When thinking about marketing strategies for small business, one of the hardest to define is leadership. Successful small businesses are driven by business leaders who inspire the people around them. These leaders attract like-minded people who are drawn to the message and the values they instill to create a dynamic team. Together, these teams build unmatched experiences, products, and businesses.
At Hatchbuck, we believe that leaders aren’t born, they’re made. Here are a few successful leadership traits to start cultivating to grow your small business.
Vision
In order to create marketing strategies for small business or turn a small business into a large business, a business leader must have a vision. A vision is an overriding image or goal that they can see in their minds that spurs them forward. In other words, a leader sees the future of their company, and they can tell everyone what that future is. Their vision drives their company and all of their employees forward.
Communication
A business leader knows how to communicate their ideas to other people. They can discuss ideas with people of all levels of knowledge and excite them about their ideas. The business leader learns how to communicate effectively and inspire others to adopt the ideas as their own. A leader learns how to evoke emotions through communication to give followers a reason to invest in their beliefs. They communicate well with employees, customers and the general public.
Confidence
Business leaders exude confidence in the face of all odds. They are tough-minded, and don’t let petty grievances and non-believers belittle their vision. Visionaries are often bombarded with doubt and skepticism. They need to be confident enough that they can keep going forward in the face of negative comments, initial failure and doubt from their critics. Sometimes business leaders are the only ones who feel that their vision is possible, and they need a really thick skin to keep moving forward towards their vision. It is difficult to be a leader, but rewards are great for those that succeed.
Customer Focus
Customers instinctively know who has their interests in mind. A successful business leader keeps their focus on the customer’s needs and wants, and never forgets them even in tough times. A small business leader knows that customers are what drives their business, and they want to nurture relationships with their customers that are enduring and solid. The best leaders interact with customers directly as much as they can in order to stay in touch with what customers are thinking about their products or services.
Employee Focus
Business leaders that succeed pride themselves on excellence, and ask their employees to do the same. However, they also reward their employees for their successes, and inspire them by example. A business leader that expects their employees to adopt the company’s marketing strategies for small business offers their employees incentives to do so. The leader gets to know their employees, understands their success and struggles, and interacts with them as much as possible.
Culture is something we talk about every day at Hatchbuck. Leading by example and bringing out the leadership qualities in all our employees is what drives our business forward.