marketing, or a consultant in your field, take a look around. You may find that working with professionals is exactly what you need here.
Identify The Right Platforms
If you’re going it alone, or even if you’re working with a few professionals, the next thing that you need to do here is work out which platforms you’re going to be on. And this isn’t about the ones you want to be on. But rather those that you know your audience is on, and that you feel you can connect with them on. Because that’s the winning formula here. Remember, it’s about them.
Set Up Social
When you’ve made that decision, you need to set up your social profiles. And there’s a way that you can go about it. You could think about setting up the bare bones of the profiles on each platform, then creating your strategy. Or, you could look to master one platform first, find your feet with it and connect with your audience, and then move on to the next.
Aim For Engagement
But now you need to make sure that you’re using your social platforms properly. It’s not enough to just get set up or to start talking. You need to be doing more than that. You need to engage your customers on social media, and connect with them. You need to get in front of the right people and start to build relationships with them. It isn’t a numbers game. It’s a quality over quantity thing every single time.
Master Your SEO
If you’re not already concentrating on your own SEO, it’s time to do exactly that. Because it’s simple, especially with an SEO guide. Sometimes, something with a fancy title can scare you. But when you step back and learn the basics of SEO, you’ll realize that things are starting to come together. By just using the right words and aiming to get your best content out there on the web, you’ll start to appear in searches properly.
Try Something Paid
At some point, you’ll also want to try out something paid. And this can be fun. You may often find that there’s only so far you can get with your organic activity, and that at some point you’ll need to run ads. But whether you do this with paid search or paid social, it’s down to your own data.
Push Your PR
The next thing that you’ll want to be able to do here, is really push your PR. And no, you do not need a PR professional to support you here, you can absolutely do your own PR. You just need to be consistent with it, know what constitutes a good story, and start to put things out into the media. Stay on top of it, and watch buzz for your business start to grow.
Harness WOM
From here, you’re then going to want to make sure that you start to harness the power of conversation. Never underestimate the power of recommendations. If you do a good job and you know that your customers love you, they’ll be more than happy to recommend you. And there are plenty of strategies that you can go for here, but you just need to be authentic and truthful to yourself. And your customers will start to do the rest.
Work With Your Data
Above all else, you need to make sure that you’re always checking in with your data. If you know that you want to go with decisions that’ll pay off and allow you to connect more, you need to look at your own results and data, and go from there.
Be Creative
Finally, you’re then going to want to make sure that you’re being as creative as you can when it comes with your different ideas. Don’t just follow the crowd. It’s cool to come up with different campaigns and to go with new and exciting tactics to get your business out there. Try to let yourself be as creative as possible and come up with fun ideas because of it. You’ll see you get better results when you do.
To summarise, when you’re new to the world of business marketing can seem confusing. It’s also something that has the potential to make you feel vulnerable. However, it doesn’t have to. Because as you can see, there are a wealth of ideas that you can turn to in order for things to work out for you. Just handpick some of the different options and see what kind of success you can make because of it.
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Many organizations experience employee turnover. Replacing competent and experienced employees is a challenge for many companies. Most of them struggle to retain their staff. New Jersey businesses can give their employees annual leaves to rest. They can visit the Resorts Casino during weekends to get an online welcome offer. It helps them relax their minds and improve their productivity at work. Employers can minimize employee turnover in different ways.
Give Competitive Wages and Benefits
Everyone has basic needs such as food and housing. Most employees try to earn extra benefits to increase their savings. An employee might leave your organization if you offer low wages. It is prudent to research the current wages which similar businesses offer to determine the right salary for your wages. For example, Colorado tech-firms offers similar benefits to their IT specialists. Offer competitive benefits to retain experienced staff.
Appreciate your Employees
Most organizations encourage and recognize hard-working employees. It motivates them to perform their roles diligently. For instance, you can congratulate a certain department once they complete a difficult project. However, it isn’t necessary to compliment them at all times. Instead, it is prudent to create a friendly environment to make your staff feel acknowledged and appreciated. You can make annual performance analysis to promote devoted staff.
