Investing in developing your small business skills is one of the best ways to support your company. However, with all the jobs you do as a small-business owner or leader, it’s not always easy to know what will have the most impact or where to begin. Below, we’ll walk you through some of the most critical areas to focus on and provide tips to help you get started.

Essential Business Skills for Thriving Entrepreneurs

Taking the initial steps to start a business is a bold venture filled with its fair share of hurdles and triumphs. The foundation of a successful business largely rests on the essential business skills that a small business owner brings to the table. From the onset, a blend of hard skills like financial management and soft skills such as adept communication are crucial.

Successful entrepreneurs often possess a well-rounded skill set that aids not just in meticulous business planning but in navigating the financial landscape, especially during tough times. Your prowess in customer service skills can be a game changer in building and nurturing a loyal customer base, crucial for business development.

In the business realm, having a solid grip on content marketing can significantly bolster the promotion of your products or services, while engaging communication skills are essential in articulating your business goals to both your team and clientele.

As your business grows, the need to identify and bridge skill gaps becomes paramount. Many entrepreneurs find that resources like online courses or engaging in mentorship programs can be invaluable for learning and refining the skills needed. Additionally, mastering your time management is essential in managing the workload of a small business, paving the way to succeed as an entrepreneur. Continuous learning and improvement not only make you a better business leader but also identify areas you need to improve, propelling your business to the next level.

How to Build Your Small Business Skills

You don’t need to attend college classes to pick up small business skills. Opportunities to learn are all around us.

Learn Through Trial and Error

Some people learn best through hands-on learning. For instance, you might have an easier time learning how to manage a new customer relationship management (CRM) program by setting one up and working with it.

Learn Directly from Others

If you’re learning independently, Charter Capital Insights covers various topics relevant to small businesses. You can also explore podcasts and books for small-business owners. When you’re ready to branch out, consider joining professional organizations or finding a formal mentorship program.

Observe Patterns

You can also learn a lot by watching others. For instance, if you have a favorite business leader, you may pick up new things by learning about their history and watching how they behave. You may want to watch competitors too. For example, keep an eye on what the company’s owner says on social media and watch business posts. Bear in mind, however, that just because they engage in a specific activity doesn’t mean their efforts are fruitful. Watch for signs that something is successful before trying to emulate it and use their failures to shorten your learning curve.

6 Small Business Skills Anyone Can Master

Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s look at some specific small business owner skills you can pick up.

1. Financial Management Skills

Around 40 percent of small-business owners consider themselves financially literate, according to Intuit. Roughly 80 percent manage their business’ finances. If you fall into this category, your business’s health depends on your financial management skills. Even those who have someone else assisting should know the basics to gauge the success of that person, understand what’s happening, and be able to make suggestions that align with business goals.

Cash Flow Management

It’s not a lack of profit but cash flow concerns that often pose a problem for small businesses. An estimated 82 percent of business failures can be traced back to poor cash flow management, according to the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). Business owners must know how to predict cash flow accurately, budget accordingly, and identify working capital options before cash is needed. For example, invoice factoring can help make cash flow more predictable and accelerate cash flow on demand.

2. Customer Service, Marketing, and Sales Skills

Many people view customer service, marketing, and sales as wholly different things. While they are typically managed independently, no area can perform at its peak unless the other areas are strong. 

Customer Service

Strong customer service is the cornerstone of your business. Nine in ten people are more likely to complete an additional purchase after having a good customer service experience, according to MailChimp. Good customer service boosts sales, loyalty, and your reputation too. 

Marketing

Half of all small businesses do not have a marketing plan, according to Search Engine Journal. Without a plan, it’s impossible to know what strategies to deploy or if your efforts deliver ROI. Furthermore, you can’t support sales efforts if marketing isn’t aligned. Plus, effective marketing can also reduce or eliminate many customer concerns.

Sales

You’ve probably heard the phrase “can’t see the forest for the trees” before. It refers to getting so caught up in the details that you don’t see the big picture. When it comes to sales, being too far on either end of the spectrum is a concern, though. You must be able to see the small-picture details, like what happens with individual prospects, and the big-picture details, such as how many deals your team is closing. However, you should also understand the middle ground, which includes things like your sales funnel, how long it takes a typical lead to convert, and what your prospects want from you both now and once they become customers. Armed with this information, your marketing team is poised to make a difference at every stage of the customer journey.

3. Communication Skills

Business communication skills come into play whether you’re asking a customer to place their next order or smoothing out employee concerns.

Verbal and Written Communication

Nine in ten employees say their boss lacks communication skills, Inc. reports. The issues are varied. For instance, 57 percent say they don’t receive clear directions, and 39 percent say they don’t receive constructive criticism. Others don’t seem to get any communication at all. More than half say their boss doesn’t make time to meet with them, and an almost equal number say they refuse to talk to their subordinates.

To nail the basics, start dedicating time to chatting with employees and getting to know them. Acknowledge when they’re doing well and the contributions they’re making. From there, you can begin working through things like constructive feedback that can help them improve.

