Should Freelancers Buy New or Refurbished Laptops?

The first thing you need to think about when you want to start freelancing, besides the types of services you will be offering, is the computing device you will be using. Most of your work will be done on a computer, and so it is important to think about the type of computer you would like to buy and that will fit your use cases. When shopping for a laptop, it is common to hear the term “refurbished” or “refurb”. What are refurbished laptops, and how do they compare against new laptops?

Refurbished Laptops: An Overview

A refurbished laptop is a laptop that has been returned to a retailer or manufacturer for a variety of reasons. The retailer or manufacturer then takes these laptops apart, checks them, and ensures everything is working like it would in a new laptop. The major testing these laptops undergo before being put back on store shelves is what differentiates them from used laptops.

When Buying Refurbished is a Great Idea

One of the most common reasons why a laptop is returned to a retailer or manufacturer is cosmetic defects. This means there is nothing wrong with these laptops and after undergoing the required checks, they are often sold for a lower price than new laptops.

This means it is possible to buy refurbished laptops that are essentially new at a fraction of the price of a new laptop of the same capabilities and specifications.

As a budding freelancer, you can shop online for refurbished laptops that have the specifications you are looking for, and you might find them.

Availability

One downside of going with the refurbished option is that stock might be limited depending on the retailer and the specific model you are looking for. If you are looking for a specific laptop model, you might have to reach out to a manufacturer directly and see if they have a refurbished option.

A common solution to this is choosing a refurbished laptop that has the same specifications as the one you are looking for, even though it may not be the exact model you need.

Warranties

Another huge difference between new, used, and refurbished laptops is the warranties offered for them. With used laptops, you do not get any warranty or quality assurances, and so you have to rely on what the seller tells you.

With refurbished laptops, you usually get a limited warranty. This is typically a fraction of the period offered by a retailer or manufacturer for a new laptop. However, even with these shortened warranty periods, you can expect the laptop to last almost as long as a new laptop due to the quality checks and assurances.

New laptops come with a full warranty. This is because they have been fully tested from the factory, and thus the retailer or manufacturer is completely sure about their projected lifetimes.

If you have the money, buying a new laptop is the best option. However, refurbished laptops are a great option if you are strapped for cash. They have been checked to ensure they perform as expected and come with a warranty, even though it might be limited. It would be a bad idea to start your freelance career with a used laptop unless you have a very small budget and trust the seller completely.

How to Rebound From a Bad Sales Month

A bad sales month can be extremely discouraging for new businesses or any business for that matter. The reality is that sales will ebb and flow, and your business should be optimally prepared for drops in revenue and potentially have other lines of income to keep yourself fortified in a pinch.

Your slumps in sales are ultimately learning opportunities and chances for you and your team to take stock of what has worked and what hasn’t worked when it comes to pushing your sales beyond the goals you’ve set for yourself. Maybe there is a key way you can adjust your sales plan, or set your goals to be more realistic in your reach.

Running a successful business means not giving up when things are slow, and being realistic about what you can achieve and in what timeline would be appropriate for a business your size. There is no reason to aim towards goals that older, more established businesses are able to achieve. Businesses that stay in the game by being smart about their goals and sales plans will move up in their industries in no time, it’s all about being patient and realistic with yourself and your team. 

Adjust Your Sales Plan 

The first thing to do when you run into a bad sales month is to review your sales plan and adjust it accordingly to meet the more realistic expectations for your company. “Rebound from a bad sales month by adjusting your plan,” said Sabrina Pereira, Head of Growth Marketing at Easy Standard. “Go back to your sales plan and review it. Find what you missed from the previous month and recalculate your plan for the next month. This includes identifying the key drivers of your forecast delta and aligning testing plans to solve for that. Plus, you can distribute the shortage over a few months and bolster your sales plans for the next few months.” This is of the utmost importance and should be done as soon as possible after your sales report comes in. 

Changing and adjusting your plan is also an opportunity to set more realistic goals for your company for the foreseeable future. If your goals are too high, you may find yourself feeling strained to meet unrealistic expectations. “Review your plan so you can set more realistic goals for the future. Part of being successful is setting yourself up with goals you know you can meet. Then, you can start to aim a little bit higher each month as sales flatten or increase,” said Dylan Fox, Founder and CEO of Assembly AI. Starting small is a key factor for any blossoming business. It sets you and your company up for success and will motivate your team to work towards setting higher and higher goals. 

In addition to adjusting your sales plan, businesses should also take stock of what they can control and what they can’t. You can draw people in, but they make the final decision to buy in or not. “Be real and honest about the things that you can control rather than the things you can’t. For instance, you can control your brand’s outreach and marketing practices but you can’t ultimately control whether customers will choose your service. Simplify your website content and make it as easy as possible for customers to sign up for your service to increase your sales,” said Jae Pak, Founder of Jae Pak MD Medical.

Learn From Failure and Go For Smaller Deals

In the grand scope of things in business, setbacks and sales slumps should be seen more as opportunities rather than failures. “Try not to look at sales slumps as failures, they are in fact learning opportunities for the future. Many times, these slumps are due to conditions that may be vastly out of our control. Use this as an opportunity to learn more about your industry and market trends to help predict your sales in the future,” said James Ville, Chief Product Officer of GunSkins. If you can shift your perspective and see the value in scaling back your goals to meet your capability, you’ll set yourself up for a more positive approach to solving these problems.

You may find that the deals you were seeking might have been too ambitious for your company as it currently exists. Smaller deals help you build connections and expand your business network. “Sometimes a bad sales month can be an indication that you need to scale back your goals and look for smaller deals you can make to help fortify your business and set yourself up for success,” said Scott Sonneborn, Co-Founder of Tydo. “Aiming too high can result in a lower return. It’s true that the higher the risk the greater the reward is, but the opposite is also true. The fallbacks from big deals can be much larger as well.” The amount of risk you can take on depends on the age of your company and your history of success with smaller deals and goals. 

Meet With Your Team

Consult your entire team as soon as possible following your low sales results. “Have team meetings immediately afterward to brainstorm ideas. Keep the meeting as upbeat as possible,” said Jean Gregoire Founder & CEO of Lovebox. “It’s best to not dwell on why your month was poor, but instead, focus on ways to improve the following month. By working as a team, you’ll have a better chance of coming up with fresh ideas that will propel you forward.” This will promote a solution-based attitude at your company rather than getting stuck in a slump after getting bad news. “You need to keep your team positive to make sure you keep your productivity up,” said CEO of Package Free Shop Lauren Singer. “Positive reinforcement is especially important during these moments when tensions may be high and emotions fragile. Focus on what went well rather than what didn’t. This will help you combat future issues.” Seeing the positive can be difficult, but it’s always going to lead your team to better results than focusing on the negatives. “It can be difficult to see the positives in a month that fell short, but being able to see what was working will help you and your team both recover and make a plan for the next month. Don’t just focus on why your sales were lower, focus on what made the sales happen that you did make,” said Kashish Gupta, Founder and CEO of Hightouch.

This also gives your team a chance to provide feedback and be honest about how they think things could improve. “Ask for feedback from your team, and encourage honesty,” said Ryan Rottman Co-Founder & CEO OSDB. “Your employees and sales team will likely have proactive and topical ideas about how to improve customer relationships and increase your rate of conversion. Don’t dwell and try to solve issues on your own, involve your team to help you come to the best solution.” This will show how valuable you find your employee’s opinions and create trust between management and the sales team that they can solve issues together. 

Plan For Slow Months 

Part of changing your business plan should be expecting that some months will be slow. At certain times of the year, the state of the economy and many other factors can go into sales spikes and slumps. “Any business is sure to experience highs and lows, try to see these challenges as positives, it means that you are in business and doing everything you can to stay afloat. Trust your instincts and learn from the challenges you face,” said Jared Hines, Head of Operations Acre Gold. Holiday sales spikes and post-holiday slumps are something that all businesses should be expecting as well. “Certain times of the year will yield higher sales results, such as the winter months,” said Katie Keirnan, Co-Founder of Nue Life. “People are buying more for holiday gifts and it makes sense to see a sales spike during this time. 

