Managing remote teams: Best practices and tips

Managing remote teams: Best practices and tips

Managing remote teams: Best practices and tips

March 25, 2024

Everything you need to know about managing remote teams

Some people will say that now, we’re in the golden era of remote work. Technology and tech related jobs are leading the way as remote tech jobs are becoming virtually the norm all around the world. But anyone who’s ever worked this way knows how challenging managing remote teams can be on a daily basis. 

When it comes to managing remote teams, communication is probably the toughest nut to crack. And when you struggle to get on the same page with your team, many things are likely to go off the track. Increased project costs and failure rate, longer task delivery periods and decreased productivity are only a few to name. Hence the importance of managing remote teams effectively.

Challenges of managing remote teams

Before we get to the remedy, we need to assess the problem that bothers your team. No remote team management tips will ever be effective if you don’t understand where the issues with remote team collaboration come from in the first place.

Virtual decision making to include the team 

Virtual decision making often makes teams feel excluded from the process. Virtual decision-making, such as virtual voting, is one innovative solution to provide a platform for team members to participate in decision-making processes and contribute to the team’s goals.
Virtual voting can foster a greater sense of ownership and accountability among team members, even if they are not physically present. Moreover, virtual voting can improve communication and reduce misunderstandings, providing a space for team members to discuss ideas and share feedback.

Your team tries to apply old ways to the new setting

Imagine this: you’ve got a task for your colleague. They work just a few steps away from you, in the same office. What you’re going to do, most likely, is to get up, approach them and delegate said task verbally.

Now, in the remote setting, there’s quite a bit of distance between you. Many companies try to replicate this “approach and delegate” method. Doing so, they end up on endless video conferences or call each other several times a day.

When you look at it from the side, it doesn’t make much sense to do so. Just because something worked in the office, it doesn’t mean it will work in the remote setting. Things once effective may now be your biggest time wasters.

And nobody likes daily calls anyway, right?

Your team has got no idea on how to get organized

If your team is new to remote work, then it’s likely you’ve got no idea where to even begin. Should you just get video conferencing software and call it a day? Do you need more tools? New processes?

Don’t beat yourself about it if you’ve got no idea how to organize your team’s work in the new setting. It’s not an easy task even for the seasoned remote workers.

That said, keep in mind that being clueless on how to organize things could lead to mistakes that damage effective remote team collaboration.

Lack of shared working space

In an office, you share a common space where you see your team on a daily basis. Maybe you meet up in a social room. Maybe you’ve got a giant whiteboard where people pin their messages and add notes about projects.

With remote work in the picture, the physical office vanishes. And with it, the precious aspect of sharing your working space.

Suddenly, you lose all ties to your colleagues. You’re alone in your own home office. You’ve got no idea where others are and what they work on. To get an update on tasks, you need to get on a (yet another) video call.

It’s hard to communicate when most that you’ve got in common are spreadsheets you’ve shared online.

Unclear rules and undefined processes

It can be related to the fact you’ve got no idea how to manage the work of your newly remote team.

Because of their limited ability to quickly communicate on the changes, distributed teams have double the need of working according to strict patterns. When questions arise and you can’t immediately get in touch with the right person, processes and tasks get delayed.

Remote team collaboration suffers from lack of processes. Getting them right could solve quite a few of your problems.

Different expectations and habits related to remote work

Imagine the situation in which the team switches to remote work. They were happy in the office and collaborated well. Now, the manager, full of trust towards their team members, believes they are fully capable of getting around the new setting.

Meanwhile the employees, even though having the best of intentions, are lost in the situation and count on being guided.

This is an easy example of how different people can view remote work. Some people need more flexibility. They want to be trusted and left to work independently. Others, on the other hand, need guidance and a daily to-do list delivered to their inbox.

Using tools for managing remote teams successfully

Now that you know what troubles your team most, let’s talk about the solutions. For example, software is a wonderful addition to your workflow. There are so many different apps and tools for managing remote workers that could help you resolve any issue.

So let’s have a look how you can leverage tools to manage remote teams.

Get into (extreme) details

If you go with a task assignment/project management tool, you’ll have plenty of room to describe what you want from your team. Use it to the fullest. Include checkpoints, control lists, useful materials, examples, samples, templates – anything that your team can use to get the job right.

Think of it this way: you’re not in the office and you can’t look over your colleague’s shoulder to check the progress. Oftentimes, you won’t see the task until it’s delivered to you. That’s exactly why you want to offer sufficient information to get it done right from the get-go.

Pick the right communication channel

You and your remote team needs to agree on one crucial thing: your main communication channel. It could be email threads, once-a-day video calls or setting up a chat room. You may also keep all the discussion to the comment section of your task. Don’t be afraid to innovate and experiment.

