In our Surviving the Cost of Living Crisis guide, we have looked at how you can Support your Employees and Keep Business Thriving.
Now I will focus on some of the advice given within those articles, firstly looking at technology and whether it can help drive growth in your business.
Read on to find out how your business can tackle this momentum and benefits of providing your team with the right tools and software to continue delivering exceptional service to your customers in the face of the cost-of-living crisis.
Data Insight
Gaining deeper insight into your business data allows for you to recognise weak areas and identify ways to improve these.
You can use this data to inform your business decisions and as a result, improve efficiency and drive growth.
Data insight will also enable you and your team to mitigate any risks and be prepared if any were to arise.
Lastly, data can also be used to enhance and personalise customer experiences. Start identifying trends of your customers and optimise on these for further growth and opportunities.
For example; if you own a shop, is there a product that sells out quickly due to its popularity? Ensure you find a good supplier who can keep you in stock and keep up with the demand.
Do you have a popular menu item that never fails? It might be an obvious one, but don’t take it off the menu!
Drive growth with technology that will make a significant impact in your business.
Tick tock, tick tock…Time!
As well as business growth, time can be saved with technology. Manual processes become (for the most part) completely eliminated and managers can focus on other business areas that require attention and back to doing what they love.
For example; with an employee scheduling software like Bizimply, managers can create schedules quickly and easily. Advanced features like drag and drop of shifts, colour coding of positions, creating popular shifts and the ability to replicate week on week means they reduce the amount of time originally spent building the schedule.
More business owners are now using technology to manage their businesses better, the report also signalled a massive opportunity for more to save time and reduce costs in this way, particularly when facing rising expenditure elsewhere. Only one-fifth (21%) are investing in productivity tools to save time and streamline processes. (Unlocking Digital Potential, Small Business Britain, 2022).
Labour Costs
Reduce your labour costs immediately upon implementation of a workforce management software. How?
Optimise employee scheduling to reduce unnecessary overtime.
*With your account each employee has a personal profile where their pay rates are submitted. This reflects throughout the entire software. When it comes to scheduling, there are labour graphs that forecast the amount that could be spent on labour each week.
This gives you an indication whether there is overspend. Where you can, it then allows you to make changes to reduce labour spend, especially if the demand of customers is not there.
“Only after 1 month of using Bizimply and being able to deduct unpaid breaks correctly, we saw a 10% improvement in our labour sales. This is a cost saving we didn’t expect to see so quickly. I can already see how technology can drive business growth.”
Gavin, Account Manager at LT Pubs
*This applies to Bizimply Workforce Management Software only.
Staff Productivity and Engagement
Even the more simple aspects of having technology can drive business growth.
Increased productivity immediately comes after implementation of technology in the workplace. Automating all your manual tasks and having a software to do it, frees up time for the manager to exert their efforts into other areas of the business and as well, to focus on their teams.
With extra focus on their teams to ensure full training is provided and that managers are keen to help, employees will appreciate the role more and in turn, be more productive.
Harnessing better relationships with your staff, but remaining professional will result in staff being more engaged in the workplace and improve performance as a team.
To your customers, showing you have a team that can be engaged and productive will represent a well run business. Managers investing time and energy into their staff will not go unnoticed and will create excellent customer service.
In the long run, this creates loyalty from both customers and your employees. You will be established as a great place to work and have minimal problems with turnover of staff.
Are you ready to implement technology to drive growth?
In a research report by Hospitality Mavericks, “60% of the respondents believed they had not yet invested enough in digital transformation across the business – a considerable jump from the 45% reported in the 2021 survey.
Download the report here 👇🏻
Reduce spend and increase profitability today, book your free business consultation below with us.
