Amazon is the largest ecommerce retailer in the world, and no, it doesn’t come down to pure luck and excellent timing. Their web sales are 5x those of Walmart, Target and BUY.com – combined.
After years in the making, they’ve become the model for ecommerce. And, like any great business, there were a variety of pieces that went into their success puzzle – in particular, these six genius strategy decisions. Read the full entry
0 Comments
Look out your window: if there’s a line of cranky employees outside waiting to punch a time clock before starting their shift it might be time to invest in attendance tracking software.
Using a time clock is the equivalent of asking your employees to yell “here” every morning as you dutifully check off their name in an attendance notebook similar to the one your second grade teacher used. Read the full entry
2012 was an enormous year for cloud computing. Gartner research estimates that the public cloud market grew to a total of $109 billion worldwide, a nearly 20% increase over the previous year. Many businesses have jumped on the cloud computing bandwagon as it emerged last year, and yours may have been one of them.
From time tracking to payroll software, there are many ways your business can benefit from the cloud. And though we’re a few months into 2013, it’s never too late to assess and improve. It’s important to consider your current cloud usage and future. Read the full entry
Are you familiar with the concept of employee engagement? What about your business? Are you aware that many studies today report that employee engagement is at a 22 year low?
We define an engaged employee as one who is fully involved in, and enthusiastic about their work, and thus will act in a way that furthers their organization’s interests. Read the full entry
According to a survey released by CareerBuilder, 35% of companies were predicted to hire temporary workers in 2012, an increase of 8% from three years ago. Hiring temporary workers can help your business fill gaps in staffing, complete special short-term projects, and save money on payroll and benefits.
Utilize the power of social media, networking, and skilled staffing agencies to find the right temporary employees for your business. Read the full entry
Thanks to modern technology, more and more business owners are running their business on the go. StartupDonut says, “Communications and computing technology mean many businesses can operate wherever there is a reliable internet connection.”
And, even if you work from a base office, it’s unavoidable that you will have to leave your office and hit the road – to meet with clients, run sales at a trade show, or inspect a vendor.
If you’re working on the go, you need to have everything in order – consider these 5 tips the next time you head out. Read the full entry
In January, Twitter introduced its newest application, Vine; a mobile video service that allows users to capture and share short, six second, looping videos.
Put simply, a Vine can be considered a tweet in video form. The short videos are meant to inspire creativity, but are they capable of wielding much more in terms of marketing value? We believe that they can.
As a small business owner, it is important to have as many marketing tactics up your sleeve as possible. This free application has many marketers thinking outside of the box for methods to engage their audience. Read the full entry
In the past, businesses connected with customers through direct mail, phone calls, and in-person conversations regularly. Now, customers are looking for more channels to have their questions answered and aren’t shying away from reaching out to businesses online. Social networks are no different.
More and more, customers want timely responses from brands they reach out to online. Twitter, one of the fastest moving networks, has become one of the major customer service outlets for today’s consumer. Here are three steps you can take now to be more successful with customer service on Twitter. Read the full entry
While good management and great employees are integral to your call center, it’s important that you take it one step further: analyzing the right data.
Experts at The Harvard Business Review reported, “It is estimated that Walmart collects more than 2.5 petabytes of data every hour from its customer transactions. A petabyte is one quadrillion bytes, or the equivalent of about 20 million filing cabinets’ worth of text.” Read the full entry
Your logo is your brand, and you worked a long time to determine what would best represent your growing business.
So, for a business to change its long-established logo, it faces considerable risk. The old logo is recognizable, respected, and carries specific connotations reflective of the business brand – and an alteration to the logo can damage that brand.
However, when a company is in the process of upgrading its brand, a new logo can be a symbol of greater changes taking place: changes to the business’s mission, focus, and values. Evolution is healthy for any business, which is why many brands choose to revamp their look. Read the full entry
