Author: Pamela Swift

Categories
Business Ideas

The Top 9 Ways To Grow Your Business in 2023

When it comes to marketing, many business owners, entrepreneurs, authors, speakers, coaches and experts get completely overwhelmed with all of the different methods, strategies and ‘blow up your business now’ hacks being promised by endless marketers – and either end up doing a million things poorly, or absolutely nothing at all!

So whilst this article is going to share 9 methods with you – there is strategy to how they may be selected for your business.

Having been in business for 14 years now, I can assure you that the best way to succeed is to have one clear objective (yes, just ONE) for your business each year.

Then use a carefully selected combination of marketing strategies that collectively and individually have the sole purpose of achieving that one, single goal.  

The one goal you choose will be unique to you, but it must be something very measurable

 eg:

  • X number of students in your online course(s)
  • X number of members in your membership program
  • X number of clients for a particular service

Note that I don’t have a monetary figure there – that’s because it’s better to:

  1. First come up with your financial target for 2020, 
  2. THEN work out how many customers you need in order to reach that financial figure
  3. Then work out how many customers you will need to get per month, per week and per day in order to meet that target

From here, your marketing activities become simple, because no matter how many or how few marketing methods you choose to take on, they all have ONE clear purpose with measurable markers.  

Eg, if your goal is to get X number of members in your membership program and you select the following marketing channels:

  • You will use Social media to connect with your audience, build relationships > lead them to become paid members
  • You will use your Website for establishing your credibility, sharing valuable information, encouraging visitors to join email list > and ultimately to sign up to your paid membership
  • You will use Emails to build familiarity and trust, establish a relationship, share valuable content > and to ultimately become paying members
  • You will use YouTube to give tasters of your content, build familiarity, build a following > and ultimately encourage them to become paying members
  • You will use Books to establish your expert credibility, get targeted customers > become members

There are endless examples – but you get the picture!

ONE goal – as many strategies as you want to use, but all with that ONE single mission at the centre.

So, what is your ONE BIG GOAL FOR 2023? (share in the comments below!)

9 Ways To Grow Your Business in 2023 

  1. Create an Online Course

Online courses have a huge array of benefits for any business and expert, and are highly versatile to meet certain functions in your business.

Not only do online courses immediately provide an additional income stream into your business as soon as you publish one, it’s passive income too!

Another excellent use for an online course is to build your email list, by using them as lead magnets.

If you have a smartphone and an internet connection, you already have enough to create a basic lead magnet course without any extra expense or complex tech.  

Simply record your top 5 tips in your area of expertise in 5 short videos, and use that as mini lead magnet course that you can deliver to your prospects by email when they sign up to your list.  

And that’s not ALL online courses can do!  

A lead magnet mini course is only ONE type of course that you can create to grow your business and your bottom line!

Did you know that there are FIVE different types of online course that you can create – all of which have extremely powerful, but quite different benefits for the course creator?

Before you get started on creating your online courses, it is critical that you know which of the 5 types is best for you and your business so that it helps you quickly achieve your goals.

I have created a quick quiz to help you identify exactly which one is right for you – and as soon as you complete the quiz you will be sent an email with your results and a full description of all of the 5 types of online course too.

 

2. Video and Live Streaming

According to recent research by CISCO, video content is and will remain the number 1 form of consumed content on the internet.

The report states that videos “will continue to be in the range of 80-90% of total IP traffic. Globally, IP video traffic will account for 82 percent of traffic by 2022”.  

This is absolutely huge and backs up the point that I have been hammering into edupreneurs for years – YOU MUST be creating and publishing videos if you want to have any influence or impact in your market.  

To take it up one notch further – there has also been published research stating that people watch live videos for over 3 times longer than they watch a pre-recorded video. 

With live streaming capability now available on YouTube (once you hit 1,000 subscribers), LinkedIn, Facebook and more, it’s easier than ever to reach huge numbers of people from your mobile phone to theirs, with the click of a single button.   