Another powerful tool for managing remote teams is SharePoint, which offers a comprehensive solution for creating dashboards that enhance collaboration and productivity. SharePoint allows you to design visually appealing and customizable dashboards, providing a centralized hub for your team to access important information, track progress, and share updates. By exploring more on how to create a dashboard in SharePoint or its other functions, you can leverage this platform to streamline communication, improve task visibility, and foster a collaborative remote work environment.

Use task tags, deadlines and assigned Users

The majority of tools for managing remote teams you will pick comes with deadlines, tags and user assigning (if they don’t, they’re probably not good enough for you ). These are features we often underestimate in managing workload of our teams.

Meanwhile, by applying such simple filters you can easily see if your work is evenly distributed across areas, employees and deadlines. Depending on your software, it may take two to three clicks to understand if someone is overloaded or whether deadlines come too closely together.

Use appointment scheduling tools

Most teams use an appointment scheduling tool to arrange meetings and calls with their clients. But it’s a creative thing to do to use them to arrange team calls as well.

By choosing the date from a shared calendar, you can cut out the annoying shuffle related to picking up the date that works for everybody.

11 tips for managing remote teams by experts

As a company that has operated fully remotely since the beginning, we know how important experience is. What we thought would work, sometimes proved ineffective and vice versa. With this in mind, we reached out to leaders who’ve been through the same and have the best remote team management tips at hand.

Being on the same page

The key to managing a remote team for me is trust and communication – namely a healthy balance between the two. 

You need to make sure that all of the team is on the same page and aware of what’s expected of them while working remotely, but it’s also important to trust your employees enough to take the initiative and work sensibly and independently while they’re remote. No one feels empowered to do their best work if their boss is micromanaging

Remote working is actually a really productive time for a lot of people – without the constant ping of emails or colleagues coming over for a chat – so keep communication channels open but trust people enough to get on with what needs to be done. 

At Untapped, we use Slack for the team to communicate and have different channels organised by projects and clients. It’s super handy for keeping files and notes in one place, plus a quick and easy way for the team to communicate and get answers quickly (without being piled under by emails).

Corrie Jones, Founder of Untapped Digital

Ask four questions

On days when my team works remotely I set up a brief conference call at the start of the day (2 minutes) to ask each member:

  • What their goal is for the day;
  • What they want to achieve;
  • If they need any help to achieve it;
  • How confident they are in achieving it. 

Then at the end of the day I make a follow up call to see how everyone got on. I find this helps get everyone focused.

Nathan Kelsey, Managing Director at Make Me Local

Sharing knowledge

I work for a VA Agency. Myself, the two founders and one other work remotely alongside our team of 40 + VAs. We use some great tools for working collaboratively. 

Slack for instant messaging, with threads for different teams. TikTik is a great tool for getting tasks done, assigning tasks and can integrate with calendars such as Google Calendar. 

Finally, Kipwsie which we use as an online knowledge base so everyone who works for us knows where to find essential information about our business, whether it is our VAT number or FAQs we get from clients about how we work. It is such a great tool for sharing knowledge and even better integrates with Slack.

Anita Vickers. Client Engagement Manager at Virtalent

Personal communication

When the team is in the office they have a banter, they play some table tennis, they drink coffee and chat. You need to create a time and space for people to share personal stuff. Add some time at the beginning of your weekly catchup to give each person to share what they did over the weekend. Create a virtual bulletin board for people to share their photos. Don’t forget that they aren’t just colleagues… they’re friends.

Susan Hallam, Founder and CEO of Hallam

Being laser-focused

Youmanage is an HR software developer based in Scotland. Many of my colleagues work from home, and we use Microsoft Teams to keep everyone connected, no matter where they are. Regular communication through Teams is essential to ensure no one is left out and that productivity is maintained. We do this by using multiple channels within Teams, so that information is relayed only to relevant team members, which means that everyone remains laser-focused.

Craig Hynd, Marketing Executive at Youmanage HR

Individual vs team conversations

We run as a virtual PR agency, so we have always been a remote team.  

We use Slack a lot – it was a slow burn but now everyone loves it. The threads allow you to have a conversation with the whole company or individual project teams, which keeps things focused and means people only read what they need to do. The ability to chat with the whole company is really valuable – as remote workers, we can all feel isolated at times, we can all suffer from imposter syndrome and anxiety, and we can all miss out on office banter and gossip. Slack gives us access to a time management tool and a digital water cooler moment.

Charlie Le Rougetel, Founder and Director , BIGTOP PR

Flexible timings

Keeping morale and employee motivation high is top of many leaders’ priorities, but more so when your workforce is remote or suddenly has to self-isolate. When many workers are remote, more consideration has to be given to company processes and methods of communication. 

