Too Many Customers? Use A Website To Streamline Your Small Business Operations.

Websites are necessary for marketing. But they can do so much more to grow your profits.

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    You have too many customers.

    I know. If you own or manage a small to medium-sized business, you may not be able to wrap your mind around that as a concept. But if the quality of your work and your ability to execute is compromised because of the sheer volume of your business, that’s a problem.

    Most website companies, (yes, this includes us,) love to talk about their ability to generate leads and boost sales conversions. But if you have too many customers already, that kind of talk feels irrelevant, at best.

    But here’s the good news: a website isn’t just a sales tool. It can significantly impact your small business operations to do things like reduce overhead, improve workload management, streamline business scheduling, and improve existing customer experience.

    All the stuff you need to continue operating at your current level of success!

    So let’s talk about what a website can do for you when you just have too many darn customers:

    A Website Can Secure Your Sales Pipeline

    Let’s get this word of warning out there now: no sales boom lasts forever.

    It’s awesome that you have so many customers right now! But if you want to continue operating into the future, you’ll need to prepare for the famine even while you’re in the midst of a feast.

    We’re not talking about trying to pull in more hot leads than your team can handle… we’re talking about securing a reliable sales pipeline.

    You’ve got momentum. You’ve got buzz. And that means it’s the right time to start building an email list.

    Your website is the principle tool for accomplishing that goal. Your contact forms, lead magnets, and opt-in forms can build up an audience of “top of the funnel” contacts who aren’t ready to buy yet.

    Which really works out when you’re not ready to sell.

    Still, you don’t want to lose the contact and you don’t want to lose the opportunity to nurture the relationship. So, take those prospects you’re unable to work with now and put them in a nurturing campaign too.

    That way, when your schedule does lighten up, you have a list of people that have shown interest in your product or service, (who you’ve been nurturing with email campaigns,) that you can follow up with.

     Want to know how your website can help generate and manage these long-term lead lists? Talk to us about email automations for your website!

    A Website Can Save Staff Overhead

    How much time does your support staff waste answering the same questions over… and over… and over…

    And we’re not just talking about the questions regarding your hours and location. There is a laundry list of questions that your staff spends precious time on with your prospective customers.

    “How does x service work?”

    “How are you better than your competitor?”

    “How much is y product?”

    Here’s a question for you: is that information readily available on your website?

    If it isn’t, it should be. Because with a good content hierarchy, it will save your staff precious time and improve your overall workload management. Which means more efficient use of your labor costs.

     Don’t have the time to update your site? Rely on the Pros! Our Super Support team can help you put all your relevant content updates where they need to be, and all it takes from you is a quick email.

    A Website Can Showcase Your Expertise (with a business blog)

    If you’re working with a huge influx of customers, you know how difficult it can be to keep those clients happy. To manage their expectations. To showcase the expertise and value of your product or service.

    This is where a blog can come in handy.

    Here’s the deal: customers have questions. And they respect the businesses that proactively try and answer those questions, who try to educate and guide rather than just sell, sell, sell.

    When you have a huge client list, it’s an ideal time to invest in your content. You already have an audience! Keep them happy, loyal, and satisfied with regular educational updates.

    A great way to build out your content: use this influx of customers as your R&D department! If you’ve got sales reps in the field answering questions, or customer service reps fielding common concerns, take those topics and turn them into informative blog posts.

    That can not only present you as a voice of authority, these posts can also become marketing collateral that you can put in your staff’s toolbox to help them manage client questions thoroughly and efficiently.

    You can also optimize your blog to grow your email list. (Remember that?)

     Don’t have a lot of time? Don’t let that be a reason why your business doesn’t blog. Rely on the Pros for business blogging services… it only takes an hour of your time per month!

    A Website Can Improve Your Customer’s Experience

    In fact, many times, customers would rather engage with your website to find information, or text via live chat, than talk on the phone.

    (Millennials especially prefer live chat, and they’re now old enough to do things like buy houses, purchase professional services, and do things generally associated with “adulting.”)

    Providing an avenue for these customers to interact with your business is a great way to improve their experience.

    And here’s the good news: since you don’t need to spend your time and resources urgently digging up new business, you can take the time to do it right.

    You have access to a wealth of customer data- use it to optimize your website and deliver an amazing experience.

    Doing this now, when you don’t need the business, will help keep your site optimized for conversions for when you do. (Especially if your business is referral-based!)

    A Website Can Help Streamline Business Scheduling

    If you’ve got more business than you can currently handle, you know that there’s one thing you can’t afford to waste: time.

    If you’re like many businesses, a good amount of your time is spent scheduling things like jobs or appointments. Wouldn’t it be nice to automate much of that scheduling?

    With an optimized website, you can integrate scheduling tools on your website that will allow for you to have customers schedule – and even be able to pay for appointments – in the space of a few clicks.

    And you don’t need to do a thing.

    That’s right. No arming the phones. No receptionist back-and-forth. Just a few clicks and your calendar is set.

    Easy for you, and easy for your customers.

    A Website Can Simplify Your Billing Process

    Do you rely on mailing paper invoices to secure payments?

    Are your customers waiting around for emailed bills that show up in the wrong folders, or have corrupted attachments?

    Many companies we work with struggle with their billing process. (And their customers don’t find it a picnic, either.)

    Did you know you can bill quickly and easily using your website?

    Integrating billing systems with your website will allow customers to have a convenient way to pay you, which reduces the probability of having to collect on that money.

    That means better cash flow and more cash in your pocket, faster.

    A Website Can Keep Customer Data Safe (if it’s securely maintained)

    If you’ve got a lot of customers, you’ve got a lot of sensitive customer information. And with data privacy being a huge issue for consumers, do you know that your data system is secure?

    Let’s be real: if business is good, you want to spend your time helping customers. And if you’re focused enough on that, you may neglect elements of your own infrastructure.

    And that means you may not catch a security threat until it’s too late.

    If your website collects customer data, now is the time to invest in monitoring technology (like a SIEM,) that can help remediate and mitigate any security threats that can impact you or your customers’ data.

     Keeping your website continuously updated can help secure sensitive information. If you don’t have the time or the know-how to update your site yourself, talk to us about a website maintenance package.

    A Website Can Integrate Your Business Technology

    If you’re like many of our customers, you probably don’t love technology.

    That’s okay. We get it. Not everybody does.

    Even if you’re a tech nut, keeping all sorts of disparate pieces of software and technology updated and working in lockstep can be a challenging endeavor.

    Is your staff doing a repetitive task over and over in a piece of software? We have good news: it can probably be automated.

    And we have better news: using a website as a central hub for your integrations, we can get a bunch of automations from a bunch of programs and web applications to work toward your business’ goals.

    We’ve talked about things like billing and scheduling. But that’s not the limit when it comes to integrating the crucial functions of your business. Order fulfillment, shipping, communications… if it’s an automated task, it can probably be integrated into your website to make your processes smooth.

    A Website Can Help

    If you’ve got the business, but you’re struggling with costs, workload management, or other elements of your small business operations, you should rely on the Pros.

    We can build you a site, (or improve your existing one,) that can help streamline business, integrate and secure your infrastructure, and improve your customer experience.

    With a package to suit every need and budget, contact the Pros at SuperWebPros for a website that can improve the margin on your business… even if you do have too many customers.

    Duke Kimball

    Duke writes words, good. When he's not crafting content for The Pros, he's crafting stories, enjoying craft beer, or gourmet coffee. He is Portlandia.

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