How to Build Small Business Systems To Quickly Benefit Your Business
If you want to build a profitable small business, there are a lot of factors you’ll need to pay attention to – but there’s one that will provide the foundation for all of them: Building your Small Business Systems.
While creating business processes might not seem like a “fun” task, it will save you a lot of time, money, and stress. They will transform your business from an unprofitable time vampire to a profitable, efficient company that allows you the ability to make a positive impact while living the life you want.
When creating small business systems, it’s important to realize that each department will have its own specific needs. These business tools might include various platforms, timelines, and project management tools (like Asana, Trello, ClickUp, Monday or Zoho) They might also include training resources that are likely to reach different personalities. (I’m sure you’ve realized by now that your Admin, your Bookkeeper, and your Marketing Assistant all learn and process in different ways!)
Let’s dive in and take a look at what each department will need to work effectively.
Effective Financial Controls Systems
Your Financial Systems are the heartbeat of your business, but I find that many business owners simply don’t know what to do with them. (I get it – I was there as a new business owner.)
Your CPA and Bookkeeper should help you gain a better understanding of which accounting software to use (Like Quickbooks, Xero or others) and how to plan your numbers. However, it is your Financial Systems that will put a step by step process in place to make sure that you receive the right reports at the right time. Here are some areas where your financial systems can help you:
Money In/Money Out
o you have clear, established procedures for what happens to your money as it comes in and as it’s paid out? In other words, is there a clear process for taking in-person or online payments? Do you know what’s happening with every dollar in your business?
Reporting
Without the right reports, you’ll be unable to make decisions based on your numbers. Your reports will help with understanding your profit margins and profit tracking.
Your financial reporting may also be tied into your business software systems as well.
Being a Good Money Manager
I have found that this is the #1 requirement for running a profitable business, but it’s the one that many of us simply aren’t sure how to do. With the right systems in place, it becomes a lot easier.
Strong financial systems will also help you identify cost-saving opportunities and minimize financial risks! Think of it this way: when you evaluate these opportunities based on feelings or what “seems” good, you really don’t have anything concrete to base the decision on.When you can evaluate them according to actual numbers though, you can make a wise decision for your business and determine the clear ROI.
Sales and Intake Systems
Your Sales and Intake Systems serve two main purposes: first, they help to close new business (always a good thing) and second, they serve as a line of defense to make sure the right clients are brought into your company.
What do I mean by this? Simply this: there are people who need your services and who you are uniquely positioned to help. When your Intake and Sales Teams have strong systems in place, it’s a lot easier for them to convey the value of your products or services to those people and bring them in as clients, as opposed to doing everything they can think of to just bring any business in the door.
Pre-Screening and Pre-Conditioning
Your Sales solution must both screen for the right clients and condition them to want to hire you.
Doing this allows your team to spend their time helping the people who genuinely need what you provide while letting your pre-screening systems identify those who aren’t a good fit . It’s really a win-win for everyone.
It is also important that we also use our systems to pre-condition the client to recognize that we are the right fit for them. This means communicating with them in a way that is comfortable for them to receive the information and showcasing how easy it is to work with us.
Customer Experience
Sales and Intake are not, in and of themselves, simple processes. They’re based on communicating value, answering questions, and determining whether you can fill and exceed the prospect’s needs. Of course, there will always be a subjective element to this, but putting a solid CRM Software, and clear processes and decision trees in place can do a lot to streamline this process. This allows your team to focus on your prospects and clients. By building procedures that focus on customer satisfaction, you are building a future pipeline of goodwill as well
Marketing Systems and Strategies
Marketing has one clear purpose – to attract the right audience and bring them to the Sales and Intake Teams – but the world of marketing is constantly changing. Therefore, your Marketing Team will need clear policies and goals paired with systems that are flexible enough to accommodate the ever-changing world they work in.