But it’s not just any old videos that are trending.  

The past few years have been insanely hot for educational, information and how-to videos. Research by Curata, sited in a Forbes article shows that tutorial videos and demonstration videos account for the most popular videos on the internet! 

Further – live videos get you exceptional reach and maximum relationship-building opportunity.  There is nothing more ‘real’ than somebody who is live.

My ‘30 Days 30 Tips Challenge’ has been designed to help you grow your expert profile using live videos.  This challenge is currently FREE, so do go and check it out!

How to make the most out of video in 2023:

  1. Find 52 questions that your audience are asking, and answer each one in individual videos.  
  2. Record them all in a couple of days worth of filming, then mass upload them to YouTube using the ‘scheduled publish’ option.  

With only a couple of days worth of work, you’ll have a video preloaded to release on YouTube every single week for an entire year.

If you need help coming up with video ideas, check out my FREE STUFF: https://sarahcordiner.com/free-stuff/

3. Authoring Print Books and eBooks

According to Author Earnings, over $1 million eBooks are sold every day on Amazon alone.  

Short of gaining exposure to millions of people by having your knowledge and education on the pages of a book, you also gain exceptional industry credibility when you have published work.

I have published 7 books, and without any real marketing (other than an email to my list and some posts on Facebook) I have sold more than 12,000 copies of my books on Amazon Kindle alone.  That doesn’t even count any of my hard copy sales at all.

 

Although it’s hardly a million dollar income stream, I’ve sold 446 books in 10 countries in the past 90 days, from ONE platform alone, whilst doing absolutely nothing other than the odd share on Facebook (automated of course!)  Not bad, huh?

Now aside from them bringing in enough money to cover my coffee habit via a nice little cheque from Amazon each month, they also serve another, very powerful function for any business owner or expert….

In the front pages of all of my books, I include a link to a free online course which many of my readers take up – thus growing a targeted email list of people who often later invest in my full Edupreneur Academy.

Book sales won’t necessarily make you a millionaire on their own, but they have certainly worked for me in affirming extra credibility, harvesting thousands of targeted customers from one of the biggest marketplaces in the world, and subsequently have them invest in my other products and services.

Imagine getting over 12,000 new eager clients?  What would that do for your business?

The best bit is that becoming a published author is nowhere near as hard as you may imagine – and in fact, I have an online course in my Edupreneur Academy on ‘How To Write and Self-Publish Your Own Print Book and eBook’ if you’re thinking about tapping into this massive platform of business growth too.

4. Subscriptions and Memberships

Predictable, regular and consistent cash flow is critical for sustainable business and should be a priority for all business owners, experts and edupreneurs.

Selling online courses is a great way to earn a good income, however your sales can be unpredictable from month to month when you’re selling them ‘one-off’.

A trend that grew exponentially in 2017 and that really improved my cash flow, was shifting from selling courses individually, to creating a subscription based business model.

This works excellently when you have more than one online or digital offering, and you bundle them all up and offer them up for a monthly fee – which is a no-brainer cheaper option for the subscriber than paying for each item in the ‘package’ individually; and thus is the incentive for them.

A lot of entrepreneurs and business owners baulk at this idea at first “but discounting my stuff devalues it! I’ll lose money!”.

You HAVE to see memberships through a different lens – it’s a different income stream, even though it comprises the same content.

You see, lots of small sales, make a big income; and customers who can see that they are getting insane amounts of value for money become your raving fans, stick around for ages and tell their friends to join too.

Not convinced?  

Look how easy it is to earn $10,000 per MONTH in residual income from a simple $47 a month online membership academy….. 

  • 10 students = $470 per month
  • 50 students = $2,350 per month
  • 100 students = $4,700 per month
  • 150 students = $7,050 per month
  • 250 students = $11,750 per month
  • 750 students = $35,250 per month
  • 1,000 students = $47,000 per month

(Note: I am not saying your membership offering should be this price – it’s just an example)

Not so scrappy now, is it?!