Some tactics that have worked for Degreed, where over half the workforce is remote, involves using video conferencing as the default (versus calls) with the video on, as this helps communicate non-verbal messages. Over-communication is essential to keep everyone fully up-to-date and to set expectations. 

Being a global company, Degreed also emphasizes flexibility with timings, to accommodate different time zones and work styles (fitting around the school run, for instance). Messaging tools like Slack allow for constant communication and spontaneous moments, similar to office watercooler chat. 

Learning and upskilling are vital for engagement, as it keeps workers constantly challenged, growing and can change the pace of the working day. It helps to build a strong and innovative culture that supports people at all stages of their career and also cultivates personal passions. Notably, during this time, workers may have more downtime than usual (because of a lack of commute, for instance) and having access to learning content can keep days fresh and interesting.

Sarah Danzl, Director of Communications at Degreed

Juggling the right apps

Our entire team is based remotely and over the years I have discovered some useful apps for managing the team effectively. 

I use Zoom for regular face-to-face catch ups and I also love Microsoft Teams, either on the phone or the PC. We use Minute Dock for managing timesheets as it integrates with Xero so well. There are many great apps for working on live documents and sharing them that we use including Google Docs, Dropbox/One Drive and Sharepoint and we also have experience of Trello and Slack. 

Personally, I find the Pomodoro technique of 25 mins work with 5 mins rest, using the Focus Keeper App, really keeps me on track and motivated.

Rebecca Newenham, Founder & Director, Get Ahead VA

Retrospective calls

Best tips for managing remote teams? Daily stand ups every morning to keep the team in the loop about what each other are working on in the day!

Running a retrospective video call every Friday in the afternoon to discuss what the team has achieved throughout the week and if they have had any issues during the week 

We run everything online including Asana to update tasks that have been done, Slack for the team to have immediate contact with each other, Zoom to create videos/call clients across the world and G Suite so every doc is kept online and can be seen/amended by anyone.

Elliott Davidson, Founder and Director of Contrast

Staying on top of everyone’s work

One of the challenges many managers that are now working remotely face is how to stay on top of their employees’ work. With everyone working from their homes, managers cannot simply walk over to an employee and take a look at what they are doing.

For this reason, many remote companies are relying on remote team management software to help them keep track of their employees’ work. With remote employee monitoring software, managers can easily monitor their remote workers, just as if they were sitting at the desk next to them.

Vojin Deronjic, Content Writer at Workpuls

Staying organized

Melewi has been a remote company since day 1. We’ve been through quite a few trial and errors until we’ve reached a daily work process that makes us collaborate effectively as a remote team. I would say it’s a combination of many small things we do: 

  • Daily standup.
  • 4-hour overlap, when everyone’s online and we schedule meetings
  • Single source of truth – a very well organized place where we keep our internal knowledge, so everyone knows where to look for answers.
  • Spending time for causal chit-chat – something that’s taken for granted in an office environment, but is equally important for team morale. 
  • Well-structured client communication – everyone from the team knows what to do at which point, so we never have to wonder whether the ball is in our court. 

Rumen Manev, BD & Partnerships Manager at Melewi

Conclusion

Managing remote teams is not an easy task. As much as technology helps, nothing can replace face-to-face communication. However, with right managing remote workers tips and tools nothing is impossible. After all, there are thousands of companies around the world successfully operating with fully remote teams.

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Benefits of google advertising for small business in 2024

Benefits of google advertising for small business in 2024

Benefits of google advertising for small business in 2024

March 04, 2024

Google advertising for small businesses

Using Google advertising for small business is a common practice today compared and while it may seem easy to set up, it definitely shouldn’t be underestimated. One wrong click and you can kiss goodbye thousands of dollars. 

To prevent that from happening, we’ve gathered some precious advice from experienced professionals who are very familiar with Google Ads for small business. They’ve seen all the pitfalls small business owners are lured into. But more importantly, they also know all the ways to avoid falling in these pitfalls.

 

The biggest mistakes small businesses make with Google Ads 

Budget

The biggest mistake small business owners make with Google Ads is budget versus campaign size. As a Google Premier Partner who specialises in working with SMEs, each time our first conversation is about setting expectations. Depending on the vertical or on the market the advertiser is in, cost per click (CPC) bids might be around £2 so if the daily budget is only £10 a day and there are lots of potential customers searching for the service/product, 5 clicks a day isn’t going to get much traffic, let alone results. Read more about how to avoid PPC spending disasters in this article about budget pacing.

It is important to have a clear outcome in mind and build the account to achieve that outcome, with campaigns that match the size of the budget, which is a realistic amount to achieve the outcome. The Google Keyword Planner is a great place to start as it will give you an understanding of the cost & results you can expect to achieve.