Use these moments as opportunities to prepare for inevitable sales slumps at the start of the new year.” Your surges in sales should help to fortify you through the slower months of the year, something that businesses should be folding into their business plan. “Use your spikes and slumps as ways to predict the cash flow in your company,” said Joe Thomas of Loom. “This way, you can use additional funds from those surges to keep your business operating smoothly when things slow down.” 

Rebounding from a bad sales month relies on a solution-minded team with management that can see the benefits in the ebb and flow of sales. This is ultimately an inevitability that every business faces, and how you deal with it will define how your company succeeds in the future. If you can’t be flexible and change up your plan, you will likely fall short of your competitors in the long run. Adjust your plan, meet with your team and plan for the future to ensure your success in your industry.

Why Strong Brands Are Important in a Digital World

 A brand is everything that a customer sees and experiences when they interact with a business. A customer’s first impression includes how the staff welcomes them, what can be seen on social media websites, and what the story behind the business is. It’s basically how the customer perceives your business.

When a consistent message is conveyed, a brand is created. From the website to the logos and social media profiles, it tells the story behind the company. There should be a consistent branding strategy, regardless of how the customer is introduced to the business whether it be through the website after doing a search, or through a link shared by a friend. Using appropriate tools to generate a very unique business name does a great trick here. 

You’ll find such a tool at www.biznamewiz.com. Here, you can read more about how the generator works, why it can be a great source of inspiration in the naming process, and you can learn more about the importance of a good name for your branding process. It is feasible to bring in more clients as well as develop repeat customers with good branding for a firm. However, the execution of great branding requires knowledge of what brands are important in a digital world. Stay tuned to learn more!

Brand Definition

A company’s branding must be defined before it can begin to create a consistent message across all media. They must evaluate the company’s mission, the advantages of its products or services, what customers think of them now, and what they want customers to think of the company in the future. All of this helps establish the business’s individual branding, including what colors to use on the website or in logos, how to design the website’s layout, which social networking networks to utilize, and more.

It is not easy to define a company’s branding, and it will take some time. There are so many reasons to use agencies when trying to define your brand.

Consistency

When a company’s brand is defined, it becomes consistent. The same visuals will be used on websites, packaging, social networking sites, and everywhere else. Even if two distinct items are being advertised to clients, the packaging, colors used in the products or packaging, the purchase form on the website, and other visual elements will all be aesthetically similar and send the same message to buyers.

It is possible to ensure that everything, from websites to social media to advertisements and more, is consistent and geared to attract targeted consumers through branding. There are now optimized methods to achieve this consistency across all devices.

You want to make your online presence user-friendly, eye-pleasing, functional, and to include some relevant images to interest people. You can also replace the photos on your website with short, interactive videos – they work wonderfully. Remember to remove images from Google search that do not match your brand vision, and do nothing but build bad brand reputation.

Peculiarity

Another important brand is standing out from the rest of the flock. When people are seeking a product or service, it’s far too simple to go under the radar in today’s digital environment. Businesses can compete even if they are located on opposite sides of the globe, so finding a strategy to stand out is critical. 

Standing out is an important aspect of brands because it attracts customers and makes them see reasons to stick with your brand ahead of competitors. 

How To Start a Business in a Digital Industry

A digital business is one that sells to clients and runs its day-to-day operations using technology, and unlike “normal” businesses, a digital business takes less time to start up, at least in some areas.  Digital firms employ technology to not only automate their day-to-day operations, but also to provide new value to their business models, customer experiences, and internal capabilities.

Offering telemedicine services, providing customers with a virtual shopping experience at retail establishments, and establishing a remote workforce are all examples of this. Digital firms include Amazon, Netflix, and Uber, to name a few.

Thousands of businesses are popping up every day and more and more people are delving into the digital industry. Detailed information on the number and progression of startups has become one that almost everyone now picks interest in.

An article from the UK Times highlights a new record was set in 2020 when it comes to company registrations with close to 85,000 new registrations, many of them being digital companies.

Building a digital business has never been easier thanks to the abundance of free SaaS solutions. However, in order to have an agile digital core, you must carefully consider the nitty-gritty of developing your digital business model. Read on for tips on how to get started.

Prepare a Great Business Plan

To establish a business, you’ll need a detailed business plan. What your business is about, who will run it, what your goals and vision are, and how you plan to achieve them should all be outlined in your business plan. You can easily generate a unique business name after deciding on all the earlier mentioned details here: www.businessnamegenerator.com.  Include information on your finance options, marketing tactics, target customers, and unique value offer. Also, specify whatever digital activities you want to employ in order to achieve your objectives.

Create a Digital Marketing Strategy for Your New Company.

A strategy is a written statement that describes “why” and “how” you intend to achieve your objectives. Developing buyer personas, designing customer journey maps, and creating a brand story are all steps in developing your digital strategy.

Your strategy document should also include information on how you intend to use technology to reach out to potential customers and run your business. If you need help, you can always look for an experienced marketing agency to guide you. Reliable agencies can offer valuable expertise and insights about how to approach digital marketing for your business. They can help you create an effective strategy that considers your specific needs and objectives.

Key components of your strategy should include Digital Presence, communication, and workflows. For instance, using the right tool to ensure uniformity and sync across all devices.

Diving into the digital industry requires more than just a great idea and determination; you also need a good foundation. Legally forming your company goes a long way in providing this foundation. Consult the best LLC service for accurate, timely, and trustworthy advice, giving your digital business the best chance for long-term success.

Using the Correct Tech Tools to Create a Solid Digital Core

Successful digital organizations invest in scalable, adaptable IT solutions that allow adaptation to the evolving IT landscape. This contributes to the development of a solid digital core, which comprises an IT infrastructure that positions your company for long-term success. As a result, to develop a successful internet business, invest in the appropriate technology and tools.

Tools you need include a business website, social media, an eCommerce website, and emerging technologies like Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence. 

Digital Talent Should be Hired, Trained, and Retained

Hiring talent with essential digital capabilities like cloud computing, machine learning, analytics, and automation is difficult. Employers are competing fiercely for people with DevOps, cloud, automation, data management, cybersecurity, and customer experience capabilities, according to a report. One of your top priorities should be to hire people with the digital abilities you’ll need to establish and maintain your company.

Tips on Using Circles in Web Design

Circles in web design is an art and getting tips is invaluable. Web Design takes a great deal of discipline to go with the flow of trends and principles. There is one design that often pops up and has grown in popularity and that’s the circle. It’s time now to sit down with your web designing company and discuss the possibilities.

You might wonder why the simple circle would be considered a design trend, but in reality, circles are used quite effectively on any website for a number of reasons. So, the leading question might be, why the circle and for what purpose is it used in web design? Is there a way to integrate circles seamlessly with your website and current brand? 

In case you still don’t have a website or want to update an existing one, it’s best for you to not try doing it by yourself unless your company provides web design services. The best way to solve this would be hiring a web design service that has all the needed specialists, tools, and other resources necessary for high-quality website creation.

Moreover, hiring a reliable and experienced web design agency will help you learn and understand a lot of new things regarding website design and use. It’s best to get your marketing department connected with the web design team for the entire period of the latter’s work on your website, so they can get a better idea of how they can use certain elements, techniques, and strategies, including circles. 

Reasons to Use Circles in Web Design 

If circles can offer you a world of benefits, how can you use them as a design feature? There are several ways.