Negotiation Skills

Negotiation isn’t about getting things done your way or convincing someone to accept your solution. It’s about creating value and developing a win-win situation for everyone involved. You’re probably already doing this so much that it’s second nature. Still, it tends to fall by the wayside when something is explicitly viewed as a negotiation, such as when closing a sale or working out a vendor contract. Home in your negotiation skills to make these interactions as smooth as all the others woven throughout your day.

4. Management and Leadership Skills

Although management and leadership skills are often thought of as interchangeable, they’re quite different in practice. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things,” as Peter Drucker said. One is process-oriented, and the other is inspiration-oriented.

General Management Skills

As a business owner, you must know which processes will produce successful outcomes for your team and be able to teach people how to replicate them.

Delegation and Time Management

Your workload will grow as your business grows, so to have any semblance of work-life balance, you must be prepared to delegate. If you’ve done well with general management, your team will already be comfortable with best practices and ready to step up to the plate. That way, you can develop business goals and focus on big-picture tasks while your team manages daily operations.

Leadership and Team-Building Skills

Your team looks to you to decide how to behave. Because of this, you must embody the values you want your team and business to convey. Explore team-building activities that will provide an opportunity to knock down barriers between you and your staff as well as between the different departments of your company.

5. Planning and Problem-Solving Skills

It may seem like planning and problem-solving skills are hardwired in a person. That’s not necessarily true.

Strategic Thinking and Problem-Solving

Developing your problem-solving skills can be fun. For instance, something as simple as doing puzzles can boost strategic thinking and problem-solving skills, the NYU Dispatch reports. Consider turning it into a team-building exercise, Time suggests. Escape rooms are ideal. Crossword puzzles have also been shown to bring people together in a way few other activities can.

Project Management and Planning

Planning doesn’t always come naturally, and knowing what variables might impact your timeline is tricky unless you’ve been through a process before. However, you can find greater success in these areas by working with a mentor and studying how others perform similar tasks. If you’re using a project management tool, you can also connect with their service team. Some provide training or additional resources at no cost.

6. Networking Skills

Developing networking skills will expose you to new opportunities and help you build connections that can help your business grow. Plus, it can help eliminate the sense of isolation business owners often feel. You may want to join groups dedicated to networking or public speaking to start so that you can develop your skills naturally around like-minded individuals. Once you feel confident, try joining professional organizations and attending conferences to practice and hone your skills more.

Build Your Small Business Skills with Help from Charter Capital

Building your business acumen skills can be fun, and you can do it over time. If a lack of working capital prevents you from seizing an opportunity to learn, invoice factoring can provide you with the cash you need to upskill and strengthen your business. To learn more or get started, request a free rate quote from Charter Capital.

Equipping your team with the right online business tools can transform the way they work, allowing you to run a more efficient, effective, and profitable company. On this page, we’ll explore the best tools for entrepreneurs and small businesses, along with a selection of free and paid options in each category. Discover online business tools that offer powerful features to enhance collaboration, streamline operations, and boost productivity for your team. From project management and communication to marketing and financial tools, our comprehensive suite of tools covers all aspects of your business needs. These tools save time and provide effective time management solutions to optimize workflows.

1. Online Business Tools for Project and Team Management

Businesses with mature project management capabilities are 21 percent more likely to meet their goals than their counterparts and are 21 percent more likely to come in at or under budget, and 24 percent more likely to do it on time, according to the Project Management Institute. They’re also significantly less likely to experience project failure and issues that lead to project issues, like scope creep.

Modern project management tools also make it easier to collaborate and manage your team, with options to assign tasks, track hours, set and track budgets, and more.

Project Management Software and Time Tracking Tools

• Wrike
• Asana
• MeisterTask
• Trello
• Agiled
• Salesforce

2. Online Tools for Business Accounting and Bookkeeping

Manual entry errors, such as the unintentional typing of the letter “B” instead of “M,” which plummeted the stock market by more than 1000 points in 2010, are responsible for around 28 percent of input errors, according to Medium. Although typically seen on a much smaller scale, similar issues are often seen when companies use manual processes and workarounds like Excel sheets to manage their budgets and track spending. Business accounting and bookkeeping tools available today check for errors, double entries, and other common problems, plus integrate with other programs to reduce or eliminate manual entry altogether.

Furthermore, the average small business has $84,000 in unpaid invoices, with eight in ten invoices being at least 30 days overdue per Entrepreneur. This leads to cash flow struggles, which contribute to 82 percent of small business closures. In addition to using accounting and bookkeeping tools for improved management and tracking, businesses can work with an invoice factoring company to accelerate payment on B2B invoices and handle collections efficiently.  

Business Accounting and Bookkeeping Tools

• Zoho Invoice
• QuickBooks
• FreshBooks
• YNAB

Invoice Factoring

• Freight Factoring
• Oil and Gas Services Factoring
• Staffing Agency Factoring
• Manufacturing Industry Factoring
• Security Firm Factoring
• Service Provider Factoring

3. Best Tools for Business Marketing

Nearly half of all small business owners manage their own marketing efforts, according to Small Business Trends. While tactics vary, both B2B and B2C brands say their top three strategies include social media, content marketing, and targeted social ads, per HubSpot. Project management tools such as those highlighted earlier can help small businesses stay on top of all their marketing campaigns. To boost efficiency and ROI or campaigns, project-specific tools are highlighted below.

