In 2020, the world was completely turned upside-down by the COVID-19 pandemic, drastically changing the way we lived our lives and conducted our business. For start-ups, 2020 was a bad year to get your company up and rolling. However, many businesses did so anyway, and are now thriving, and they were able to succeed because they applied a few particular mindsets that helped them weather the storm of the pandemic and made it possible for them to rise above it. Here are some tips for startups in the post-pandemic.
Source the Right Materials
Regardless of whether you’re making basic tumblers and glasses or going complex and selling drone delivery robots, you’re going to want the right materials. This means getting the highest quality plastics or the best prototype PCB assembly possible, including the as9100 aerospace-certified circuit board.
Remember that in the 21st century, the customer-centric nature of business means that high-quality products that add personal value to clients is the key to ensuring not only revenue but also positive customer experience.
Prior to the pandemic, manufacturers and companies sourced their materials from China, Southeast Asia, or other countries that could make the raw materials they needed faster and cheaper. With the pandemic in full swing, however, it will be better for both your marketing and your overall safety to source your materials locally.
Think about it: it cuts down your production time, which makes product delivery more efficient, and it shows your clients that you’re very much supportive of buying American and supporting local producers. It’s a win-win for you and your customers.
Research Your Customers
Again, the 21st century’s business model is currently defined as being customer-centric, which means that companies now need to make sure that their products and their marketing are focused on what the customers want and need at the moment. Gone are the days when brands can convince people to buy a product simply for the sake of owning it; now, a product needs to be able to offer value to an individual and it must address a pain point they when purchasing it.
With social media and other data-gathering tools available to brands, creating a psychographic model of a customer base is essential to find out exactly what your customers want, why they want it, how they want it, how often they need it, and where they want it purchased, among other things. Creating an accurate psychographic model used to be the dream of advertising agencies back in the Mad Men days, but now, it’s an essential tool for a company’s continued survival.
Leverage Digital Solutions
To do all of this, however, brands need to leverage digital solutions for their business processes. Whether it’s data analytics, digital marketing, online accounting, automated customer onboarding, drone delivery of products, and everything else in between, a company should leverage any and all digital solutions that it can to make their business processes faster and make their customers lives a little easier.
In the 21st century, and especially in the post-pandemic world we live in now, a company needs digital solutions to survive and thrive. Digital technology isn’t the future; it’s the necessary present.