8 Things Your Business SHOULDN’T Be Doing During Covid-19
Many companies have had business disrupted by Covid-19 this year. As a result, they have had to adapt their ways in order to keep making revenue. While some businesses have managed to adapt successfully, others have made costly mistakes. Here are some of the mistakes your business doesn’t want to be making during Covid-19.
Raising your prices
To help cover the costs of covid-19, some businesses have responded by hiking up their prices. It makes sense to try and earn some extra money this way (it’s certainly easier than trying to sell more products), but consider the impact that it may have on you current loyal customers. Those that are already financially struggling due the impact of the virus could see this as an extra kick in the teeth – which could have a negative impact on your customer satisfaction. If your competitors choose not to raise their prices, you could see a lot of your customers abandoning your service to try out that offered by competitors. Try to focus on reducing costs and finding new income streams rather than upping your prices.
Cutting back on marketing
When considering cutbacks, you should avoid cutting back on marketing. In fact, now is the time to spend more money on marketing. With less people mingling, you’ll find it harder to attract customers via old-fashioned word of mouth – which means that you have to advertise and promote your brand yourself. Cut back on marketing, and you could see a dramatic reduction in the amount of new customers you receive. Unless you really don’t want to attract new customers at this moment in time, refrain from cutting back.
Investing in offline marketing
Now is not the time for offline marketing tactics. With social distancing laws in place, marketing events are generally not feasible. Meanwhile, billboards and posters are less likely to get spotted due to less crowds on the street. You’re much better off pouring your time, energy and money into digital marketing during Covid-19. Strategies such as social media marketing, SEO and email marketing are likely to have a much bigger impact given that people are spending more time indoors and more time on digital devices. Allow yourself to get creative when pursuing digital marketing strategies.
Arranging in-person meetings
In-person meetings are also not practical in a pandemic. This could be a team meeting with employees or a meeting with clients. Unless the task can only be carried out as a group in person, you may as well conduct the meeting via video call or phone call – or you could simply have an email exchange. Some clients may be put off if you insist on having an in-person meeting. Some employees may also feel that you are putting them in unnecessary danger and could possibly sue. If you do have to arrange large meetings in person, make sure that everyone has PPE.
Reducing staff, but not reducing the workload
As a way of saving costs, some companies have furloughed or even laid off staff members. This can sometimes be a necessary cut back, however you need to be sure that the workload is also cut back. If you demand the same workload from your remaining employees, they will likely struggle to get it all done. You need to have a team that’s large enough to take on all the day-to-day roles. If employees are having to take on responsibilities on top of their existing responsibilities, they’ll get overly stressed and likely hand in their notice. This is something that you definitely don’t want to happen.
Micromanaging remote employees
Many companies have allowed employees to work from home. While this has helped to keep people socially distanced, it has made team communication a little harder. Less trusting employees may feel that they have to keep communicating with employees to check that they are still on target. This style of remote micromanaging could be stressing out your employees and may be something that you want to limit. So long as employees are meeting targets and deadlines, there’s no need to keep checking up on them. Your employees are likely to be more productive if you’re not constantly trying to have conversations with them.
Not supervising remote employees at all
While you shouldn’t micromanage remote employees, you also don’t want to ignore them completely. Some of your employees may realise that they’re not being monitored and may take advantage of this. This could result in corners being cut and certain work not being done. Using some form of software for tracking employee activity will allow you to see how far projects are coming along without having to constantly chase up employees via phone or email. There are lots of software solutions out there that can do this.
Ignoring the pandemic altogether
The worst thing you can do is ignore the entire pandemic and try to continue on as usual. You’ll likely get into legal trouble and it could negatively affect your reputation. For instance, if you run a restaurant and decide to put absolutely no measures in place, you can expect a lot of customers to not feel safe and some may report you to the police (especially if there’s no attempts to abide by social distancing rules or supply hand soap). Employees may even leave if they feel that you are not taking the virus and their health seriously.
Conclusion
If you want your business to keep making money through the remainder of Covid-19, you need to make the right changes to your business model. Anything that involves or inspires social gatherings cannot go underway. If you choose to take on a remote workforce, you need to understand how to manage them without micromanaging or being too relaxed. You also need to resist increasing your prices, instead finding other ways to recover from the costs.
Image: Pexels. CCO Licensed.
This is a contributed post