Project a Career Path for Your Employees
Many workers apply for jobs in other companies when they stagnate in a certain position for long. They strive to increase their knowledge and expertise in a certain field. Show your staff a clear career path to instill a sense of purpose and direction in them. You can change an employee to a higher position or another department to hone their skills. Nevertheless, it is important to inform your employees before you switch their positions.
Set Flexible Work Schedules
Create flexible work schedules for your employees to allow them to adjust their location and work plan. Everyone needs a work-life balance to remain healthy and productive. Flexible schedules allow employees to spend adequate time with family and friends. However, some organizations have strict work schedules. They have fixed work hours which all workers must adhere to.
The current job market is highly competitive. Companies with high employee turnover experience numerous financial constraints. They spend a lot of time and money recruiting and training new staff. Organizations can offer flexible work plans and benefits to minimize employee turnover. Also, they can assign new roles to employees to help them advance their careers.
As a leader, you are constantly trying to maximize the magical effort to effectiveness equation (a.k.a. efficiency). You can see this play out in your daily operations and ultimately in the P&L. However, there is an intangible asset that is very difficult to quantify — but without it you cannot ultimately succeed. This asset is, of course, alignment.
Alignment matters because it is an amalgamation of understanding, agreement, buy-in, engagement, empowerment, and accountability.
It amazes me how few leaders understand how to harness, measure, leverage, and ultimately achieve true alignment behind their strategies and objectives. Too many leaders assume that just because they have spoken, their teams are all on the same page with them — and everything will proceed from there. Achieving true alignment takes a significant allocation of effort. But there is a direct correlation between the extent of alignment and the results achieved.
Therefore, it is in your best interest as a leader to focus more on achieving, gauging, and calibrating alignment than almost any other executional activity. The good news is that achieving alignment is more science than art — meaning that there are tools that work nearly every time in getting people behind an idea, strategy, or mission. Below, allow me to present three of my favorites:
1. Define and Drive organizational culture. Culture is the glue that holds an organization together. It’s often the reason behind why people choose to stay with your company over jumping ship to a competitor. As a leader, it is your role to create, foster, and harness culture against organizational objectives. Conduct focus groups, one on one’s, and surveys to get a strong grip on the current state of your business culture. Then define a desired state for the values and behavior you expect to see on display daily, and embody them in everything you do.
Once you are well on your way towards your desired cultural state, you need to then define your business’s hedgehog concept. This is time very well spent because it takes your underlying culture and applies it to specific business problems. By deriving the intersection of three key questions: what are we wildly passionate about, what can we do better than anyone else, and what drives our economic engine, you set a direction for people that is easy to align with. Ask the three questions at all levels of the organization, calibrate the responses, and then package the inputs into an easily digestible reason for organizational being that relates to the majority of your enterprise. Then you can focus organizational attention on how you are doing, not on what you are doing — or even worse, why you are doing it.
2. Don’t just communicate, connect. When you give a presentation on your business strategy, key priorities, and other initiatives, how often do you check (either via polls, surveys, show of hands) what people understood from your communication, what they are taking away, and whether or not they agree? Many leaders are scared to ask these types of questions because they don’t like being second-guessed. Still, it’s better to be second-guessed than to be zero-followed! Taking the time to gauge the degree to which key messages are landing, as well as whether the audience is aligned, is probably the most important investment you can make as a leader.
Once you know where your participants are on a given issue, the next step is to connect the dots for them. Do the hard work of helping them see what you see and understand why you are making these choices. Allow them to question, build on, and enhance your ideas. And finally, move forward, together.
3. Keep it very simple. It is relatively easy to stick to one road, drive the speed limit, buckle up for safety, and arrive at your destination both on time and with all passengers on board. Once you start introducing shortcuts, detours, scenic routes, and bypasses into the mix, you are almost destined to lose some people along the way. No one (besides Forrest Gump maybe) meanders their way to success. You pick a destination based on the best available information (expected weather, road conditions, permitted speed), calculate the mileage, gas expense, and time to arrival, and then start driving in as straight a line as possible until you reach your desired location, or in this case desired mission, goal, or objective.
Leaders who jump from highway to highway, seemingly without rationale, are leaders who lose the power of an organization primed and focused on achieving results. You have to know when to forge ahead, when to change course, and when to abandon ship — but at each inflection point, the more important concept to remember is that you need to reengage the enterprise when change is afoot, and never assume that people know the key why’s and what’s and how’s behind the new direction.
