4 Common Mistakes Online Businesses Make
In order to survive and grow in the current competitive business environment, it is important for companies to learn from past mistakes and vow never to repeat them. Online businesses are highly competitive since so many options are available to consumers. In order to retain customers and build a long term relationship, it is essential that some of the most common mistakes are avoided at all costs. Following are some mistakes that many businesses make:
Not Being Different
Businesses in a particular industry often try to imitate what their competitors are doing in order to lure customers. The key to success is being different and doing something that hasn’t been done before. Ideally, businesses should improvise, innovate and invent new methods for production and delivery of services. One of the ways to be innovative and create something new is to invest in research and development. Today most successful companies including Apple and Facebook have spent billions of dollars in research and development. Be unique in your service delivery and try to reach out and offer to your customers what others are not doing.
Not having Effective Communication Channels
A comprehensive communication plan is vital for the success of any business which ensures you are reaching and engaging with your customers. Online businesses are often faced with the problem of ineffective communication with their customers since they don’t have sufficient resources and staff available to handle a large volume of customer queries and complaints. An effective way of communicating with your customers is to integrate a live chat service on your website or Facebook page. Companies such as LiveAdmins provide proactive chat service 24 hours a day. The real time nature of the communication allows customers to have their questions answered immediately without any delay. Live Chat is also highly cost effective since live chat operators can handle multiple conversations at the same time.
Not Understanding Technology
Some businesses are reluctant to adopt new technology into their operations. Modern consumers are very tech savvy and turn to digital mediums for their needs. For example having a responsive and mobile friendly website is a basic need for online businesses. Your website should meet the needs and requirements of customers no matter what device they open the website on. Similarly developing an app which they can download on their smartphones and fulfills all their needs when doing business with you is important. Also, online shopping processes and conducting online transactions should be simplified and made easy for them. Technology also provides and supports innovation and improvisation which is a key to success.
Not Marketing Your Products
Many companies put in a lot effort into developing products and services that are exceptionally well-designed and innovative, but fail to adequately market these products to customers.
Effective marketing is one of the most important factors responsible for success, which means businesses need to invest time and money into marketing the product intelligently. The first step involves finalizing a market strategy, which will include segmentation. Targeted marketing based on these segments will be more effective in terms of cost and results. In addition, different channels must be explored for marketing purposes. It must be made sure that the marketing channel being used is appropriate for the given product and service.