Jaye Cowle, Founder of Launch Online

Small businesses seem oblivious to the fact they are spending more on ads than those ads are bringing in. They just kind of assume advertising is a cost of doing business, but don’t actually dive into the analytics to figure out that they are paying $20 to get a sale that makes them $10. Now initially sometimes ads aren’t profitable when experimenting and dialling things in. However, ads should quickly become profitable or you should stop that ad and try something else. 

John Frigo, Digital Marketing Lead at Best Price Nutrition

Keywords

The biggest mistake I see is that if business owners are running their own Google Ads, they don’t pay enough attention to Negative Keyword Lists

Negative keywords are a simple way to ensure your search terms don’t appear for irrelevant terms, and to exclude common terms which you may not want to appear for.

For example, a retailer selling luxury handmade engagement rings might be bidding on “engagement rings ” as a broad match phrase. 

Left unattended, this keyword bid may appear on:

cheap engagement rings 

vintage engagement rings 

antique engagement rings

unusual engagement rings

luxury engagement rings

platinum engagement rings

Of course, some of these will be relevant and happy to appear on, but ideally, they would be excluding terms like “cheap” or “vintage” if they are not appropriate. 

Negative keyword lists need constant attention with the regular and consistent trimming to ensure the budget is not being wasted on irrelevant search terms. Log in and check the Search Terms at least twice a week, ideally more depending on budget, to make sure your spend isn’t wasted. 

Adam Bastock, eCommerce SEO at abastock

A lack of understanding around potential customers’ search intent and not sourcing the right keywords to target are two interrelated mistakes made by small businesses using Google Ads. 

For example, I have seen local businesses miss out on locally-focused keywords that may result in their ads appearing in front of relevant searchers in their area and better

outcomes. Instead, they have tried to target broader, national words in their industries.

Andrew Clark, Marketing Strategist at Duckpin 

Another big mistake that small business owners make with Google Ads is cluttering their campaigns with too many keywords that don’t convert very well. The best way to solve this is to limit each ad group to around ten keywords that are extremely relevant to the content of the ads within that ad group. This way the user’s search query and the content of the ad that receives an impression are a very close match.

Michael Anderson, Marketing Specialist at GeoJango Maps 

A lack of keyword research can certainly prove costly for a business running Google ads. The keyword should resemble the product or service your business is currently offering, the wrong keyword can significantly increase the bounce rate (number of visitors backtracking after clicking initially) and this results in the budget being taken for unnecessary and ineffective traffic. This can be solved with an easy solution with SEO tools such as Ahrefs and Google Keywords.

Rizwan Girach, Chessgammon 

Match types

The biggest mistake I’ve seen several times with small business owners is not knowing about the correct usage of match types. They’ll put in a keyword like “Accountant” as a broad match, and get tons of clicks that are never going to convert. Match types aren’t an especially complicated concept, so a small business owner either needs to spend a bit of time learning more about Google Ads or hire someone to give them a basic set up that at least avoids the obvious pitfalls.

Abir Syed, Digital Marketing Consultant at Upcounting.com

Most business owners assign Broad Match keyword to their ad campaign(s), and since Broad Match is meant to capture as many variations of the keyword as possible (BM keywords also captures traffic to topic related searches that don’t have to include your target keyword) on the web, the small business owner starts losing advertising spend quickly because the ad is being shown as much as possible throughout the internet.

To avoid this issue, small business owners should learn about how keyword match types work or speak with a PPC specialist.

John Pinedo, Co-Founder of Instinct Marketing

Audience

Trying to be all things for everybody is yet another mistake small business owners make with their Google ads. You must focus on your target audiences. Know what they want and need. Learn what their interests are. You must know what makes them tick. That’s the only way your Google Ads can get views. If you know what your target audiences are looking for, you’ll know how to sell to them.

Julia Brookes, Finance Consultant at Now Loans 

Landing pages

The biggest mistake that I see small business owners make is that they treat just about every single click the same. In my experience, the closer you can match the ad and the landing page to the search query, the more likely it is that you’ll increase conversion rates and improve your down funnel CPAs (cost per acquisition).

A simple way to solve this is to identify the top keyword(s) that drive the most volume and create a landing page and ad that matches the search query. I would break these top keywords out into their own ad group and focus on creating the most consistent and relevant experience possible. Then move onto other keywords as time permits.

John Porrini, Founder of LeadBoost

Too often, SMBs lack customized landing pages designed for advertising (with stripped-down navigation and a design based on best practices for optimal conversion optimization). Even more often, companies fail to create or direct ads to relevant landing pages on their website, whether custom or existing pages. This dramatically impacts conversions and indirectly, Quality Score. 

