How Technology Can Help Your Business Move Forward

No one can deny the fact that technology has changed the way we humans live today. This includes corporations, organizations, and businesses, as well!

There are so many ways modern technology can help a business function and grow.

In general, technology can help businesses:

• Operate effectively & efficiently with little to no manpower.
• Increase connectivity to customers, suppliers, and employees.
• Decrease operational costs and pass down those benefits to customers in the form of lower prices.

Yes, technology can do all this and much more for a business. And there are statistics that prove it.

 

Small Business Technology Statistics

In particular, small businesses have embraced technology because of its ability to help them compete with larger organizations within their industry on many levels, and they have shifted their budgeting to include more technology within their operations.

The fact is that small businesses continue to spend more on technology each successive year.

Since 2010, small businesses have increased their technology spending by 18%.

That is not the only statistic that supports the integral relationship between technology and small business growth either.

The following stats gives more credence to the current technological business boom:

Each year small business employees save roughly 725M work hours by using mobile apps.

26% of all enterprises, spend over $6M per year on cloud computing.

Two-thirds of small businesses would not be able to compete effectively without wireless technology.

66% of small business utilize wireless technology for daily operations.

In 2015, approximately one-third of small businesses said that their top-most investment was in technology.

It seems obvious from the above that small businesses are more than willing to reinvest their profits into technology in order to increase productivity and maintain competitiveness within their industry.

Technology is an investment in a business’s future!

 

3 Ways Technology Can Take Your Business to The Next Level

Businesses of all sizes use technology-driven software, applications, and processes to make their entire operation smarter, faster, and more efficient.

To be even more specific, technology helps businesses, especially small to medium-sized businesses, get more organized, improve customer experience, and create higher levels of employee satisfaction.

1. Technology Equals Organization

But only if those tools are used wisely!

If a business does not design a proper strategy that provides an adequate environment from which they can take full advantage of the technology they have invested in, then it is just like buying a brand-new Ferrari and putting it in the hands of drivers who have never driven a car before — the results will be disastrous and the investment a failure.

However, if the business provides proper education and resources to their management and employees on how to get the best benefit from their new tools, then there are a number of organizational benefits that can be obtained from each department within the company, 3 of which are as follows:

Streamlined/Organized Human Resources

Technology gives many benefits to a business’s HR department. 

For one thing, technology helps to automate data-driven & communication tasks to free up manpower for more important work.

Secondly, the hiring process is simplified and expanded through the use of online interviews, online job postings, and online educational resources.

Thirdly, technology can help cut down on the time spent by HR employees searching for pertinent employee records as they can now access the information they need with a click of the mouse instead of a tedious trip to the file cabinet, which is often cluttered and out-of-order.

Streamlined/Organized Marketing

A business’s marketing department has a plethora of technological tools available to them today that can help them spot buyer and product trends, scale their advertising campaigns, and create higher consumer engagement.

Big data, marketing analytics, and online marketing tools & software allow businesses to analyze consumer behavior in the form of social likes, buying habits, and conversion rates in order to better market to them.

Technology speeds up the entire scaling process once a particular campaign is found to be profitable. For instance, automated online marketing tools have the ability to compare the ROI (return on investment) of each campaign in a matter of seconds, as well as provide the marketing team the ability to gauge consumer engagement and email responses in order to cut the losers and dump more money and time into the winners.

Last but not least, is the ability technology offers to expand audience reach through online platforms like social media and blogs. Without the use of online social networking platforms, brands simply will not be able to reach the maximum amount of potential customers possible.

Using traditional, non-technical advertising methods alone decreases a business’s reach and ultimately halts exponential growth.

Streamlined/Organized Production & Cost Control

Ultimately, technology assures that all business tasks get done in the proper order and at the proper time.

3 specific ways in which technology can help in this regard are as followed:

1 – Tracking Performance

Managers can access real-time data on employee output with the help of technological solutions. This helps to reduce errors, increase productivity levels, and eliminate the ability to manipulate employee output.

