Survival Tips for Startups after Pandemic
Introduction
The Covid 19 outbreak was a bolt from blue and it has affected everyone, especially startups so it’s more crucial to find survival tips for startups. Most startups have observed a decline in supply or orders. According to a survey done last year, around 70% of startups were impacted. 12% had to shut down and 60% were operating in disruption.
Now as the situation is slowly normalizing, it is important to make a proper recovery plan and take back the market with a storm. If you are not sure how to start or proceed, here is a guide that can help you in getting your business back on course.
What should you do next?
↬ Evaluate the financial damage done on your startup because of covid
The first step in making a plan is to determine how much your business has been affected or in which areas you have to work more.
Compare your last year’s financial plan to see how much your business has been affected. Check, which areas you have faced the most loss, where it has been profitable, or which customers have left.
Check — STARTUPS: You Need To Watchout For! 2021 EDITION.
↬ Learn from your loss
It is important to take some time and learn from everything that happened during that time of the pandemic. Think of all the things which worked and which didn’t during that time and figure out how you can rectify those problems.
↬ Prepare a post-covid business plan
Planning is really important for every business. Many business owners don’t prepare a business plan or even if you have a business plan it is time to re-assess it and make changes to meet the new requirements of the market.
It is never late to make a business plan. In this new plan, you need to analyze how the pandemic has affected you. It should work in the favor of your strengths. You should set small and realistic goals rather than taking large steps and put a strain on your budget.
↬ Rebuild your budget- Most Important Tips for Startups
Now that the plan is set it is important to make a budget to move ahead with the set plan. There are chances that you may need to spend money before earning it. You may need to hire or train new people or buy some necessary types of equipment for the office.
So the main focus of the budget should be to cut off unnecessary wastage of money and to stay up float till you start making profits again.
↬ Make new sales channel
As we are getting digitized day by day it is a necessity to have multiple sales channels and to take your business online. With quarantines, it was difficult to make revenue for the businesses with very few sales channels.
Even after the pandemic, it will be beneficial to have an online business because people prefer it over going through the hassle of finding the location and going to them.
↬ Hire trustworthy and skilled people
It may be possible that during the time of pandemic you had to fire some of your employees to meet your financial losses. To meet the shortage of employees, don’t hire ‘good enough’ people rather hire skilled ones.
Most people make the mistake of choosing ‘good enough’ employees only, though they work just fine and get all things done, they rarely bring something new or interesting to the table which can’t be beneficial in the long run.
You can also ask your old trustworthy employees if they want to come back now that you are trying again. Because having someone whom you can trust eases up a lot of burdens and helps in building the foundation of business.
Check — 10 Startup Advice by Top Founders
↬ Set a time period for Rebuilding
You need to do several things to rebuild your business and doing all things together is not ideal. It is important to set a timeline to do things in a methodical order so the chances of mistakes are reduced considerably.
Prioritize the things and start doing them in that order, like you may need to first create a budget then restocking, hiring, and so on.
↬ Let your voice be heard
Invest in a good digital marketing strategy to improve your startup’s visibility. It will bring new customers. An emotional touch in your advertisement campaign will connect you to new customers directly.
One of the best ways to do advertising is to let your customers speak about you. Ask your client if they can recommend you to their friends. This will also promote your business.
You should not spend way too much on advertising in the starting phase, just enough to get your word out.
↬ Reconnect with your former customers
Talk to your former customers and tell them about your new schemes and lure them on your side again.
Reconnecting with former clients is the easiest way to drum up sales in business. When the client already knows about your services and was used to paying you will trust you much easier.
Though it is not a good idea to assume that they remember you, so when you reconcile with them and they don’t exactly remember you, don’t get bummed up and remind them of your connection.
↬ Keep some extra fund for emergency
Don’t use all of your funds in this current plan only. Keep some liquid money for emergencies like if you get an important order you might need cash for that or any crisis occurs. This extra money will save you from further shocks.
Having a plan B doesn’t hurt because you can never be too safe. Getting precautionary measures for the worst-case scenario improves the chances of surviving.
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Conclusion
Challenges are there in every aspect of our life the only thing we can do is learn from them, adapt, and fight. The same goes in the business world, the only thing you can do is don’t give up and fight till you achieve your goals.
Take ideas from the above tips and take your business to the next level.
If you are still not sure how to move forward or how to recover and come back into the game? Then we are here to help you, what are you waiting for?