Why Video Conferencing is Beneficial to Businesses

In order to conduct business on a global scale, it pays to invest in the right types of communication technology. These days, many companies have satellite offices scattered around the world. Important clients and suppliers are often scattered across several different continents. Staying connected is critical, but the need to hop in a plane is increasingly diminishing. While the Internet has played a huge role in this development, video conferencing is making one of the biggest differences of all. Today's successful businesses rely on technology such as 3 way video conferencing to hold meetings, compare notes and to stay in touch when it matters the most.

Save on Transportation Costs

Fuel prices are at all-time highs. It's more expensive to travel by plane than ever, which means that the costs of holding in-person meetings and conferences can be prohibitive. In many cases, there's no pressing need to have every key player in the same room. With video conferencing, a company can still get together on a face-to-face basis without having to spend vast amounts of money to get everyone in the same place. Video conferencing happens in real time, so meetings can be scheduled when they are needed.

Last-Minute Meetings on a Whim

Emergencies crop up from time to time. Discussing such matters by phone can be quite inefficient. With video conferencing technology on hand, a company can hold an emergency meeting on a last-minute basis. Notifying the people who need to attend is easy, and getting the conference started is too. Using video conferencing in this way is akin to calling everyone to the boardroom. In this case, however, the participants can be located in far-flung corners of the earth. It is well worth it for a business to invest in this type of technology because it can keep business moving along no matter where various employees are.

Brilliant Presentations

From keynote addresses to presentations about new products and services, big announcements call for special features. The nice thing about video conferencing is that it allows businesses to hold presentations that include a wide range of cutting-edge features. These presentations can be shared with people across the world, and those people can interact and provide feedback at the same time. New ideas and exciting new strategies can be developed between participants who are located in several different time zones. The possibilities are endless.

Spend Less on Travel Accommodations

Hotel accommodations can be quite costly. In lieu of sending an employee out to participate in a conference, video conferencing is an affordable alternative. More and more companies are turning to this type of technology for this exact reason. Even if video conferencing is only used on special occasions, the amount of money that it saves a business can be considerable. Reducing overhead is an obvious way to enhance profitability, and 3-way video conferencing and related technologies can go a long way towards achieving that goal. In addition to that, it enhances employee productivity by eliminating a lot of wasted travel time.


There's no doubt that video conferencing is one form of technology that isn't going away any time soon. If anything, it will only become more ubiquitous in the months and years to come. By getting on board with it now, today's businesses can start enjoying all of its benefits as early as possible.

Four simple marketing tips for small businesses

As everyone knows, marketing is a key part of any company’s arsenal if it is to succeed in today’s world of instant communication and fierce competition. But whilst it is certainly essential to have a business marketing strategy in place, you don’t have to overcomplicate things – particularly if you are a small or fledgling business with a limited budget for promotion. 

Here are five simple and relatively low-cost tips to get you started:

• Strategic advertising: Big corporations will often have huge advertising budgets for both television and national newspapers or magazines, not to mention online. But if you are a small company you won’t have the capital for this so you have to think a little more creatively. Place adverts in local papers or on local website and remember that it is more effective to place smaller, cheaper adverts more frequently than to splash out on a big advert that you can only afford to place once a month. Also, design your advertising to help bring in more sales by including some kind of special offer to draw in the customers.
  
  
• Email marketing: Using the internet is a perfect form of business marketing for small companies because it is cheap and you can use it as often as you like. The crucial thing here is to compile a detailed database on your customers so you really know which products will be suited to them. Then you can work on sending out targeted marketing emails which are specifically tailored to their needs. Send out regular e-newsletters as well as this serves both as a reminder that your company is still out there, and as a way of keeping customers informed of new products or offers.
  
  
• Professional website: This is so crucial: your website is your biggest marketing tool and yet so many companies neglect it or allow it so look amateurish. It is worth it to hire a really good web designer to put together an eye-catching and simple-to-use site. Yes, it will cost more but every customer visiting your site will be impressed by its professional look. Once you have your website, update it regularly with new content to keep it fresh and current – another thing many companies fail to do.
  