How many membership subscribers would you need to achieve your personal passive income goal for 2020?

5. Blogging & Guest Blogging

Blogging is still one of my favourite ways to invest my time to create evergreen marketing collateral and I will definitely be continuing to use blogging as a growth strategy in 2020 and beyond.

The best bit is that blogging is a free and easy, lifelong marketing strategy that you get better and better at the more you do it.

I still get business today from posts I published years ago and without fail, I make some kind of sale from every post I put out each week.

Every time you publish a blog post you are putting out a digital, Google-searchable signpost to the world that points back to your website and ensures that your future customers can find you in Google search results for all of time to come. 

I always liken blog posts and other ‘content’ such as videos, to the silky rings of a spiders web.  Every time you publish a blog, you add another ring to your web. Your web gets bigger and bigger with every new blog, more people can find you and the wider area of ‘capture’ you have.

Blogs never stop working for you and they simultaneously demonstrate your expertise and gather up leads.

To take it to the next level, you can write blogs for other people’s sites.  

Why? Because these sites could have thousands, hundreds of thousands or even MILLIONS of subscribers and YOUR blog article will be put in front of all of them – thus the potential for you to attract lots of brand new fans and followers yourself.

How to make the most of blogging

  1. Ensure that your blog titles are the questions your target audience are typing into Google, then your blog will come up in their search results.  
  2. Search for the top 20 questions that your audience are typing into Google and answer them all in 20 blog posts
  3. Send it out to other blogs first so that they get ‘first publish’
  4. Schedule your blogs to auto-publish on your own website once a week and to auto-email to your mailing list for maximum impact.

Blogging has by far been consistently one of the best investments of my time for the most passive and sustainable rewards.  I highly suggest you consider it as a long term growth strategy for 2020. 

Want to buy my list of email addresses for blog owners and editors?  

I have created a list of 303 international blogs and online magazines in the field of business, entrepreneurship and online education and you can buy it here: >> BUY THE GUEST BLOGGING CONTACT LIST

6. Podcasting & Guest Podcasting

Just like blogging and publishing videos, creating and publishing podcasts is another incredible way to ensure that your prospective customers come across you and your content.

Podcasting has now become an everyday part of many people’s lives, so to ‘be there’ is to ‘be found’.  Although I have admittedly neglected my Course Creators podcast, it still gets new listeners and followers all of the time.

 

However, the tech and time required to set-up and run a podcast is not everyone’s cup of tea, but never fear, you can still tap into this enormous opportunity another way – by being a guest on other people’s podcasts!

Simply search for podcasts that serve your target audience, and reach out to the podcast owner to ask if they accept guests on their show.

But don’t leave it at that.  

Make sure that you outline a very specific way that you would like to contribute to their podcast as a guest, including what your interview topic could be called, what top 3-5 things you can share or teach their listeners and something you have to offer their audience for free as an extra value contribution.  

This method has got me many podcast interviews and they continue to collect new leads for me constantly.

If you have a podcast that’s looking for guests, I’d be delighted to come on your show – feel free to email me!

7. Digitising traditional products and services

Going online means going from a local market to a global one, instantly.  

I used to limit my face to face workshops to 20 students in a classroom at a time; now I have over 20,000 students enrolled in over 40 of my courses in 146+ countries at any one time (and growing every day) – all because I went ‘digital’.  

And when it came to my curriculum design services, serving my clients depended a lot on me driving into their offices and physically working with their teams in-person.  Now, I offer my course creation services online and have corporate, Government and small business clients all over the world – without leaving my office. You can too.  

Instead of having JUST face to face based offerings, can you ‘digitise’ what you do?

  • Turn common consult content into video tutorials
  • Create an online course
  • Put your topo tips into a published eBook or print book
  • Provide your consultations and coaching online and via video call rather than in-person
  • Offer predefined services for a fixed price that can be delivered remotely
  • Deliver your knowledge via paid or free webinars
  • Produce audio files or audio books
  • Create a digital instruction manual / PDF

Going digital with your offerings doesn’t have to replace your face to face offerings – in fact, once you have digital products and services your face to face options can go up in price.

