How Technology Can Help Boost Productivity in Small Business

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August 6, 2020 Business

We live in an age where everything is done by a computer. If your small business is not already making the most out of the technological revolution, then it soon will be. Technology offers shortcuts and solutions to many problems, and by using more antiquated methods, you will constantly falter when encountering these easily resolvable problems. By adopting the use of tech in your business, you will increase productivity, and make your small business more fluid and adaptable. This page will tell you a few ways that technology can help to boost your small business productivity.

How Technology Can Help Boost Productivity in Small Business

Up to eighty-five per cent of employees feel that they are unable to complete their tasks due to a lack of up-to-date technology and do not have the required resources. To ensure your business runs efficiently, keep your tech up to date. Here is how technology can boost productivity in your small business.

Outsource Your IT

IT support is very important for a small business; there are far too many things for small business owners to be worried about without having to manage their own IT system. Outsourcing your IT support can be very beneficial. According to the professional IT providers of Terminal B, technological gaps as such can easily hinder your competitiveness. Outsourcing your IT can ensure that you are on top of your competition and you are leading the market with up-to-date tech. It also allows you to give attention to other areas of your business that may require it.

Group Chats

Using group chats is a great way to make good use of technology. By having all of your employees in a group chat, you will be able to speak to them and have them speak to you, at all times, wherever you are. Group chats can be set up online or on your phone and are a very ingenious way to maintain constant communication with your staff. Very few businesses are using group chats at the moment, so by using one today, you will be ahead of everybody else and all of your competition. Group chats also make your business run very efficiently.

Time Tracking

Rather than using a traditional clock-in sheet, use an online time tracking app. This will save your staff a lot of time and enable you to keep track of them without having to read through stacks of paperwork.

Automated time tracking is growing very popular and is one of the best ways to monitor your staff’s hours. Abandoning the more antiquated method is necessary for an efficient and tech-friendly workplace.

SaaS Solutions

SaaS is a system in which programs and documents are hosted on the cloud. There was a time, not long ago, when an office would have to have the software installed manually on all of its computers. Now, thanks to SaaS solutions, the software is hosted on the cloud and can be used remotely by computers all over the world without a manual installation. SaaS solutions have made everybody’s lives much easier and have increased overall productivity.

They also ensure that when an update is due that your workers are not unable to work through it, and rather the update will take place overnight in the background. SaaS is the hottest trend and a very ingenious tech solution that everybody should be using.

Onboarding

Remote onboarding is another time-efficient method to boost productivity in your small business. When prospective employees are joining your team, in the past they would have had to send the necessary documents to payroll to prove their identity and bank account, but no longer is this the case. Employee onboarding is an online system in which your employees can upload their details and have them dealt with online rather than in person. Not only is this time conservative, but it is very effective, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic when we are being told to prevent as much unnecessary human contact as possible.

Online Training

Online training can boost productivity tenfold and mean that you do not need to hire out halls and spend money on training locations and equipment. Online training can simply be undertaken from a video call and is a very effective way to train your staff. Again, as previously mentioned, following the COVID-19 pandemic, we are told to limit our human contact as much as possible, which is why online training is great. Online training is something many businesses around the world are waking up to and beginning to adopt, and before long, will be industry standard.

Knowledge-Based Software

Knowledge-based software is an ingenious way to improve your small business productivity. Knowledge-based software is essentially software that offers you the ability to operate help centres and live chat on your website; the software can be doubled to work internally and can work as a functional and effective method for your employees to raise queries from behind their computer screens, thereby reducing the amount of time they spend walking around asking questions and increasing the amount of time they spend working.

For e-commerce websites and businesses, knowledge-based software can be a very effective tool for building a network of customers. It also reduces the number of people you have to employ to manage your phone lines for you; knowledge-based software completely circumvents the need for customer support lines and can allow your customers to raise queries online.

You should, of course, still have open phone lines for customers with urgent queries, but must encourage your customers to raise queries that are not necessarily urgent online as opposed to phoning in. This means you can cut down on the staff you pay to act as customer service, thereby saving money. You can also put more effort into other areas of your small business that may require it, boosting productivity.

Knowledge-based software will please your customers greatly, as nobody particularly wants to be constantly ringing into a call centre to ask simple questions. Try to, if you can, have actual people manning the live chat, as live chats that are controlled by automated robots can become very irritating, and can deter people from using your website at all.

Now you know a few ways that technology can boost your small business productivity. Technology is there for everyone and is something that everybody should make full use of. Your business needs the technical solutions mentioned in this page, so do not deprive it any longer.