While extremely popular among web designers and companies, many people want to know why the circle? One reason, they are highly effective and come with a range of advantages including:

Getting Your Attention

Let’s face it, our screens are rectangular and the grid pattern is standard for consumers to view. Circles, on the other hand, are round which makes them stand out. When you grab the viewer’s attention, you can direct them to different areas of your website or different features. Some important features would include where to click on your Call to Action, or the navigation bar.

Reading Your Text

You might wonder why text sitting inside a circle would draw your attention. It’s because the shape will draw your attention to the inside instead of the outside of the circle.  Therefore, if you have a message you want people to see, using a circle might be your best bet.

Emphasis On Text

If you are not aware, there are many websites out there that have circular designs or a circular background for accentuating their text. This approach is very effective because it creates an area of distinction and interest for your visitors. 

For Navigation

Circles have become the most popular way for visitors to navigate a website. The internet is constantly evolving and changing. Because it loves mobility, circles have become the chosen child for navigation.  On top of that, due to touch screens devices, circles have become favored over buttons making it easier to connect with potential customers. Because the circle is shaped like a fingertip, it entices visitors to press on it. 

Logos 

Circular logos have become the next great thing. They are neat and essential for a new look for websites. Circles give websites a feel and look of sophistication and a touch of class.  Most web designers have said they prefer circular logos making the design the top choice. 

Image Framing 

If your website supports image framing, you might want to look into circular frames for your smaller images for your web design. The frame should be an accent color to help it stand out. That along with the shape will create an impressive impact on the site’s design. 

Image Previews 

Round images have proven to be very appealing to visitors and users.  These images are very popular for image previews and are commonly used in portfolios. Offering your previews in a cropped circle will direct users and also communicate directly to them. You will not have a cluttered look to the site, instead, the site will look creative and friendly. 

Icons 

Logos in circular design have become extremely popular in web design.  The circular icons are image-based meaning CSS is not needed. There are many web developers that have grown tired of circular designs and feel it’s time to move on to something else. That said, for now, these designs are very pleasing and attractive so the style will probably be around for some time. 

Calls-to-Action 

Calls-To-Action are critical for all websites and blogs. Please note, if you use circular for both your CTA and for navigating you will have to distinguish between the two. There\’s no doubt that Calls-To-Action will take top priority and well should. Because most web designers are great at visual order, this is merely a continuation of that. 

Conclusion 

Now that you know why and how you should use circles on your website. It may turn out that you won’t need to use them at all because your site is going to have a different concept and an audience that won’t see any sense in circles. It’s best for you to trust the professional opinion and go with the flow

Why Do Businesses Need to Use RSS Feed Readers?

Businesses stand to win from their use of RSS feed readers in their day-to-day work especially when it comes to the realm of digital marketing and research. RSS feed readers have been on an upswing in popularity and are quite the overall powerhouse tools. We’ll discuss this in detail in a minute. But first…

What is RSS? 

In case you need a refresher, RSS is the abbreviation of Real Simple Syndication. It’s a technology that makes it easy for users to receive and follow content from many sites in a single application – that’s the RSS feed reader. You use the RSS feed reader to subscribe to a site via an RSS feed.

As soon as there’s a new article published, the RSS feed updates, and when the feed reader crawls the feed pulls the article and loads it. The RSS feed is a simple XML file, which displays the most important information about the posts – title, URL, timestamp, author, and a short summary or an excerpt.

Traditionally, RSS only showed the title and a little bit of text. Once you click on the headline, you’d be directed to the site. RSS readers today display articles in full length and with embedded multimedia files.

Can Businesses Use It?

Absolutely.

RSS feed readers have made the jump into the land of productivity and are excellent for a variety of tasks, ranging from improving your value proposition via social listening to brand monitoring. The applications are varied and the best part is that there are so many options on the market.

You’re bound to find an RSS reader to match your taste and pay relatively little for its features, which is not something you can say for the big tools that promise you the same results. All you need is a bit of ingenuity.

How RSS Feeds Can Benefit Your Business

Identify Blog Topics

Let’s start with something RSS feed readers are known for – handling massive amounts of content and information. As long as it’s written or recorded somewhere, an RSS feed reader will probably be able to read it. That’s quite useful when you need to perform research on what customers would find useful and resonate with, and what current hot topics in your industry are.

RSS readers today are great at recommending content. The Old Reader does so socially through what your friends are reading and liking, and user-generated trending page for articles that have caught the attention of everyone on the reader. Feedly and Inoreader have their own designated areas for content discovery, where you can perform all kinds of searches and dig into topics.

Maybe you’ve stumbled on a great new site that can act as an inspiration. Through Inoreader’s fast Chrome extension, you can identify whether the site has an RSS feed and then subscribe to it with one click.

Get To Know Your Customers

Once you start monitoring your industry for trends, it’s easy to make the transition into monitoring branded words – these would be your brand name, slogan, products, and services. People are talking about your brand, whether you’re tagged in the conversations or not. RSS feed readers make it so easy to tune into conversations and gain valuable insight.

What are the main drawbacks to what you do? What are you being praised for? What do customers also want to see in a product or service from you? What are their concerns about the type of product you sell? All these questions come in handy when you’re workshopping new products or looking to update existing offerings. 

Collaborate Better in a Team

At their most basic levels, RSS readers are meant for individual, casual use, but once you get into the higher-priced subscriptions you unlock a lot of team features for collaborative work. Inoreader has an excellent team feature to assist units in organizing their research together.

It’s a trend you’ll see all around major RSS readers. Feedly also has team boards, where you can directly tag team members and then convert the curated content into newsletters. Feeder is another good example of how you can make groups together.

Save Time and Money

In the long run, pro accounts are a smart investment, because you’re able to add a small degree of automation to some menial, repetitive task. It’s distracting and time-consuming to have to open a lot of tabs and refresh websites to check for new articles.

Plus, current readers have nice little tricks. Like sharing articles to social media without leaving your dashboard. Integrate your reader with IFTTT and Zapier and see how you can create chains of triggers and commands to automate your process further. Or command your whole army of apps by getting Netvibes, which is one of the most powerful RSS readers out there.

Understand Your Niche Better

All that research into potential blog content makes it easier to understand where your industry is heading and what’s the status quo at the moment. That’s incredibly valuable in terms of what you want your digital media strategy to be. What are you targeting? What are the keywords you want to focus on for your SEO?

But also you’re seeing trends form, which opens up opportunities for you to better target your ideal customer and give directions for new product development.  

Keep Track of Your Competitors

We wrap up with the old faithful – competitor analysis. I’m sure you’ve all heard about keeping your enemies closer. In business, this has never been truer. Following your competitors gives you several advantages:

·       Knowing their release schedule and campaigns so that you can schedule around them.

·       Adapting what they’re doing right to your brand in order to cater to your shared audience in the hopes of attracting some of their less enthusiastic customers.

·       Learning from their past mistakes. Sooner or later every business makes a public mistake, and it’s very useful information on what to avoid in your digital messaging from here on out.

Are Your Business’s Data Archiving Practices Compliant?

Businesses have more data at their disposal than ever before and the analytics firms are finding ever more imaginative ways of putting it to use. But while all that information can certainly bring a competitive edge, it can also bring big problems and liabilities if it is not handled with care. The SEC is not shy about handing out six, or even seven figure penalties to offenders. Don’t risk becoming just another statistic.

Archiving is mandatory

First, let’s get one thing clear. If your business is subject to SEC oversight, archiving web data is not optional. The SEC sees your website as the main conduit between your business and its clients. But that conduit is comprised of many channels, including web pages, webchats, social media posts and comments, even discussions over platforms like Facebook Messenger. All of this data needs to be archived in a particular way to meet regulatory requirements. Specifically, SEC rules state that it must be in its original format – in other words, PDFs and screenshots are unlikely to be good enough in most cases.

