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5 Tech Innovations Essential for Small Businesses

The promise of higher revenue is what drives today’s small businesses to invest more into their technology – and for a good reason. In order to have a superior business performance, companies have learned to make the best of our technology advancement and invest into powerful IT. Small business owners who don’t take advantage over this massive shift in technology are very much losing in this game of revenue, and it may seem at first that entrepreneurs are enslaved by it – but the perks that technology gives us are actually very liberating, not to mention inexpensive. Here is a list of technology innovations that can put any small business into gear and lift them up instead of pulling them back.

Applications

Whether it be on your mobile, tablet, or any iOS device, custom applications are a life saver when you have a busy day working. For example, you might not even be at the office for most of the part because of some more important obligations, but applications can allow you to stay in touch with your employees, customers and so you can easily share information and data using applications. It’s not about communication, too – you can even conduct business at the touch of a button with applications that allow you accept credit card payments or organize your employees across multiple devices.

Communication

Constant and quality communication that flows through the whole business is the key to making your employees more productive and therefore, your business more successful. That doesn’t mean that you have to talk on your phone 24/7, though – especially if you have workers that are on the field, or telecommuters, which is a very frequent occurrence nowadays. So, how do you keep everyone up to the task and informed at all times? Online conferencing solutions are one of those innovations which allow everyone to have quality long-distance communication and always stay on track.

Social Media

If you’ve believed that social media exists solely for personal purposes, you’re losing the opportunity of expanding and making your business more reachable. Keeping a close look on your customer or client base using various tools will enable you to promote yourself better and improve your goods or services. Social media enables you to promote anything you desire, from a new product promotion, to specials, giveaways and other nifty tricks to attract an audience and have a better output every time you interact with them. Customers are very social – they always look for opinions, reviews, comments or any kind of confirmation that they’ve found exactly what they’re looking for, so you need to make sure your business stays transparent.

Analytics

If you’ve decided to go with social media as a definitive way of promoting your business, you won’t do it effectively if that doesn’t go hand-in-hand with the use of analytics. You won’t know if your marketing efforts have been effective if you don’t have clear insight on how they affect your customer base (or how they react to it). Gain advantage in these competitive waters by collecting all of the important data and analyzing it – turning it into insight. Some of the best free analytics tools are Google Analytics, Bitly, or SimilarWeb.

Finance Apps

If you’re new at running a small business (or even if you have been in the job for some time) chances are that tracking the cashflow can be an overwhelming task. However, knowing how much money you have at hands and using it wisely can be a less daunting task if you turn to some of the available finance apps for help. Experts who offer consulting and professional insolvency solutions suggest using apps like Dollarbird, QuickBooks and Goodbudget.

Adaptability

Technology and internet are making it easier for people to have access to an infinite amount of information – which means learning and adapting to new waves of marketing and learning new technology is a top priority to stay on top of the game. This also means that by learning, you diminish the fact that you’ll need to hire additional staff for, app development for example. By having less need to hire more people for specific jobs, people are learning new things on the go, and adapting their businesses towards those goals. Graphic designers, app developers, marketing efforts, everything can be done in-house and a ton of money saved in the meantime.

Final Thoughts

Innovation is always working towards the same goal – to finish the job faster, more effectively and inexpensively. That’s why small businesses need to take advantage of it: especially if it’s going to save them a ton of money which they can prioritize for more complex and important things. But, however tiring or troublesome that sounded, it really is a better and more efficient way of kicking businesses into gear, especially in the first stages of development. You’ve got to make do with what you have, and there’s nothing else to it – and since technology is here to make our lives easier, why not make conducting business easier as well?

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