2 – Team Coordination

One of the biggest problems many businesses face today is how to coordinate workflow amongst various departments. Technology assists in this area, as resource planning tools make it much easier to unify and integrate various departments into a single, cohesive unit.

3 – Transparent/Communication

Every member of a business can see what others are doing and what they are saying with modern-day software and technological solutions.

All members can now organize their daily tasks in a more efficient manner and obtain information from their colleagues in a much clearer, quicker, and more concise way with the help of technology.

2. Technology Equals Better Customer Experience

Not only does technology help the internal functions of a business, but it also creates more ideal customer experience situations, which ultimately increases customer base and profitability (i.e. business growth).

If used wisely, technology can make it easier for customers to purchase goods and services and get their issues resolved through an easy-to-navigate customer support system.

If a business makes the customer’s life easier, the customer will make the business’s life easier!

3 examples of how technology can improve customer experience have been listed below.

Payment Options

Mobile payments & automated online purchases (i.e. stored debit/credit/PayPal information) make purchasing simple and easy, a combination that is proven to build customer retention and increased revenue.

Kiosks (Touch-Screen)

While this is a recent trend being implemented by big brands like McDonald’s, this technology is sure to catch on and become more commonplace among brick-and-mortar stores and shops as it allows seamless ordering and reduces long lines and customer waiting.

Apps

People these days cannot live without their apps, specifically their mobile apps. Many brands, like Starbucks, have already taken advantage of this fact and built apps for their customers that simplify the ordering & checkout process.

Mobile apps can also help to improve customer support.

App feedback forms are a great example of how a mobile app can help build a stronger relationship with the customer, handle & provide solutions to customer queries & problems in real-time, and reduce the amount of negative feedback from disgruntled customers on social media platforms and other online properties.

Technologies such as these make the customer an active participant in the brand and not just a spectator who has no say in the matter!

3. Technology Equals Happy Employees

Technology benefits almost every aspect of a business. From organizing & streamlining its daily operational activities to providing better customer service and support, business-based technology has and continues to advance all areas within a business, including employee satisfaction.

Employees are the backbone of every enterprise and if they aren’t happy, the customers won’t be happy.

If a business’s employees are unsatisfied with their tasks and working environment, the company will cease to progress and even regress if it does not do anything about employee morale.

Technology solves this problem in 3 ways.

Ticketing Automation

With the new technological versions of customer support, there will be no more lengthy online ques. Of course, while that is great news for customers, it is especially beneficial for employees.

The old ways of email, text, and voice-based customer support are done and businesses are already seeing new technological automation in the areas of on-demand services.

Smart bots will soon be able to handle most “ticket support” functions which will free up employees from this laborious and often-times thankless task and put their talents to better use.

Language-Based Technology

Employees are often times confused by computing systems which only understand specific sets of code and organized data streams.

Enter human-based technology…

Basically, these programs are able to understand what employees are trying to get at even if they use natural language instead of code.

This not only saves them time and frustration but also helps them provide better service to the business and the customers it serves.

All-Access Technology

How happy would employees be if they could access all the data and information they needed from any device they chose?

Very happy, indeed!

Technology has not only made this a possibility but a fact!

Employees can now access and work from a mobile phone, laptop, or tablet with the same efficiency and ease as sitting at their desk while working on their desktop.

The end result of such technology is improved productivity, not to mention well-being which is a major contributor to employee satisfaction.

 

Wrapping Up

Technology has provided numerous advantages to our society. One does need not to look any further than to companies that are currently doing business this way to gain a solid understanding of this fact.

Having an optimized workflow, better customer service, and a high rate of employee satisfaction are just some of the ways in which technology can help businesses compete, not only today but in the decades ahead.

Business leaders should first find out which tasks need to be streamlined within their organization in order to remain ahead of the competition and then find technological solutions to automate a great majority of them to make life easier for their managers, employees, and customers.