Archiving is different from a backup

A common misunderstanding is that if you already have backup procedures in place, that checks the archiving box, too. Unfortunately, that is seldom the case. Of course, it depends on the type of backup you perform, but most often, this is an emergency copy of your live data, saved in a simplified format and retained for a few days in case you suffer a sudden data loss and need to recover it. Archive data needs to be fully searchable, instantly accessible and retained for 3-6 years depending on the type and nature of the data and the industry sector in which you operate.

No different to paper records

Today, we send emails and instant messages instead of faxes and letters. Even commercial contracts are often finalized electronically. Under the circumstances, it is reasonable that business correspondence we type, even if it’s from our smartphone as a WhatsApp or Facebook message needs to be properly stored in its original form.
It amounts to exactly the same rules that we have lived with for paper correspondence for years, but it takes some getting used to. Obtaining professional support to ensure you are in compliance is a wise investment if you are in any doubt – the alternative could carry a cost, both financial and reputational, that does not bear thinking about.

What is Growth Hacking (And Why You Should Be Doing It)

We live in a world that is full of opportunity, and that remains especially true if you happen to have access to technology. While we can see that digital marketing and everything that comes with it is evolving over time, it feels like there is one thing that gets left out all too often. If you’ve never heard of the term “Growth Hacking”, this article is just for you. 

Most people don’t understand what growth hacking is all about, and many of you will claim that it’s merely a buzzword. I used to think the same thing, as I thought it was just another phrase that tech-geeks murmured to each other to seem special. Now that I know growth hacking is real and how effective it can be, I’m just sad that I didn’t get into things sooner.

There’s a difference between digital marketing and using everything at your disposal to grow a company. Some people are content with setting up a few YouTube ads and seeing what happens, but others are genuinely addicted to growing companies. 

Is Growth Hacking Just Another Hoax?

We’ve all been through a phase in life where we feel like everything sucks and it’s all fake, which is true for most things in the world. Growth hacking, thankfully, doesn’t fall under that category, and you would know that first-hand if you’ve ever read into it yourself. It’s a concept that seems complicated, but it’s generally quite simple. Your sole purpose in the business world is to grow your company, regardless of what you’re doing.

Every step you make, and every technique being used is done so with growth in mind. The best part about all of this? It makes you a much more flexible person. You aren’t going to be stuck with one industry for your entire entrepreneurial career, and instead, will be able to dabble in a bunch of other things. Doesn’t that sound like fun? 

Why Are There So Many “Gurus”?

Like anything else in life, where there is money to be made, there are bound to be fakes. There are genuine gurus like Roy Abou Trabi, and then there are plenty of fraudulent ones to avoid entirely. It’s tough to figure out which ones are just trying to sell you a poorly written eBook, and which ones are genuinely trying to help you grow your business, but there are some tricks you can use.

Read up on reviews that other people have written about their course or eBook, and see how valuable the information they’re giving out truly is. The fact that there are so many gurus alone is a red flag, but it’s quite easy to sniff out the ones that are just going to waste both your money and time. 

How Do I Know Who To Trust?

I’m glad you asked! As somebody who has consumed a large number of useless eBooks in his time, I would say that you can tell whether it’s worth it almost right away. There are times where my “scam alert” was ringing like crazy, and I still decided to go ahead with the purchase anyway. It’s a gut feeling at times, and there are other times when a poorly designed website or bad reviews will be the giveaway.

Whatever the case may be, know your worth and understand that you’re giving these “gurus” your time. Not only that, but you’ll be giving them a reasonable amount of money as well, so it’s crucial to be sure that it was well spent. 

Growth Hacking vs. Digital Marketing

Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is when you’re facing off against other companies head-on, fighting to see who can retain more customers. It’s a war at times, and there are budget limits, unreasonable targets, and plenty of other resource issues that can make it tough to master. 

Growth Hacking

Being a complete addict when it comes to growth and worrying about much more than just the traditional means of digital marketing. You aren’t competing with anyone because you’re too busy competing with yourself. 

Which One is Better?

Every successful company will have a CEO that considers themselves a growth hacker, but also have a department that handles the traditional digital marketing path as well. You cannot ignore digital marketing entirely, but you cannot use it to replace the growth hacking mentality either.

The best way to approach growing your business is with a mixture of the two, giving you the flexibility needed to grow your business regardless of what the future holds for us. Many of you reading this will have an opinion one way or the other, but can’t we all just get along for one article?

Grow Your Business with Peace of Mind

You won’t ever have to worry about whether you’re doing “enough” to build a successful brand when you’ve adapted to the growth hacking approach. If you’re not willing to adapt and change your marketing with the times, you’re only going to be limiting your potential.

It’s easy to confuse digital marketing with growth hacking and vice versa, which is probably why the industry is so saturated these days, but that doesn’t mean you can’t decipher things for yourself and benefit from it. 

If you are always willing to change and do whatever it takes to grow, be happy! You’re already well on your way to become a certified growth hacker. 

Essential Software Your Growing Business Should be Using

As your business success begins to flourish, you may find your success comes at a price. As your enterprise inevitably grows, so do your responsibilities, yet the amount of time you have to complete these tasks is only diminishing. It’s at this point that most entrepreneurs and small business owners should consider utilizing a variety of software applications and online tools to help streamline their daily operations, enhance their productivity and keep their business success on track.

Business people in a video call meeting

In this post, we’ll explore some essential software that your growing business should be using. Read on to find out more. 

VAT Software

The pressures of accounting and financial management can quickly become overwhelming for small business owners, especially as your enterprise begins to grow. Whether you have minimal experience in handling company accounts or you’re still scrambling together receipts, expenses and financial reports, VAT software is an essential tool, you shouldn’t be working without. Using VAT software is easy to implement and makes navigating your tax obligations easier, allowing you to submit VAT returns to HMRC effortlessly.

No matter how complicated your VAT return may appear, small businesses can streamline their VAT responsibilities with just a few simple clicks. VAT software will also help you create a digital paper trail, one that allows you to register all your VAT-related actions and activities in one easy-to-manage location, highlighting how much you owe with monthly snapshots and giving you the knowledge to make better business decisions. With the right VAT software application, you can protect your business from penalties incurred through late submissions or inaccuracies in your reports.

Time Tracking Software

As your business flourishes, you may find that the hours available to tackle your responsibilities proficiently begin to diminish, and effective time management becomes an essential part of your working day. This is where time tracking software can help. By highlighting how long it takes you and your employees to complete specific tasks, you’ll be able to use this data to your advantage. By developing accurate time frames that streamline your daily operations, you can encourage employees to make the most of their working day and to meet the expectations of your clients, effortlessly.

Understanding how you and your employees spend your working hours keeps everyone accountable while still providing full control over the working day and maximizing efficiency across your business. If you’re working on an hourly basis, then time tracking software also helps to keep payroll/invoices as accurate as possible.

Customer Relationship Management Software (CRM)

Developing meaningful and beneficial relationships with your clients can drive your business success forward. By carefully managing those relationships and interactions using CRM software, you can also improve those relationships and use them to your advantage. This software provides a central location for all client (and prospective client) data to be collected, stored and updated, as well as building a library of individual customer interactions which can be used to curate unique and specific future interactions that can lead to a sale.

A CRM tool gives your customer service the edge, and can completely transform the way your clients view your business. And as this software is cloud-based, this information can be accessed securely from anywhere – so no matter where your working day takes you, your growing business can maintain strong customer relationships effortlessly.

Communication Software and Tools

As a growing business, you’ll already recognize the importance of strong communication. But as your enterprise continues to push forward, the importance of communication now applies to both external and internal situations. Maintaining strong levels of contact between you and your clients was something you undoubtedly managed via email chains and multiple messages across various platforms, but now your communications approach directly impacts the customer experience and employee collaboration.

Therefore, it makes sense for growing businesses to utilize communication software to improve communication workflows and to keep their employees organized. Tools such as Slack and Skype are perfect for businesses with remote teams, whilst video conferencing/calling applications such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams and even WhatsApp can keep you and your clients in touch and improve the client experience.