Analytics Tools

• Google Looker Studio
• Google Analytics

SEO Tools

• Ahrefs
• SemRush
• BuzzSumo

Social Media Marketing Tools

• HootSuite
• Buffer
• Quuu
• Facebook Ads

Content Production Tools

• Grammarly
• BuzzSumo
• WordTune
• Wordable

Graphic Design and Branding Tools

• Canva
• Infogram

Email Marketing Tools

• MailChimp
• Sendfox
• Omnisend
• ActiveCampaign

4. Best Website Builders and Blogging Platforms

A website is central to all marketing efforts because virtually any other marketing activity the business engages in directs traffic to the website. For instance, the call-to-action on an email campaign will typically send the reader to a landing page. Social media posts often link to blogs. Even offline activities create brand awareness that results in online searches for branded terms. Therefore, it’s important to have a solid website and blog to support these efforts.

Website Builders and Blogging Tools

• WordPress
• Shopify
• WebFlow
• Squarespace

5. Online Business Tools for Calendar Management and Meetings

It takes an average of eight emails to schedule a meeting, according to Clockwise. Their research shows a typical employee spends nearly five hours each week just scheduling meetings and attends a total of 62 per month. These meetings and scheduling attempts take focus off critical tasks and diminish productivity, and they’re far from the only tasks that need attention each day. Modern calendar management tools can handle everything from finding ideal meeting times for everyone involved to automating meeting workflows and helping structure a day for improved productivity.

Calendar Management Tools

• OnceHub
• Calendly
• TimeTree
• Clockwise

Communications and Meeting Tools

• Google Workspace
• Zoom
• Skype
• 8×8

6. Customer Relationship Management and Customer Support Tools

Organizations that use a customer relationship management (CRM) platform see a 29 percent increase in sales on average, a 24 percent increase in sales team productivity, and up to a 14 percent sales cycle decrease, per HubSpot. Their research also shows that $8.71 is returned for each $1 a business spends on a CRM.

Many CRM platforms offer customer service features, such as ticketing systems, email, chat, and integrated phones. However, these are available in standalone products too.

CRM Platforms

• HubSpot
• Salesforce
• Keap

Customer Support Tools

• Zendesk
• Help Scout
• Chatdesk
• Freshdesk

7. Business Tools for File Sharing and Storage

A strong file-sharing system makes it easier for teams to collaborate, ensures content stays in company control, and helps keep files secure. Although many project management tools include file storage and sharing and even allow people to attach files to specific tasks and projects, there are times a company will have general-purpose documents or will want to share access to a file with a broader pool of people. File storage and sharing tools make this simple.

File Sharing and Storage Tools

• Google Drive
• Apple Business Essentials
• Dropbox

8. Online Business Tools for Process Automation

If it’s a repetitive process, chances are it can be automated. Let’s say someone fills out a form on your website. An automation tool can add all the contact’s deals to a CRM, assign the lead to the appropriate sales professional, send out a welcome letter, and add the contact to a nurturing workflow that will send them emails at regular intervals. This is how marketers save 25 hours per week with automation, and sales reps save around six, according to Zapier. Their research shows huge savings for IT, HR, and accounting departments too.

Automation Tools

• Zapier
• Zoho Flow

Streamline Your Accounts Receivable and Unlock Working Capital to Obtain ROI-Boosting Online Business Tools

Whether your business wants to accelerate collections or needs working capital to obtain a tool like those listed above, Charter Capital can help. Request a complimentary invoice factoring rate quote to learn more or get started.

The best recruitment strategies make it easier to attract top talent, speed up the search and hiring process, and go a long way toward ensuring the ideal candidate is placed in each role. Use the recruiting idea on this page to level up your recruitment strategies and grow your team quickly.

What is Recruitment?

Employee recruitment refers to the end-to-end process of attracting potential job candidates, creating shortlists, choosing candidates, and all other steps along the hiring journey.

Internal Employee Recruiting Strategies

• Internal job boards
• Managerial nominations
• Knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA)databases managed by HR

External Recruiting Strategies

• External job boards
• Third-party recruiters
• Temp-to-hire agencies
• Public relations activities

Talent Pool vs. Talent Pipeline: What’s the Difference?

Two common terms often talked about alongside recruitment sourcing strategies are “talent pool” and “talent pipeline.” Although sometimes used interchangeably, talent pool refers to the collective grouping of potential job candidates. The talent pipeline is more selective and only includes people who have demonstrated they’re qualified for a role in some way.

9 Best Recruiting Strategies for When You Want to Grow Your Business

Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s explore some recruitment strategies you can start leveraging right away.

1. Develop a Strong Employer Brand

More than two-thirds of candidates research companies online, and 37 percent say they’ll move on to another job posting if they can’t find information, according to CareerBuilder. To ensure potential candidates find you and like what they see, ask yourself these questions:

• What makes you a top employer?
• What distinguishes your business from other employers?
• Why do people want to wake up every morning and work for you rather than the business down the street?
• How does your team work differently than others?
• How would you describe your company culture?

