Small business owners can ensure a more profitable and successful year in many ways. One of these is to anticipate the needs of customers and work hard to meet them. Aside from a good product or service and building relationships with customers, there are other important areas to focus on in the year ahead. For example, customers have preferences about where they do business that owners may not know about. Few small business owners would cite the age of their computers as something customers care about, but it is of vital importance to many of them.
A recent survey from Microsoft found 91 percent of consumers would stop doing business with a company due to its technology being outdated.
“Consumers definitely care” about the level and kinds of technology small business use, and they “care even more than I thought they would,” Russ Madlener, senior director of US SMB group at Microsoft, told Fox News.
Consumers want to do business with small firms that can safeguard their data. This applies not only to e-commerce businesses but also to any company that ever has access to its customers’ personal details like credit card information – which includes the vast majority of businesses.
Customers are also interested in ways technology can make doing business simpler, such as through solutions that enable quick appointment-setting and communications. Nearly two-thirds of those who responded to Microsoft’s survey said they would be likely to come back to a small business that uses this kind of modern technology.
Furthermore, customers want to see the businesses they interact with have an up-to-date website – 80 percent said they’d leave a website that looked outdated and asked for credit card information.
Small business owners who want to stay current and reap the benefits may wish to look into equipment financing, which can help them acquire the latest in technology. This can make the tech demands of consumers within reach for all business owners.