 Social Media Management Software

A strong online presence is one of the key factors of business success, and while your business is experiencing growth, you must take the management of your social media platforms seriously. SM management software can help you manage multiple accounts, using one login and an easy-to-use interface that helps you move from one platform to another. SM management software means you’ll never miss a notification or an opportunity to engage with your followers. You can also schedule posts ahead of time, freeing up more time for you to focus on other areas of your growing business.

Final Thoughts…

A variety of software and tools can help your growing business continue to flourish. Consider these options above to continue with your success. 

How to Start Software as a Medical Device Business step by step

The use of software within medical devices has grown rapidly in the past 40 years. However, we can notice a rapidly growing trend in the last 20 years. The main reason for this is the interest in things and improved coercivity. With broad access to smartphones, enhanced sensors, wireless connections, artificial intelligence, and clouds, every industry experiences changes. 

Modern technologies impose drastic changes in healthcare in terms of delivering services. It is crucial to know that medical software is an essential element of medical devices. Therefore, things are about to get better within the industry.

SaMD, or software as a medical device, is a unique product that serves a medical purpose, experiencing immense popularity lately. There is no hardware included in the process, or the hardware has already been subject to improvement. Therefore, the software can quickly receive feedback meant to improve the service. Some of the leading aspects for immense growth are machine learning and AI.

The Basics

SaMD, or software as a medical device, is a special software designed to execute medical functions. It can be a mobile device or software specifically designed to prevent, treat, diagnose certain conditions. These functions can be performed without the use of hardware, which makes the process more straightforward. They can be connected to other medical devices or virtual networks without the use of special hardware. 

SaMD Challenges

SaMD is a useful software that has two main functions. Firstly, it uses data to prevent, improve, and diagnose conditions. In addition, the software has a quick feedback-giving process. Lastly, modern technology is subject to improvements and will be updated to suit the emerging needs. 

Even though the software comes with a wide array of benefits, there are specific challenges. We know that digital products are prone to changes to suit the current needs of the market. The rapid improvements need to fit with the regulations, clinical efficacy, and patient safety, vital aspects of healthcare. If a software developer manages to keep all the elements, they will succeed in this specific industry. If they aren’t ready to follow the drastic changes while being mindful of all aspects, they will fail.

The software developers should assure patient safety, innovations and get quick feedback. If we follow the TPLC approach, there is a high chance of succeeding. The total product life cycle gathers valuable techniques, such as improved UX, human factor, agile development, up-to-date data, and other implementable methods.

Large businesses should carefully approach this concept. It would be best to get started with pilot programs to see how the operations proceed. In addition, speeding up the feedback receiving process would be beneficial. Some companies will even implement changes in their current quality management system to fit the new practices better. If your quality management system already solves the methodology at the product level, it is considered an ideal base. 

How to Start the Business

Just like with any other business, you need to do a deep market analysis. To define a clear marketing strategy, take some time to study the market, consumers, and competitors.

Then, it would be best if you double-check whether your product can be categorized as SaMD. Think about how to do the FDA registration and make a strategy. Next, you should define your software’s features and requirements. After that, you need to plan a developing and testing process according to the already defined features.

You need to determine the architecture, tech stack, and integration. Develop your proof of concept, and finally create the product. Do the trials, register with the FDA, and launch your product. 

Tips To Help You When You Are Expanding Your Business

Expanding your small business is not only about making a decision, but you will also have to evaluate every detail about profit and loss, you have to deal with sales and marketing and most importantly, you have to build the whole plan outlining every financial and strategic risk and ways to counter it. Even though you would have to work very hard to expand the company, once your brand or company gets recognition, you will achieve popularity and success. However, you will have to focus on the customer base and marketing techniques to get your product trending and visible in the spotlight. Since the world has completely shifted to online working and social media campaigns, to make your product a success, you will have to target the local buyers of your company through different online marketing platforms. Besides marketing strategies, there are other ways by which you can expand your business and get benefits in the long term. So, here are some proven ways that can help you expand your business in the long run.

Hire the Right Team

One of the most important elements on which a company depends is its employees and staff. The qualification, experience, and working strategies of your workers are what determines how smoothly your company functions and gets success. They must be able to decode your orders and work accordingly because if they are fast learners, your work can get easier. Moreover, you must train them to stay united and dedicated to the goal you are working towards.

Develop a Reliable Sales Funnel

Setting up the right sales funnel can help you automate the marketing process and sales. It helps to drive traffic and customers to your page where some people buy your product and others read and think about it. Subsequently, you add those customers to your target customer list and send them emails of your special offers to persuade them to buy your product. This way, within a short period you will gain several new customers. To elaborate the process of the sales funnel, here are five steps that you need to ensure:

  • Create awareness in your audience about your product by implementing various marketing strategies.
  • Build interest in your customers by email campaigns, blog posts, lead magnets, chatbots, retargeting campaigns, and other deals for customers.
  • Evaluate your customer’s interest and add testimonials, pricing pages, case studies, discounted offers, live demos, product comparisons to help your customers evaluate your product or service quality.
  • Engage with customers who are about to buy your product using follow-up emails, product success stories, and other special offers.
  • Provide your customers with easy and efficient payment methods and platforms like Paypal, Stripe, Snipcart, or the card payment method.

Focus on Loyal Customers

It is crucial to prioritize your customer’s needs and provide them with special and discounted offers. Since your old customers are already acquainted with your old product quality or services, if you will maintain a friendly relation by using marketing strategies and discounted offers, they will maintain a stable buying experience with you. On the other hand, if you ignore your loyal customers and make special deals only for the new customers, there are chances that you may lose both. That’s why established business owners will always suggest focusing on your established revenue more than acquiring new audiences.

Limit the Internal and External Threats

A business is all about taking risks and evaluating your strategies critically. However, you can decrease the probability of these risks by limiting external and internal threats. For small businesses, it’s necessary to manage their resources to achieve success. So they can get investment from different sources like insurance providers, banks, or other investors. 

On the other hand, to limit the resources, businesses can also opt for local coworking services that are more economical. In Australia, there are several coworking locations around Sydney, Darlinghurst, Melbourn, and Brisbane that largely benefit the start-ups. There are many cases where businesses have expanded from these coworking spaces by using shared resources.

Know Your Competition

Before lining up for a competition, you should always study in advance the challenges you are going to face in the market. Once you know how to set your pricing, marketing strategies, and product quality, you can easily create a more improved product with better features that can be a competition for other brands.

Adapt to New Changes

Expansion of a business comes with adaptation and diversification. The more you will learn from the top businesses in the market, the more you can adapt according to it. For instance, most businesses are now virtually functional, that’s why people also prefer online shopping and services. Therefore, you should create websites with SEO optimization to enhance the productivity of your brand. On the other hand, using several ways to market your services and products can benefit you a lot faster than ever. For instance, you can use social media sites to create websites, blog posts, advertisements, business campaign emails, etc.

Benefit From Global Platforms

Your business can experience new levels if you take it to the global platform. These platforms include Amazon, Upwork, AirBnB, etc. Depending on your budget, the more expensive and high rating platform you will consider, the more your business will be in the spotlight. On the other hand, you can also benefit from FBA service to market your product efficiently and get higher traffic.

To expand your business in the long term, you will have to put in a lot of hard work, dedication, patience, faith, and discipline. Since success is not an overnight process, always remember that the higher the density of your success will be, the greater fall your business may experience in the future. If you take slow and steady steps to build your organization, your business will be more stable for a longer period. Moreover, to expand your business, you should take your decisions analytically and follow some proven tips explained by this article.

Driving Efficiency on Your Construction Projects: A Guide

Most leaders in the construction space know that efficiency is everything. Because your projects can last a number of months to complete if they are of a large enough scale, you’ll have seen costs ballooning when you’re not hitting your deadlines and targets, and when workers are disrupted or materials are stuck in supply chains. As such, you’re more than aware that anything you can do to make your processes more efficient could save you hundreds of thousands of dollars. Here are three ways that you can get there, operating a watertight, optimized construction business.