About the Author
Omar L. Harris is Associate Vice-President and Country Manager for Allergan PLC in Brazil. He is the author of Leader Board: The DNA of High-Performance Teams available for purchase in ebook or print on Amazon.com. Please follow him on instagram, twitter, LinkedIn, and/or his website for more information and engagement.
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How to Start a Diesel Truck Repair Shop
/in Starting Your Business/by StrategyDrivenThis growth only makes sense as businesses continue to grow and need diesel trucks to transport their goods from place to place in our country. Trucks matter so much that writer Stan Mack predicts if the trucking industry stopped for some reason or another, so would the United States economy.
Behind the industry of big rigs and eighteen-wheelers reside the skilled grease monkeys that make them move. Diesel mechanics keep trucks on the road and keep goods moving from place to place.
Keep reading to learn how to start your own diesel truck repair shop.
Truck Repair Shop Or Service Truck?
As you consider the move from diesel technician to diesel truck repair owner, you begin with one decision: truck or shop.
Diesel repair trucks have the mobility that a shop may not, and yet they are still a legitimate truck repair shop business, without the foundation. They’re just a shop on wheels.
A repair truck will serve customers remotely, giving them the luxury of you going to them. Because you do not have a shop, per se, you do not have to invest yet in certain tools, like a hoist.
You also have a limited scope of skills with a mobile shop, but you can offer your services to a fleet versus the average joe looking for an oil change. A service truck works well to service a fleet of trucks, especially if a customer doesn’t care that you’re in their yard.
The mobile shop works well if you want to get your name out there but don’t have the finances for a building yet.
A good mobile shop will have a place for tools, fluids, and parts along with a compressor, generator, welder, floor lights, and potentially a crane. Invest in a good truck because, after all, you’d hate to break down on your way to serve someone else’s vehicle.
If you’re looking at an actual building for your service shop, then consider location first. Look at the potential for a walk-in client with this particular location, which means you want a place with high traffic near a freeway.
What Equipment will the Building Need?
If you opt for a foundation and walls, a building, for your diesel repair shop, you’re going to need specific equipment before you hang your shingle out front. Invest in some diagnostic equipment, a brake lathe, jacks and jack stands, mechanic tools, and vehicle lifts.
Your essential tools will run you around $15,000. Expect to spend approximately $4,000 for each lift and its installation, and know that diagnostics machines and equipment can cost anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000.
This equipment does not come cheap, but you can find high-quality, used equipment if you know where to look. Keep an eye out for brand names, knowing that if you have your own equipment, you will not have to outsource specific tasks.
Keep an eye out for auctions and retiring mechanics. They will have used but quality equipment for much less money.
As you look at the building itself, look for a well-ventilated and well-lit structure. Consider having a shower installed so you and your technicians do not have to go home with the day’s work still on you.
Who Are Your Clients?
As you put together a business plan, ask yourself if you’ll be helping consumers or businesses. Businesses will require more heavy-duty service. Consumers, on the other hand, have a light-duty service.
Businesses often have a less emotional response to the service you give them as the person you’re working for is just an employee of the business and not the truck owner himself. He will be someone working with a budget and paying the bills.
Business work or heavy-duty service tends to generate more revenue, but they also require a specific skill set, so make sure you have the skills necessary to work on heavy-duty equipment.
Business vehicles tend to be more valuable because they do heavy-duty work as opposed to your basic farm diesel truck. These pieces of equipment make money for the business, so the owner values them more. Business diesel equipment also sustains more wear and tear compared to customer’s light-duty equipment.
If you’re going to opt for customers or light-duty service, think farm pickups or off-road diesel vehicles. These typically require light maintenance and do not earn as much revenue.
Will You Have Employees?
When you open your own diesel truck repair shop, you will most likely be the technician and business owner. You need to be forward-thinking, though, and consider if you will want employees in the future or if you want to be a one-man operation.
The majority of businesses are husband-wife teams, and if you’re in this boat, you must ask yourself: can your marriage sustain the stress of a business?
If you plan on having employees, vet the local tech school graduates. Consider offering an internship that may turn into something else.
What Will You Charge?
