Communication Should Be The Secret To A More Efficient…

Are you looking at your team and wondering how to make them more productive? Simply shouting at them to work more won’t work, and it will only make the workplace a more tense place to be. Instead, you should look at where many of the misunderstandings and mistakes can begin: with communication. Here, we’ll look at how a change in how we get in touch can also change how we work, for better and for worse.

Ensure everyone can stay in touch easily

To make that employees don’t miss the opportunity to contact one another, or messages that are directed to them, it’s wise to standardize certain methods of communication. Emails can be messy to track after a while and it’s easy to lose conversations within direct message software. However, team communication software could be precisely what the team needs, able to contain and track conversations amongst multiple groups, with the ability to pin and note down whatever messages turn out to be important to the group.

Make sure everyone stays informed

If there are any changes that have to be implemented by multiple people across a team, or across the whole business, then ensuring that every gets the message is crucial. Simply sending out one email that everyone has to read isn’t enough. You should also take to other means to ensure they’re informed, such as announcing it over a buzzer vs speaker, or even going from department head to department head, or room to room, and personally informing them so that the word spreads. If there’s any change in direction or method decided from the top, it’s on you to keep the team informed.

Give them a reason to pay attention

Feel like your team isn’t as engaged in the conversation as they should be? Are they missing out on details because they’re not paying as much attention as you want? You can’t force them to be more interested in team meetings or strategic planning sessions. You can encourage them to be more engaged, however, by encouraging them to contribute more often. You can help encourage the kind of thinking that helps any business and thus they will be more likely to listen and contribute.

Invest in communications training

You might think of training and courses as something specifically for hard skills, but it can be just as important for softer skills, as well. Communications training can help establish ground rules for how your team talks, making sure that they are making the facts of any conversation clear, communicating with a clear goal, and less likely to make the little mistakes that can lead to misunderstandings and bigger errors along the line. If communication is truly important to your business, then finding communications training for your team should be a top priority.

Improving standards of communication across the office isn’t guaranteed to suddenly shape up the office. There can be other obstacles in the way of the efficiency and productivity you want to see. However, it should show a marked improvement.

Is Your Website Getting The Hits It Deserves?

Every business relies on metrics of some kind or another to decide how successful they are within a certain area. This may be about sales turnover, profit, margin, shrinkage, or conversion. When something is not good enough, the response is never to shrug your shoulders and hope for the best. The solution is always to see what you are doing wrong and to look for ways to improve or do this in another way. 

When it comes to your website, this is no different. And as a business, you need to be taking your data very seriously. If your website is not getting the hits that it deserves, then you need to create a whole new strategy.

Developing Your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Strategy 

If your business does not have an SEO strategy, then you need one as soon as possible. If this has left you scratching your head, you may well want to bring in the services of a digital marketing company who will know exactly how to get you to the top of the search engine results page in no time at all. 

If this is something that you plan on doing in-house, then you will need to create a strategy that focuses on several key areas of your website and online presence. Once implemented, you will need to make continual adjustments and changes. Your SEO is not a one-stop fix. Getting you to the top of the search rankings is only half the battle. You will need to work to stay in the top spot. 

How Best To Focus Your Attention

Improving the search rankings of your site should begin with a full assessment of where your site is performing. You can work this out by using tools such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console- which will provide you with lots of useful information about the links to and from your page, the speed that your page loads at, and whether all of your pages are appearing on Google. You can also look at the URLs of your pages to make sure that they are search engine friendly. 

Other great sources of information about how your website is performing can be found on Arhefs and Moz. These sites can provide a full breakdown of how your site may be scoring based on a number of criteria that search engines may be using. Moz will provide your site with a domain authority score between 1- 100. The higher the score, the better. With breakdowns in a number of key SEO areas, you can see what may be affecting your score. 

Making Your Site Accessible

One of the biggest areas that you should pay attention to is the speed of your website. Search engines don’t like directing users to slow loading sites. And people don’t want to wait more than a few seconds for a page to load. Don’t lose your visitors to a faster site.

The other area to look at is whether it loads on all devices well. Your site needs to load from phones, laptops, desktops, tablets, as well as be read by AIs 

Bringing The Best Out Of Your Employees

A strong leader inspires their team. Effective management, trust and pride in your team can help them become the best they can be and excel in their roles. With your team working to the best of their abilities, they will work harder, faster and feel happier in their roles. 

So what can you do to transform your team and ensure success for your business? Here are some strategies you can adopt to help bring the best out of your employees.

Improve communications

One of the most effective things you can do to improve your team’s performance is to work on your communications. Some simple ways of improving team communication include having an open-door policy, having regular meetings and getting to know each member of your team individually. Your team should feel comfortable knowing they can speak to you about their ideas and concerns, and you should always be tuned into the work that they’re doing.

To further improve team communications, introduce collaborative working tools. These can make it easier to manage projects and deadlines and allow teams to work better together, wherever they are.

Try coaching 

Coaching is a fantastic way to help your team achieve success. Employees will not only benefit on a professional level, but a personal one too – growing in confidence and becoming more focused in their roles. Ask yourself, what is success worth to your company? Investing in your employees through coaching could be a fantastic way to ensure success.

Reward and recognise

Maintaining employee motivation is important. It’s what keeps your employees enthusiastic about their work, and it helps them feel valued within the company. Having reward and recognition schemes can celebrate the hard work of your team, and inspire them to do more. From bonuses to company-wide recognition through congratulatory notes and rewards, there is a lot that can be done to thank your staff and inspire them to excel in their next project. Not all rewards have to be monetary to be appreciated, so it’s worth thinking of all the ways you can thank your team for a job well done.

Help them enjoy a healthy work/life balance

A healthy/work life balance is something that everyone should strive to achieve. However, it’s important that as an employer, you do everything that you can to support this. Providing flexible working, wellbeing sessions and making sure people don’t stay in the office past a certain time can all help your teams enjoy a life outside of work. By looking after your employees, you can make them feel a stronger connection to the company that will reduce turnover and increase job satisfaction.

By investing in your employees through motivation and support, you can develop a team that works hard for your business. Building a strong team takes time, great communication and a lot of trust, but it is worth it to create a more dynamic and passionate workforce. Start bringing the best out of your employees and experience some significant transformations in your workplace.