Meticulous Planning

All businesses are only as strong as the thought leadership underpinning them. And all projects require careful management in order for all the individual components to come together as quickly and smoothly as possible. Your job is to facilitate this seamless operational side of your business. And you can get ahead by:

  • Using high-end management technology to keep you abreast of developments on site
  • Structuring a chain of command that helps you remain aware of all elements of the project
  • Use a Construction Management Company
  • Making contingency plans in the case of delays that may be out of your hands
  • Hiring outsourced staff where appropriate to help you get the job done

These tips all fall under the auspices of “organizational skills” – absolutely vital if you’re to make a success of your construction business.

Tech Engagement

On site, your workers will be using all kinds of tools, vehicles and machines to get the job done. They’ll be expensive and valuable, but they may also be approaching several years of age. Some may break, some may be faulty, and others might simply not be up for the job on a modern construction site. So the advice here is to engage with new technology and to make upgrades where you can to your tools and hardware.

Where to start? Well, you should always be keeping an eye out for automation technology. Look to automatic welders for plastic, for instance, to give your workers a head-start when they’re fixing the paneling on roofs and under floors. Or invest in far better material-moving equipment – like cranes – so that the logistics of getting things around your site take far less time.

Great Staff

It’s easy to lose sight of the workers when you’re in the planning office of a project site. You’re trying to see the big picture constantly, envisaging potential delays that could come from anywhere on your risk map. With this perspective in mind, you can often forget that it’s the people who are following your commands that are ultimately going to decide the success of your project. Training is key for a cohesive business. Whether it’s the administrators, the crew, someone looking to become a welder or learning to run heavy machinery, ensuring everyone is on the same page is essential.

On site, you want there to be team unity and motivation to get the job done. You want great managers underneath you to head out there, making sure everyone’s pulling in the same direction. And you want to hire the best talent where possible so that you can rely on your workers to get the job done on time.

Run a more efficient construction firm, on more efficient sites, with the three key tips outlined above.

Different Types of Insurance Medical Practitioners May Need

With the rising cases of medical negligence lawsuits against a medical practitioner, medical malpractice insurance has been prevalent over the years to protect the livelihood and assets of such professionals. Overlooking this important aspect has cost heavily for many doctors so far. 

According to Washington Post, 2016 “The medical negligence payouts in 2014 in the New York alone stood at $690 million”

It has also been observed that there are other forms of insurance which a medical professional is required to cover under the law. But due to the lack of inadequate knowledge, most of this coverage is likely to be missed by them resulting in huge losses at the later stages.

Most of the doctors focus on medical liability coverage, which is the largest premium paid by them on account of medical malpractice insurance. However, they tend to ignore the other types of insurance which are equally crucial in protecting their livelihood and assets.

In fact, under several circumstances, these insurances are required by the law which most of the doctors are unaware of. 

In this article we are going to discuss different forms of medical insurances:

Medical Malpractice Insurance

It is one of the prevalent insurance sought by medical professionals. Medical malpractice insurance carriers are protected against the financial losses that arise due to the lawsuits filed by their patients claiming professional negligence leading to an injury/death of the patient. 

Hence the patient’s claim of negligence is covered under medical malpractice insurance for the doctors.  

Business Auto Insurance

Some medical practitioners facilitate their patients with home visits and require using their vehicle for the commutation. Hence the need for commercial or business auto insurance is imperative. 

Most auto insurance policies do not cover the damage that occurs due to business use. Thus business auto policy is designed to cover the vehicles used for business purposes.

The insurance primarily covers the property damage and medical expenses for bodily injury on account of such accidents. Depending on the coverage, the insurance company will replace or repair your vehicles due to theft, accidents, or any natural calamity.

Medicare Insurance

Many people assume that Medicare, the federal government’s health-care program for people aged 65 and over, will cover all of their medical bills. Unfortunately, it does not. The truth of how much you’ll have to spend for health-care services out of pocket might be a significant budget buster.

It is important to understand how to decipher Medicare’s various expenses and keep them under control. MedicareWire.com explains how much Original Medicare costs to better understand and pick your coverage carefully.

Professional Liability Insurance

The unfortunate event of lawsuits made by your patients to claim negligence on your part is a re-occurrence when you are practicing as a medical professional privately. 

Due to the lack of a one-size-fits-all policy, this special insurance coverage helps in covering the legal defense cost that can even run up to hundreds and thousands of dollars.

Most of the private small physicians do not have enough resources to cover such claims, thus malpractice insurance for professional liability is a must. 

Practice Overhead Insurance

Individual liability insurance is relevant for the inability to practice medicine due to illness or injury. While this type of insurance is usually kept as a backup to recover the medical expenses on such an inability, the prime concern should be – Who will replace your absence in such an event?

However, when you are temporarily out of office, expenses like salaries, rent, taxes, and utility bills are still in place to handle. Practice Overhead insurance helps in recovering such overhead expenses in the event of loss of income due to injury. 

Worker Compensation Insurance

When you come up with a private clinic, you require employing dedicated employees to maintain it. If anyone gets seriously injured, how to continue with your practice? Most of the states in the United States make it a mandate to such business owners to obtain workers’ compensation insurance if they have more than the prescribed limit of employees. 

This type of insurance helps in paying off the loss on account of wages and medical expenses to the employees who get injured while discharging their duties. In the event of the death of the employee, the insurance companies compensate the employee’s family. 

This insurance is significant for most businesses to ensure the livelihood of employees in the event of accidents. 

Property Insurance

Like every business, opening a clinic requires a lot of time, effort, and investment for the right medical equipment, fixtures and furniture, and other medical supplies. But, in the event of a natural disaster, how will you ensure safety?

Property insurance is the best way to secure your property in the event of unwanted theft and fire. It exhaustively covers the physical building along with the medical equipment and other fixtures used for your practice. Especially in the event of leasing your space, property insurance is a must.

Business Interruption Insurance

Some places are likely to be affected by natural calamities and disasters at a higher rate than others. If you choose to practice in such areas, this insurance is of utmost importance for your business. In the event of a catastrophic event, the business operations will suffer.

A reliable business interruption insurance policy helps in running and getting back on your toes. 

Compared to property insurance, this type of insurance aims at covering the income stream from the business, which is adversely affected due to the disaster. 

The temporary closure of business and structural rebuilding to overcome the adversity of natural disasters are the reason for stagnation in business operations. Business Owner policy is a comprehensive insurance solution to cover the property insurance policy and business interruption insurance. 

Medigap Insurance

Medigap insurance protects you against the expenses that Medicare does not pay, which are referred to as “gaps” in coverage. Medigap policies help you budget for your out-of-pocket medical expenses. Giving you peace of mind by protecting your cash from unforeseen medical expenses. You’ll simply have to worry about the monthly cost with Medigap insurance. Aside from your monthly payment, the expenditures are relatively low. Depending on the letter plan you choose, your cost-sharing might be as low as $0.

Life Insurance

Although it is not directly related to your practice, life insurance is a significant form of insurance that extends financial protection to your family member in the event of accidental death. 

Your appointed beneficiaries receive financial protection in the event of your death under life insurance. Not just your family members, your business partner gets their peace of mind too. It is the best way to compensate for the loss of income to your family members in the event of accidental death. 

Summary

The right type of insurance is the best way to avoid major financial losses to any medical practitioner in case of catastrophic events. The day you begin your medical practice, you are certainly exposed to various liabilities. 

Having suitable insurance in place helps a doctor to protect their practice from the various kinds of potential risks. 

Top 10 Must-Follow Marketing Tips for SAAS Start-UPS in 2021

The SaaS market is promising but it also brings incredible competition. With new software products getting launched every day across every vertical, building a viral product is harder now more than ever.