  
• Joint promotions: Another useful marketing strategy if your budget is small is to team up with other small companies who are not in direct competition with you, but complement your business in some way further up the chain. For example, if you are a catering company, perhaps you might want to contact an events organiser or wedding planner and offer to publicise their services in exchange for them recommending yours. This is a simple and, more importantly, completely free way of generating new business.

If you are a small or medium sized business you may not have the budget or time to spend a great deal of money on your marketing strategy. However, every company needs a marketing strategy of some kind and luckily there are many simple and low-cost methods you can use to get you started.

Time to bring in the marketing experts?

Every company, whether small and local or large and multinational, will find itself going through peaks and troughs. Depending on where the problem lies – whether it is the result of external market forces or problems within the company itself – there are certain times when it may behove you to call in the services of a professional marketing company. 

These exist to help businesses develop methods to keep bringing in new clients and present their goods and services to the world in the best possible way. But how do you know when your company might benefit from a little help in this department? 

Here are some signs to look out for:

• Behind the competition?: If your biggest competitors seem to be everywhere you turn, it may well be because they’ve devised a more effective marketing strategy than you have. You don’t want to lose out to them, so this is the time to hire an expert in before you begin to lose customers to them. If you’re less visible than your competitors, who are clients going to choose?
  
  
• Not enough time: If you’re constantly putting things off, or you and your employees never have enough time in the day, it may well be that you have overextended yourself. If this is the case then there is no way you are going to be able to devote the necessary amount of time to promotion. Hiring in a marketing company will pay two-fold in this situation: Firstly, they will re-invigorate your marketing strategy; and secondly, they should be able to suggest practical ways for you to make better use of your time.
  
  
• Lack of leads: This is one of the clearest signs that your marketing strategy is failing somewhere. Rather than sitting back and waiting for the customers to come to you, you should be using all means at your disposal – print media, billboards, the internet, word-of-mouth or whatever else you can think of – to get your message out there. If you aren’t getting the leads then you clearly aren’t doing this in the most effective way, or often enough. Time, then, to seek outside advice.
  
  
• High employee turnover: This can be for many reasons, but employees will often be dissatisfied if they feel there is a lack of direction or structure to their role. A clear marketing strategy gives employees something to focus on, and also creates a more dynamic, positive working atmosphere are the new business begins to come in. Bringing in the services of a marketing company for a limited period of time will set you on the right track and hopefully ensure your staff feel motivated enough to stick around.

Choosing the right consultant for your business

Once you’ve made the decision to hire a business consultant to boost flagging sales or help set your company on a new path, you may think it’s just a simple matter of picking up the phone and calling one in. However, be aware that there are many companies today offering business consulting services and not all of them are what they seem. 

It’s crucial that you take your time when choosing the right person for you, or you could just be throwing good money after bad. Here is how to go about making your selection:

• Get references: Look on internet forums or speak to other local companies to listen to the experiences of others who have recently hired consultants. What kinds of problems did they encounter, and what did they wish they had done differently? Find out which consultants have helped achieve good results on more than one occasion and which ones have been less than effective. This will give you a good initial idea of who to consider and who to avoid at all possible costs.
• Thorough vetting: It may seem tedious, but when you have selected a short list of consultants you think may work for you, you need to set up meetings to talk to them about what they might offer you. These conversations should be able to tell you a lot: Did they listen to what you wanted, or did they just fire off some ‘quick’ solutions right away? Did they seem to understand the issues you presented them with and ask thoughtful questions, or did they just ramble on with stories of past clients? If the former in both cases, they may be legitimate, if the latter – hire them at your peril.
• Billing: Find out how you will be charged for these business consulting services. Don’t automatically go for the cheapest service, as there may well be a reason why they need to charge so little. Instead, look at the payment structure. Are you able to agree a fixed amount upfront, or are they proposing to leave things open for additional costs later on? If the latter, beware, as many less reputable consultants will attempt to maximise their profits by bringing other ‘advisers’ into the project, for which they will charge extra, or charging for unspecified additional services. Generally, I would say it’s always best to agree from the outset exactly how much you are going in for.

Above all, don’t be put off by the potential pitfalls as a good consultant really can bring enormous benefits. As long as you are careful and follow recommendations from trustworthy sources, you should soon see your business change for the better.