The fix: creating dedicated landing pages for Google Ads, ideally for each ad group.

Kent Lewis, President and Founder of Anvil

Data

I was getting my butt kicked in our Google AdWords account, I had tried almost everything I could think of until one simple change that I made proved to be the thing that would give me a leg up I guess my competition.

Big data is a buzzword to get stone around a lot but I was able to use it to make AdWords work for us.

I began to leverage our data, combined with publicly available census data, for marketing insights.

For example, in a recent campaign we ran in Nashville, TN , we ran pay-per-click (PPC) Adwords campaign with one ad targeting the entire metro Nashville area. The headline read ‘Local Lawn Pros in Nashville are a click away.’ and I thought the performance of the ad was good with a click-through rate of over 1% and conversion rate of over 10% on the Nashville landing page but we needed to improve on it.

We thought, how can we make this more contextual and relevant to the viewer? Se we researched census data, looking at the average income and home values throughout the Nashville area.

We found that East Nashville, an up-and-coming neighbourhood, was populated with more working class, and a creative class demographic and we hypothesized this customer segment would be price sensitive but still not want to cut their own lawns. So we segmented those zip codes and only ran a specific ad for them, with a headline ‘The Cheapest Lawn Mowing in Nashville. Lawn mowing from $20.’”

We then created a matching landing page. After running the ad for one month, on-page analytics proved our hypothesis to be true. We saw over 200% lift in click-through rate and 30% lift in on-page conversion.

Studying the data your own business generates can tell you which of your online marketing campaigns works best. Do the ads appeal to your target market or another market altogether? The data may also point to completely new areas of customer interest.

Bryan Clayton, CEO at GreenPal YourGreenPal.com

Tracking conversions

The biggest mistake we see over 90% of small business owners make when it comes to Google advertising, is not directly tracking conversions. Google has the most advanced machine-learning on the market and to make it work for you, it needs to know what to optimize around. When you tell Google what your conversions are and track them within Google Ads, you open up Data-driven attribution and bidding strategies that other small businesses miss out on.

Grant Higginson, President of Welby Consulting

Display advertising

We are a small business and one of the biggest mistakes we made was keeping the Display Advertising selection checked when setting up our account. We wasted so much money there and didn’t know until months later Display Advertising should have its own campaign. 

We unchecked that option and immediately saw far better results and were actually profitable!

Jeff Moriarty, Marketing Manager at Moriarty’s Gem Art 

Advertising an entire catalogue

The biggest mistake small business owners make with Google Ads is trying to run ads to their entire catalogue. When it comes to paid traffic, not all products are going to be profitable. It’s important to pick and choose the products you’re putting ads behind based on common sense, average order value, and data. This is especially crucial with Google Shopping, many newbie store owners (myself included when we were starting out) just turn on the shopping feed with their entire catalogue, and let it run.

Cole South, Co-Founder of Gold BJJ

Conclusion

It takes more than one try to make a successful Google Ads campaign. Or better yet, it takes constant effort to find the perfect formula for your business. And even when you find it, it will most likely change sooner rather than later. So keep on experimenting, testing, learning, but never give up. Moreover, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Paying an agency to run the ads for you can sometimes be more cost-efficient than doing it by yourself.

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10 benefits of hiring millennials: Tips to attract them (2024)

10 benefits of hiring millennials: Tips to attract them (2024)

10 benefits of hiring millennials: Tips to attract them (2024)

February 28, 2024

Benefits of hiring millennials

One of the biggest decisions you need to make as a business owner is who to hire on your team. Do you prefer age diversity in the workplace, only senior employees or millennials? 

The only way you can make the right decision is by doing your research and be sure about what can every generation bring to your company. Therefore, let’s start with the pros of hiring millennials.

Millennials, with their natural aptitude for technology, social media, and creativity, millennials are some of the most ambitious employees in the workforce.  The key benefits of hiring millennials should be – they are self-starters, entrepreneurial in spirit, and hungry for success. These are traits that make them ideal candidates for any small businesses.

To get the most out of hiring millennials, business owners should think beyond the obvious perks to more original and resourceful benefits.  

10 proven pros of hiring millennials

Well, you probably heard so many bad things about hiring millennials. But actually, most of these stories were probably exaggerated or were a result of major generational differences in the workplace. Trust us, there are worse hiring mistakes you could do than hiring younger talent.

And even if you really want to avoid millennials, soon you’ll be left with no talent pool because the Baby boomers are all retired, and Generation X will soon be too.

Millennials are very sensitive to social issues

Employing millennials can benefit a company’s public image. Millennials tend to be socially conscious and will voice concerns if they feel a company project or marketing campaign might offend or exclude certain groups.