Labor Rate
Do some research regarding local shops to see what they charge. Then offer a commiserate labor rate or one slightly lower. If you have a slightly lower rate, then a client may preauthorize you to do preventative maintenance like what you can find mentioned in this article.
Parts markup
The common mark up on parts in stock at most diesel truck repair shops is 25% of total revenue. After all, carrying parts costs money, so make sure you have an appropriate mark up for the luxury of having the part in stock. Consider a graduated scale where the markup percentage goes down with more expensive parts.
Insurance
Check your federal, state, and local regulations to see what insurance you will need. The liability for a diesel truck mechanic is large. If the brakes you worked on fail, you are liable.
Do not underinsure yourself. If you have no idea how much insurance you’ll need, consult with seasoned vets that have done the work before you.
Consider the Cost, Then Take the Plunge
Once you’ve evaluated the decisions you need to open your very own truck repair shop, you can take the plunge with some knowledge. You can go to your local banker and then realtor with the full understanding of what you’re getting yourself into.
To read more interesting articles about business strategies, check out our blog.
Make A Difference in the World with Your Career
/in Professional Development/by StrategyDrivenPolitics
The current political climate all over the world has become unpredictable. Divisions between people seem to be growing wider despite the fact that we live in one of the most accepting times in human history. Although politicians have a bad name, working in politics with a view to bettering the living conditions of people around the world is an honorable endeavor. Following your convictions and attempting to improve the world isn’t easy, but it is worthwhile.
Health
The world can never have enough doctors, nurses, surgeons, and researchers. Scientific advancements throughout the ages has led humanity to a point where people can live long lives with previously deadly diseases. Of course, doctors are very respected within society but there are other career options for people who want to take an alternative route. Mental health is extremely important and choosing a career that strives to help those with mental illness is hugely commendable. Take a look at the National Counselling Society for more information on how to get involved.
Entrepreneurship
It’s not uncommon for the business world to be portrayed as cutthroat and brutal, particularly through TV and movies. However, not all businesses can be lumped into this cold category. People who develop new technologies or create new inventions that serve the world are important for the healthy continuation of society. Designing to solve a problem or creating a business that brings care to people in need is a great way to make a positive difference through your work.
Education
The only reason the world has reached these heights of advancement and collective understanding is through the gradual improvement of education throughout the generations. Children are built to absorb information and being able to bestow knowledge upon them is a great way to plant the seed for a better future. Who knows what good that child might do when they grow up? Becoming a teacher makes you the jumping-off point for potential greatness.
Emergency Services
Thinking ahead and planning for a better future are excellent ideals to have for a potential career. However there are jobs that exist mainly to keep the world safe in the present. By training to become a paramedic, police officer or fire fighter you are transforming yourself into someone that can take care of other people when circumstances are dangerous. Protecting the world is just as important as improving it.
How To Master Marketing When You’re Brand New
/in Marketing & Sales/by StrategyDrivenYet, even when you know you need to do this and you feel willing to step up, you won’t always know how to get started. And that’s only natural – because you’re brand new. So, you’re not expected to be a marketing master right now. But you can be soon. You just need to try out some different ideas, work with different tactics, and get creative too. And you really do need to let it be fun. So, take a look at some of these ideas and see what works for you.
Set Goals
To start with, you need to make sure that you have goals in place. We all need goals. And you need them for different parts of your business – but you definitely need them for marketing. So, ask yourself – what do you want to achieve with your business? What do you long to create? When you write this all down, you’ll find that it’s easier for you to come up with the most suitable campaigns.
Know Your Audience
But then also, you need to make sure that you know your audience incredibly well. Because you have to remember that your business isn’t about you. It’s about them. Serving them, creating something for them. And if you’re going to be able to promote what you do and market to your audience effectively, you’ll need to know your audience well. So make sure that you know exactly who you’re talking to, and what they need.
From here, you then need to make sure that you’re doing research – and enough of it. You don’t have to spend weeks and weeks on this, however. The aim is to just get enough knowledge of the areas of marketing that you know nothing about. You don’t need to become an expert, as you’re going to learn a ton as you go along.
