A boost in sales, improved brand awareness, increased revenue, a bump in the bottom line, call it what you will, all companies big and small want to grow. While there are many ways to go about achieving growth, technology has become one of the most effective and applicable options for a variety of different reasons. Here are a few of the most common ways that tech can help you grow your business.
The Relationship Between Tech and Business Growth
When tech is avoided or shunned by a business owner, it’s typically for one of two reasons. On the one hand, they may see it as a complex area of business that is far too complicated to understand and apply to their small operation.
On the other hand, technology may be seen as little more than unnecessary “bells and whistles” for already-addressed business activities. Sure, you can indulge in using tech, but all you’ll be doing is spending money on gadgets that won’t actually help your bottom line. That’s the story, at least.
However, the technological revolution of the 21st century has officially dispelled both of these mindsets. Tech has officially become a means to an end — especially if that end is growth.
Two decades into the century, modern technology is capable, diversified, and affordable so that even the smallest of businesses can take advantage of the powerful benefits that it offers. Here are just a handful of those benefits:
- Tech enables you to do more: 97% of entrepreneurs have an overtly (and often excessive) hands-on role in their business. This is true, even though 65% of them agree that they would be better equipped for long-term growth if they could at times step back from their myopic, day-to-day view of operations. Tech can take over mundane items like payroll and bookkeeping in order to free up a business owner’s time.
- Tech boosts your reputation: Tech allows you to establish, monitor, influence, and protect your brand’s reputation.
- Tech provides quality at affordable costs: Tech has the ability to streamline tasks and reduce the cost of operations in order to facilitate efficient and productive growth.
- Tech enables scalability and adaptability: Developments such as remote work and the virtual office have allowed business owners to replace expensive office spaces with affordable alternatives.
- Tech offers insights: Collecting data and turning it into actionable information can become a key aspect of progress that specifically enables small business owners to develop growth strategies.
- Tech ignores geographic limitations: E-commerce, search engine marketing, and other tech-driven activities defy geographic limitations and provide even the smallest entrepreneur access to billions of potential customers across the globe.
Tech isn’t just part of a method to achieve growth. It’s a powerful, diverse, and multi-faceted tool that can help a business thrive in nearly every area of its operations.
Universal Tech Applications for Growth
Here are a few of the ways that tech is specifically impacting growth-related areas of business:
- Online marketing: Digital marketing offers companies of all sizes the ability to reach a massive audience at an extremely affordable cost. This enables brand awareness, customer acquisition, and even customer service, all at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing and communication methods.
- Innovation: Tech allows small businesses to achieve unique innovation through collecting and organizing customer feedback, utilizing tech to develop new products, and even simply freeing up and empowering employees to spend time brainstorming rather than tending to mundane tasks.
- Perfecting the customer experience: From chatbots to e-commerce sites, to content marketing, tech has allowed even the smallest teams of professionals to move people through a customer journey that is more personalized and tailored to them than ever before.
Tech has officially passed the point of being a useful tool. Instead, it’s become an essential aspect of nearly every part of a healthy business. From marketing to product development to customer service, tech can positively influence and improve business activity across the board.
Being Proactive, Not Reactive
It’s tempting for business owners to take the safe route by opting to let tech prove itself before adapting it into their company’s operations. However, if entrepreneurs want to do more than survive, they must be proactive about the way they implement tech into their business.
In order to thrive, business owners must be willing to approach technology with a growth mindset that isn’t just willing to use proven technology but is also willing to embrace new changes and developments as they occur. By proactively identifying how new tech can improve your company, you can put yourself at the forefront of business growth in your industry. In other words, being proactive and open-minded as you prepare for growth enables you to surpass others who are lagging behind due to their own reactive nature.
Using Tech to Grow Your Business
Every modern entrepreneur’s goal should be to both utilize existing tech and position themselves to take advantage of future technological evolutions. If you can do this, you will be able to quickly realize potential growth in your business. In addition, you’ll be ready to scale your company in order to accommodate that growth in an efficient and effective manner.