By listening to millennial employees and considering their perspectives on inclusiveness early on, companies can make internal adjustments to campaigns and other initiatives. Since they will speak up their minds if your project or your marketing campaign is offending one sector of the community, you can already edit it out internally so once you put out the project or the campaign, it will be well-loved by the whole community.

Millennials work for the company’s purpose

This is the main difference between hiring millennials versus other generations. As most millennials are doing side jobs that are able to support them well, they choose a day job that well reflects their stand in social and political issues. 

Millennials usually work in companies that have a mission geared towards helping the needy, companies that help in environmental conservation, or companies that have a proven track record in their corporate social responsibility.

They believe that their generation can save the dying world created by the generations before them so they make sure to contribute positively to society. Hence, hiring millennials can save you a lot of money and reinforce your company’s positive impact on society and the environment. Not hiring them would create a big void in your company.

They are flexible and can easily adapt

Another reason why hiring millennials is a good idea is that they’re good at seeing the bigger picture. And that encourages them to be flexible and adapt.

Millennials have grown up in an era of constant change. This unpredictable environment has taught them how to adapt easily. That’s why they’re not afraid to change jobs if they see no growth, which is often mistaken with impermanence.

They offer creative solutions

Millennials’ lack of traditional experience and knowledge can be an asset in driving workplace innovation. Without decades-long careers to shape their perspectives, millennials offer fresh, creative takes on processes, products, and functions. Their fluency with digital tools and technologies further enables them to put forward innovative ideas and solutions naturally. Companies can leverage millennials’ out-of-the-box thinking and technological prowess to reimagine workplace norms.

They are cost-friendly

Hiring millennials is also cost-friendly because they are mostly new entrants in the job market and have little experience compared to the earlier generation. Therefore, since experience is one factor used to bargain for one’s salary, possessing little of it means a low starting remuneration. 

In addition, because they are pursuing work experience to improve their resumes, you will get employees who are dedicated to their work and will give their best to bring value to the company. 

But most importantly, since you hired them in the beginning, you must keep an eye on their progress. Appreciating their dedication and recognizing their progress is crucial to make sure you keep them in your company.

Hence, if the main reason you hired millennials is that they were cost-friendly, but their work helped your company to grow, you should definitely put the cost-friendly reason aside, and do your best to pay your employees the salary they truly deserve. 

Millennials are motivated

Maybe the most important advantage of hiring millennials is that they’re good at seeing the bigger picture. And that encourages them to be flexible and adapt.

Millennials have grown up in an era of constant change. This unpredictable environment has taught them how to adapt easily. That’s why they’re not afraid to change jobs if they see no growth, which is often mistaken with impermanence.

They are fun to work with

They are energetic, outspoken, and passionate about what they do. To think of it, the presence of millennials within your office will contribute immensely to the creation of a flexible, dynamic, and efficient culture within your company.

For millennials, the idea of bureaucratic hurdles and slow services simply doesn’t make sense. That’s why having Millenials within your workspace will make the workspace upbeat and dynamic across the board.

Millennials are risk-takers and go-getters as well

Whereas previous generations followed more traditional linear career advancement, millennials pursue professional goals on their own terms. This may be one of their biggest generational assets to contribute in a workplace. Hence they also are best in gauging chances and opportunities which is why they know if it’s a good risk or otherwise.

The biggest takeaway in hiring millennials is opening your door to a wide array of suggestions and exposing your brand to more innovative techniques especially in gaining attention. Millennials know what they want, but most importantly, they know how to acquire that too which sets them apart from other generations.

They are digitally savvy

As the first generation to be brought up with the Internet and other high-tech advancements, members of Gen Y are digital natives. They’re in tune with each social media platform and many can edit a webpage with ease.

Millennials could magnify your online presence and act as brand advocates for your company. Their innate understanding of technology gives them an advantage over those who may not be as familiar with various computer programs and social media channels.

These young professionals can ensure that your business maximizes the latest tech to increase productivity, marketability, and efficiency. This means that they know a lot of things that can simplify your workflow and make everyone’s lives easier.

They are highly educated

As the most highly educated generation in the workforce, millennials offer a sophisticated skill set for businesses to utilize. A majority possess college degrees, and many hold advanced qualifications through graduate studies and certifications.

With training costs for new hires averaging thousands per employee, millennials’ innate drive to actively upskill provides built-in value. Those that invest in nurturing millennials’ intellectual capital can reap rewards through forward-thinking contributions across critical business functions.

4 tips for hiring millennials

As more millennials enter the job market, it’s important for businesses to engage with this age group and extend competitive advantages. Here are some suggested benefits that will make the process of hiring millennials easier by making young professionals consider your next job offer.