Consider Working With Professionals
Next up, you may want to think about working with different professionals to help you here. Maybe you don’t want to do it all alone, or you feel as if you could use the help of experts in your industry. Whether this is finding a specialist PR person, a team that knows franchise marketing, or a consultant in your field, take a look around. You may find that working with professionals is exactly what you need here.
Identify The Right Platforms
If you’re going it alone, or even if you’re working with a few professionals, the next thing that you need to do here is work out which platforms you’re going to be on. And this isn’t about the ones you want to be on. But rather those that you know your audience is on, and that you feel you can connect with them on. Because that’s the winning formula here. Remember, it’s about them.
Set Up Social
When you’ve made that decision, you need to set up your social profiles. And there’s a way that you can go about it. You could think about setting up the bare bones of the profiles on each platform, then creating your strategy. Or, you could look to master one platform first, find your feet with it and connect with your audience, and then move on to the next.
Aim For Engagement
But now you need to make sure that you’re using your social platforms properly. It’s not enough to just get set up or to start talking. You need to be doing more than that. You need to engage your customers on social media, and connect with them. You need to get in front of the right people and start to build relationships with them. It isn’t a numbers game. It’s a quality over quantity thing every single time.
Master Your SEO
If you’re not already concentrating on your own SEO, it’s time to do exactly that. Because it’s simple, especially with an SEO guide. Sometimes, something with a fancy title can scare you. But when you step back and learn the basics of SEO, you’ll realize that things are starting to come together. By just using the right words and aiming to get your best content out there on the web, you’ll start to appear in searches properly.
At some point, you’ll also want to try out something paid. And this can be fun. You may often find that there’s only so far you can get with your organic activity, and that at some point you’ll need to run ads. But whether you do this with paid search or paid social, it’s down to your own data.
Push Your PR
The next thing that you’ll want to be able to do here, is really push your PR. And no, you do not need a PR professional to support you here, you can absolutely do your own PR. You just need to be consistent with it, know what constitutes a good story, and start to put things out into the media. Stay on top of it, and watch buzz for your business start to grow.
Harness WOM
From here, you’re then going to want to make sure that you start to harness the power of conversation. Never underestimate the power of recommendations. If you do a good job and you know that your customers love you, they’ll be more than happy to recommend you. And there are plenty of strategies that you can go for here, but you just need to be authentic and truthful to yourself. And your customers will start to do the rest.
Work With Your Data
Above all else, you need to make sure that you’re always checking in with your data. If you know that you want to go with decisions that’ll pay off and allow you to connect more, you need to look at your own results and data, and go from there.
Be Creative
Finally, you’re then going to want to make sure that you’re being as creative as you can when it comes with your different ideas. Don’t just follow the crowd. It’s cool to come up with different campaigns and to go with new and exciting tactics to get your business out there. Try to let yourself be as creative as possible and come up with fun ideas because of it. You’ll see you get better results when you do.
To summarise, when you’re new to the world of business marketing can seem confusing. It’s also something that has the potential to make you feel vulnerable. However, it doesn’t have to. Because as you can see, there are a wealth of ideas that you can turn to in order for things to work out for you. Just handpick some of the different options and see what kind of success you can make because of it.
4 Ways Reduce Employee Turnover
/in Talent Management/by StrategyDrivenGive Competitive Wages and Benefits
Everyone has basic needs such as food and housing. Most employees try to earn extra benefits to increase their savings. An employee might leave your organization if you offer low wages. It is prudent to research the current wages which similar businesses offer to determine the right salary for your wages. For example, Colorado tech-firms offers similar benefits to their IT specialists. Offer competitive benefits to retain experienced staff.
Appreciate your Employees
Most organizations encourage and recognize hard-working employees. It motivates them to perform their roles diligently. For instance, you can congratulate a certain department once they complete a difficult project. However, it isn’t necessary to compliment them at all times. Instead, it is prudent to create a friendly environment to make your staff feel acknowledged and appreciated. You can make annual performance analysis to promote devoted staff.
Project a Career Path for Your Employees
Many workers apply for jobs in other companies when they stagnate in a certain position for long. They strive to increase their knowledge and expertise in a certain field. Show your staff a clear career path to instill a sense of purpose and direction in them. You can change an employee to a higher position or another department to hone their skills. Nevertheless, it is important to inform your employees before you switch their positions.
