Small businesses in the United States have taken a steep dive as closings and cutbacks have decimated many industries. Small retail shops and restaurants struggle especially hard to make ends meet with alternative income streams like food delivery and virtual shopping clubs. Unfortunately, small businesses need to get creative to survive as governments are slow to jump to the rescue.
Transforming Your Business
The Los Angeles Times editors recommended these strategies in a recent post:
Stay flexible. It is wise not to commit irrevocably to any business or marketing strategy. You can experiment with new ideas and sales approaches to find what works during these trying times.
Pivot to address new ideas. Product launches and fashion shows can’t be showcased in large groups, so you must pivot to address new ideas. Virtual shows can draw a larger audience for your products, and you can ramp up to deliver those products efficiently by mail, UPS, and Federal Express. Some organizations might host small retreats to generate income.
Consider abandoning storefront marketing. Marketing products in window displays has consistently produced less income, and reopening stores have trouble regaining their pre-pandemic customer base. You can switch over to offering a community space that hosts virtual or in-person meetings and events and selling products to the participants. That might get you through the tough times until business picks up.
Take on partners. You can consider taking on partners to market products if you have a large space. They would give you a larger base for scheduling virtual and in-person events and attract more people to in-house sales.
Embrace remote work. Your employees will likely embrace working from home if you provide them with the resources to communicate with one other and access customer records.
Tough Times Call for Drastic Changes
The number of business owners fell by 22 per cent to 3.3 million owners in the first three months after the government response to Covid-19. Black-owned business income dropped 41 percent.
Entrepreneurs are rapidly discovering that it is not back to business as usual. Some of the measures they need to take to adapt and survive include:
Promoting internet sales with creative ideas;
Offering contactless deliveries of products, food, prescriptions, and ready-to-eat meals;
Adopting new revenue streams — such as converting production lines to produce hand sanitizer, face masks, or other first-aid products;
Training employees in new skills needed for changes in the business model;
Implementing safety measure to reassure customers and employees;
Implementing new technologies;
Introducing new service apps to expand online business.
Applying for Emergency Loans
Making big changes in the way you operate can quickly eat into your capital or stymie your efforts to retool your business. As a small business owner or manager, you could weather the crisis by applying for a loan through the government-backed Paycheck Protection Program, also known as PPP for short. Those government-funded loans were designed to help you maintain jobs and ensure employee payroll.
No matter how loyal you think your customers are, many people are scared to return to business as normal, and employees aren’t happy to work among others in closely positioned cubicles.
Keeping all your employees might involve offering remote work opportunities and training remote employees to act as proactive ambassadors of your services. Paying staff on time is critical, but you can apply for a PPP loan immediately at Revenued.com if you ever find yourself in a jam.
You can apply for this type of government-sponsored load even if you have already received a loan as long as you can prove it is an emergency.
