This year a number of emerging trends in technology have had an impact on how people do business. Cloud service and data management providers have been running the show, due to the increased threat to cybersecurity. Advances in production have been made with the introduction of artificial intelligence, and many fields have benefited from automated transactions.
Read MoreBeing tech savvy can be a real benefit to any business owner by helping to cut costs, improve business efficiency, and find new ways to make work smoother and more enjoyable for your employees. Here are some must-have tech items all businesses need to get on board with.
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Mobile Device Management
Find out what MDM can do for your organisation. Mobile device management is essential if you provide staff with any devices like laptops, mobile phones, or tablets. You can use MDM to remotely manage all devices, whether they are in the office or not to keep them secure and up to date.
Block access to apps that your staff won’t need and ensure the devices can only be used for work purposes. You could even track usage if you felt it was needed. Automatically push software or security updates to the devices to keep them all functioning as they should and properly secure. In the case of a device being lost or stolen, you’ll also be able to wipe them remotely to protect all your information, and even block them from being used.
Social Media Marketing
Social media is a very important part of any modern marketing mix and you should build a proper social media plan. Save some funds on your marketing by making use of the free options on social media, and speak to your customers in a more informal way.
Do some research into which social platforms your customers tend to use, such as Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Set up profiles and keep your branding consistent across all the platforms you decide to use. Use the same username to make it easier to find you, and choose a professional looking profile picture and header image, like a logo.
You can use social media to engage with your customers in a relaxed manner. Your customer service team can respond to questions and complaints, and engage with customers who leave reviews. Make sure you post content on a regular basis, and try to keep the tone of the content in line with the rest of your business. You can share a more human side on social media, but remember you are a business.
Email Campaigns
Make the most of online tools that are designed to manage your email marketing. Many of these tools are free, and you can gather your customer email addresses and divide them into lists by specific interest. You can send hyper-personalised emails to these different lists.
Regular emails or newsletters can be sent out to targeted customers to share offers, news, or product adverts. Send these emails regularly to keep you in the forefront of your customers minds, but not so often as to make them consider your emails spam. Keep the emails you send relevant and avoid a spammy vibe.
Remote Working
Many offices now have at least part of their team work remotely at least some of the time. With the right technology, you can make remote work a possibility for anyone in your company. With work device and mobile device management, you can easily add other tech options to make remote work easy and simple to arrange. With staff out of the office, you can get away with using a smaller office space which will be cheaper to run and will require less spending on office supplies.
Make sure that any devices, like laptops, that you provide to staff are reliable, to ensure they can get online with no technical hitches. Make use of communication tools like Slack, WhatsApp, or Skype to keep talking to your team all day, no matter where they are. You can use some of these programs to share screens with your team to allow for remote meetings.
You can use online file sharing tools like Google Docs, which are ideal for remote working teams. Share files easily between your staff, and keep them safe in the cloud, where they can be accessed any time, anywhere. If there are any problems, you can track changes on the document too, see who made them, and restore to an earlier version. It’s also easier to share documents to other machines, without the potential for incompatible software causing problems.
Offering the option to work remotely gives your staff a much better work/life balance, which in turn makes them much happier and less stressed. A happier workforce is likely to stay working with you for longer, saving you the cost of recruitment. It’s great for staff with children too, as they can work around the children’s care needs.
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