You may learn more about us and schedule a free appointment.
You may listen to all of our exclusive audio podcasts here.
Now, enjoy the video podcast!
Host: John D. Verlin
Transcript:
[Music]
00:02
Wonderful good afternoon to you today
00:04
John Verlin once again with On-Demand
Advertising Solutions. another Digital
00:10
Marketing Update this is number 41 the
00:13
podcast number 41. There was a survey
00:16
taken that I thought was great and it
00:19
was done April of 2016. This is a post
00:24
from All Business.com author's Brian
00:27
Sutter, and it's really good summary of
00:30
basically the top 15 challenges facing
00:34
small business today. Now this was taken
00:36
April of 2016, little over a year ago. But
00:40
I was about to say, well it should be
00:43
applicable but who knows things change
00:45
so much. But I think in general for small
00:47
business owners,
00:49
you'll like this information. It'll glean
00:51
possibly some of the things you're
00:53
experiencing and maybe reinforce some
00:56
things that you suspected. We'd love to
00:59
be able to interview your prospects or
01:03
your customers right? Well this is what
01:06
they did, they actually took 1,100
01:09
small business owners and were able to get
01:12
answers from them. I was a little, I
01:14
don't want to say I was surprised or
01:16
shocked--but I was a little bit, because
01:19
of my experiences talking to Chamber
01:23
members, Small Business Development
01:25
Center instructors who work with a lot
01:29
of small business owners particularly
01:31
the new businesses and startups. And they
01:34
you know, it's pretty much in agreement
01:36
with what I've discovered. But a few of
01:39
these areas I was surprised because this
01:41
pretty much documents from an actual
01:43
survey things I've been suspecting--the
01:47
challenges small business owners in
01:51
this survey were having issues with.
01:54 More than half said they were hiring new
01:56
employees. That's not terribly new
02:00
because of the labor shortages as the
02:03
economy has come out of the recession.
02:04
More and more people obviously are going
02:08
to be needed as companies grow. However
02:11
you know we're seeing maybe
02:13
not salaries growing as much. More
02:15
stagnated and a number of things I've
02:19
read on blog posts about freelancing
02:22
side gigs, part-time work things like
02:25
that. That's probably going on as well
02:28
and maybe one reason why people can't
02:30
hire people because the job
02:32
opportunities may not be paying what
02:34
people want and or their side businesses
02:37
or side gigs that just don't have enough
02:40
hours for people to work. The second
02:43
challenge is employee health care and
02:46
this of course was done in 2016
02:49
referring to 2015 healthcare which was
02:52
beginning and 2016. The numbers jumped
02:57
from like thirty percent of the small
02:59
business owners were concerned about it
03:00
up to forty three percent and my guess
03:03
is today 2017, it's even higher because
03:07
of uncertainty. Even though we've got you
03:11
know the u.s. gov or US healthcare.gov
03:13
is you know still offering an enrollment
03:17
right now. As a matter of fact, health
03:19
care it's been changed and Congress is
03:22
still battling with all that how they're
03:23
gonna do and whatever they're going to
03:25
do. The third challenge, I guess you could
03:31
call it is the confidence in the economy
03:32
has dropped. Now again, this is a year old
03:35
but small business owners
03:37
have less confidence
03:39
according to Mr. Sutter from this survey
03:41
in the economy than they did in 2015. Now
03:45
this year, my guess is that's
03:47
it was a 25 percent bump compared to 21
03:52
percent in 2015. So you know it's better
03:56
for 2016. My guess is it's even better
03:58
this year.
04:00
Small businesses want to hire according
04:03
to this--50% want to but they can't
04:07
find qualified applicants and again that
04:10
could come down to wages. It could come
04:12
down to new skills, new software, new
04:17
platforms this whole shift we've talked
04:20
about in past podcasts of the new media.
04:23
The new experiences, the customer
04:26
experiences. The
04:27
focus on customer experience why this is
04:31
such a big deal in this shift because
04:34
you've got technology shifting to
04:36
smartphones and searches and artificial
04:40
intelligence now and all this sort of
04:43
thing. There's Alexa and Siri or what
04:46
used to be Siri. I guess so yeah,
04:48
things are changing and you got to have
04:51
people with skills to be able to do that.
04:53
The fifth challenge is growing revenue
04:57
Seventy-one percent of small businesses
04:59
expect revenue growth in 2016 more than
05:02
they did in 2015. That's 57 percent and
05:05
that's great. It shows that you know
05:07
we're coming out of the recession.
