October 2022
Weathering the storm: how to survive as a small business in the UK in 2022
It’s no secret that costs are rising across the UK, particularly for small business as many are forced to close their doors for good. As the winter rolls in, small businesses will really feel the squeeze this year.
To help you keep everything in order, we’ve put together some tips to help keep track of your financial situation, so you can have some peace of mind this winter.
Assess the financial situation
Answering all of these questions will give you an idea of what you can do to plug up the holes in your business, and keep things water-tight in hard times. Try to take a holistic approach at first, looking at your business generally before you go in to specifics. Then it’s time to make an action plan for you and your team.
Is the office becoming too expensive? If your business runs from an office, have you considered whether or not it’s necessary. In 2020 many businesses made the decision to close up their offices for good and have recognised the green impact it can have on their operations. It’s not just better for the environment to run a business remotely, it’s also better for your wallet. Ditching office space or downsizing and have a part-remote team might be a necessary step to cut costs and still run efficiently as a small UK business in 2022.
Is staff productivity costing money? It’s not to say that your staff aren’t working, they just might be struggling to achieve their full potential if their workload is spread across multiple software packages and processes. Why not consider a CRM that includes third-party integration, allowing your team to access everything they need from one place?
Are you paying too much for equipment and services? A lot of businesses make use of multiple software packages and IT infrastructure that adds up considerably in costs as time goes on. By switching to a cloud-based all-in-one CRM solution, you could save on costly IT equipment and multiple software packages by having everything you need all in the same place, without paying a premium cost for anything individually.
By taking that step back and answering all these questions you can quickly identify the areas of your business that could be trimmed down, without impacting profits.
Don’t keep secrets
Keeping your team in the dark during difficult times will only serve to heighten their anxiety and potentially lead to a dip in staff productivity at best and low staff retention at best. So you need to be up front – establish a plan of action to get your business through a difficult time and ensure all the key stakeholders in your business are aware of it.
You may have to face the reality of difficult conversations with particular staff members as a small UK business in 2022. If their roles are nice to have rather than need to have to keep your business running, this might be something you need to make them aware of, and unfortunately you may need to discuss letting them go. Be fair in these arrangements, it’s a difficult time for everyone so be sure you’re giving them enough time to seek other opportunities.
Do you have what a small UK businesses in 2022 needs?
Have you given your team everything they need to work to the best of their ability, maximising their time to get as much productivity as possible? Have you considered looking into freelance talents to take care of smaller processes of running your business?
Providing your team with a bespoke CRM solution that allows them to integrate all the features they need for their day to day workflow can be a huge timesaver, making it a sound investment for productivity. With robust real-time reporting and integrated accounting, a bespoke CRM solution can be the go-to package for multiple teams and departments within your business to save money and boost productivity.
While a lot of businesses may seek to hire new members for every single process, offering those positions temporarily to freelance talent could be a great way to save money. Simply put with freelance talent you can hire on a temporary basis and only pay for work that needs to be done at the time, rather than looking for a new salaried member of staff that may not be required.
Keeping your team happy as a small business in 2022
Finally, it’s always important to consider the mental health of your team. While poor mental health does lead to dips in productivity and ultimately lead to a knock on cash flow effect, it’s also important to remember that we’re all human. Running a small UK business in 2022 is stressful, but so is just existing through it.
Consider partnering with organisations like Mind so that your staff have the option of counselling for work related stress (or so that you can make use of their services!). Making meaningful steps to demonstrate that you care about your team’s wellbeing and provide relevant resources:
- Improves overall positive internal sentiment towards your business, which can lead to positive word of mouth on professional networking sites like LinkedIn or Glassdoor
- Improves staff retention rate
- Ultimately improves productivity.
So it really does pay to care about your team. After all, they’re there to help you keep the doors open, even in difficult times.
Are you looking for an affordable bespoke CRM solution that could help your small UK business in 2022? Get in touch to try a demo of Lunar CRM and see if it could turn things around for you.