Throw Away Your Fax Machine - Still receiving and sending paper faxes? You can send faxes from your email by simply typing in the receiving phone number in the subject line, and sending the email to a subscription service that does all the work for you! Incoming faxes will come to your email inbox, as a PDF attachment.
Get an Intranet Site - An intranet site for your business will make the process of finding information you need one mouse click away. Any good intranet site should have a Google-like search tool to bring up that important contract or reference an employee's work log.
Invest in Great CRM Software- At minimum, customer relationship management (CRM) software tracks important information about your customers. More advanced CRM software can track your leads and products, and can interface with your marketing and accounting processes.
Measure Critical Vital Signs -Put your finger on the pulse of your business. If you don't know your KPI (key performance indicators), such as your cost per lead and cost per sale, you are running your business blind. A "ballpark" number might be good enough for some businesses, but things that are measured tend to improve.
Outsource - You are an expert in your business niche, so why not let others help you out with their expertise? A small technology business can benefit by outsourcing book keeping, and a small book keeping company can avoid trouble by outsourcing their computer systems to a technology business.
Set Realistic Expectations - Implementing new policies, processes, or software can have far-reaching impact, and can take longer than you anticipate. For a period of time, you might even have more work as the new system phases out the old one. Keep your end goal in mind as your ride through the rough spots, and remind your employees that you are all in this together.
Get Everybody On Board- Not everyone will want to go along with change. Improvement will come easier if you include people who will be impacted by changes as part of the overall process. People may feel threatened by change, so showing them a clear benefit from their perspective and helping them understand the process as a whole is the key to a successful transition.
Identify Bottlenecks - Points in your business where communication is impaired or stops completely are called bottlenecks. Bottlenecks can be people, software, or other processes. Throwing technology at a problem might create the illusion of progress, but it may just get you to the bottleneck faster.
Become Process Focused - Once you have found your bottlenecks, you can step back and look at the entire process you want to streamline, from beginning to end. Shifting to a process mindset will result in a business that is focused on customers and improvement, rather than assigning blame for problems.
Ride the Pendulum -There are only two ways to increase cash flow in business. The first way is to cut costs by focusing on improving your business operations. The second way shifts your focus to sales and marketing. You can only cut costs so far, so simply being aware of this natural cycle can help you plan when you should streamline, and when you should charge full steam ahead!
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