The Importance of Customer Satisfaction Surveys

Successful business owners and managers quickly realize that keeping customers costs less than finding new ones. If certain practices drive customers away, a business repeatedly spends time and money on advertising and other efforts to recruit more. These business owners know that weaknesses in the production or delivery of goods lead to distressed customers, so they use online surveys to collect feedback. Customer satisfaction surveys can become imperative tools for improving your business and ensuring your customers are happy and loyal.

Build your brand

Studies show satisfied clients tend to buy products more often and develop loyalty to a particular brand. They often spread the word by recommending products and services to friends and family as an informal referral process. Customer satisfaction surveys give firms specific information about positive and negative perceptions, which could improve marketing or sales efforts. These perceptions are especially important because of the increased use of social media by people of all ages. One negative comment posted on a social media site could be seen by thousands of potential customers. Angry customers can use unfair criticism and untrue statements to harm a firm's reputation. Repairing the damage or countering false representations could prove costly.

Measure your results

A customer satisfaction survey might be worthless unless it creates statistical data that can be scientifically analysed. The first step to developing a meaningful online survey is to establish intended goals and a process for comparing results. Employees responsible for analyzing survey results should have some background in statistics to make the survey meaningful. When drafting survey questions, as much detail as possible should be included in the questionnaire, along with an area for independent customer comments.

Update your customers

If survey results lead to a plan to improve weak areas of operation, a follow-up survey can be used to measure whether changes worked. Information can again be analysed and compared to earlier feedback. It is also valuable to let your customers know you're endeavoring to make improvements and to thank them for their help. Customer satisfaction surveys also reveal data that can be used to gauge estimated customer satisfaction rates of competitors.

Keep it personal

In some firms, each unhappy customer is personally contacted in an effort to resolve any problem. Customers who ranked service or goods poorly might be offered discounts in an effort to retain their business. If comments they made on the survey resulted in action to improve customer service, the unhappy client might be informed of changes linked to their responses on the online questionnaire. These personal contacts let customers know their opinions are valuable and taken seriously.

Online surveys are an easy and cost-effective way to find out if your customers truly satisfied by your service and product, and a happy customer is a loyal one.

Why Companies Should Blog

It helps your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) as Google loves new content!

You can engage and understand your customers better.

You are seen as an expert in your field, a ” Thought Leader”

Great new content gives people a reason to keep coming back to your site.

Blogs are a much more trusted source than companies press releases and official company PR.

It moves customers to a conversion point where enough trust is created for people to take the next step and buy.

By writing you are learning

So if you are going to start a blog what functions and features should a blog include?

1. Menu to Include

• About us
• Home back to your company website

2. Subscription to be via an RSS Feed and Email (and put these in top menu and right side)

3. Search Feature for Articles on the Site

4. Two Text boxes in the right panel to include

• A one sentence description of  who your company is
• Your clients

5. “Connect with us Box” on right panel that includes Subscription to:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Subscribe to our Blog RSS

6. Multi User (allows multiple users to add posts to your company Blog)

7. Popular Posts Box

8. Browse by Tag Post Box

9. Browse by Category

As Google’s search alogorithms are in constant evolution with recency and new unique content becoming an important part of the mix, Blogging is something that your company should not ignore.

So do you think your company should be blogging?

3 Important Reasons Why Growing Businesses Need ERP

Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP has been around the world for quite sometime. It’s a popular notion that, implementing an ERP solution improves the efficiency, provides a clear view on productivity and growth. Here are 3 important reasons why growing businesses need ERP solutions.

1. Operational Efficiency for growing businesses

When the business is really small with less than 50 employees and few defined processes, its easier for managers to organize, control and track things. But, imagine, when the business has grown quite a bit with 1000+ employees, countless different processes, activities, numerous workflows and procedures. Out of these numerous procedures, some of them might be manual and some automated. Chances are minimal that these activities and procedures are well documented.  In this highly competitive world, this kind of disjointed and not so integrated system will bring down the productivity and profitability. This in turn will affect the growth.  Implementing an ERP solution could help businesses streamline variety of processes, log them and track them on an hourly basis. In addition, it reduces operating and overhead expenses.

2. Improved Consistency & Accuracy

Another major advantage of implementing an ERP solution is that, it helps maintain information in a consistent and accurate manner. Especially in organizations where different departments are not properly integrated, information is inconsistent and sometime inaccurate. The views of different departments vary and hence the information they provide the Manager will also be different. This sometimes leads to confusions and wrong decisions being made. These problems might impact revenues over a period of time, if not considered seriously. Implementing an ERP solution will ensure that all information are maintained and managed in a consistent manner across the departments.