Once you know which themes or branding elements you’re leveraging, find novel ways to share your employer brand with the world. For instance, you may wish to profile employees who emulate your brand ethos on your blog or cover company events that tie in with your values. On social media, consider sharing photos of employees going about their days or engaging in team activities.

Keep sharing this content even if you’re not actively recruiting to build awareness and familiarity for your employer brand.  People will start to seek you out before you have an opening, and you’ll have a talent pool ready to go as needed. 

2. Leverage Technology to Streamline Your Recruitment Process

The right technology can help you recruit faster and more cost-effectively. For instance, an applicant tracking system (ATS) makes it easier to follow candidates through the hiring process, much like a CRM makes tracking sales leads easy. Some of the more modern ones will assess resumes based on keywords included and rank them so that the hiring team can focus on the most qualified candidates. Others streamline the posting process or automate repetitive tasks such as scheduling interviews.

3. Prioritize Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Your Recruitment Strategy

Companies with a diverse workforce are 35 percent more likely to experience greater financial returns than their counterparts, according to Forbes. They’re 70 percent more likely to capture more markets and 1.7 times more innovative too. To achieve these types of results, aim for a team that’s comprised of different:

• Abilities
• Ages
• Cultural backgrounds
• Educational backgrounds
• Genders and orientations
• Races
• Religions
• Socioeconomic backgrounds

You won’t automatically build a diverse talent pool without intentionally cultivating one, though. You’ll need to start by creating a culture of inclusion, building it into your brand identity, and mindfully recruiting candidates through different channels to do it.

4. Be More Strategic with Candidate Sourcing

Companies are often reactive when it comes to hiring. Sourcing strategies in recruitment are more proactive in nature and help ensure you have candidates ready to go when your business is growing. A few tips here include:

• Source even when a role isn’t open yet. Great Resignation aside, only 36 percent of the workforce is actively looking for a new role at any given time, but 90 percent is open to discussion and learning, per Employa. You can nurture these relationships until you’re ready to hire.
• Source from the ATS. These are people who have already expressed an interest in your company. They may not have gotten the job the last time, but that doesn’t mean they’re not excellent candidates for another role or top-tier choices for the next round of hiring.
• Diversify sourcing channels. This is a key component when creating diverse teams and can help you uncover untapped talent.
• Include offline recruitment activities. Networking, partnerships, conventions, and more can help keep your talent pool well-stocked.
• Maximize employee networks. Happy and productive employees tend to refer others with the same qualities. You may want to consider an employee referral program offering a referral bonus to hire an employee referred by an existing employee.

5. Strengthen Your Talent Pipeline

One of the most important components of sourcing strategies for recruitment is building a robust talent pipeline. Again, these are candidates who have been prequalified in some way, so the quality is better, and they move through the hiring process quicker. Some ways to address this include:

• Working very closely with managers to clarify roles and expectations.
• Working with managers to identify candidate “must-haves” and “nice-to-haves.”
• Stay close with shortlisted candidates that are still eligible for hire and continue nurturing the relationships.

6. Offer Employee Perks and Benefits

Perks and benefits can make a world of difference when talent is choosing between multiple offers. Plus, they help boost morale and loyalty after hire. Some popular examples are provided below.

Employee Benefits

• Health, vision, dental, disability, and life insurance
• Wellness program
• Mental health coverage or benefits
• Paid time off (PTO)
• Paid family leave
• Retirement benefits
• Professional development and education

Employee Perks

• Flexible schedules and remote work
• Employee recognition programs
• Paid volunteer time
• Lunches, snacks, and beverages

7. Optimize Your Job Postings

Think of your job posts like you do your marketing. A great job post draws the right candidate in, speaks to their needs, and makes it easy for them to take action. The tips below can help you achieve this.

• Remember your employer brand and tell your company’s story in the job post, so people can picture themselves immersed in the culture.
• Use keywords to make it easier for candidates to find.
• Avoid biased language. Even something as simple as using gendered terms can reduce the number of applicants and greatly reduce the diversity of candidates.
• Be mobile-friendly. Nine in ten job searchers are using their phones to research openings, and one in five is applying from their phone, per Inc.
• Check out similar jobs and explore ways to differentiate yours.

8. Answer Candidate FAQs

If possible, add a page to your company website that answers hiring FAQs. It can help address concerns that might otherwise prevent people from applying and will make the process smoother for candidates moving through your recruitment workflow.

The more you work with candidates, the easier it will be to gauge what needs to be on the page. As a start, you may wish to include:

• The steps involved in the hiring process.
• How resumes should be submitted.
• Key people involved in the hiring process.
• Who to contact if the candidate has a question.
• How candidates are notified if they don’t move to the next stage and what happens to their resume after. For example, do you keep it on file and reach out if something else comes up or should they reapply?
• Hiring policies.
• General information about the company and employer brand.

9. Step Up Your Interview Game

Interviews are about more than determining if someone has the aptitude and skills for the role. Use the interview to get to know the candidate’s personality, temperament, and motivation. You may also be able to gauge soft skills like emotional intelligence and coachability.

