Some businesses have undoubtedly had a tough time through 2020 and into the New Year, whether from a financial perspective or their ability to grow and scale successfully into new markets.
The impact of coronavirus must also be measured against the universal challenges that have continued to face businesses, including the overwhelming number of strategies and tools that can drive commercial success in the digital age.
In this post, we’ll look at the best creative tools for firms in 2021 and beyond, especially if they intend to thrive, grow and scale over time.
Table of Contents
#1. Squarespace or Similar Web Management Tools
In the digital age, your business can live and die by the quality of its website, especially in terms of its navigability, ease-of-use and the load time of individual landing pages.
To provide perspective, Google recommends that your most important landing pages (such as sales and customer support) load in under two seconds, or run the risk of higher bounce rates and lost customers over time.
So, you may want to consider investing in website management tools such as Squarespace, which provide a one-stop-shop and various management features such as hosting in design (to create a more professional site), and domain name acquisition (for pure startups).
There are plenty of tools of this type, of course, so the key is to consider the market and identify the option that best suits your needs.
#2. Loyalty Programs
From a commercial perspective, it’s widely thought that increasing your customer retention rate by 5% can boost profitability by as much as 95%. This is just one of the many benefits of creating a loyalty program, which are widely used by large corporations such as Starbucks.
Firstly, such programs can secure the long-term future of your business, as they help to provide targeted incentives to customers and lay the foundation for secure and mutually beneficial relationships.
Loyalty programs are also favoured by customers, with around 75% more likely to switch brands or service providers in pursuit of a better scheme.
More than half will also prioritise brands that offer rewards programs in the first place, so such tools are a highly effective way of retaining and engaging customers across the board.
#3. Social Media Tools
Social media is also a key engagement and cost-saving business tool in the digital age, and not only in the form of staple platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube.
Make no mistake; you can target other and more niche social media channels when marketing your brand, with female-oriented sites (Pinterest) and those aimed at younger consumers (TikTok) offering relevant cases in point.
Regardless of which social platforms you target, however, ideally you’ll be able to manage your tweets activity using scheduling tools like Buffer or Hootsuite.
Social strategy tools like Canva and Pexels can also be used to launch and maintain your social presence, without requiring you to spend significant or inflated sums of money.
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