3. A Helping Hand for Employees

Implementing an ERP solution will ensure that the routine reporting work of employees at all levels are reduced.  Ramco OnDemand ERP, for example, allows field staff to enter data on the go and hence it helps Managers to get accurate information real-time. It also helps key decision makers of the company to understand their workforce in a better manner – from analyzing individual performance across different business sites to visualizing the overall performance of an entire operational zone. This helps organizations to take strategic decisions as well.

Overall, ERP solutions can serve as an excellent information tool especially for medium and large businesses, for better decision making and accomplishing required goals. Hence it’s a must for every growing business.

The Importance Of Blogging

Entering 2015 the importance of blogging will continue to grow as Google places a greater emphasis upon fresh and frequently updated content. Anyone who either runs a website, or is considering starting one, knows that in order to be successful you need traffic.

As the number one search engine in the world Google remains as the single most important factor in the ability of a website to attract new visitors. With it's obvious importance people running websites, or considering starting them, need to pay close attention to how Google ranks pages when a search is conducted. Knowing that blogging is going to be an area that Google focuses upon means that websites need to make blogging a large part of what they do going forward.

With the importance of blogging is at an all time high it's very important that websites learn how to make the most out of the blogs that they associate with. In order to be successful and make the most out of blogging websites should use multiple blogs that are related to their subject matter. For example if you have a website about gardening, then you could start blogs about different aspects of gardening. Once you have your blogs started you can link them to your main website, which will help you to generate additional traffic.

The importance of blogging should become increasingly clear as you realize that it will increase your presence on the web. When someone uses Google to search about a subject, having multiple blogs about subjects related to your website will increase the likelihood that one of them will show up in the search results. Since Google is emphasizing fresh content the chances that a blog you are running will show up are pretty good.

If someone visits your blog then you have a pretty good chance of having them follow a link to your main website, which will help you to reach your goal of gaining more site traffic. With an emphasis by Google upon fresh content, and the possibility to draw additional visitors to your site, the importance of blogging should not be overlooked.

Blogging has long had a reputation as something done by an individual, as a niche website that allows people to have a small presence on the web. The truth is that blogging has the potential to be so much more. Blogging can help you to cast a wide net out with search engines helping you to capture new visitors to your website. You can also use blogging to earn supplemental income by placing ads on your blogs. With all that blogging can do for you and your website you need to learn to take advantage of it.

Google is the largest and most powerful search engine in the world. When Google says that it plans to emphasize fresh content and active websites then you need to pay attention. You need to recognize the importance of blogging and use it to help ensure the future success of your website.

Why You Need a Good Website

As the Internet becomes more prevalent in our society, it has become commonplace to turn to the Internet for shopping, finding directions, researching products, and even to find a church or seek answers to spiritual questions. As businesses and other organizations begin to understand this dynamic, they are increasingly beginning to recognize the importance and the need for an effective web presence – not just a web site, but a real presence on the web.

A web presence is more than just a nice looking web site with fancy graphics or flashy pictures. It is a way to connect to your audience and draw them in. An effective web presence provides a way to build trust in your organization. It explains how you can meet their needs and why they should choose to do business with you.

Having a quality web presence is essential to a successful online endeavor. Just as having a quality, polished resume is essential for a job seeker trying to get that first interview, having a quality professional website is essential in getting that first call from a prospect.

Therefore, it is essential that your website reflects who you are, your qualities and the personality of your organization. Your website may be the visitor’s only impression of who you are.

Our goal is to aid you in developing a more successful web presence. We will equip you to better reach your audience. The more educated you are in your approach the more likely you will be to succeed in your efforts. And ultimately, the more successful you will be in making your organization stand out in your unique marketplace.

Key Things To Consider

1) Set Your Website Goals

These should be directly in line with the main goals of your organization. Make sure they’re measurable. Establishing your website goals drives the rest of your decisions on content, features, design, and more.

2) Target Your Audience

This helps you center on their needs. Determine their demographics and what would appeal most to them.

3) Focus Your Content

 Sites need substance. Your content should meet your audience’s needs and to help them make informed decisions.

4) Express Your Reality

Your web presence is a reflection of who you are. Show that you pursue excellence in all you do. Explain your relevance and keep it consistent through all of your printed materials.

5) Streamline your Design

• Navigation. Clear, consistent navigation makes it easy for your visitors to find exactly what they need.
• Graphics and other Design Elements. A picture is worth a thousand words. Use graphics strategically to better convey your message.
• Layout. Visitors will rarely be patient enough to read long, drawn out pages. Providing headings and quick, concise content allows readers to obtain the basic information and determine whether they want to read further.
• Accessibility. Your website should be available to as broad an audience as possible. Consider those with vision impairments and those who use wireless devices, such as cell phones and PDA’s. You don’t want to miss out on large numbers of people because your website isn’t appropriately equipped.

