Using technology in your small business

Gone are the days when we used to queue up outside the printing press and wait for our turn to negotiate and get our business pamphlets printed for us. It is the 21st century and in the last two decades, we have been blasted with a whole lot of new technology and technological advancements. Let’s dive right into the methods and technologies that we have at hand which we can use for our benefit and that too very efficiently.

We all know about Google as the tech giant that is doing wonders in the technical field. But we actually miss the larger picture here, Google just not only provides a splendid search engine but also boasts a large variety of tools and applications that can be used by anyone to their benefit.

G Suite by Google Cloud is the answer to almost all the problems you face in handling your business.

Applications –

• Gmail — It is the easiest way to communicate with the different layers among your business. It is the virtual form of letters that are official and precise. You can make it the main communication channel for your business employees to maintain decorum and keep dialogues brief and precise.
• Meet — It is a Video and voice conferencing application brought to us by google. You can video call your employees and they can communicate with each other using Google Meet. You need not call each employee separately as 100 participants can join one single video conference which makes it super easy for you to discuss strategies and your next move with the important members of your organization at one go.
• Chat — It is a team messaging app which unlike Gmail is quite informal. You can be in touch with your colleagues and share important details as well as have a casual and light talk with them using chat. Different groups can also be formed in chat to keep people from different domains connected and aware of the situation of other members.
• Calendar — The Calendar helps you to keep track of your deadlines, goals, and accomplished tasks in one place. Once you share your calendar with your colleagues, they can also have the same plan for themselves too. It is very useful in maintaining efficiency.
• Drive — It is by far one of the most useful applications developed by Google. You can upload plenty of files, images, documents, videos, and what not and then share it with whomever you want. Google Drive offers a 30GB cloud storage which is more than enough to download and upload a variety of things.
• Docs — Using Docs you can create documents, spreadsheets, and presentations effortlessly and these help you in collecting and displaying information in the easiest way possible. You can also use Documents to make feedback forms, review, rating forms, and then circulate it among your colleagues. Google docs is the digital form that has replaced the vintage, paper form.
• Sheets — Use sheets to make spreadsheets, analyze data, and build a strategy for your business.
• Slide — Slides is used to give presentations whenever needed. You can build beautiful presentations easily using slide and take your business to different heights by impressing your clients with flawless and magical slides.
• Forms — You can use forms to digitally collect information, reviews, feedbacks, get people to sign up, and a lot of other things.
• Sites — You don’t have to be a Web Developer to build a website for your business when you have sites. You can make a beautiful website for your business and take it to the larger stage with a greater market for your business.
• Keep — You can pin up important notes using keep. These are shared notes which means that you get to decide who all can see these notes. You can create different notes for different domains and pin-up for them. You can use it as a reminder as well.
• Currents — Currents is a great way of keeping employees engaged. Share ideas with employees and gather input through meaningful, focused discussions on topics that matter to your organization. Discuss key topics and gain from each other’s experiences.

G Suite also offers you Security and Management tools that will help you to manage your mobile fleet.

Now let’s talk about the customer relationship of your business. It is the most important aspect for any business to grow. Now how do you improve that? Don’t worry, technology has got your back.

CRM

CRM stands for customer relationship management. It’s a category of integrated, data-driven software solutions that improve how you interact and do business with your customers. CRM systems help you manage and maintain customer relationships, track sales leads, marketing, and pipeline, and deliver actionable data.

Why implement a CRM solution?

CRM solutions increase your profitability by streamlining administrative processes in your sales, marketing, and service divisions, and letting you focus on building and maintaining the customer relationships that matter. A strong CRM solution is a multifaceted platform where everything crucial to developing, improving, and retaining your customer relationships is stored. Without the support of an integrated CRM solution, you may miss growth opportunities and lose revenue because you’re not optimizing your operating processes or making the most of your customer relationships or sales leads.

Imagine misplacing customer contact information, only to learn that your delay resulted in losing your client to a competitor. Or, picture your top two salespeople pursuing the same prospect, resulting in an annoyed potential customer and some unfriendly, in-house competition. Without a centralized and automated CRM system, your people can lose track of customer interactions and miss business opportunities.

DYNAMICS 365

It is a feature brought to us by Microsoft. With Dynamics 365 you get a flexible solution that’s customizable to suit your business requirements. Choose a stand-alone application to meet the needs of a specific line of business, or use multiple CRM tools that work together as a powerful integrated solution.

All these applications and tools are either free or available to the general public at a minimal price which is way better than investing hundreds of thousands of bucks just to get started with your business. Instead, be sure to make the best use of the technology available around you. Keep yourself updated and polished at all times because in this digital age you can achieve heights that were earlier never even heard of.