To ensure the best candidate is selected, many businesses opt for a structured series of interviews rather than a single one. A typical flow might include:

• A brief phone screening to gauge the candidate’s interest, experience, and skills.
• Assessments such as personality or aptitude tests.
• Formal interviews with HR, leadership, and management.
• Background and reference checks.

Additional Best Practices to Help Small Businesses Hire the Right Candidates and Keep Them

Recruiting the right candidate is only part of the hiring equation—retaining them is equally important. Once a new hire is selected, a well-designed onboarding process becomes critical to long-term success.

Effective onboarding goes beyond basic orientation. It should include clear role expectations, structured training, introductions to team members, and check-ins during the first 90 days. This helps new employees feel supported, improves job satisfaction, and accelerates productivity.

For small businesses in particular, where every team member plays a key role, onboarding is an opportunity to reinforce company values and reduce early turnover. By investing time and attention in this phase, small business owners can strengthen team cohesion and lay the foundation for long-term retention.

Invest in Your Recruitment Strategies with Help from Charter Capital

Recruiting top talent is always an investment, but it’s far more cost-effective to get the right person in a role to start than it is to constantly replace employees. Finding and hiring top talent can be a challenging task, but with the best recruitment strategies in place, you can attract and retain the best candidates for your business. If a lack of working capital is holding you back from building a team that will support your company’s growth, Charter Capital can help. Request a complimentary invoice factoring quote to learn more or get started.

Customer feedback is crucial to business growth. Yet, most organizations don’t ask for feedback in a way that leads to better business outcomes, let alone leverage the data they receive effectively.  On this page, we’ll break down the different types of customer feedback your business can gather, why it’s beneficial, and how to ask for it, so you can start building a stronger business and gain potential customers with these insights right away.

Definitions and Types of Customer Feedback

Customer feedback is the information that customers provide about their experiences with a business. Many people equate this with a traditional customer feedback survey but, in reality, customers provide feedback in a variety of ways and are continuously doing so, even if your brand isn’t consciously aware of what they’re doing.

There are many types of customer feedback. Moreover, feedback can fit into one or more categories simultaneously. Some examples include:

• Prompted/ Solicited
• Unprompted/ Unsolicited
• Structured
• Unstructured
• Explicit
• Implicit

Prompted Customer Feedback

Insights that you request from your clients are considered prompted feedback. This is sometimes referred to as solicited feedback or direct feedback. For instance, if a customer completes a survey that your business sent him, he’s providing prompted customer feedback.

Unprompted Customer Feedback

When customers share their feedback without being asked to do so, it’s referred to as unprompted customer feedback. For example, if a customer leaves an online review for your business and you didn’t ask him to, he’s providing unprompted customer feedback.

Structured Customer Feedback

Structured customer feedback is more quantitative in nature. It provides you with measurements related to the customer experience. For instance, if your survey asks customers how likely they are to recommend your business to friends or family on a scale of one to ten, the feedback is structured.

Unstructured Customer Feedback

Unstructured customer feedback is more qualitative in nature. It provides you with greater insights into why customers feel a certain way or why they behave how they do. For instance, the insights a customer shares during an interview with your customer are generally unstructured.

Explicit Customer Feedback

Feedback a customer directly provides the company is considered explicit feedback. For example, if a customer completes a survey and indicates they’re happy with your products or services, he’s providing explicit feedback.

Implicit Customer Feedback

Implicit feedback is often overlooked. It’s the messages customers give you based on their real-world behavior without necessarily knowing they’re telling you anything. For instance, 67 percent of customers say they’d consider leaving a review after a positive experience with a business, per Bright Local research. Yet, review analytics indicate only 34 percent of them actually do. Equally, a customer may tell your sales rep that they’re not interested in a specific product or service, thus providing explicit feedback. If you’re tracking analytics, you may see the same customer clicking on links about the product. They’re providing implicit feedback that they do have some level of interest. Gathering implicit feedback is helpful when there’s a mismatch or if you want to see if what customers tell you they think, feel, or do, is how they actually behave.

Top 9 Customer Feedback Benefits

Now that you have some background on the types of customer feedback available to your business, let’s dig into the benefits of gathering and using the data.

1. It Can Help You Understand Your Customers Better

The more data you gather, the better you’ll understand your clients. For instance, customer insights can tell you what motivates people to engage with you or to place an order.

2. Your Customers Will Feel Heard

Nearly two-thirds of customers say that businesses need to care more about them, per Qualtrics surveys. Providing them with a platform to provide their opinions is the first step in showing them that you’re listening and care.

3. Handling Reviews Effectively Increases Customer Satisfaction

More than half of all online reviewers expect a response from the brand within seven days of leaving a review per Social Media Today research. By meeting this expectation and addressing any issues revealed in the review, the business can turn a bad experience around and avoid future issues related to the same root cause.

4. You Can Boost Customer Loyalty and Retention

Nearly two-thirds of customers say they’d buy more if businesses treated them better, according to Qualtrics. Following up on feedback fulfills this need, which can contribute to greater loyalty and customer retention.

If you’re actively requesting insights from clients, you’ll also catch signs of disengagement before the client unsubscribes from mailings, deletes their account, or leaves your business. You can then take action to preserve the relationship and reduce churn.