05:08
Consider the boom I guess you want
05:12
to call it of entrepreneurial boom is
05:14
still going. So they
05:17
expect to increase revenue. The sixth one
05:20
is they don't have a lot of love for
05:21
government and they wanted a Republican
05:24
president which they got one. But fifty
05:27
percent believe the government didn't do
05:29
enough to support us small businesses
05:30
and only 24 percent believed the
05:34
government did. Now we have I believe
05:35
it's Linda McMahon who is a Small
05:38
Business
05:41
Administration's new director and she
05:43
had a you know obviously a small and
05:46
very successful wrestling type business.
05:49
She sounds like a good
05:51
person in the right place at the right
05:52
time to help small businesses grow.
05:55
Number seven challenge they want
05:58
government completely out of small
05:59
business One in ten said they didn't
06:01
want any government involvement--well
06:03
that's pie in the sky probably, but at
06:06
least that was a desire that showed up
06:08
on the survey which was interesting.
06:10
Number eight, they favored a Republican
06:13
presidential win, which they got. And
06:16
number nine, now this I talked about this
06:20
before folks but most marketing
06:24
budgets are small. Nine percent invests
06:28
nothing in marketing, 25 percent invest
06:31
one to three percent of their revenue
06:33
and 29 percent invest four to six
06:36
percent. Think about this,
06:39
9% don't have any investment in
06:42
marketing. And 25% just put 2-3
06:49
percent of their revenues in. 29% do four
06:54
to six percent that's the biggest amount
06:57
you know 30 almost 30 percent put four
06:59
to six percent but what about the other
07:01
70 percent? What's going on with them? Why
07:04
are they not investing in marketing? Now
07:06
you would say well John, your marketing
07:08
background yeah you're expecting that.
07:10
But think about okay what if they had to
07:13
buy a building or building
07:16
insurance for their business. Would they
07:18
skimp on that? Would they skimp on
07:21
financial advice? Accounting? Taxes? I mean,
07:26
what makes marketing so different?
07:29
Because I think you know businesses as
07:33
they grow or not grow they begin to
07:36
realize wait a minute--we've got to
07:38
figure out what we're doing for
07:39
marketing here. And they try to play
07:41
catch-up
07:41
rather than having as we talked about on
07:44
our last podcast, having a marketing plan
07:46
in place so you can adjust it. Just like
07:49
any other plan part of your business. And
07:54
again, I refer back to my experience in
07:56
advertising over the years and how
07:57
shocked I was. This agrees with what I
08:00
experienced so you didn't put any
08:02
revenue aside to advertise what are you
08:05
gonna do six months from now? Well we had
08:07
a really successful Christmas season.
08:09
okay, its February. What are you gonna
08:11
do? I'm saying it's the planning
08:15
aspect, in the budgeting aspect you know.
08:18
Hey we are definitely putting aside you
08:22
know 10 grand a month to do social media,
08:26
TV ads, radio. Having a definite plan with
08:31
a definite budget in mind and not just
08:33
shooting from the hip. Because
08:35
that's a guarantee. And I've seen this
08:37
happen over and over where okay we got
08:39
to go out have a store closing sale or
08:43
almost a going-out-of-business sale to
08:45
survive. And why did that have to happen?
08:48
Well, my guess is you know lack of
08:51
planning. But the business environment
08:53
changed. They didn't anticipate. They
08:57
didn't plan. I mean we can't have a
09:00
crystal ball but at least you know and
09:03
I've talked about this quite a bit--the
09:06
competition. I don't hear a whole lot of
09:08
marketing firms talking about
09:09
competitors, not only their competitors
09:13
but competitors for their clients. The
09:16
competition can sneak right in and just
09:18
steal your customers. If you don't
09:21
have a marketing plan in place and a
09:22
budget. What
09:27
do you do when a new competitor comes in
09:28
town?
09:29
They've been checking you out and your
09:31
industry and your market and you had no
09:33
idea. They just come moving in here
09:36
from San Diego. Opened up a whole new
09:38
athletic apparel store right across the
09:41
street or a mile from yours. What do you
09:44
do? That's why this is important to plan
09:47
and budget just like anything else you
09:49
would do. The tenth challenge was that
09:53
the top four marketing tools used by
09:55
small business were email, company
09:58
websites, social media and word-of-mouth.