6) Increase Your Traffic

You want people to find you. Consider search engines, links from other sites, printed use of your web address, using your own branded email, and other strategies to drive traffic to your site.

7) Call to Action

Ask for their business and encourage them to contact you. Make it easy. Provide multiple ways to contact you.

10 Key Benefits of Using ERP Software

Here are the ten key benefits that having an ERP software brings:

1. Scalability: An ERP system is easily scalable. That means adding new functionality to the system as the business needs change is easy. This could mean easy management of new processes, departments, and more.
2. Improved reporting: Much of the inefficiency in operational work stems from improper reporting. With an ERP system, this possibility is eliminated as reporting follows an automated template system, allowing various departments to access information seamlessly.
3. Data quality: As compared with manual record-keeping or other traditional approaches, an ERP system improves data quality by improving the underlying processes. As a result, better business decisions can be reached.
4. Lower cost of operations: An ERP system introduces fundamental innovations in managing resources, which eliminates delays and thus reduces cost of operations. For instance, use of mobility allows real-time collection of data, which is indispensable to lowering costs.
5. Better CRM: A direct benefit of using a good ERP system is improved customer relations as a result of better business processes.
6. Business analytics: Having high-quality data allows businesses to use the power of intelligent analytics tools to arrive at better business decisions. In fact, many good ERP systems have built-in analytics functionality to allow easier data analysis.
7. Improved data access: Controlling data access properly is always a challenge in organizations. With an ERP system, this challenge is overcome with the use of advanced user management and access control.
8. Better supply chain: Having the right ERP system in place means improved procurement, inventory, demand forecasting, etc., essentially improving the entire supply chain and making it more responsive.
9. Regulatory compliance: Having the system in control means organizations can better comply with regulations. Further, the most important and recurring regulatory requirements can be built right into the system.
10. Reduced complexity: Perhaps the most elegant argument in the favor of ERP systems is that they reduce the complexity of a business and introduce a neatly designed system of workflows. This makes the entire human resource chain more efficient.

There are many more benefits of an ERP system, but these are the chief ones. Needless to say, a good ERP system is indispensable in the modern economic scenario.

Benefits and importance of digital marketing

Nowadays, customers have access to information any time and any place they want or need it. Thanks to the Internet and globalization, most people on the globe are able to access the information via computers, tablets or mobiles. What business owners should remember is that everyone can influence the image of their companies via ex. Social Media and you can be sure that your customer feedback will be more trustworthy for others to read than your own one. 

Why Digital Marketing is so important and gives you so many benefits? Because via electronic channels and by posting positive comments, feedback's about your company/product you (and your happy customers) can attract new customers and build long-lasting relationship. But, be careful! It works both ways! Happy customers can help you, but unhappy customer can harm your business very seriously. That's why as a business owner make sure you always remember about the following points:

Encourage engagement through digital media. You can simply acquire new clients via ex. Social Media channels. When doing so, ensure you segment them into different customer groups according to their interests. Later, you will be able to interact with them and encourage to various actions. 

The more likes the better. As part of Digital Marketing – Social Media is underestimated. It's a big mistake because your “Facebook” likes or “Twitter” shares can help your company grow as they build credibility and trust. They also bring traffic to the website and are cost less. What you have to do is to insert a Social Media plugin onto your site and keep updating your customers about the company news, discounts, etc. Bear in mind to schedule the frequency of updates and not to overwhelm them with too much information at once. You may be surprised with the outcome.  

Get ahead of your competitors. Every year more and more businesses give up traditional advertising methods and focus on SEO, Google Adwords or Social Media spending huge money on these resources. This is the reason why the market gets increasingly competitive and big players get ahead of little companies. As a small business on the market, you cannot compete with them but there is something you can do. You can use Google Alerts tool to monitor your competitors. This tool will allow you to track your competitors products and marketing strategies so that you can learn something from them and improve your own business strategy. 

Go beyond the boundaries. It's important to understand that digital marketing doesn't only apply to your website! However most of the marketers create a website or an eCommerce and  invest in SEO and/or AdWords. But to make your business stand out from the crowd, you need a real strategy that puts potential customers first and use all the available tools to acquire them. 

Business reputation first. Good reputation of any business is essential. Without the trust and confidence of the customer, a company will not survive. Especially in the past years the importance of reputation has become increasingly noticeable. If a business has a good reputation, customers may choose that particular company from many on the market. The positive reputation enables marketers to differentiate their products/services in a highly competitive market and successfully compete with big players. How to build a good reputation? Make sure that you communicate with your customers and everyone who interacts with your company through website, e-mail, Social Media. Answer any doubts, offer help and make sure you build a long-lasting relationship with your customers.