Small Business Trends 2020
The small business landscape is constantly changing. Evolving technology, changing consumer needs, and political and social issues all impact the ways in which small businesses operate. Or at least they should, if you plan to stay in the game.
Trends aren’t just for fashion, they’re for business too, and keeping up with them could help boost growth, improve sales and generally better your business. With that in mind, here are some of the small business trends we expect to see in 2020:
Sustainability
Climate change is on everyone’s mind at the moment and sustainability has become profoundly important to consumers. Many small businesses are keen to go green, and their efforts will only grow in 2020.
Consumer demand is calling for reduced waste, plastic-free packaging, sustainable products and more. If you don’t have a sustainability initiative in place already, now is the time to adopt one.
It isn’t enough to simply be green; you should also tell your customers about it. Be authentic and honest, but do let them know what you’re doing to help the environment.
Automation
Don’t worry, 2020 won’t be the year of the robot uprising but small businesses will be looking at the ways they can automate time-consuming processes like admin and marketing.
Accounting software is one key way to automate admin tasks, but small biz owners will also be automating sales, workflow, email and social media marketing, and customer support. Moving towards automation will help small firms keep up with increasing demand and gain competitive edge.
Stories will dominate social media
As a small business owner you’re probably well aware of the benefits of social media marketing. Social media is the best way to reach a huge audience, but it’s constantly changing and can be hard to keep up. Well, the next big trend in social media marketing is Stories and it’s a fun and easy one to adopt!
On Facebook and Instagram, more and more businesses are choosing to post Stories rather than posting in the news feed because it helps them get seen. Not familiar with Stories? Read this great guide to get posting.
Consumer reviews
Reviews have become more important than ever to both consumers and small businesses. With a vast majority of people using reviews to make buying decisions, it’s important that businesses leverage this power. If you’re not on Google My Business (or any other relevant review site, for that matter), it’s time to create a profile.
If the reviews aren’t coming in, you can gently nudge customers to write one. A small note with their order explaining how a review can help your business or asking a client for a testimonial is totally valid, and most will happily oblige.
These trends won’t apply to every business equally, but it’s important to be aware of them. The bigger trends will affect consumer expectations as a whole, which in turn may require you to change the way you do business. To find out more 2020 business trends, check out this article.