There is one recurring challenge for women entrepreneurs that we hear a lot about at our regular Lioness Lean In Breakfast events, and that is how to work more on the business, rather than in it. It’s so easy to get bogged down by the day-to-day issues, the fire-fighting, the administration and the general minutiae of running a business that it’s easy to lose the big picture and maintain perspective. Although it’s part of the overall challenge of being an entrepreneur, its essential to be able to take a step back on a regular basis and see what you need to do to keep making positive changes to the business that will keep it on track and growing. So, here are 10 useful tips to ensure you keep working on your business, not continually in it.
- Delegate or shop-out mundane activities that are a drain on your time
- Increase your brand’s visibility by harnessing the power of social media - in other words, get people talking about it for you
- Research why customers buy your products and services and use that insight to better hone your marketing activities
- Step back and look at your website through the eyes of a new customer, and fine-tune it
- Prioritise and focus on the 80/20 - work on what will deliver 80% of the results, for 20% of the effort
- Get on top of your on-line metrics - understand who’s visiting your website and social media platforms, what are they buying, how are they connecting?
- Take better care of your customers - improve your after-sales service and communication
- Improve your sales conversion rates - look at how to turn your website hits into downloads, CRM opportunities and sales
- Congratulate yourself and your employees on work well done and celebrate the small wins, not just the big ones!
- Keep the big vision for the business constantly in sight, and ensure employees are also focused on making it a reality.