How to improve any part of your business

In today’s blog post, we'll dive into a powerful topic: 'How to Improve Any Part of Your Business.' Whether it's marketing, operations, customer service, or leadership, today's strategies are universally applicable.

Continuous business improvement is vital for several reasons. It allows businesses to adapt to changing market conditions, stay competitive, and enhance customer satisfaction, leading to increased profitability and long-term sustainability. Furthermore, it fosters a culture of innovation, employee engagement, and improved efficiency. 

Lets take a look at how to improve any part of your business.

Step 1: Identifying Areas for Improvement

The first step toward improvement is awareness. Without this step you’re basically guessing and just take a stab at what you need to do and why you need to do it.

You have to be brutally honest with yourself, remove any emotion you may experience and look at just the facts right now.

Begin by asking yourself these questions:

• Where are the bottlenecks?

• Which processes feel inefficient?

• What customer feedback have you received?

• What staff feedback have you received?

• What is stopping us from making more revenue, quickly?

• Where are we losing time, money, or opportunities?

Create the space for yourself and potentially your senior team members by taking yourself out of your work environment to do this exercise. You don’t want anything to distract you or make you feel protective over your business. Remember this is to improve your business not hinder it, any harsh realities you reveal or note are only raised so you can make it better for you, your business, your staff and your customers.

Use tools like SWOT analysis to pinpoint strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. If you need a template to do this then visit our website for free tools and templates, the address is purpleyak.co.uk.

To improve any part of your business, you first need to understand two key concepts: clarity and focus.

• Clarity means knowing exactly what part of your business needs improvement. Is it marketing, operations, customer service, or perhaps leadership?

• Focus is about zeroing in on that area without getting distracted by peripheral issues.

Remember, you can’t improve what you haven’t identified clearly.

Step 2: The Power of Assessment and Data

Once you’ve identified the area for improvement, the next step is assessment. This is where data becomes your best friend.

When it comes to data you have two flavours to use, these are quantitative and qualitative.

Quantitative Data: This is data like Sales numbers, conversion rates, customer retention data, etc. Effectively the numbers in your business.

Qualitative Data: This data comes from Customer feedback, employee insights, and even your own observations. At its essence, this is opinions.

Here’s an example for you to help demonstrate the data you’ll need to improve an area of your business.

If your sales are dipping, as well as looking at your numbers you’ll need a view on both numbers and views on this area.

You’ll need the expected data on sales and lead generation that you would expect, these are examples of quantitative data.

• Volume of leads coming into your business daily or weekly

• Volume of converted leads into sales

• Volume of returning customers

• Average spend (money) from customers initially but over time

You’ll also need qualitative data which you need to get from internal people and customers. Ask questions such as…

• Are leads coming in but not converting?

• Is your sales team trained effectively?

• Has there been a shift in market demand?

• Has there been any feedback from customers not buying and why?

Gather as much information as possible. This helps you understand the root cause rather than just the symptoms.

Step 3: Setting SMART Goals

You’ve identified the problem. You’ve gathered data. Now, it’s time to set goals—SMART goals.

The SMART in SMART goals stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound.

• Specific: Clearly define what you want to achieve.

• Measurable: Ensure you can track progress.

• Achievable: Set realistic targets.

• Relevant: Align with your overall business objectives.

• Time-bound: Have a deadline to maintain urgency.

Defining these parameters as they pertain to your goal helps ensure that your objectives are attainable within a certain time frame. This approach eliminates generalities and guesswork, sets a clear timeline, and makes it easier to track progress and identify missed milestones.

An example of a SMART-goal statement might look like this: Our goal is to [quantifiable objective] by [timeframe or deadline]. [Key players or teams] will accomplish this goal by [what steps you’ll take to achieve the goal]. Accomplishing this goal will [result or benefit].

For instance, rather than saying, "I want to improve customer service," say, "I want to reduce customer complaint response times from 48 hours to 24 hours by the end of Q3."

How to write SMART goals

S: Specific

In order for a goal to be effective, it needs to be specific. A specific goal answers questions like:

• What needs to be accomplished?

• Who’s responsible for it?

• What steps need to be taken to achieve it?

Thinking through these questions helps get to the heart of what you’re aiming for.

M: Measurable

Specificity is a solid start, but quantifying your goals makes it easier to track progress and know when you’ve reached the finish line.

To make your SMART objective more impactful, you should incorporate measurable, trackable benchmarks.

A: Achievable

This is the point in the process when you give yourself a serious reality check. Goals should be realistic – not pedestals from which you inevitably tumble. Ask yourself: is your objective something your team can reasonably accomplish?

Safeguarding the achievability of your goal is much easier when you’re the one setting it. However, that’s not always the case. When goals are handed down from elsewhere, make sure to communicate any restraints you may be working under. Even if you can’t shift the end goal, at least you can make your position (and any potential roadblocks) known up-front.

R: Relevant

Here’s where you need to think about the big picture. Why are you setting the goal that you’re setting? Is this goal you’re setting working towards the ultimate direction and mission of your business?

T: Time-bound

To properly measure success, you and your team need to be on the same page about when a goal has been reached. What’s your time horizon? When will the team start creating and implementing the tasks they’ve identified? When will they finish?

SMART goals should have time-related parameters built in, so everybody knows how to stay on track within a designated time frame.

Knowing how to set goals using the SMART framework can help you succeed in setting and attaining goals, no matter how large or small.

Step 4: Strategic Action Planning

Improvement doesn’t happen by chance. It requires a strategic action plan, you’ll need to consider the following points if you want to achieve your goal easier and faster.

1. Break Down the Goal: Identify smaller tasks within the larger goal. Make sure you set a clear path for how you can achieve your goal. This will make your journey to achieve this goal much clearer, especially if you have a team as well.

   
   

2. Assign Responsibilities: If you have a team, delegate effectively. Clear responsibilities will help you, your team and your business. Don’t take all the responsibility for action if you have a team, if you do then you will bottleneck your ability to achieve your goal quickly if at all.

   
   

3. Establish Processes: Create systems that support consistent improvement. This will help you better your business in the long term.

   
   

4. Utilise Technology: Automate where possible to free up resources. Make the lives of you and your team easier by utilising the power of technology. Don’t be afraid of it, if you’re not confident with tech then delegate this to someone in your team who can do this for you and your business.

If you have a team then make sure you involve them around the previous points to ensure they’re bought into the actions that need to be taken, the they need to be achieved by and how they’re going to get there. Without this you will be fighting a battle potentially when progress isn’t taken by people saying “I knew it wasn’t achievable” and things of that nature. By ensuring they’re involved in the action planning then they will take accountability for achieving the goal and when things get behind or stuck, they will take corrective action without much steering from you.

Step 5: Continuous Monitoring and Adaptation

Improvement isn’t a one-off task; it’s continuous.

Keep track of action and progress, introduce cadence calls or meetings to track progress and get things back on track if you’re falling behind on timescales. This is an opportunity for everyone to openly and confidently voice their concerns, constructive feedback and ideas.

Here’s a few way on how to keep the momentum:

• Regular Check-ins: Weekly or monthly reviews to track progress.

• Feedback Loops: Encourage ongoing feedback from customers and employees.

• Flexibility: Be ready to pivot if something isn’t working.

Think of this as a cycle — identify, act, review, adjust, and repeat.

Improving any part of your business boils down to understanding the problem, setting clear goals, taking strategic action, and continuously adapting. It’s not always easy, but the growth you’ll experience is worth every effort.

Got a burning question? Reach out on our social channels or email me at michael@purpleyak.co.uk

Thank you so much for reading.

Take care.