Pay off their student loan

With the average graduate joining the workforce with more than $40,000 in student loan debt, it’s no surprise that repayment assistance is a hot benefit. Paying off an undergraduate degree is an immediate concern for many young professionals. Adopting this innovative employee perk is highly coveted and will likely set you apart from competitors.

Providing in-office wellness

Gen Yers have a deeper appreciation of their mental health and well-being than their predecessors. They want to keep themselves emotionally, psychologically, and physically fit. 

This means a small business that offers holistic wellness initiatives such as yoga, free gym memberships, stress management, and dietary consultations may be more appealing. Offering free or discounted healthy snacks throughout the day is another hit with the younger crowd and it will also improve the wellbeing of employees at the workplace

Offering them flexible work hours

More than previous generations, millennials want to establish a healthy work-life balance. In fact, many see no reason to be in the office five days a week if they can be just as productive from home. For this reason, young professionals are fans of remote work options that allow them to juggle personal and work schedules more efficiently.

Implementing this benefit could increase retention among millennial team members. It also conveys confidence and trust that young employees value.

Give them learning and career development opportunities

Most millennials are in the early stages of their careers. They want to learn and grow as much as possible, which is why if your goal is hiring millennials then you should offer training and development. 

By implementing career development initiatives, you could attract the most ambitious professionals. A good example is offering international relocation, which gives Millennials an opportunity to enhance their skills, build their career and find unique and meaningful experiences in another country. Promoting a culture of learning also instils a sense of purpose for the younger generation, which may help motivate them and push your company forward.

Conclusion

The belief that hiring millennials is a bad idea is just another statement that proves that generalization is a massive problem in today’s world. The truth is, whether someone will be a good employee or not is very individual. 

But, you can’t just have job interviews without preferences, so these facts are a good start to decide where should you look for new talents. Read them carefully and decide if these qualities are a good fit for your companies needs. If yes, then start looking for new employees among millennials, and if not, set your goals and locate which generation has them the most. 

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The consequences of bad location decision in business (2024)

The consequences of bad location decision in business (2024)

The consequences of bad location decision in business (2024)

February 23, 2024

The consequences of bad location decision in business featured blog image
We’ve already talked about the factors you should consider when choosing a business location. However, we didn’t get much into detail about the consequences of a bad location decision. So we found someone who’s gone through it all and knows how location affects the success of the business. Luckily, they were willing to share their lesson with you.

Last summer, in July of 2019, myself and my two co-owners opened our florist, Otown Flowers, in Orlando. However, we soon discovered that our location was going to be a challenge. The full story of our small business location dilemma, and how we solved it, continues below.

How to overcome a bad business location

1. We searched for two traits in a new location: distance and price. We didn’t want a long commute, and as a new business, we needed to be reasonable with rent.

2. In our research, we considered rent and neighbourhood statistics, but overlooked competition. It turns out one of the most popular florists in the city is within half a mile. They have a fleet of vans, a neon sign, and a beautiful street-facing location. It was intimidating.

3. We knew right away that there will be consequences of our bad location decision. First, we realized the online local listings were going to be a challenge. Our nearby competitor has years of history in Orlando, so of course, they are going to be prioritized by search engines and map apps.

Our store is also tucked into the corner of a plaza, and difficult to see. We weren’t seen by those passing by on the street. The plaza gets quite busy, but even from the parking lot and sidewalks, our visibility was limited.

4. To get noticed, we had to work both online and on the storefront. Our first step was optimizing our website and local listing pages. We added photos of our work to our local listings. But the biggest effort was following up with customers and asking for reviews. I am not the type of person who likes to ask things of people, especially when they’re the customer, but we made the effort. Those positive reviews literally put us on the map.

For the storefront, we added signage. Our window sign wasn’t enough, so we built a new sign to hang over the door, and installed a hanging sign that was more visible to those walking down the plaza’s sidewalk. In addition, we had a folding sign to set outside during opening hours, to incite curiosity and make the storefront more welcoming.

Lastly, online community groups on Facebook and Nextdoor were essential in growing the business. The key is to not spam these groups, you have to actually act as a member of the community, and that means helping others even when it isn’t immediately beneficial. Giving a neighbour advice on plant care, recommending a venue to a bride-to-be, over time I became a familiar face in these groups. I keep a strict rule to only promote the store before Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day, when people are looking the most, or if there is a post that is explicitly searching for a florist. Neighbourhood groups don’t take kindly to in-your-face marketing, but love to support a local business when they can.

5. We noticed positive results almost immediately, but it took about a year for us to get consistent calls and walk-ins. At first, we could usually track the source of how someone found us, maybe a recommendation or through a Facebook group, but now more people are stumbling upon us online with no idea who we are. We are showing up more frequently on map listings and search engines, and we are getting more “word-of-mouth” orders.

