Many businesses have struggled for a couple of years now, but 2022 seems to be bringing things to a head with supply chain issues, inflation, and hiring difficulties. These are not new business trends – you’re familiar with these challenges by now. As chamber pros, it feels frustrating and disconcerting to know that many of these issues are beyond our control.
There are even newer and everchanging trends on the horizon. While you can’t control those either, you can provide resources and connections to help our members find their own solutions. In this article we will cover some of the top new business trends of which your chamber of commerce should be aware.
We’ll also give you ideas on how your chamber can add that into its programming through webinars, speakers, or resources.
Freelancing
If you can’t beat them, join them–as the old saying goes.
While some business owners have been reticent to hire freelancers in the past, they may need to be open to the possibility now. Freelancers are available as full-time employees or for single, one-off tasks.
From accounting professionals to writers, menu creators to home care, freelancers exist in almost every market and industry. They can be an affordable solution because businesses don’t have to pay benefits and they can hire when they need them and pay per project.
Also, freelancers often have the software or tools necessary for the job. That means the business doesn’t need to pay for the technology or equipment (like a particular software subscription) when the company may rarely use it.
Sure, small businesses can go to sites like Fivrr or UpWork, but cheap isn’t always better. And freelancers for hourly hire tend to disappear easily. Plus, your chamber wants to promote not just local shopping but local outsourcing. Your freelance community is likely to be much larger than you or your members know. You just need to reach out to introduce both sides of the business equation to each other.
What the chamber can do:
Host a freelancer / small business intro mixer (speed networking style perhaps) or create a “Freelancer Fest” trade show. Often small business professionals don’t know the extent of the opportunities available when it comes to hiring independent consultants. Freelancers could wear easy-to-read name tags to help facilitate conversation and matchmaking such as “Hello, I create restaurant websites.”
Hybrid Online/Offline
It started with COVID and restrictions on gathering in person, but online/offline hybrid models of selling are likely here to stay.
From car buying to food orders, businesses need to embrace online shopping in all phases of the sales cycle. And that’s not just the ability to buy something online. Things like customization and personal shopping (via Zoom or other platform) are becoming expectations. That’s not likely to end even when COVID does.
What the chamber can do:
Offer a webinar on online sales or create a new section of the business directory dedicated to professionals and companies that can help small businesses meet current customer expectations.
Remote Work Options
Most businesses feel very strongly about offering remote work options. They love it or they hate the idea. And, yes, of course there are some businesses where remote isn’t a possibility. But for those where it is, it will be much easier to hire if remote work is offered.
There are challenges with managing a remote workforce. It’s a new business trend with a completely different skill set since you’re not face-to-face. It may also require collaboration tools and instituting metrics that might not currently exist within the business structure.
Many people are looking for remote work these days and because of that, employers are competing to hire against companies across the country, not just in their own backyard. However, offering remote work opportunities also opens up the business’ employee recruiting pool from nearby to anywhere with an internet connection.
What the chamber can do:
Host a webinar on the top skills to develop when managing a virtual team or provide information on how to hire for a remote position.
Larger Communities
In the past, a business may have been compared to similar businesses in a 25-30-mile area. These days, competitors are world-wide. That means not only is the price of goods and services being compared across the country/world but also company culture, company perks, employee benefits, and a host of other things.
This is one of those new business trends that cannot be ignore. Deciding you can’t implement something because it “hasn’t caught on here” is not valid. “Here” is no longer the town you are in. It’s everywhere.
What the chamber can do:
Communicate the idea that while the chamber represents business interests in the community, businesses are being compared with (and competing against) something much larger. Help them understand what that means by bring up these trends even if your members don’t think they apply to them or your area.
Marketing Automation
Technology is scary. Change is off-putting (for most) as well. But while marketing automation isn’t the most new business trend, it has now become a necessity in the sales nurturing process. And most businesses are going to have to embrace it or potentially lose out.
The good news is that marketing automation has been incorporated into a lot of the platforms/apps businesses are already using. They just have to set it up.
What the chamber can do:
There are many levels of training and expertise in marketing automation. Chambers can put together content about what marketing automation is and how to begin using it. Invite a member or marketing professional to share a marketing sequence they use. Bring in a marketer or power user of a program like Mail Chimp, Mailerlite, or other popular software and have them walk people through setting up their first marketing automation campaign. Add this as a specialty for businesses in your chamber business directory so that business owners who want someone else to do this for them don’t miss out.
More Niched New Business Trends
Depending on your member demographic the following topics may be hot draws for the chamber:
- Cryptocurrency
- Hybrid events
- How to create a class (online or in-person) to drive more business
- Expanding e-commerce with marketplace and 3rd-party websites
- Creating a truly unique selling proposition (hint: good customer service is not a differentiator)
- Addressing sustainability on a budget: things small businesses can do to make a big difference
- Preventing and/or dealing with burnout
- Using Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok for business
- Improving your mobile site
- Unique recruiting ideas on a small budget
There have been a lot of changes businesses have had to adapt to over the past couple of years. Some business owners are still not even aware of them or of the extent to which things have changed because they are just trying to survive. However, if you are looking to reexamine your offerings and try a new course of action or services, these new business trends should provide a good direction for content.
