Whether you already own an online business and find yourself constantly exhausted from the daily work, or you plan to open an online business in the future, there is still plenty of time for you to get into the swing of systemizing your business. Once you start working on the steps outlined in this guide, you may realize that many are simply common sense.
Step One: Identifying Recurring Tasks
To start systemizing your business, you need to start by listing all the general functions that you do, both daily and weekly. If you are a brick-and-mortarbrick-and-mortar business, an online business, or a hybrid business that involves an Internet presence and a physical site, it doesn’tdoesn’t matter. Some of the more common tasks will be applied to every business.
Accounting
When it comes to your business’sbusiness’s income and expenses, you must create a for keeping track of what comes in and what goes out. Having business systems in place for your accounting tasks will allow you to ensure that you are profitable, as well as make sure you have the appropriate records to back up your tax filing, that you have paid your vendors, and that your customers are paying you within It is essential to make sure that your employees are delivered on time and have the right amount of taxes deducted from their paychecks.
You have to keep a close eye on this system in your business, but you can still do the work yourself. Tracking credit card purchases, invoicing clients, and following up on past-due accounts are some things that can be done with financial management systems. Some other accounting systems can be systemized.
- Purchasing
- Tracking credit card purchases
- Accounts payable
- Accounts receivable
- Deposits to the bank
- Cutting checks
- Payments on taxes
- Profit and loss statements
- Invoicing
- Daily cash out
- Petty cash
- Employee expenses
- Payroll
Putting these systems in place will help prevent employee theft and give you a clear picture of your business’sbusiness’s numbers. They will enable you to control your purchasing and ensure that you sign off on each decision.
Administration
Depending on the size of the business, a central manager or several managers who oversee one or more departments are required to ensure that the day-to-day tasks are being accomplished. Some administrative tasks should be computerized. Implementing a series of systems can reduce training time and keep you from explaining to new hires how the phone needs to be answered every time they join the team.
Opening and closing procedures
- Phone greeting
- Mail processing
- Office maintenance
- Filing
- Paper management
- Document production
- Inventory management
- Order processing
- Creating orders
Marketing
You need to know that people are interested in your products to get your online business off the ground. Creating strategies, learning how to reach niche markets, itioning your product, and writing compelling marketing copy and general marketing collateral are some areas where you spend most of your time. You are likely concentrating on generating new leads and getting more people to call you. These efforts can be easily delegated to other members of the staff. Different marketing systems can be systemized.
- Promotions
- Marketing Calendar
- Advertising
- Direct mail
- Advertising creation system
- Social media
- Content creation
- SEO systems
- Newsletter Agence 25 templates
You can use systemization to create simple systems for your business’sbusiness’s primary promotional efforts. Your team should be able to pick up your marketing manual and implement a successful email marketing campaign or create a purposeful advertisement.
Sales
Sales and marketing are lumped together by many people. To create a truly systemized business, they must be treated as different functions within the company. While marketing is about getting the general word about your business, sales are about following leads and converting prospects into paying customers. Some of the sales systems you can systemize are as follows.
- Referral program
- Customer retention
- Sales procedures
- Lead generation
- Lead management
- Sales script
Technology and Data
It’sIt’s almost impossible to operate a business if you don’tdon’t have reliable resources to help you keep your website functioning correctly, your server running, and your workstations up and running. Your business needs to have transparent systems for managing both paper and electronic organization to ensure that sensitive business information is protected and easily accessible.
Implementing data management systems in your business will help you stay organized. If everyone on your team knows where information is supposed to be stored and how it should be handled, you can reduce the amount of paper around the office. Here are other data management systems that can be systemized to ensure your business keeps running.
- IT management
- Data backup
- Computer repairs
- Electronic information storage
- Client files
- Project files
- Point of sales system
- Financial data management
You must ensure that your data management systems include a data backup system. This will ensure that your data and business are protected if something happens to your server or computer software.