But by adding a digital version of what you currently do in a traditional manner will scale your customer base to unlimited numbers, along with your bank balance.

8. Mini Challenges

The concept of the short, sharp ‘challenge’, with it’s promise of practical implementation and a quick result, has proven to be a highly successful strategy for me in previous years; and has attracted thousands of new leads and customers into my business.

The 5 day and 30 day challenges to achieve X result, have been the most popular for me – but you can chose whatever number of days you prefer to help your audience attain a certain desired outcome.

If your ‘challenge’ is a 5 day challenge, simply:

  1. Film 5 tutorial videos (one for each day)
  2. Develop a practical task for the challenge participants to complete each day
  3. Add downloadable templates
  4. Make it available by email, messenger bot and as a free online course on your website or learning management system (a delivery style to suit different preferences).  

What challenge could you create to engage, educate and help your clients and prospects get a much desired result for themselves?

If you need some help, why not join my FREE 5 day challenge which will teach you how to create an educational challenge of your own?!

9. Sell packages instead of individual items

People want more for their money, and you probably want more money for your time.

By shifting from an hourly rate service, or a single product sale, instead move to selling packages that include numerous offerings.

Bundle your online courses together to increase your transaction value, add eBooks to your course packages, add a consult to the bundle, templates, checklists and even discount vouchers for other people’s products and services and more.

There is no limit to how creative you can be about what you add in, but increasing the value of your packages does NOT have to mean adding more of your time to it.

Stop working for an hourly rate and instead work for a value transaction that maximises your profit and increases your customer satisfaction.

Even better, create 3 different packages that your customers could choose from (think baby bear, mummy bear and daddy bear, or bronze, silver, gold).

One of my clients managed to increase her hourly rate from $250, to over $1,500 per transaction without increasing her input by a single second, by simply packaging a number of her digital offerings together.

List all of your assets, content, products and services and work out what you can offer together in a much higher value bundle instead of selling everything individually. 

I go into more detail on how to do this in my book “Edupreneur: How To Monetise Your Expertise and Profitably Educate Your Market”.

Final thoughts

The strategies listed above are only a teeny weeny selection of the many strategies out there  – I could write a whole other book just on the various business growth strategies that have worked well for me, but hopefully these will be enough to get your brain ticking for now.

Remember that there is no single method to attract leads and grow your business, and that different strategies work for different businesses.

The best way to know what works best for you is to simply start experimenting.

Challenge yourself to try something new and make your 2023 the best year yet.

If you need some guidance, consider grabbing a 30 day free trial of the Edupreneur Academy where you can access over 30 online courses and books from me that all aim to help you grow your business whilst making a positive contribution to the world.

If you found this article helpful, please give it a share! 

Contributor name: Sarah Cordiner

Contributor website: www.sarahcordiner.com

Categories
Sales & Marketing

Top 10 Benefits of Outsourcing Digital Marketing that Improve Sales

Accelerating growth is one of the prime aspects on every business leader’s agenda. And looking for new opportunities is only natural in order to inch closer towards the desired growth. One such gate of opportunities is the domain of digital marketing. Flooded with endless possibilities and an equally remarkable flexibility in terms of ideas and methods of execution, digital marketing is indispensable for every business today. Digital marketing improves ROI, boosts your reach and targets the exact customer base that you need.

However, these infinite possibilities and opportunities may also make digital marketing quite overwhelming in more ways than one. This becomes more of a problem when a business decides to not rely on external support or expertise. In that case, failure and chaos become inevitable. 

