Without internal business processes the left hand not only doesn’t know what the right hand is doing, but the foot is at a total loss. What does that even mean? Well, it’s about as clear as your business operation looks without internal business processes. So, let’s get down to it.
Successful businesses provide value to their customers. One of the ways this happens is by creating and fine-tuning internal business processes so the customer experience appears seamless. Evaluating and improving each business process, even those that are not overtly attached to sales, strengthens the entire company’s ability to succeed. An alignment of internal business processes provides a smooth transition from interest, to education to purchase for each customer.
Areas that need to have a defined business process include:
1) Brand Management
The importance of branding can’t be overstated. Every employee needs to understand your company identity and be able to easily communicate it to others. That’s not all, though; it’s vital that your team members are all on the same page with regard to these key branding components:
- Knowing who the most important customers are for your business
- An understanding of what motivates customers and what makes them choose your brand over others in your industry
- Having a clear, concise elevator pitch that everyone knows by heart and can trot out whenever they are asked what do you do?”
- Reinforcing the promise of your brand at every customer touch point
Give your employees the tools and training they need to be champions for your brand personality. Facilitate this through internal webinars and employee contests that promote brand recognition.
2) Quality Control
Selling lots of products does no good if too many returns are back coming through the door, so it’s vitally important to ensure the quality of what you sell. Word of mouth is a powerful “maker or breaker” in the business world. Use customer surveys, shoppers etc., to keep in touch with the quality of your product or service from a customer standpoint. It doesn’t matter if you believe you are the greatest company on earth. If your customers don’t agree, you are in trouble. Track your returns and the reasons for them, and conduct regular customer surveys to find out what your buyers think of your products. Use the results to identify problems and correct them, so you don’t wake up to any nasty surprises.
3) Productivity
Time is money – you know it, we know it. The thing is, if you don’t have an internal business process to gauge measurable benchmarks, you have no idea how you are doing in this area. Rather than wonder if the new sales rep is sitting in Starbucks surfing dating sites on your time, set business process standards that will measure his day. Determine a standard for the number of phone calls, sales calls and follow ups expected each day, week and month.
By the numbers you will have a clear picture of who your best employees are. In addition, when you can target a weakness in an area, you can counsel the employee to improve performance.
4) Admin Stuff
Nowhere are your internal processes more important than in your administrative function. Poor processes in this department result in unhappy employees, inaccurate financial records and potential losses in revenue.
Take the time to evaluate your methods of administration now and save yourself endless headaches later. Evaluate issues such as whether potential employees have easy access to your online application forms. What about other forms? Nothing sucks valuable time from your day like having to hunt down purchase orders, schedule requests and expense forms.
Developing a process for such details and where they are kept means the difference between 30 minutes of frustration and one minute of retrieving for use!
5) Information Technology
This one’s huge. In today’s technological world, a chaotic or weak IT department can bring down a business. Conversely, a well-oiled IT machine gives your company wings. This department can track and evaluate sales, leads, inventory, purchasing, accounting… well, truth-be-told …..everything about your company. From the company’s email marketing functions through to designing ads falls under the IT umbrella. Spend the time to regularly investigate new software on the market, automated processes and employee network security so this foundation to the business remains strong. And don’t overlook the implementation of good disaster recovery protocols (DRPs) to ensure that you don’t lose everything in the event of a fire, flood or other occurrence.
Whether your business is doing well or currently in a free fall, creating internal business processes and aligning them with each other so that the end result is a seamless customer experience can only improve your bottom line. What are you waiting for? This is your year to scale!