Human Resources
Even if you only have one other person involved in your online business, someone has to ensure that you are functioning within the guidelines and regulations that apply to the kind of business that you are running. Managing HR policies and procedures can get very involved, so it is essential that this function is controlled by someone who has an eye for detail and can understand many data.
Along with creating systems for hiring, firing, and training employees, your HR systems will include documented processes for the following:
- Recruitment
- Retention
- Incentive programs
- Employee reviews
- Employee feedback process
- Employee training
- Professional development
- Ongoing training
- Job descriptions and role profiles
- Uniforms and dress code
Employees with clear expectations and structures are happier and more productive in their positions. Establishing a clear training manual will save you the time of training each new staff member.
Communication
Communication is essential to any business and can take up much time. Sales letters, fax cover letters, internal memos, newsletters, and reports are some types of communications that need to be created regularly by different people within the organization.
Most of the time, the communication systems you use in your business are similar. From scratch, each one is created by a different person. There is a massive opportunity for the systemization of your communication systems. Consistency in your business will be ensured by systemizing these communication systems.
- Internal memos
- Fax cover template
- Letterhead
- Team meeting agenda
- Internal emails
- Newsletter Agence 25 templates
- Sales letter templates
- Meeting minutes
- Reports
- Internal meetings
- Scheduling
Customer Relations
Customer relations are one of the critical areas you need to consider systemizing. Establishing a system for your customer relations will ensure that new employees understand how your business handles customers. This makes it possible to maintain a high level of customer service. These customer relations systems are a good choice if you want to get your business systemized.
- Incoming phone call script
- Outgoing phone call script
- Customer service standards
- Customer retention strategy
- Customer communications
- Ongoing customer communication strategy
- Customer liaison policies
Purchasing
You will be required to purchase items for your business from time to time, no matter how lean your online business is. Having a process in place can ensure that you always have things you need, even if you only buy general office supplies, software programs from time to time, or promotional materials. You can systemize some of the purchasing systems that you have.
- Inventory
- General supply orders
- Shipping materials
- Evaluating pricing
- Policy compliance
- Filing paperwork
It is essential to have someone in your company capable of establishing relationships with your vendors and maintaining the rapport to ensure that you are getting the best prices on the goods and services you are purchasing. Your initial list needs to encompass all the essential functions related to operating your business. Once you have the list in place, you can begin the next step of the process.
Step Two: Organizing and Prioritizing the Functions
Once you’ve identified all the recurring tasks in your business, it is time to organize and prioritize those functions. Depending on the size of your business, you can combine some of the functions into a single, general category as long as your business remains relatively small. It’sIt’s also essential to remember that you can always split classes later on as it becomes necessary. Here are some examples of how you can prioritize your critical business functions.
Product Development
It’sIt’s essential that you have a core product or service that you can offer to potential customers before you start a business. Product development is one of the most critical functions in your business and, therefore, should be at the top of your priority list. Since you will need to continually improve and refine your product over time to stay competitive in your market, product development is likely to remain high throughout the business. Being able to come up with new products that complement your core line will be a function that you will have to perform throughout your time in industry.
Administration and Accounting
It makes sense to combine the administration and accounting functions for small businesses. A single office manager who can take care of the day-to-dayday-to-day clerical tasks, and postedits and debits to the books, can be hired. You can divide these two functions into separate teams as your company grows. These two areas of your business need to be structured and in place before you can start selling your product or service.
Tech Support
You can successfully run an online business if you don’tdon’t have a functioning website or need help with your equipment. Having someone who knows how to build and manage a site and keep your equipment running is essential to have in place before you make your first sale.
Sales, Marketing, and Customer Support
When you start your online business, these functions can be combined and handled by one or two people. As your business grows, you will need to split the tasks into their department and have separate policies documented for the processes that go along with each task.
After you’ve analyzed your list and prioritized the functions according to their importance and need for getting your business up and running, the next step is developing the policies and procedures that will be essential for keeping your business running, even when you aren’taren’t in the office.