10:00
Not terribly surprising but I've
10:03
commented on this before. First of all, to
10:05
get the emails you've got to have
10:09
customers or have them sign up for
10:14
something to legitimately get that email
10:16
to send email blasts to them. It could be
10:19
a newsletter, it could be a free ebook, or
10:22
anything you know. But you have
10:24
to get their email willingly and they
10:26
have to agree to that to receive emails
10:28
from you. So email marketing yes, if you
10:32
do it properly you know by getting
10:34
permission not spamming that kind of
10:37
thing. Company websites. That's huge. We've
10:40
talked about this quite a bit also, how
10:42
small businesses so many of them I found
10:45
do not have that. And again, I'm shocked.
10:47
That is your online presence. Social
10:51
media. More and more. So yes, you're having
10:56
to because that's where your customers
10:58
and prospects are hanging out. And
11:00
word-of-mouth--that kind of goes hand in
11:02
hand a little bit as more and more
11:05
people are communicating. Particularly
11:06
younger people. I've heard yeah, they'll
11:08
be standing ten feet away and they're
11:10
texting each other. They're not even
11:12
talking.
11:15
That's why these devices are becoming so
11:17
important. The 11th issue that a lot of
11:21
small businesses have our challenge says
11:23
social media is not Universal. One in
11:25
five small businesses did not use social
11:28
media. Sounds like most of
11:32
them do but some don't. And if you don't,
11:35
that again it could affect your customer
11:37
relationship with your prospects your
11:39
business relationship. Because they
11:41
expect you to be up on the latest things.
11:44
If they are, why aren't you? And they can
11:48
look down on you for that. Number 12 it
11:50
says, websites are missing key parts. Only
11:52
50% of small businesses provide company
11:55
locations, phone numbers, and email
11:57
addresses on their website. And only 35%
12:01
give website visitors the opportunity to
12:04
apply for a job.
12:06
68% do not conduct e-commerce. Don't
12:10
even have phone numbers, addresses or
12:12
email addresses. Fifty percent! What is wrong with
12:17
that? That surprises me. You got a
12:21
website. You've put 10 grand into or
12:23
whatever to build it. Include your phone
12:25
number, your address or your email for
12:27
crying out loud! I'm sorry. I just
12:30
thought that shocked me. All right, number
12:33
13 of the challenge is small business
12:35
owners faced in this survey inventory
12:37
information is not up-to-date. Only 16%
12:40
use inventory control software systems.
12:43
56% used excel pen or
12:48
paper or other systems that cannot be
12:51
updated in real time. As your
12:54
business grows yeah you probably need
12:56
some sort of accounting system or
12:58
inventory system to track everything to
13:01
make you more efficient. The 14th
13:03
challenge information about their assets
13:05
aren't current. Asset tracking system
13:08
again like Excel or an accounting system
13:10
again that will make you more productive
13:12
and efficient
13:14
as your business grows--to track your
13:16
assets. And creative and technical work,
13:19
number 15, gets farmed out more than
13:21
other tasks. 54% of small businesses use
13:24
outsourced firms or contractors for
13:27
graphic design and web design. 44%
13:30
outsource their tax preparation. Now, as a
13:33
marketing freelancer guy as I am--I could
13:37
see the need for that. You can you
13:39
know. That's that's part of my pitch as
13:40
to save you money by not going to a 200
13:43
member marketing firm. Where you don't
13:45
need a whole lot.
13:46
You just need specifics. ala cart so to
13:51
speak. You know, I just need social media
13:52
yes I could use some video graphic or
13:56
animated video or some podcasting or
13:59
whatever. That's one reason I targeted
14:02
some of those because I felt
14:04
there was a real need for that for small
14:06
business owners. To have some options in
14:08
addition to the larger firms. But again,
14:10
that the outsourcing--yes it can save you
14:13
money, just make sure it covers what you
14:15
need. Because you want to
14:18
include a good web designer to
14:21
include your phone number in your email.
14:23
Top 15 challenges small business owners
14:27
faced questionnaire done a year a little
14:30
over a year ago. We'll see you next week.
14:33
John Verlin is my name with On Demand
Solutions.com is the website. Have a great
14:43
day and we'll talk to you next week!
All podcasts are recorded by Verlin Studios / Gardner, Kansas
Copyright, John D. Verlin 2017
Comments
Post a Comment