As we enter 2022, staying on top of business trends is the best way to ensure your small business is successful throughout the whole year. While we continue to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic, new, safer ways to ensure that you can communicate with customers, check-in on sales, and run your business are of the utmost importance. Here are the top three trends you can use to nurture and grow your small business throughout the year:

1. Open Communication with Customers

With an increased emphasis on digital communication, staying plugged in is increasingly becoming the best way to make sure your business grows. Utilizing various forms of internet communication can help keep you, your team, and your clients connected while continuing to stay safe during the pandemic. 

Although a well-known form of communication, emails have become extremely important for communication within businesses and with their clients. Creating an easy and effective flow of information between you and your employees helps your business stay on track. Plus, allowing customers to sign up for email subscription services will let them stay up to date on your products. 

Video calling software has become commonplace for all industries, and if the last couple of years has taught us anything, getting familiar with this software is essential for conducting business. Using video calling services and understanding how to navigate different platforms of this technology is the best way to keep crucial business communications open and frequent. 

Social media is a big contributing factor to ensuring that you properly market your business and make sure customers stay in touch with your brand. New product announcements, funny videos made with trending audios, and solid branding on social media platforms all help raise the profile of your business. Being active on social media sites like Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter can help you engage your clientele beyond interactions at work, helping you build long-lasting connections with your customers and increasing brand loyalty. 

2. Create Better Customer Connections

Customer connections are essential for any business, and building a good rapport with your clientele is one of the best ways to ensure your business makes a substantial profit. Friendly, warm employees inviting customers into your store is always a great way to make customers feel at home, but there is always more that you can do to foster lasting and meaningful connections with them. Your customers can also provide valuable input on how you and your team can improve these connections using review pages and rewards programs: 

• Let customers leave reviews

Creating a space for customers to review their service experience goes beyond general reviews of products. Asking about their experience, service quality, and whether or not they would recommend your business to a friend allows customers to feel heard by your business and gives you insight as to how your business is performing. 

• Be responsive to the reviews

Let’s face it — not all reviews are positive. Whether it’s a disgruntled review about missing salt packets in a takeout order or a larger, nuanced issue with service, bad reviews are to be expected. As a business owner, responding to customer requests and reviews is important to keep customer connections high while taking the time to address your business practices. For example, if multiple customers leave a review about the quality of your packaging, you can take this feedback to address the problems in your business model. 

• Utilize rewards programs

The concept of a rewards system for your business may seem complicated, but it’s often quite easy to implement. Between punch cards and full-blown apps, integrating a way to encourage your customers to come back is always good for business. Not only do rewards systems incentivize return business, but they also help increase familiarity with your regular customers, establishing positive relationships and ensuring business flow. 

3. Increase Payment Methods

Transactions are one of the largest parts of owning a small business. Material suppliers and customer flow require calculated transactions for payment, and with more on-the-go interactions, integrating touchless pay methods into your business will help increase business flow and make transactions easier. These newer methods include:

• Tap to pay

At your point-of-sales, creating a system where customers can tap their card or phone to pay for their order is key to driving up sales. From Apple Pay to cards with contactless chip payments, tap to pay technology is becoming one of the biggest forms of payment in small businesses. The convenience of tapping a card or a phone on your card reader to make a purchase is appealing to customers, making their transactions extremely easy. 

• Digital pay

Offering increased accepted payment methods for your business will inevitably drive sales, allowing customers more freedom in choosing their preferred method. This payment method is very convenient for customers, giving them the option to pay with a few taps on their phone screen. Plus, digital payment options such as CashApp, Venmo, and PayPal are all contact-free, helping to minimize high-contact surfaces that could be a problem for containing the spread of COVID-19. 

How Can I Integrate These Changes Into My Business?

Although it sounds somewhat daunting, these solutions are easily installed and can drastically improve your sales. One of the first steps to ensuring that your small business is ready to take on 2022 is the use of digital marketing. Applying the right digital marketing campaigns can help create a steady flow of advertising and business for your company. Choose Wine Down Marketing for your business campaign, and we’ll help your business reach and connect with customers, achieving greater success. Contact us today to get started.