Day to Day Marketing Systems
It would be nice to hand a set of SOPs to your Marketing Team and tell them to run with it, but this simply won’t happen. Instead, your marketing systems must connect with your business goals. Your messaging needs to connect to your content marketing plan. This means having step by step guides for your blog posts, your email lists and your social posts. Couple this with insights from your team and analytics software and you can determine which platforms are likely to resonate with your audience. Building this type of marketing plan is part of a structured business development process that reminds us to pay attention to who we are targeting and what we are wanting to convey.
Tracking and Reporting
Next, it is important to have an ongoing process for tracking and reporting data. This may also include a suite of tools that give you data ranging from Google Analytics to CRM systems like Active Campaigns or Mail Chimp. Each will have clear processes and guidelines so anyone on the marketing team can understand the step by step processes.
Client Happiness Systems
It’s Marketing’s job to bring the right people in the door, and it’s Intake and Sales’ job to bring them through the sales process. But once they decide to hire or purchase from you, how can you ensure that what they experience will be what you sold?
This is where your Client Happiness Systems come in – and they are what will often set you apart.
Many business owners think that they have to have a complex system in place to make sure their clients have an amazing experience. The truth is, you can start with something very simple to create happy customers and build out from there as you grow.
Simple Customer Service Systems
To start with, we want to always make sure we have a clear process to handle any client complaints or concerns. This could be a simple 9 step guide to resolving client issues.
As hard as we try to meet everyone’s needs, they’re always going to happen. You can see complaints as a burden to deal with or as an opportunity to exceed expectations and gain a client for life – and with the right process in place, gaining a loyal client becomes a lot easier.
Business Growth Systems
You will also want to have a business development element that allows you to proactively reach out to clients. This might involve monthly or quarterly calls to each of your clients to check in with them, answer any questions, and make sure that they are happy with their service.
This will also give you an opportunity to find out if there are any questions or comments they might not be willing to share with the owner or their primary contact.
The point of these calls isn’t to sell anything, but just to show that you care and maintain top of mind awareness.
Then, you might layer in birthday or anniversary cards. These might not seem like a big deal, but when you’re the only business they deal with that sends them, that makes an impact.
You’ll still need amazing people to carry out your Client Happiness Systems but equipping them with a checklist of steps will make their jobs a lot easier and allow them to help you grow.
General and Admin Systems
These are the systems that we tend to put off until last because, let’s face it – they seem pretty obvious. Well, they do until someone other than you tries to run with them.
The point of your General and Admin Systems isn’t that they’ll keep you on track, but that they’ll allow someone else to take these tasks off your plate and run them effectively.
As you’re starting out, it’s often helpful to simply document these business processes and why you do things so that the person you hire can carry on the procedure.
As your company grows and you implement new business systems, talk with the people who are actually doing the process to get their insights and involve them in documenting everything. This way, as you keep growing, you know the process is accurate.
Creating Department-Specific Timelines and Platforms
As nice as it might sound to have every system on the same timeline and platform, this isn’t always going to be possible. This is because every department is going to have different goals, different tasks, and different types of business activities.
Consider the Different Platforms
Think of it this way: while your Bookkeeper can likely keep all of your financial reports and timelines straight in Quickbooks Online, that platform won’t do much for your Marketing Team. And while your Marketing Team can do a lot in Canva, Facebook, and WordPress, those programs probably won’t serve your Intake Coordinator or Salesperson very well.
When you’re determining your timelines and platforms, listen to your teams to learn about their needs. See which teams can be combined with 1-2 business software systems with different project boards and which will need their own resources. This way, you can consolidate as much as possible to bring down your costs and prevent confusion.
Consider Timing of Reports & Information
In terms of timing, consider when your team needs various information. For instance, your Bookkeeper will have specific reports that need to be run on a specific day each month. Your Marketing Team may run their reports daily, weekly, monthly, or at specific times during a promotional campaign. Your Sales Team may by hyper focused on the flow of leads and weekly stats. And all of this data may need to be held in different platforms to keep track of everything.
Building your systems does take some consideration and planning, but once you have a great framework in place, you’ll find that it makes everyone’s jobs (including yours) a lot easier. If you need help with building your systems or triaging what to work on first, please let me know – my team and I are here to help!