5. Customer Reviews Can Help You Attract New Customers and Boost Sales

Reviews and a strong online reputation improve SEO, which helps your business appear in more online searches and appear closer to the top of the list. Reputable factoring companies ensure their online presence and customer reviews reflect their strong reputation, helping potential clients make informed decisions. In this sense, they help your business be discovered more.

Research shows that a strong online reputation is often the primary factor when someone is deciding whether to reach out to a business too. In all, 98 percent of people read reviews for local businesses, and about half trust them as much as personal recommendations from friends and family, per Bright Local research.

6. Feedback Helps You Improve the Customer Experience

First, it’s important to note that just one in 26 unsatisfied customers will complain, per Huffington Post research. The other 25 will simply leave.  Furthermore, the average non-complainer will share their bad experience with 15 friends. Of those who do review, nearly three-quarters do so specifically because they want to help ensure others have a better experience, per Forbes.

Put that in perspective. The one person who does review represents dozens more who don’t express any concerns and they’re providing feedback because they want you to do better. If you handle the feedback with the care and consideration it deserves, you’re improving the customer experience for all the voices that remained silent.

And, if simply doing better isn’t enough to motivate you, it’s worth noting that 55 percent of customers are willing to pay more for a guaranteed good experience, per Huffington Post. Your response directly impacts your bottom line.

7. You Can Gain Valuable Insight into Your Business Using Customer Surveys

One of the most popular surveys asks customers a single question: “How likely are you to recommend this product/ service/ company to a friend or associate?” Respondents are given a ten-point rating scale, with zero being not at all likely and ten being very likely.

This is the basis for a Net Promotor Score (NPS), and it’s often regarded as the best predictor of a company’s long-term growth. Even simple customer surveys such as this provide valuable insights that you can use to spot issues in the customer journey and make improvements that will benefit your business in the long run.

8. You Can Improve Your Products or Services

Real-life application often differs from what business owners envision before launch. Moreover, how people engage with your products and services may change over time. By listening to what your customers have to say, you can continuously improve your offerings to ensure you’re meeting demand. You may also get new ideas that, when implemented, will give your business a competitive advantage.

9. You Can Make More Informed Decisions

Let’s say that you want to expand your business, but you’re unsure if you should improve your core offering to attract more customers and boost retention or if you need to launch a new product to reach new markets. Your customers can shed insights into which path is best.

Or, let’s say that you know your customer experience is lacking. You have a limited budget and can only focus on one thing: the development of your product or hiring additional customer service representatives. Your customers can tell you which is more important to them. They may even tell you exactly what’s lacking in the experience. If it’s a small change with minimal investment, you may discover you can address both areas while staying within your budget.

The applications for informed decision-making are endless as long as you start with good data.

What Makes Customer Feedback Difficult?

With so many clear benefits of leveraging customer feedback, why aren’t more businesses using it to achieve their business objectives? Low adoption and effective usage rates typically come down to one of the following reasons.

The Customer Feedback Loop Must Be Closed

The customer feedback loop consists of four steps:

• Gather Data
• Segment Feedback
• Analyze Information
• Respond Appropriately

Many businesses gather data, but they don’t handle it properly once they have it and even fewer take action.

Improper Administration Can Make Analyzing Difficult

All too often, businesses start with the noble intention to gather feedback and respond to it, but they don’t have a specific goal in mind and don’t solicit the right type of feedback for their needs. For example, they may ask lots of open-ended questions, which is great for understanding concerns. However, it doesn’t necessarily tell the business what to focus on first, and manually culling through written responses is time-consuming.

To avoid this issue, businesses should keep the various types of customer feedback in mind and select the best format to begin with. Additional tools, such as keyword and sentiment analyzers, can also make it easier to assess data.

Inaccurate and Vague Customer Feedback May Diminish Results

Another key issue tied to improper administration is inaccurate or vague responses. For instance, if a question can be answered with “yes” or “no,” this is how most people will respond. Customer questions need to be framed in such a way that they’re easily and uniformly interpreted and encourage complete responses.

Some Customer Opinions May Be Biased

Both internal and external influences will impact how customers respond. For example, customers who read other reviews before responding may start to rethink how good their experience was. Even if something didn’t create major friction in their experience, hearing others recount a friction point may redirect their attention to that issue.

The way you frame customer questions makes a difference too. For instance, “Please rate our product” is not the same as “How satisfied are you with our product?” The latter is a leading question that assumes the customer is satisfied.

If steps aren’t taken to solicit feedback in a way that minimizes bias, any insights gained are questionable at best.

Customers Can Become Frustrated for Many Reasons

When customers are asked to provide feedback too often, providing feedback is time-intensive, or a survey doesn’t provide any insights as to how much is left to complete, customers may experience what’s known as “feedback fatigue.” You can often tell this is happening because customers stop providing helpful feedback, don’t answer questions fully, skip survey questions, or refuse to take surveys altogether. Keep requests to a minimum to avoid this.

Another major concern is that customers may still feel unheard after completing a survey. To avoid this, surveys can contain spaces for additional written feedback at the end, and businesses must be mindful of closing the feedback loop.

