No matter how passionate you are about your business or ministry, no matter how much you care or how many hours you work there are always ways to improve. Many times I cringe as I watch small businesses and ministries make simple mistakes that could be costing them time and money. There are certain things that are essential to success, whether you are running a business or ministry – for all practical intent and purpose a ministry should be run as a business.
Let me address one of the major issues that plague entrepreneurs and ministries alike: Customer Service
Your customers need to be satisfied. If your ministry is taking two weeks to ship out a item or deal with customer inquiries you have failed. I don’t care how good your message is, how wonderful your speakers are or even how understanding your customers are… you have failed! If there is one single area in which many of our ministries and non-profit organizations fail it is in customer service.
It’s important to understand not only what you are able to do physically but also what you are capable and good at. I see many people struggling to do jobs they are absolutely horrendous at. If you are not good at customer service get somebody who is. Do what you excel at and find other people to fill roles based on their talents and expertise.
We live in a society that is completely upside down. On the one hand you have to have a piece of paper that states you have graduated from a prestigious institute of learning which qualifies you to do your job. But on the other hand I see those same businesses and ministries place people in roles they are absolutely awful at simply because of relationships and status.
My goal as I work with you and your team will be to discover and fix some of these common but important issues. If necessary I will fly to meet with your team, I will observe interactions with customers and staff and analyze workflow and productivity and create a strategy for success.
Inadequate and outdated website and functionality
Another major issue I run into is ridiculously outdated websites with poor or even broken functionality. A number of years ago I had a client who ran a very successful niche. We built them a website and marketed and promoted it. After a lot of hard work we were able to acquire 1st page rankings for some of their most competitive keywords which translated into a significant stream of high quality traffic looking to buy their product – now we have a issue! Our client didn’t want to have a shopping cart or sell from the website, they wanted customers to call in orders. As silly as this may sound to you, I am sure we have all made similar bumbling decisions which have cost us money and customers.
In fact, you may not even realize your website is mediocre. But here are some clues to help you see the light.
#1. Age – If your website is over 5 years old it probably needs a update. If it is over 10 years old it is completely outdated and needs to be rebuilt.
#2. Where is it hosted? – if your website is not hosted on it’s own domain, i.e. 1stRankings.com, but instead is hosted on a subdomain it is inadequate. Sites like godaddy, vistaprint and many others offer website hosting with mediocre features and options. If you are serious about your business or ministry these simply will not do.
#3. Broken links and functionality – If you have broken links – pages that don’t work – or lack of functionality such as a shopping cart (if you are selling products) and a contact form then your website needs to be updated
#4. Responsive design – if your website cannot be viewed properly on your phone then your website is outdated and needs to be updated. Up-to 60% of all internet traffic is not coming from mobile devices and if your website is at all technology related that percentage increases by 20%. It is imperative that your visitors be able to view and browse your website effortlessly from the mobile devices.
Contact us today to talk to a consultant about your website and business.