Set Flexible Work Schedules
Create flexible work schedules for your employees to allow them to adjust their location and work plan. Everyone needs a work-life balance to remain healthy and productive. Flexible schedules allow employees to spend adequate time with family and friends. However, some organizations have strict work schedules. They have fixed work hours which all workers must adhere to.
The current job market is highly competitive. Companies with high employee turnover experience numerous financial constraints. They spend a lot of time and money recruiting and training new staff. Organizations can offer flexible work plans and benefits to minimize employee turnover. Also, they can assign new roles to employees to help them advance their careers.
How to Keep Your Team Agile and Aligned Under Pressure
/in Management & Leadership/by Omar L. HarrisAs a leader, you are constantly trying to maximize the magical effort to effectiveness equation (a.k.a. efficiency). You can see this play out in your daily operations and ultimately in the P&L. However, there is an intangible asset that is very difficult to quantify — but without it you cannot ultimately succeed. This asset is, of course, alignment.
Alignment matters because it is an amalgamation of understanding, agreement, buy-in, engagement, empowerment, and accountability.
It amazes me how few leaders understand how to harness, measure, leverage, and ultimately achieve true alignment behind their strategies and objectives. Too many leaders assume that just because they have spoken, their teams are all on the same page with them — and everything will proceed from there. Achieving true alignment takes a significant allocation of effort. But there is a direct correlation between the extent of alignment and the results achieved.
Therefore, it is in your best interest as a leader to focus more on achieving, gauging, and calibrating alignment than almost any other executional activity. The good news is that achieving alignment is more science than art — meaning that there are tools that work nearly every time in getting people behind an idea, strategy, or mission. Below, allow me to present three of my favorites:
1. Define and Drive organizational culture. Culture is the glue that holds an organization together. It’s often the reason behind why people choose to stay with your company over jumping ship to a competitor. As a leader, it is your role to create, foster, and harness culture against organizational objectives. Conduct focus groups, one on one’s, and surveys to get a strong grip on the current state of your business culture. Then define a desired state for the values and behavior you expect to see on display daily, and embody them in everything you do.
Once you are well on your way towards your desired cultural state, you need to then define your business’s hedgehog concept. This is time very well spent because it takes your underlying culture and applies it to specific business problems. By deriving the intersection of three key questions: what are we wildly passionate about, what can we do better than anyone else, and what drives our economic engine, you set a direction for people that is easy to align with. Ask the three questions at all levels of the organization, calibrate the responses, and then package the inputs into an easily digestible reason for organizational being that relates to the majority of your enterprise. Then you can focus organizational attention on how you are doing, not on what you are doing — or even worse, why you are doing it.
2. Don’t just communicate, connect. When you give a presentation on your business strategy, key priorities, and other initiatives, how often do you check (either via polls, surveys, show of hands) what people understood from your communication, what they are taking away, and whether or not they agree? Many leaders are scared to ask these types of questions because they don’t like being second-guessed. Still, it’s better to be second-guessed than to be zero-followed! Taking the time to gauge the degree to which key messages are landing, as well as whether the audience is aligned, is probably the most important investment you can make as a leader.
Once you know where your participants are on a given issue, the next step is to connect the dots for them. Do the hard work of helping them see what you see and understand why you are making these choices. Allow them to question, build on, and enhance your ideas. And finally, move forward, together.
3. Keep it very simple. It is relatively easy to stick to one road, drive the speed limit, buckle up for safety, and arrive at your destination both on time and with all passengers on board. Once you start introducing shortcuts, detours, scenic routes, and bypasses into the mix, you are almost destined to lose some people along the way. No one (besides Forrest Gump maybe) meanders their way to success. You pick a destination based on the best available information (expected weather, road conditions, permitted speed), calculate the mileage, gas expense, and time to arrival, and then start driving in as straight a line as possible until you reach your desired location, or in this case desired mission, goal, or objective.
Leaders who jump from highway to highway, seemingly without rationale, are leaders who lose the power of an organization primed and focused on achieving results. You have to know when to forge ahead, when to change course, and when to abandon ship — but at each inflection point, the more important concept to remember is that you need to reengage the enterprise when change is afoot, and never assume that people know the key why’s and what’s and how’s behind the new direction.
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