Starting a small business is like navigating a minefield. You’re excited, passionate, and ready to conquer the world, but the statistics are daunting. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, a staggering 20% of small businesses fail in their first year. By year five, half have shut down, and by year ten, that number jumps to 80%.
So, what makes these first two years so critical? And more importantly, how can you beat the odds?
The answer lies in understanding and overcoming the top challenges small business owners face (Cox):
1. Finding Customers: This is the lifeblood of any business. Without customers, you don’t have revenue. But attracting them in a crowded market can feel like shouting into a void. Especially, if your service area is limited by a geographic boundary, there are very limited options to reach your target audience. As a small business owner, your life is already busy and you may not have time to ideate and execute all potential growth hacks.
2. Increasing Brand Awareness: You need to stand out in your neighborhood and among your competition. Customers need to know you exist, recognize your brand, and understand what makes you unique.
3. Building an Contact List: Email and SMS marketing remain a powerful tool for nurturing leads and building lasting relationships with customers. However, most small business owners don’t have tools to capture customer contacts. Even if they capture contacts, they don’t have means to mass communicate with their customers.
4. Lead Generation: It’s not enough to just be visible; you need a consistent pipeline of qualified leads who are interested in your products or services. Currently, small businesses don’t have purpose built tool to help in this area.
5. Delighting Customers: Customer satisfaction is key to repeat business and positive word-of-mouth referrals. Small businesses can’t afford technology that can process customer feedback and share insightful information for improvement.
6. Hiring Talented People: As you grow, you’ll need a skilled team to help you manage various aspects of your business. Hiring, training, rewarding and retaining employees is top priority for most businesses and currently there is no tool to help with staffing.
7. Managing Workflow: Organization is crucial for efficiency. Streamlining processes, delegating tasks, and staying on top of deadlines is essential. Operational efficiency will lead to cost optimization which is crucial for small businesses to thrive.
8. Financial Planning: Budgeting, forecasting, and managing cash flow are vital for staying afloat, especially in the early stages. Access to mentors with local knowledge and expertise in financial planning is currently very limited.
9. Scaling: Once you’ve found your footing, expanding your business requires strategic planning and execution. Scaling comes with a significant cost in hiring more staff, buying more inventory and expanding infrastructure. Scaling the existing customer base at a given location requires increased outreach and an assurance that more customers will show up at the business in the future.
While each of these challenges requires attention, a key factor connecting many of them is customer outreach. This is where BlooTusk comes in, a platform that helps small businesses survive and thrive by digitizing the power of word-of-mouth referrals.
BlooTusk addresses five of the nine critical challenges listed above:
- Finding Customers: BlooTusk helps businesses reach new customers by leveraging their existing customers’ networks.
- Increasing Brand Awareness: By encouraging referrals, BlooTusk helps businesses expand their reach and increase visibility within their community.
- Building a Contact List: The platform facilitates the collection of customer information for future marketing efforts.
- Lead Generation: Successful referrals translate directly into qualified leads who are more likely to convert into paying customers.
- Scaling: BlooTusk’s automated system makes it easy to manage and scale referral programs and marketing campaigns as your business grows.
BlooTusk is revolutionizing local marketing by:
- Leveraging technology: The platform utilizes a digital referral system to streamline and amplify word-of-mouth marketing.
- Rewarding loyalty: Businesses can offer points and incentives to customers for referring their friends and family.
- Providing a risk-free solution: BlooTusk only charges businesses when they see tangible results in the form of new customers and additional revenue.
Looking ahead: BlooTusk is committed to continuous innovation. The platform is evolving to incorporate AI, automating marketing campaigns based on customer taste profiles. This will further personalize outreach and maximize the impact of referral programs. BlooTusk’s mission is to provide small business owners with affordable access to the latest technology.
BlooTusk understands the struggles of small businesses. It’s a platform built for success, designed to help businesses not just survive, but thrive in those critical first two years and beyond.
Explore more and join the BlooTusk revolution at business.blootusk.com.
References:
Cox, Lindsay Kolowich. “9 Business Challenges Every Small Business Struggles With (And How to Fix Them).” HubSpot Blog, 28 June 2021, https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/small-business-challenges. Accessed 14 May 2024.