The Solution: Outsourcing Digital Marketing 

When we compare in-house strategies with outsourced digital marketing, the latter is a clear winner. Why? The pay-off is better, the threats are lesser and the comforts are more. After all, time is a precious commodity and we all seem to be running out of it if you look close. Irrespective of how big or small your business might be, it requires a team that would make it possible to optimize all that available time in the most productive ways. This is where outsourcing comes into play. It brings in a fresh perspective, new techniques and a load of new possibilities to make your campaigns a success while simultaneously allowing you the luxury of more time that can be spent on focusing on other key areas of your business. Let’s take a closer look at how you can better keep up with the latest digital marketing trends if you take the outsourcing route. 

  1. Access to the Best Industry Experts

When you outsource digital marketing, you can enjoy access to an immense pool of experts in the area, all around the globe. Since you are no longer limited by geographical boundaries, it automatically makes things easier. Professionals in the area are already aware of how to achieve results that you are expecting. Their experience makes it possible for them to handle your projects with utmost efficiency. 

  1. No Administrative Hassles

When you approach a digital marketing agency, you don’t have to worry about payroll and employee benefits. The concerns of non-performance can also be put to rest when it becomes the responsibility of your hired agency or organization to ensure output. You are basically making an expert to get the desired results more efficiently. And it is certainly more cost-effective than hiring a full-time in-house employee for the same job. 

  1. Better Consistency and Professionalism

Consistency is one of the keys to successful digital marketing. So, if your in-house employees keep taking multiple days of leave repeatedly, it could become a problem for you. Or a massive internal event may throw everything else off track. Outsourcing can certainly help get rid of all these issues. That is because even if you are not working on the same project due to other priorities, your digital marketing experts would still be taking care of business. 

  1. Better Structure 

When you outsource your digital marketing to the right agency, they tend to have a more balanced structure. You get a full team of art directors, copywriters, designers, illustrators, web developers and so on, working on your marketing round the clock. There is an equal distribution of work among the specialists and set deadlines which further ensure a better quality of time and a faster turnaround time.

  1. Better Innovation

When members working on your team sit together to brainstorm ideas and their best execution, it boosts up the chances of yielding desired results in terms of creativity, novelty and effectiveness.  

  1. Access to the Latest Technology

Your in-house marketing department is highly likely to be technology-deprived or at best, be an assortment of incompatible marketing technologies that can render even the best ideas hopeless. There are over 4000 marketing technologies waiting to be explored and outsourcing can make it way easier for you to access the same. A performance-based overseas company that can ensure the right guidance to your marketing strategies coupled with implementation service and support can add immense value to your business. 

  1. Ability to Focus on the Core Areas of your Business

If you wish to keep your marketing processes separate from the core of your company, outsourcing services can be all the more helpful for you. It allows you to play around with better ideas and develop better strategies that are independent of the company’s other processes. With the right information and access, it becomes extremely helpful to focus on all areas of the business equally and in way better ways than ever before. 

  1. Improvement in SEO

SEO is a highly specialized job that requires dedicated experts working on it independently. When you outsource your digital marketing work, you are improving your chances of getting better SEO for your website too. That is because digital marketing and SEO often go hand-in-hand. 

An All-Round Approach to Digital Marketing

  1. Higher possibility of beating competition

Outsourcing further makes it easier to beat online competition. The amount of time and expenses required for setting up an in-house digital marketing team can be invested more wisely in exploring options across the globe that are reliable, experienced and established in their areas of expertise. You get to enjoy more transparency and a more 360-degree digital marketing approach that includes maintenance and development of strategies, campaigns, websites and other digital products that may have been a crucial part of your marketing move. 

  1. Better reach and visibility

Outsourcing broadens the possibility of increasing traffic, improving brand awareness and ultimately, sales. This is achieved as your visibility increases across multiple digital marketing and advertising platforms. In other words, a global reach is what you need for a better push to business. 

It is important to choose the right organization when you want to outsource digital marketing. The idea is to get better results at justifiable prices. So, a thorough look at their portfolio, credibility and hiring models is crucial. Besides, the larger and more competent your team is, the higher the chances of success. Outsourcing ensures this by removing boundaries and biases in terms of knowledge, trends, resources and so on.

