Define Performance Indicators

All your efforts will be of no use if you do not take note of the results obtained. Keep in mind that there will be certain actions that provide you more benefits than others. Perhaps a certain type of customer is more profitable, or perhaps you discover that some product is more in demand than another.

The important thing is that you use the KPIs so that you can know if your business is growing. These are some of the most important profitability indicators

Measure ROI

The Return on Investment or ROI for its acronym in English lets you know if the company is making a profit. In addition, it can be applied in a disaggregated manner by activities, to know if a certain strategic decision has been profitable.

Study The Economic Margin of The Company

It is the difference between the prices of goods and services and the cost of your business. With the profit margin you can set your prices appropriately and define growth strategies based on it.

There are also many other metrics to consider, some are generic and others from particular areas within the business.

• Customer retention rate

• Market share

• Average revenue per customer

• No. of complaints and returns

• No. of sales of a specific commercial

• Default or delinquency rate

• Average profitability per sale

• Profitability per product

• Assets

• Passives

• Income

• Taxes

The important thing is that you take into account the indicators in which you want to fix yourself, so that you can examine the results continuously. You can set, for example, a time every Friday to review results. This way you can improve the strategies to grow your SME in 2021.

If you want to analyze efficiently, don’t limit yourself to four papers or one Excel. There are programs that allow you to view the main indicators on dashboards. This is much more efficient, intuitive and comfortable. In addition, it is the way to make sure that you do not miss anything, and that you can anticipate opportunities or threats.

Imagine being able to see in a graph, for example, if your company is increasing its turnover this year. If you can see in a drawn line the difference between your income in February 2021 and those of 2020, you will also have more criteria to know how you are progressing.

Many software solutions can be integrated with each other, and there are also complete ERPs that include all the business tools integrated in one .

Find an option that is affordable for your business, meets your needs, and is also intuitive . Think that people from your SME will have to use it, so they better be able to adapt to it without problems.

Automate Tasks and Processes

If you want to grow your company, remember that phrase of Einstein. “Don’t expect different results if you always do the same thing.”

Endless face-to-face or telematic meetings, an email tray that never runs out … Does it sound familiar? It has a solution, creating agile work dynamics and relying on automation.

Thanks to technology you can improve your results, first of all, because you can make better strategic decisions. At the same time, if you have a good work system supported by software solutions, it will improve the productivity of your company.

Investing in Automated Marketing in 2021 pays off for many reasons:

• You will be able to gain in productivity

• You will reduce paper and therefore your environmental footprint and need for storage space

• Improve team coordination

• Teleworking will be viable

• Data and information will be more secure

• You can scale your business

• It will be easier for you to take a vacation

There are all kinds of technological solutions today so you can reduce the time spent on each business task. There are not only for large companies, but also the most affordable and easy-to-integrate software solutions for SMEs.

It may take some effort and investment at first, but it really pays to make the leap to business automation . Once past the learning curve, its use becomes very natural, and it really saves a lot of work, as well as costs and energy.

For example, did you know that there are accounting programs that do a lot of the work for you? Issuance of remittances, bank reconciliation, automated emails, billing … It sounds like science fiction, but it is a reality for companies that know how to take advantage of it.

If you want to know some of the main digital tools to automate the different areas of your company, take note:

• Automate emails : MailChimp or SendinBlue.

• Schedule posts on social networks: Creator Studio, Hubspot, Hootsuite, Metricool or Social Pilot.

• Billing and accounting: Holded.

• Manage sales and sales: ForceManager

• Teamwork: Trello or Slack.

• Design of banners, posts in social networks and others: Canva.

Please note that some of these programs include more than one functionality. For example, there are many types of CRM that also have billing modules and so on.

We also have the case of Hubspot, which not only has functions for social media, but also includes blogging, mailing, contact and sales management, personalized reports and others.

In addition, there are specific programs to solve more specific problems. For instance:

• To optimize the SEO of a website or blog, the Yoast SEO plug-in is worth it

• With Typeform you can make forms , integrate them with your CRM and make automatic submissions when they are completed

• Use Google Drive if you want to store, share and edit all kinds of documents in an agile way

• If you don’t know how to subtitle a video , there are tools for it like HappyScribe

The list would be innumerable, but you already have where to start automating in your company. Only you know what the priorities are in your business or what kind of activities you need to delegate most urgently.

Study The Competition

A good study of what the market is demanding and what your competitors are doing will give you the perspective you need to move forward. This is one of the strategies for SMEs 2021: learn from others.

There is sure to be a lot you can learn from your own competition. What are they doing differently? Analyze their strengths regarding your company, and what is a competitive advantage in your business.

You can use the SWOT or SWOT, a matrix to detect threats and opportunities, as well as evaluate strengths and weaknesses.

• In the face of threats, get ahead with contingency plans

• The opportunities: detect them as soon as possible to take advantage of them

• Know your weaknesses to be able to reinforce what is necessary

• Boost your success by leveraging your strengths

After analyzing and working on these points, you will be able to know what makes you more competitive and what is better if you do not spend energy or effort.

Also Read: Cybersecurity Errors Of SMEs In 2021

Set SMART Goals

‘No wind is favorable for those who do not know where they are going’ says the proverb. If you want to boost your company the year that begins, set clear and defined goals!

New Year’s is usually an ideal time to make resolutions, so nothing like setting goals. There is a very useful model to do this effectively. Have you heard of SMART goals? They are so named because they are smart and for their acronym in English.

• SPECIFIC

• Measurable

• REACHABLE

• REALISTIC

• DEFINED IN TIME

For example, if you were looking for strategies for SMEs 2021, a goal could be: grow 150% in 2021 turnover.

It is specific, measurable and defined in time. Only you, by analyzing the results of the previous year and the evolution of your business, in addition to the market as a whole, will you be able to know if it is realistic and achievable.

What Conclusion Do We Get From the Trends in Strategies For SMEs 2021?

As you can see, there are many tips and keys to be able to set a strategy for success and growth for the year 2021. Do not settle for good intentions when eating grapes. Having a clear methodology and well-defined concepts will be decisive for you to achieve the desired results.

In summary, this is what you can start to do to grow your SME:

• Automate, delegate everything you can to technology
• Analyze the market and the competition
• Use the SWOT to know your strengths and weaknesses, and analyze threats and opportunities
• Define SMART objectives for your company
• Specify your main KPIs that will be like your compass on this trip

With all these concepts and tools, it will be much easier for you to come to fruition. Remember to constantly review each one of them, so that your business course is not twisted at any time.

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