According to the World Economic Forum, small businesses in the United States are responsible for employing half of the private sector workforce. It makes small businesses the backbone of the country’s economy.

COVID-19 has been an ultimate disaster to the economy, globally. Many companies and start-ups have felt the virus spread blow, but small businesses have been suffering from it the most.

In volatile times where social distancing, lockdown, and measures to curb the spread of virus happened, small business has been struggling to survive.

In September, Yelp released its Economic Impact Report that revealed that businesses across the US are facing closures due to the coronavirus crisis. The report also concluded that approximately 97,966 businesses were closed out of which 60% of the closed businesses will not be reopening.

While these reports are giving small business owners a feeling of doom and gloom, there are still many ways through which they can work on building their small business.

Pandemic has been hard for everyone, but it has also been a source of innovation. Many businesses have started putting their energy into discovering new ways and also adapting changes to make sure their business stays stable during the coronavirus storm.

If you have not thought through the process of keeping your company stable, then we have listed down some ways that can help you:

Be True on Social Media

COVID-19 is still making it impossible to foster a relationship with clients, through in-person meetings. It is time for small businesses to use social media to showcase their relationship skills.

As per the report of Smart Insights, more than half the world is now using social media. The report also said that social media users are spending an average of 2 hours and 24 minutes of their lives on different networking sites.

With such high usage, social media should have your attention most. A business that is using social media to help people learn about their products and services are simultaneously building a better and stronger relationship with their customers online.

In times like these, small businesses need to go beyond marketing their products and services. To build a loyal clientele online, a small business should focus on interacting with the customers.

Since the coronavirus outbreak has shifted millions of people into homes, the usage of social media has also increased. Therefore, this is the best time to start working on your social media appearance by fostering your conversation with your customers and by being responsive on social media platforms.

PIVOT

As a small business owner, you should always be ready for pivoting. Pivoting means to shift to a new or a better strategy if the old one is not working well with your company.

The coronavirus pandemic has changed our lives completely. People that had a routine of taking a walk outside their homes or spending their half-day at gyms had to find an alternative to continue with their fitness time in the coronavirus outbreak.

Similarly, the business had to shift their working mode in the coronavirus times to help their companies continue during the times of crisis. Many businesses were reluctant to put their staff on work from the home mode, but now with the growing spread of the virus, companies have started making remote working a permanent option for employees.

And keeping the changes in mind, employees are shaping their lives accordingly. Many employees have changed their slow internet connection with high-speed internet services like RCN Internet to work effectively from home.

All of this shows us that there is no harm in shifting your plan at the time of need. Therefore, as a small business, you should not shy away from pivoting and also understand that time has come when you should pivot to survive.

Optimize Business Spending

There is no better time than the time we live in to optimize your business spending.

By reducing the operational costs of your company, you can make space for higher chances of survival in a pandemic.

A better example of how businesses have started optimizing their spending during a pandemic is switching to digital ads from print ads.

By investing in digital marketing strategy, small businesses can save plenty of their marketing expenses, which can be used later for other purposes.

Bottom Line

There is no better time than this to start thinking about alternatives to keep your businesses running at low cost and higher effectiveness.