Using technology to help organise your business

Ian Egerton looks at how technology can help create a smooth-running salon business. There are literally hundreds of tools gadgets and gizmos to help you organise and run your business. Many are free or low cost and can add amazing value to your management systems. So which tools are right for you and how effective are they in helping you run your business?

• To reach a wider audience you might use social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Pre-scheduling your posts helps manage your time and it is made easy with any of the free and low cost online marketing tools available, such as Buffer, HootSuite or Stacker.

• To organise your paperwork you could lose the filing cabinet (or bits of paper scattered between home and work) and keep everything in the Cloud, with free or paid-for secure Cloud based options from many providers. Common ones include Dropbox, SugarSync, Google Drive or SpiderOak to name but a few.

• Note keeping for meetings is easy as we jot down key points whilst on the move using our smart phones and tablets. Evernote, MS OneNote and SimpleNote help you sync across multiple platforms and allow sharing, which is great for managers to send a unified message across any number of people.

• Communicating with your team is essential. While team meetings and one-on-ones are invaluable, for a quick injection of motivation why not group chat? Use closed forums such as WhatsApp or Viber to send short direct messages about a promotion, focus products or services.

• What about keeping your team on track with progress reports, updates on bonuses and commissions earned; or staff reviews and pay reviews? There are digital calculators for salary setting, price list creators and tools for recording staff attendance and calculating holidays. There are also many online tools, some from your POS system and  some more specialist tools from a plethora of online resources.

Software and Apps should be designed to help you save time, effort and help you be accurate in your management processes. At the end of the day, all you want is the best tools for the job, as the salon industry is labour intensive you need tools that are relevant to you and your team; help you understand your business and improve salon performance. Digital management solutions allow you to:

• access your information across many platforms on multiple devices
• share information, communicate with your team quickly and simply, individually and as a group
• accurately calculate many business queries

Advantages to you and your team

• digital tools save you time and energy by collating information into useful data
• better engagement and employee feedback
• free and low cost software available online
• improved information sharing and communication with your team

For more information about using technology to manage your business contact Ian Egerton via LoopHR.com See his HR software in action here.