Author:

John Tie
Digital Marketer & Content Strategist
www.virtualemployee.com
Categories
Operations

How to Move An Office Without Losing Productivity

Some companies move an office to lower operating costs or increase revenue, while others look for new clients, markets, or staff. Moreover, companies focus on reducing employee turnover by improving work-life balance within their team but also on increased efficiency as a result.

However, the process of office relocation is a challenge in itself. Avoiding reduced productivity during the transition to new office space should be a concern of every good manager. After all, moving an office includes much more than the simple relocation of furniture.

What does it take to move an office?

We are continually witnessing that business growth often leads to an office or headquarters relocation. One of the ways to handle rapid business expansion is to analyze thoroughly. Even though companies differ in size, they all follow a similar routine during relocation.

Essentially, it is just another project, although one that involves the whole organization. A successful office move is based on the hope-for-the-best-plan-for-the-worst rule and relies on proper

  • Moving strategy
  • Budgeting 
  • Communication

Moving strategy

First of all, you and your team need to make a comprehensive moving checklist, timetable and set up a budget. Moving strategy involves a lot of planning, so make sure you start well in advance. To move an office smoothly and avoid reduced productivity, you need to ensure that you put everything in order before moving day comes. Compiling a detailed inventory, communicating clearly, contacting utility and service providers, scheduling tasks and coordinating teams require significant additional effort. However, it is feasible.

You must prepare your new office before the moving day comes. If there is anything you need to fix or modify, you should do it before the first boxes arrive. Consider relocating departments one at a time from least to most significant for the business. Once your new office is fully functional, move the key department swiftly. The best time to conduct office relocation is over the weekend or after working hours.

Experts rely on experts

Only those who comprehend the complexity of moving an office understand the need to delegate a part of the relocation to experienced professionals. No matter how big or small your business is, consider relieving your employees of tasks such as packing, labeling, and unpacking. It will make the stressful time of office relocation pass smoothly, without serious disruption of work.

There is at least one moving company in your vicinity that has expertise in commercial relocations. Don’t hesitate to ask for assistance. After all, every company with its best interest in mind hires people who know what they’re doing. 

Moreover, consider renting a storage unit for the items you’re not ready to dispose of yet. The good news is that many moving companies offer short- and long-term storage services, as well. Additionally, while an archive is a necessity, you don’t need to clog your new working space with documents you rarely use. A nearby storage facility that is available to you 24/7 is the answer.

Setting up a moving budget

Poor budgeting, in general, is one of the bad habits that can ruin a business, so make sure to plan your relocation budget in detail. It should start with the selection of the most suitable moving company. Asking for several moving quotes is not sufficient. Hence, ask the movers to send their estimator to your current office if they do not offer it themselves. That is the only way to get the most detailed moving estimate. 

To save on the moving costs, consider what is worth moving to the new office space. If it makes financial sense, buy new, modern, ergonomic furniture, higher quality electronic equipment, and newer software. It will improve your team’s job satisfaction, efficiency and, thus, productivity. Moreover, you can sell some of the old office furniture over time or donate it for the tax return.

Communication strategy

Setting attainable goals before your team is only one of the secrets that drive entrepreneurial success and the same applies to the project of office relocation. The only way this goal can be achieved is through clear and timely communication with employees, business partners, and clients. A vast number of smartphone apps for business communication helps you to get in touch and share files with employees if they need to work from home for a while.

Most importantly, employees should know the details about office relocation well in advance. Not only because they might be tasked with additional duties but because it’ll affect their regular work routine and everyday lives. Also, designating additional tasks to workers without proper reimbursement inevitably leads to reduced productivity. 

A business doesn’t solely rely upon employees. The public should know about the office relocation, as well. Suppliers, customers, clients, business partners, and other stakeholders must know where and when to find you. In the era of e-communication, that shouldn’t pose an issue.

Make sure there is a banner on your home page, that you post on your social media accounts about the imminent move, and send newsletters and/or emails to all parties. Finally, put a good old sign on the entrance to your office with your future address and contact details.