The Role of Feedback Management in Business Growth

A structured approach to feedback management ensures that once you collect customer feedback, it’s processed in a way that supports business-wide improvements. Simply gathering responses is not enough, companies must have systems in place to organize, evaluate, and act on feedback consistently across departments.

When properly managed, feedback from customers becomes more than just opinions, it becomes a source of actionable feedback that can help you improve customer satisfaction, reduce customer churn, and align offerings with real customer needs. This is especially valuable in fast-moving environments where priorities shift quickly and customer feedback is everywhere, from in-app feedback to post-support ratings and feedback on your website.

A centralized feedback tool or customer feedback software enables teams to track issues, identify trends, and share data with decision-makers. Businesses that listen and adjust based on feedback signal to their customer base that they are committed to providing the best customer experience, a key driver of customer satisfaction and business performance.

Managing this process well is what allows businesses to use customer feedback not just as insight, but as a lever for smarter decisions and long-term growth.

How to Ask for Customer Feedback

There is no singular best way to request customer feedback. What works for one business, audience, or concern may not work for another. Instead, follow some general guidelines to establish the best method for your situation.

Start with a Purpose or Goal

Your goal or purpose will be the basis for most decisions going forward. Consider whether you want to:

• Gauge Overall Sentiment
• Improve the Customer Experience
• Better Understand the Needs of Your Customers
• Eliminate Friction Points in the Sales or Onboarding Process
• Find Ways to Strengthen Customer Relationships and Loyalty
• Uncover Ways to Increase Sales
• Or Something Else

Choose a Method

Your goal will determine the best method for gathering feedback. For example, NPS can be used to get a general pulse check on the health of your business and relationships, but it’s not going to help if you’re deciding which product features people value most.

• Email Surveys
• SMS Surveys
• Social Media / Review Sites
• In-Product Surveys
• Website Pop-Ups
• In-App Surveys
• One-on-One Interviews
• Focus Groups
• Panel Research
• Operational Research (implicit feedback such as website analytics)

Decide on Questions

Ensure questions provide you with the data you require, be it qualitative, quantitative, or both, and take care to avoid biased questions.

Segment Your Audience

People may have drastically different opinions of your company or service based on the products they use, how long they’ve been a customer, how long it’s been since they last ordered, and other factors. While it’s generally best to ask related groups the same questions, it’s also helpful to ask qualifying questions or segment audiences in advance, so it’s easy to slice the data after.

Increase Buy-In

People with strong opinions about the company on either end of the spectrum are more likely to respond to your requests, but you’re going to want a balanced view. Give people a compelling reason to respond, such as a discount, small reward, or entry into a contest for a large prize.

Also, ensure you’re reaching out to people via their preferred method. Letters, email, SMS, website or app pop-ups, and more can all be effective channels.

Lastly, ensure people know what their commitment is in advance. You’ll get more responses if your call-to-action is “Take a 3-Minute Survey to Be Entered in a Drawing for a $100 Gift Card” compared to “Please Take a Quick Survey for a Chance to Win.”

How to Handle Positive and Negative Customer Feedback

Once the replies start rolling in, it’s important to follow up to close the feedback loop.

How to Handle Bad Customer Reviews

• Address the customer personally and thank them for their time.
• Apologize for the poor experience and empathize with the customer.
• Take responsibility for any issues that were within your control.
• Correct the issue and let the customer know that you’ve done so.
• Request another chance to provide them with a better experience in the future.

How to Handle Good Customer Feedback

• Address the customer personally and thank them for their time.
• If possible, reward the customer for providing their insights.
• Ask them to provide more feedback. For example, a customer who left positive remarks internally could be asked to leave an external review.
• Encourage them to follow through with secondary feedback if they don’t do it on their own right away.
• Offer them related services that they might find equally beneficial.
• Share positive customer feedback with your team. It’s fantastic for morale! You can also share testimonials on social media, your website, in emails, and across other marketing channels to build trust and increase sales.

Support Your Initiatives with Debt-Free Funding

Customer feedback initiatives can help you accelerate growth and build a stronger business. But, if cash flow issues prevent you from acting on the feedback, you might as well not be asking for it.

Invoice factoring provides immediate cash for your B2B invoices, so you’re not stuck waiting weeks or months for payment. The customer pays the balance when they pay their invoice. There’s no debt for you to pay back and you’re free to move forward. If this sounds like the solution your business needs, contact us for a complimentary rate quote.

Expanding a business under the right conditions and with the ideal strategy can be incredibly rewarding. But how can you tell if the time is right or which method of growth is best? Below, we’ll go over some signs it’s time to consider expanding your business and cover tips that can help you do it quickly.

When to Expand a Business

Before we start breaking down ways to expand your business, consider if the timing is right. It’s not a good idea to move forward just because you’re impatient over stagnation or because you feel ready. Instead, you should be seeing one or more of the signs below.

You’ve Got “Regulars”

Roughly 65 percent of business comes from existing customers on average, according to SmallBizGenius. If you have a strong customer base, it indicates there’s an ongoing demand for what you’re offering. Use a CRM to track customer behavior and monitor KPIs.