Step 3: Developing Policies and Procedures
When you have your priorities in order, it is time for you to start developing the policies and procedures at your business’s core. You can focus your time and effort on growing your business if you have policies and procedures that keep each of the essential functions of your business running smoothly. You shouldYou must remember that even if you combine several functions under one umbrella, each of them must be clearly defined with their specific processes and responsibilities.
Policy and procedure development is all about creating a logical process that can be documented in a training manual. A team of three must be as relevant as they would be for a group of three hundred. You can use these examples to start crafting the procedures for each of the essential functions of your business.
Accounting
You should have policies that include guidelines on how frequently posting should be done to Payables and Receivables, when taxes should be determined, how to handle employee payroll, and how to track expenses.
Administration
The administration policies and procedures should include:
- Guidelines on scheduling employees.
- Drafting letters and general correspondences.
- Arranging and maintaining the filing system.
- Book travel for department personnel.
- Order office supplies.
Sales, Marketing, and Customer Support
The sales, marketing, and customer support departments will need clearly defined instructions on interacting with the public. When approaching prospective customers and taking care of existing ones, the Sales and Customer Support departments will need guidelines for creating compelling ads that appeal to consumers. In contrast, the Marketing department will need guidelines for making effective advertisements that appeal to consumers.
Step Four: Documenting the Processes
For your business systems to work correctly, they need to be documented so that everything runs smoothly and smoothly in any given situation. Your new hires will have experience in the area where they will work, so there are some excellent resources for managing this. You can draw on this experience to help create policies and procedures for your business. If you want to cut down on the time you spend writing down the processes, you can use templates and samples found on the internet or from other companies. There is no need for you to spend your time reinventing the wheel. A lot of the information you need has already been written and can be tailored to work for your company with minimal effort.
Suppose you don’t have the time or resources in your company to help you document your policies and procedures. In that case, you can always hire a business consultant to help create a training and workable employee manual. The money you spend on this service will be well worth it in the long run.
Step Five: Implement the Processes
Once you have started documenting your processes and procedures, you’ll want to take them for a test drive. Start implementing the strategies to determine if the basic structure is sound. Don’tDon’t be upset if you run into bumps along the way. No business, no matter the size, gets it entirely right the first time. As you do a test run on the processes, consider whether the process has the potential to be tweaked along the way to ensure that your company is capable of running smoothly when you’re you’re away.
As your company grows, you must add positions to various departments, adjust policies and procedures to accommodate new laws and regulations, or create new departments by splitting older ones. If your primary system is sound, these new developments in your company will be relatively painless to deal with and will only partially require you to overhaul the way you do business.
Step Six: Diagram the Flow of Your Business
It isn’tisn’t enough for you to merely identify and prioritize the functions in your business. You also need to ensure that there is a logical ebb and flow between each of these essential areas.
While this may seem redundant once you’ve-you’ve figured out what each department is supposed to do, you can think of it as creating the jewels that go into the necklace. They may be beautiful in their own right, but if they aren’taren’t correctly linked, nobody can wear them. Here are some ideas to help you with the diagramming and definition of the communication flow within your business.
- Start with diagraming how things flow through each department. For example, a new customer order begins with Sales, makes its way to Order Processing, finds its way to Shipping, and ends with billing. At some point, Customer Support will need to follow up and ensure the customer is happy with their purchase.
- Next, identify who is responsible or accountable for each progression in the flow.
- Evaluate how long it takes for the order to flow through the process and determine if any areas need improvement.
If you diagram the various processes, you will be able to see whether or not the policies and procedures you have implemented are working correctly. It will help you and your team spot areas where you can improve communication, more clearly defined processes, and which steps can be streamlined to save you both time and money. Depending on the size and nature of your business, the degree of detail and time you spend developing these procedures will depend.
While some of the steps will be able to be completed in a matter of minutes, others will take days or weeks to accomplish. Building a solid foundation when you start your business will save you a considerable amount of time and money once you have your company up and running.