Employees: motivation for relocation

The most important aspect of office relocation are employees affected by the move. Moving within a city is disturbing workers significantly less than a cross country move. However, company management should take every detail into account.

What usually worries employees are commute options and time they need to get to and from work. Moreover, lower productivity is often a result of poor motivation. There are many ways to stimulate and reward your team. A one-time raise, an extra day off, team building or gift cards, it is up to you. 

Companies should have ready solutions before the problems even arrive in the form of disgruntled and disappointed employees. Once again, we stress the importance of timely communication. Well informed workers who are motivated and encouraged to voice their concerns are the core of every successful business. Not only during an office move.

Stella Myles is a team leader at an international corporation and a guest blogger on mod-movers.com with topics regarding corporate culture. She thrives in a multinational environment she works in and enjoys sharing her experience with others.

Categories
How-To Guides

How to Prepare Financially for a Career Change

Are you ready to make a significant shift in your career path? If you’re considering jumping ship from your current job to find a new position, you’re not alone. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, median employee tenure was 4.3 years for men and 4.0 years for women. However, switching jobs comes with risk — and fears about financial turbulence have stopped many professionals from going after the career they want. Fortunately, there are preventive measures you can take to manage your money before you make that career shift. The chart below breaks down the average number of years that people are employed at certain ages. This chart implies the trend that people are more likely to change careers when they are younger. The reason for this can be attributed to the fact that it is easier to change careers when you are younger due to less financial responsibility. It may also be attributed to the fact that people become more satisfied with their career as they become more successful and experienced in their chosen field.   

Keep the following strategies in mind:

  1. Keep tabs on your spending

Before you make the switch, consider the current state of your finances. How are your monthly expenses faring against your budget? If you’re spending unnecessarily, you can pivot that money flow into a savings account that functions as a financial cushion during your career shift. 

It’s important to know where your money is going each month, then set goals around your finances moving forward. If you don’t already keep close tabs on your spending, consider downloading a budgeting app or printing out a monthly financial calendar that you can use to set and track your money moves.

By keeping yourself accountable through actionable financial to-do lists, you can better avoid frivolous spending during times of transition. 

  1. Understand the Financial Impact of the Switch

You need to be realistic about what a career change might mean for your wallet. Is the pay range at your planned position higher or lower than your current income? If the pay rate is lower, will you be able to maintain your current lifestyle? In addition, will your new job require further training or credentials? It’s important to factor in the cost of furthering your skillset in pursuit of your new career. Check out sites such as Salary.com to determine the average pay range for the position you’re pursuing, and do the math on how your expenses might change. 

  1. Build a Rainy-Day Fund

If you don’t already have an emergency savings fund, it’s time to start one. Most financial experts recommend saving up at least three months of expenses; if you find that the job switch wasn’t the right one, you’ll still have money to fall back on. 

  1. Supplement Your Income

If you’ll be dealing with a few weeks without a paycheck during your transition, or if your new role will pay less than your current, consider picking up a side hustle to supplement your income. The freelance market is booming, 36% of the population report that they’re involved in the gig economy. If you’re interested in supplementing your income, you can find freelance work through sites such as Upwork.com, GigGrabbers.com, or Fiverr.com. 

  1. Don’t Touch Your Retirement Savings

Your retirement savings may begin to look very tempting, but don’t drain your account to finance your career change. Pulling your retirement savings out early means dealing with significant tax consequences, and you’ll also negatively impact your long-term retirement goals. 

Preparing your finances for a career change can ease the stress of a job overhaul. Keep the above tips in your arsenal and set yourself up for success in your professional and financial life.

Categories
Online Business

Thriving eCommerce Trends That Will Shape the Industry in 2020 and Beyond

Ever since the expansion of eCommerce back in the 90s, it was clear to everyone that this particular form of transactions will forever change how we think about trading. Fast forward 30 years into the future and you will find a world in which 96% of US citizens have made an online purchase at least once in their life, 80% of them in the last month alone. With how things are, it would be foolish to assume that eCommerce hadn’t undergone some tectonic changes to evolve to this point.