You’re Dominating Locally

Just one in five businesses with below-average growth rates in their local market manages to outgrow their peers, per McKinsey. Your business should be performing well in your region before you try to expand outward.

If you are doing well locally, look for other signs that there’s demand for your business elsewhere, such as orders being placed from far away or customers reporting they’re traveling to see you.

Your Business Has Been Profitable for Several Years

Lots of things can impact profitability in the short run. For example, you might see a spike during certain seasons or if a competitor shuts down. However, ongoing sustained profit shows you’re likely nailing business operations and providing excellent customer service. You should be able to replicate the success of your growth initiatives.

You Have Strong Cash Flow

Cash flow can be a double-edged sword. On one hand, you need strong cash flow to cover your expenses invest in growth, and expand your business. On the other hand, reduced cash flow can often be a sign that your business is already growing, especially if you invoice customers and it takes months after delivery before you see a check for your goods or services.

If you think you have sufficient cash flow for growth, run an analysis to confirm the level has been stable for some time. You can still expand if cash flow is tight, but you’ll want a backup source of funding ready to ensure your business can survive the growth.

You Have Infrastructure and Resources

A strong and reliable team, vendors who are prepared to ramp up, equipment, and other resources should all be in place, or at least accessible before you activate any business growth strategies.

Your Industry or Market Is Growing

Consumer trends shift over time. If your industry or market is stagnant or even shrinking, it’s probably not going to be a good time to grow unless you’re expanding with a related product or service that’s gaining demand. Equally, if your industry or market is growing, it may be a good opportunity to capture a larger share.

7 Tips On How to Expand Your Business

Now that we’ve covered if the timing is right, let’s explore how to expand your business.

1. Improve Your Customer Experience

If you’re running an average professional services business, you’ll lose around 27 percent of your customers each year, according to CustomerGauge. Those in manufacturing lose around 35 percent, while logistics companies lose 40 percent, and wholesale businesses lose 56 percent. These churn rates represent how many potential customers the business will need to bring in just to hold steady. New customers are generally needed on top of the existing counts to see growth.

At the same time, it can cost five times more to attract a potential customer than to retain one, and just a five percent boost in retention can increase profit from 25 to 95 percent per OutboundEngine research.

What this means is that it’s imperative to keep your current customers happy, and you can do that by improving your customer experience.

• Track data internally to identify trends in what your customers view, open, and respond to. Use this to deliver more of what they want.
• Developing a relationship and creating customer loyalty requires regular contact with your customers.
• Gather customer feedback through live chat tools and surveys to find out if customers are getting stuck anywhere and ways you can improve the experience to create a better customer journey.
• Go through your own customer flows and experience what they do firsthand.

2. Create a Customer Loyalty Program

A customer loyalty program can help your business grow in much the same way that improving customer experience can. Customers spend 67 percent more when they’re part of a loyalty program, according to AnnexCloud. Their research shows loyalty programs can also influence affinity and how often people recommend your business to others as well.

3. Research the Competition’s Digital Strategy

Take a look at what your competitors are doing online. Examine the ads they place, their landing pages, websites, and other marketing collateral. Keep tabs on it for a few weeks or even months and watch for changes. If the way they promote themselves seems relatively stable, it’s a sign that they may have found a winning advertising strategy, which you can duplicate to achieve similar results.

Be mindful of “keeping up with the Joneses” here. Just because a competitor is doing something doesn’t mean it’s a successful strategy. For example, you may see a competitor release a series of video shorts. If you can see the view counts on them and they’re comparatively low, it’s not a strategy you want to borrow.

4. Be Adaptable

One of the biggest advantages small businesses have over large ones is that small businesses can pivot faster. You probably don’t need clearance from a board, approval from a legal department, or multiple massive teams to align before you can seize an opportunity. If you’re adaptable and ready to move, you’ll beat larger competitors to market and will have the first mover advantage.

5. Move into New Markets

The more traditional way of expanding a business is to move into new markets; to sell your current products or services to a new group of people. You can do this by finding a new demographic to target or by expanding geographically, perhaps with a new location.

6. Add New Offerings

New offerings can help you grow your business in multiple ways. First, it may allow you to reach markets that aren’t interested in your current offerings. Secondly, it may allow you to increase sales with your current customers.

Learn as much as possible before launching something new. Solicit feedback from current customers, research demand for similar offerings, or consider working with focus groups to find out if you’re investing in a winning opportunity.

7. Consider Franchising

If you have a replicable business model, proven profit, and unique offerings, franchising is an alternate way of expanding a business that won’t necessarily drain your resources.

Get Help Expanding Your Business with Invoice Factoring

Most methods for expanding a business require working capital at the onset, and businesses often struggle with cash flow crunches during periods of rapid growth. Therefore, it’s important to have a business funding solution in place at these times. Invoice factoring can help by accelerating payment on your B2B invoices. Most businesses qualify because it’s not a loan, and there’s no debt to pay back because your customers clear the balance when they pay their invoices. If it sounds like invoice factoring might have a place in your business growth strategy, learn more or get started by requesting a complimentary rate quote from Charter Capital.