No matter how challenging and saturated the market may look, it is not impossible to gain the attention of your audience. With the right mix of product-market fit and smart email marketing tactics, you will witness the ball to be at your side. This is what we are exactly going to talk about in this blog post.

We take a deep dive into the 10 marketing tips that can create the foundation of your marketing success for your SaaS business in 2021.

10 Marketing Hacks To Skyrocket Your SAAS Start-up in 2021

No matter what marketing technique you use to acquire customers if your product does not meet the demands of your target audience. In other words, build something that people want.

This makes developing a unique selling proposition the heart of every growth hack technique.

Yes, you heard that right.

If your product is just like your competitors then no one is going to care about what you build. Did we tell you that you can use your audience research data here?

Finding the bridge to connect what your audience want and competitors fail to deliver is going to make you unique. The best part? Your perceived value in front of your audience will grow. But once you have developed your USP, the rigorous part comes in; marketing.

Ideally, you would have to undergo multiple experiments and iteration in your strategy to find out what works and what doesn’t but we make that easier for you so here are some examples of a good marketing plan.

The following 10 tips can streamline your SaaS customer base in no time.

1. Adopt a freemium model

If there is one strategy that opens up your software adoption rate like no other, it is the freemium model.

In an oversaturated market, where your customers are overwhelmed with product choices, a freemium model makes it easier for them to make the final decision. You empower them to make their own decision.

There are multiple strategies to experiment with here. From a 30-day trial window to lifelong freemium access, you can sample tests on real audiences.

2. Word of mouth marketing

There’s a good reason why word of mouth marketing is so popular amongst the SaaS startup community. More than often, SaaS startups include this model to gain their first customers.

It is the most effective, sustainable, yet low-cost strategy to gain loyal customers. But all its sweetness comes in one condition.

You need to deliver a superlative customer experience to your early customers. If your first customers do not find you valuable, there is little chance that they would tell their community about you.

This means to turn your customers into brand evangelists you would not only need to satisfy their expectations but exceed them. Be obsessed with customer delight. No matter what you have to do, be it give discounts, create a hyper-active response team, be there in there to answer their needs.

3. Viral marketing

Creating a viral effect with one marketing technique is often hard yet not impossible.

All you need to do is look closely into your process to identify the growth lever that can make it possible. Infact, there are a few established ones already available in the industry. The best part?

They always give results.

From referral schemes, loyalty programs for existing customers to giveaway contests any of them can give you results. It can not only give you the opportunity to establish new relationships with customers but improve the total value of your existing customers.

4.  Content marketing

There is so much value that content marketing can bring to your SaaS process.

Content is king after all.

But while you get invested in developing the heart of this scalable marketing strategy, do not forget to market your content.

There are so many methods to do so. From microblogging, SEO optimized knowledge base, webinars, infographics, time-sensitive promotions, to lead magnets, you can test all. For promotions, you can consider guest blogging or sponsor the content for an influencer to do so. Another cost-efficient way would be to use user-generated content.

5. Branding

Building a successful SaaS product is almost impossible without building a brand. Unsure why?

Here is the answer.

A successful branding venture can bring multifarious benefits to your SaaS product. From faster adoption rate, strong community, higher retention, optimized marketing costs, and the best part, market capture.

You can basically become synonymous with the category of product you are building. Does that suddenly sound like Google?

There are so many ways to do this. From SEO optimization, press review, authority review, influencer marketing to affiliate marketing. But to ensure performance, you need to keep in mind your unique situations. The budget, constraints, and goals.

6.  Optimize all the time

In business, there is no such thing called maximum sales. Ideally speaking, even if you have reached the saturation point of your total market size, it doesn’t mean your growth potential has reached the roof. You can always work on improving the perceived value of your product in the eyes of your target audience.

But to do so, you would need to optimize your processes which makes it so valuable to realize your startup potential.

There is so much you can do here. From aligning the micro-level factors like landing page elements to macro-level factors like product-market fit there is always room for improvement. The best part? It will help you yield better results without investing more resources in your marketing.

What follows is a significant improvement in the LTV (lifetime value), CAC (customer acquisition cost), and the final ROI (return on investment).

7. Create API integrations

APIs are the best scalable customer acquisition techniques you can integrate into your marketing operations.

It can not only open doors to new audiences but reinforce the foundations of strong partnerships with your collaborators. The best part? You automatically gain the position of authority in the market.

But here’s a word of caution.

Partnerships can make or break your brand’s reputation. While the right partner can fast pace your growth by years, the wrong choice can deter your speed by many years. An effective way to think about it is to ask a vital question. Whether your collaborating brand is an extension of your product’s value? If yes, then it is often the right choice.

8.  Paid marketing

Although there is no substitute for what you can accomplish with organic marketing in time, only depending upon organic growth will slow down your SaaS startup significantly. This makes paid marketing and campaigns incredibly vital. But here’s a thing.

Before you jump into paid marketing, ensure you have a complete strategy laid out. With the increasing expense of paid ads, chances are you will invest significant resources with little to no returns.

There are so many techniques to do this right. Use FOMO (fear of missing out), time-sensitive offers. Campaigns that are contextual and personalized on the basis of audience profiles and channels of distribution tend to perform better. But the best piece of advice is to develop a mindset of testing and optimizing.

The more you are open to A/B tests and campaign optimization, the better your long-term results will be. Chances are you can even witness exponential growth.

9.  Invest in building trust and authority

Trust is one of the most crucial elements for your SaaS product to succeed. No matter how promising your product may appear, if your target audience does not trust your brand, they will not engage with your brand.

This puts authority building as one of the top priorities for your marketing team.

The best part is there are many cost-effective ways to do so.

Use social proof like customer testimonials and peer reviews to do so. Platforms like G2, Quora, and ProductHunt are great ways to kickstart this. You can later integrate the best reviews of your clients on your website too. But this is not all.

You need to make sure the payment gateway is safe and secured. Using end-to-end encryptions and third-party vendors like Paypal is a good strategy to do so.

10. Collaborate with experts

Collaborations and partnerships are undoubtedly one of the most sustainable strategies for building a robust SaaS business. But if you thought that your partnerships are limited to indirect competitors, influencers, and authorities, then think again.

There is so much value that a domain expert can bring to your SaaS startup.

A SaaS growth marketer brings their domain expertise. Some of the best SaaS marketing agencies can optimize your growth levers to unleash the true potential of your product. From reducing marketing costs, finding new sales opportunities to improving customer acquisition and retention, there is so much a specialist can do.

They can prove to be your biggest asset when it comes to growth in the long term.

Conclusion

Building a successful SaaS product is hard and going to be even harder in the future.

But that doesn’t mean there is no room for winning. All you need to do is shift your mindset about the development process. Think of disrupting the existing process even in a small way possible.

Keep on reiterating and evolving your product-building methodologies and even your product if required.

This dynamic landscape makes the requirement of a nimble marketing plan incredibly important. Sure, the above tips are to give the foundational speed for today. But to sustain that growth you need to optimize the process and make changes from time to time.

Only then can you see true success with your SaaS startup.

Author bio

Atreyee Chowdhury works full-time as an Instructional Designer and is passionate about writing. She has helped many small and medium-scale businesses achieve their content marketing goals with her carefully crafted and compelling content. She lives in Bangalore, India with her husband and parents. She loves to read, experiment with different cuisines, travel, and explore the latest content marketing and L&D trends in her free time. You can reach her on Linkedin or write to her at atreyee.c@gmail.com for any content writing/marketing requirements.