A poor location decision with a happy ending

The biggest lesson we learned from this was to research the competition and see where they are located. Depending on your business, being near your competitors could be beneficial or disastrous.

Another metric we would have considered is what major companies are nearby. Our city (Orlando) is home to a lot of corporate headquarters and busy hospitals, and those places have a lot of high-spending consumers. It is a factor we would definitely prioritize in a future location.

It’s been a little over a year since we have moved in, and even facing the uncertainty that coronavirus has placed on the events industry, we are excited to stay at our current location and continue growing the business. We have used the problems we faced as learning opportunities and built a community of neighbouring businesses and clients to turn our problem location into a new strength.

Connect and do business with Otown Flowers on Enterprise League

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The 10 Ds of entrepreneurship: Why are they important?

The 10 Ds of entrepreneurship: Why are they important?

The 10 Ds of entrepreneurship: Why are they important?

February 21, 2024

Which one of the 10 Ds of entrepreneurship do you have?

Henry Dalziel, Director of Growth at Growth Hackers Hong Kong, discusses the meaning and importance of the 10 Ds of entrepreneurship, and urges you to check how many of them you possess.

The 10 Ds of Entrepreneurship were first published by William Graves, the author of the Portable MBA in Entrepreneurship. In essence, the 10 Ds represent the DNA of many entrepreneurs.

If your vocation is to become an entrepreneur and you haven’t yet started your journey, you might want to consider if you possess all the qualities that we outline below. We didn’t had any experience with setting up a company in Hong Kong , so when we created our Hong Kong SEO Agency one of our key questions amongst others was, “Do we truly have what it takes”? 

The 10 Ds of entrepreneurship

Let’s review what the 10 Ds of entrepreneurship are exactly, and see how many of them do you have!

Dream

Entrepreneurs that start any sort of business, not just marketing agencies, all share a vision of what the future could be like for them and their businesses. However, of greater importance, they have the ability to implement their dreams. Therefore, as a founder, what is your dream? The dream should be big and bold because if you think small you will remain small.

Decisiveness

Entrepreneurs don’t procrastinate and they typically make decisions fast. Their swiftness provides a key factor in their success, and as an agency founder, this is key for me. For example, saying “no” to potential customers was a good thing for us in the long run because the alternative would have been annoying people and causing bad energy and disappointment. 

If you feel that it isn’t going to work out, then ditch that lead and focus on clients that you can absolutely deliver quality digital marketing services, which for us includes SEO, Content Marketing, and Lead Generation.

Doers

Entrepreneurs are all, without question, “doers”. They “talk the talk, and walk the walk”. Once they have decided on a particular course of action, they will execute it as quickly as possible. The same applies to clients that you decide to onboard. How fast can you get wins for your client? Ask yourself that question and if you’re confident that you can then get it going!

Determination

Entrepreneurs manage their agencies (or indeed any other businesses they start) with total commitment. They seldom give up, even when confronted by major obstacles that seem insurmountable. Remember that nine out of ten businesses fail, so make sure that you’re either the one that succeeds, or that you fail fast and learn from your mistakes.

Dedication

Entrepreneurs are wholly dedicated to their agencies or businesses they start, sometimes at considerable cost to their relationships with their friends and families. They’ll tend to work tirelessly without thought and the concept of a 9-5, five days a week, are all abstract concepts.

Devotion

Entrepreneurs, especially Internet Marketers, love what they do. That love and passion are what sustains them when the going gets tough. What carries them through is the love of their product or service that makes them so effective at selling it. The SEO marketing industry is packed full of dedicated and passionate individuals, and for the most part, they are a very colorful bunch.

Details

“God is in the detail,” say some, whilst others take the other side and say that “the devil resides in the details”. Either way, you’ll certainly see that the successful entrepreneur will almost always be obsessive about details and this is particularly true for the SEO and Digital Marketing industry where keywords, content structure, and hundreds of other variables can either “make or break” a campaign.

Destiny

The successful entrepreneur will want to be in charge of their own destiny as opposed to being dependent on an employer. Remember that the 99% work for the 1% that never quit.

Dollars

For the most part, getting rich is not the prime motivator of entrepreneurs; I’d argue that freedom is greater quality. Generating wealth is more a measure of success rather than “the absolute driver”.

Distribute

Entrepreneurs understand this simple concept: “a happy employee is a good employee”. Keep your core team happy and they’ll look after you and your business.

Which of the 10 Ds of entrepreneurship do you possess

Having read the ten Ds of entrepreneurship, how many do you feel you truly possess?

If you feel that you are lacking in one of the areas then there is always room and time for improvement. Whether by building up your business knowledge through books and movies. Or taking riskier lessons through trial and error. The truth is, there’s always a way to polish what you already possess, and grow what you lack.

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