But the world of online trading is ever-growing and ever-expanding, which means its evolution is still on. Let us take a look at some of the most important trends that will shape the industry in 2020.

Every user gets a personalized experience

If you take a look at a recent study published by Accenture Research, you will see that 43% of US consumers are more likely to opt for the companies that offer them personalized purchasing experience. These numbers are to be expected – people like to feel special. It is important to point out, however, that we are finally living in a time when this beneficial practice can be successfully emulated in the online environment. Machine learning, advanced analytics and big data are all the tools that can be employed to deliver our customers timely, relevant and personalized content.

Devices becoming dominant trading tools

When we think about online trading, we imagine a rather clunky process that requires several necessary steps that are the easiest performed in the desktop environment. Mobile devices were predominantly reserved for emergency situations. This year, when it`s safe to say that nearly half of all purchase decisions will be made on mobile, we can say the tides are slowly turning in favor of these devices. The causes of this development are numerous but we can single out the fact that most of the contemporary trading platforms are built around the needs of mobile users as the strongest contributing factor.

The expansion of online B2B market

For most of its decades-long history, eCommerce was considered to be something that unravels between businesses and customers. The examples of B2B transactions were always present but never frequent. This trend is undergoing a gradual change, and not only that – the list of products that are entering the global B2B eCommerce market is growing with each passing day. For instance, these days you can easily buy quality oilfield equipment with nothing more than a couple of clicks – a transaction that was hard to imagine just a couple of years ago.

Multi-channel trading

If we take a look at recent research conducted by Harvard Business Review, we can see that as much as 73% of participants have used multiple trading channels to perform shopping. As you can expect, this number is only expected to grow in the following year. But, what does that mean for the expanding eCommerce landscape? Well, one of the obvious developments we can expect to see is that retailers will stop putting too many resources in one trading channel or another and instead, invest their efforts in building comprehensive omnichannel trading environments.

The evolution of AI assistants and chatbots

In 2019, we’ve seen AI making a true invasion of the eCommerce industry. This year, the technology behind it is expected to become even more accessible and affordable. We can expect to see a growing number of small businesses using the services of chatbots and AI assistants. If we had to put this into numbers, we could resort to research published by Zendesk which says that 85% of customer interactions in the online environment will be performed without any participation of human agents. Of course, this is only a projection – this number can turn out to be even higher.

Fast delivery

The eCommerce industry is not an isolated world that exists entirely in the online environment. Its efficiency depends on a number of different real-life factors with delivery being probably one of the most important ones. The good news is that these ancillary services are undergoing an evolution of their own and reaping the benefits of developing technologies both in terms of effortless management and the very process of delivery (e.g. the rise of drones). With how things are, the time for local deliveries could be cut to mere hours.

The untapped potential of emerging markets

All of the things we’ve covered above only speak in favor of online commerce. With all these positive factors at its side, the eCommerce industry will become leaner, more efficient, and continue to grow. But keep in mind that in spite of working 24/7, the online market services only a fraction of the global population. Some projections say that up to 3 billion consumers will get access to the internet in emerging markets like Brazil, China and Africa by 2022. The first effect of this global expansion will be felt in 2020. 

As we can see, although it is more than firmly established, the eCommerce industry is far from stale. On the contrary, exciting new developments are occurring seemingly on a daily basis. Tracking these developments and using their benefits is the only way aspiring businesses will be able to remain competitive in the contemporary global market.

About the author: Lilly Miller is a freelance writer, who focuses on the latest business trends, commercial design, and environmental issues. She also loves to experiment on daring new home decor trends and write about it as a regular contributor on Smooth Decorator. Settled in Sydney for the time being, Lilly shares home with two loving dogs and a gecko named Rodney. You can find her hanging out on  Twitter.