What is Product Liability Insurance? 4 Things You Need To Know

Large business manufacturers produce goods at a massive scale every day, and there are always products that will have defects that cause malfunctions and a decrease in quality. Because of this, production lines always include a quality testing stage in the whole process to ensure that all products are tested and Inspected for any type of defects. After a product passes quality control, it can now be packaged and shipped to outlet stores and distributors. Still, some products get damaged during transport, and these can still make it to the store shelves and the consumers. When consumers purchase a defective product while being unaware of its condition, it may cause serious harm to the user if an accident occurs due to the malfunction of the product. These situations usually lead to lawsuits being filed against the company, and the consumers may sue them for the damages caused by their products. Lawsuits regarding defective products and damages to customers usually lead to million-dollar lawsuits that can greatly affect the company’s sales and reputation, leading them towards bankruptcy. To avoid such situations, manufacturing companies can avail product liability insurance that can protect them from lawsuits and damages to their company’s name and sales. The next part of this article will cover the basic knowledge that one must know regarding product liability insurance.

Several phone manufacturers also avail of product liability insurance packages.

1. What is product liability insurance?

Product liability insurance is a type of insurance package that companies and manufacturers can avail to protect their companies from lawsuits and claims of personal injury or property damages from their customers. Companies take time to set up product liability insurance since this can help them cover the legal costs brought by lawsuits. The insurance package can also cover costs of medical damages and property damage. Insurance companies offer different insurance packages depending on their client’s business scale, which ranges from small business owners to large conglomerates.

2. How does product liability insurance work?

Whenever a malfunction occurs on a product purchased by a customer, the product liability insurance package of the company will help pay for the damages done by the malfunction of the product. An example of this occurrence can be observed on a Samsung Note 7 lawsuit that happened on a flight of Jet Airways.

In October 2017, a female passager was boarded on a flight to India on Jet Airways when suddenly, her phone burst in flames while stored in her handbag. The passenger observed smoke coming out of her handbag approximately 15 minutes after boarding the flight. A flight attendant immediately responded to the situation and tried to use a fire extinguisher on the device, but the fire extinguisher failed to operate. The attendant then submerged the device in a tray full of water to prevent any possibility of fire or explosion. Fortunately, the device stopped smoking, and nobody was harmed during the incident. In the aftermath, the female passenger was furious over the lack of preparation of the airline’s safety precautions and was planning on filing a complaint against the company as well as the phone’s manufacturer.

In this incident, the phone company was expected to pay for the damages caused by their product. This was not the first time that Samsung has encountered smartphone problems as they had to recall some of their products in the past year. The company did not have product liability insurance, and they also had to recall the note 7 series products in the previous year due to other claims of malfunction and exploding batteries, so they were expecting a loss of over $17 billion in total revenue. There are a number of other companies that have received lawsuits or even class action lawsuits when a large number of people goes through a similar issue with a product and due to the large number of people the combines settlement is usually high and sometimes proof is not required by some of the plaintiff and plaintiff can claim there share without the proof of purchase and can get compensated from such no proof class action lawsuits.

Had they availed a product liability insurance for this product, they could have lessened their losses significantly. They could have avoided a product liability lawsuit that could affect their resources and brand reputation.

3. How much is product liability insurance needed?

To decide how much a product liability insurance package will cover, the scale of the business must be considered. A large-scale business will typically produce a thousand units of products in a single day, which means there is a larger possibility of occurrence of defective products. A larger yield will mean more defective products, so the insurance must cover the majority of the price of production to avoid major losses in case of a recall or a lawsuit. Smaller business owners will only need to avail a basic package for product liability insurance since their production rate is less than that of large-scale companies.

Insurance can help secure a business against liabilities.

4. What is the difference between general liability insurance and product liability insurance?

General liability insurance is a type of insurance purchased by businesses to protect their companies from all types of claims and lawsuits that may affect their sales and profits in any way. This type of insurance covers all types of services provided by a company. The difference between general liability and product liability is the range of the compensation that the insurance will provide. General liability insurance can cover all the services provided by a company, which includes consulting, estimates, and customer service. In contrast, product liability insurance only covers the products sold by the company to its customers.

3 Steps Landlords Can Take to Protect Themselves from Lawsuits

Landlords need to protect themselves against lawsuits to a high degree, perhaps more than any other business owner. Unlike other industries, courts tend to favor tenants, especially in difficult situations. Now that the world is experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic, courts are especially sympathetic toward tenants facing eviction, even when it’s clearly the tenant’s fault.

Tenants don’t just sue their landlords over evictions. The truth is, you never know what will drive a tenant to file a suit, whether its because of real maintenance issues in their dwelling or COVID-19 fraud. Sometimes tenants file lawsuits that don’t make sense, but you still have to take time out of your day to show up in court.

Lawsuits are costly and time-consuming, so you need to protect yourself if you want to avoid the inconvenience of litigation. Here’s a good starting point:

1. Require Your Renters To Carry Renters Insurance

 To get your mortgage, you probably had to show proof of homeowners insurance, if not additional types of insurance. Tenants renting the property should have their own type of insurance designed to cover losses and damage to their personal property. It’s called renters insurance and if you want to protect yourself from lawsuits, you need to require tenants to hold a policy.

Renters insurance protects tenants’ personal property when it’s damaged by things like natural disasters, burglaries, and random accidents. For example, if the sewer backs up into the house and the flood destroys a tenant’s musical instruments, they can file a claim to recover the cash value of their instruments.

Bay State landlord always look for Massachusetts flood insurance policies that will protect their finances and help them quickly restore their property. Such coverage may also include liability insurance, which protects the tenant if someone gets injured while in their dwelling.

Renters insurance will cover relocation expenses

Relocation is another expense renters insurance covers. If your property becomes unlivable, a tenant with renters insurance can get a hotel covered until you fix the problem. If the problem can’t be fixed, renters insurance will pay for the tenant’s moving expenses. Some policies will even pay the additional cost of increased living expenses if their new rent is higher.

In some states, landlords are required to pay for a tenant’s accommodations if their main rental becomes uninhabitable. Tenants can sue if their landlord refuses to provide alternative housing.

If you don’t want to risk having to pay for your tenants’ hotel stay while you fix a serious plumbing issue, require your tenants to carry renters insurance.

2. Create a Strong Lease With an Attorney

Your lease is only as strong as your weakest clause. If you forget to include a legally required clause, your lease could end up being no better than swiss cheese in court.

The only way to create an iron-clad lease is to consult with an attorney. While you can find lease templates online allegedly created by lawyers, templates are too generic to rely on for the basis of a tenancy agreement.

For example, unlawfully withholding a security deposit is one of the top reasons tenants sue their landlords. You might think you’re fine if you aren’t withholding your tenant’s deposit. However, a lease containing illegal security deposit terms can also justify a lawsuit.

Lease mistakes often have far-reaching consequences. Creating your own lease makes you susceptible to losing lawsuits that you would otherwise win if your lease were designed by an attorney.

3. Be Clear and Direct to a Fault

Some people feel threatened by direct communication, but you can’t be vague or ambiguous with your tenants. For example, if your tenant misunderstands something you’ve said, they might act on that misunderstanding in a way that violates the lease. If you try to evict them, they might sue you – and win.

Once you get to court, it will be your word against theirs. Did you really give your tenant permission to install a zipline in the ceiling? If the judge thinks you did, you won’t easily change their mind. Verbal agreements are considered legally binding agreements.

Make every effort to be clear and concise with your tenants in all of your communications. Try to avoid text messaging and only use email for electronic correspondence. Make sure every phone call is accompanied by a follow-up email to provide a permanent record of the points discussed. Leave no room for unnecessary confusion.

Being a Landlord Is Risky

Being a landlord is a risky business. Although, owning rental property is appealing because it’s one of the best ways to amass wealth over a long period of time.

Tenants have rights, as they should, but often, those rights are abused and taken advantage of in the legal system. No matter how great your tenants are, most are just one upset away from filing a lawsuit. While you can’t prevent all lawsuits, you can mitigate the potential for lawsuits arising from common misunderstandings.