You might run your own online business, but that doesn’t mean you’re not anyone’s boss or that you don’t answer to other people. In fact, your communications skills are more important than ever because you are now the face of your company; customers and business partners alike know with whom they are communicating when you correspond by email. To make it easier for you to stay in touch with everyone and stay on top of business, here are a few tips to help you improve your communications.
Keep your contacts organized
There are different ways to use organizational charts; usually companies use them to identify the organization structure of the enterprise, and the roles and relationships of the jobs, so they know who to whom they report. You could use them to stay on top of your suppliers and business partners. This way, you know who to get in touch with over specific issues, and who has assumed responsibility for certain aspects of your business.
Make the most of your meetings
While it can be easy to rely on email or the telephone, they don’t quite replace the effectiveness of face-to-face communication. That said, you probably won’t get a lot of opportunities to interact with your partners, so you need to make the meetings count. Even if you’re conducting the meeting through webcam, you should still make sure the area is tidy, and you dress professionally. If you’re all gathering for a face to face meeting, don’t be late. Either way, make sure you have a clear objective, or you have plenty of relevant questions to ask if you’re not running the meeting. You don’t want to waste anyone’s time, but you also want to make sure you cover all areas of concern; who knows when you’ll all be able to get together again.
Take advantage of social media
Take your social media marketing campaign a step further and use it to reach out to existing, and potential partners. After all, you’ve probably made a few connections this way already. You can use your social media platform to share ideas between your partners, solve problems together, and make further deals to benefit your business. Remember, this platform of sharing goes both ways, so make sure you offer your services to your partners if you think you could help.
Send out newsletters
It can be difficult to individually keep your partners up to date with your business ventures. To let them know you’ve developed new services that could be useful for them, send them all a newsletter covering the highlights. An internal newsletter is an excellent tool for ensuring that every employee is up on recent happenings, whether they be small or monumental in nature. Furthermore, you can include links to your website in this newsletter so they can learn more about your new services.
Check in
The best way to stay on top of internal news among your partners and suppliers is to check in with them regularly.
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