I know all too well what it can be like when all of a sudden you’re having a quiet week or even month in your business. It can make you go stir-crazy! Why is it so quiet? Where is everyone? Is it just me or is everyone else quiet too? WHAT am I going to do? I have bills to pay, staff wages to pay and the suppliers need their money too!
Sound familiar?
I was having the exact same conversation with my friend who runs her own business just the other day. She’d started to panic because her business was going through a quiet spell. Those pesky mind monkeys were playing havoc with her mindset, making her doubt herself, her business and service.
If you’re having these same thoughts, stop! Yes, that’s right. Just stop. It’s time to look at everything from a different perspective:
Track Your Data
The first thing you should be doing is tracking your data. Look at your accounts for the previous year compared to this year – is there a pattern as to when your business goes quiet? Take a look at your website data through google analytics as well as the insights on your social media platforms. What are they telling you? Where does the majority of your business come from and what can you do to make that more beneficial for you?
Set Up a Contingency Plan
Now you know when your quiet periods are and where most of your business comes from, it’s time to set up a contingency plan so that when this happens again, you’re ready and prepared for it. So what sort of plan can you put into place to ensure the quiet periods aren’t so quiet?
Here’s a few ideas for you to consider to tackle those quiet spells in business:
1. Have a strong and consistent brand presence online and offline
They say it takes 6 months worth of marketing for a person to eventually decide to do business with you, so making sure your brand presence online and offline is consistent all the time can be so important. This means making sure your brand message is clear, you are appealing to the right target audience and your actual branding is consistent in it’s look and feel so people will in turn become to recognise that it’s you and your business. Have a consistent brand presence can increase overall awareness of your brand and get you out there more in front of the right people too.
2. Go networking
Nothing beats interacting with people face to face and getting your business out there in a personal and sincere way. This will open up new avenues for you and you never know who’s in other people’s circle of friends, family and business contacts. They might just know your ideal customer! This will also help you step outside of your comfort zone a little and give you that extra little confidence boost.
3. Run a flash sale
This could be a certain discount off your products or services for a very small window of time – 24-48 hours. A flash sale can start up a conversation about your business and will get some increase your sales instantly.
4. Launch a competition
This is a great way to increase reach and engagement on your social media platforms, but it also increases your brand presence too and gets you in front of more people too. If you launch the competition on Facebook as an example, your reach will increase massively getting your business out in front of like minded people who you want to see more of and interact with. Another option could be to hold the competition whereby they enter via an online form. This is a brilliant way of capturing their email addresses and then reaching them through email marketing methods. And with a branded email going out each time, it’s another channel for brand awareness. It also gets them visiting your website too.
5. Send a thank you card
All those loyal customers that come back to you time and time again? Why not surprise them with a thank you card and let them know you are thankful for their loyal support. Why not offer them a discount on their next purchase with you. This is great for Christmas time, especially when January can be very quiet for a lot of businesses. You could send the thank you cards out in the post of via a nice branded email and offer the discount for the following month only. Your clients will love receiving a card from you and it’ll evoke an emotional response from them too. You want your customers talking about your brand to everyone they know and this is a great way for that to happen.
6. Birthday cards
Say Happy Birthday to all your customers and give them a special Birthday treat – let them know you care and are thinking of them. This works particularly well for product based businesses as well as some service based businesses too. They will feel extra special knowing that you’ve been thinking of them and your lovely branded Birthday card will be sitting on their mantelpiece in price of place for all their friends and family to see.
7. Connect with other local businesses
Depending on what your business services or products are, why not offer a local company near you a discount just for them and their employees. This will create a new segment within your client base and by giving them regular discount, they will in turn become regular clients of yours too.
8. Target a different audience
If you only work with business women who are also lovely Mummies, why not change who you are targeting? A lot of business Mummies will be taking time off over the Summer holidays and half term weeks to spend time and look after their children. Could you target men instead as they’re least likely to have time off over the school holidays. This could open new doors for your business and service.
9. Work ‘on’ your business
When opportunity arises, why not work ‘on’ your business rather than ‘in’ it. This could open up a whole host of ideas for new products and services you could offer. Creating a clear and concise plan for a new product or service is better than something that’s just been thrown together. If you’re the type of person who is always thinking of new ideas of things you could offer from your business too, now is the time to do some research and explore those options and see what could work best!
And there you have it. Nine fresh new ideas to consider when your business seems more quiet than normal.
Do let me know if you ever experience those quiet spells in your business and what’s worked for you in the past to overcome them by commenting on this post. Whatever you decide to look into, remember that everything needs that super eye-catching design to grab everyone’s attention, so get in touch if you’d like to discuss this further.