Every dark thing can have a bright part. So what good can come out of this COVID-19 pandemic?
We left many of our daily habits and social activities since the Coronavirus causing havocs around the world. You know all the bad news already. But don’t you think our changing context of living has some hope? Apparently, yes.
Counting all the disasters of history, humankind lives through it. Therefore, each of the harshest times always opened some new opportunities. Think of the great Spanish Flu pandemic in 1918, it has completely revolutionized the healthcare sector after making people realize how helpless human can get during an epidemic.
So, if you want to build a business in this global business crisis due to COVID-19, then what are your chances to succeed? How should you proceed further? Which changes bringing new business possibilities? In this blog, we are going to answers all of these questions.
Major Changes This Global Outbreak Brings
We may never get back to the life we used to have. Phrases like “Home quarantine” and “Social Distancing” became a part of our everyday living now. You can’t go outside without safety measures (Masks, gloves, hand sanitizer, etc). The jokes seem valid enough, “we all are becoming a walking dispensary.” And all our lives are hanging in an endless uncertainty.
Humans are made to do something for a living. But now you are bound to stay in the home as billions of people also doing the same. So, the first shock bearer is the global economy. It took a large hit. But again, seeing no other option now everyone is trying to cope up with it. And the good news is they are finding new ways to survive with it.
Let’s follow through the different scenarios of changes this Coronavirus pandemic is bringing.
Remote Working Is the Lifeline for All the Businesses
A few years ago, did you ever think that you are going to do office besides managing the households almost every day? Tech giants like Google, Facebook to the tiniest business firms, most of the organizations are encouraging their employees to stay at home accomplishing all their official activities remotely.
7 million U.S people are working from home which consists of 3.4% of the total population of the country. Remote work is growing by more than 44% over the last five years.
Since the lockdown took place, the companies already realizing what they were missing. Remote office management does have limitations in many aspects. But it can save effort, the huge expense of rentals, utilities, and of-course, the importance of cloud computing.
Nowadays remote working tools are gaining immense popularity. Slack got 9000 paid customers from mid-February to March. It is 80% more than the estimation of the two preceding quarters. Google Meet topped the list with 100 million daily meetings in last month alone.
However, many companies that produce physical goods, they have no other way to run their mills. But they are reinventing the working shifts now.
Online Shopping Is Seeing Surge in Sales
Walmart probably waiting for this situation to boost up their eCommerce growth. They have seen a superb rise of 24% in sales since the lockdown began. The overall online sales in the US increased by 74% in the first quarter of 2020.
People are purchasing online extravagantly. Since you need more supplies than usual while spending all the hours inside your home. Therefore, you can have a good experience spending your time through different eCommerce shop.
The COVID-19 situation is creating new needs of products you were never going to buy in such amounts even in the last year. Can you imagine how many tons of tissues been sold over the past three months?
Look at this list prepared by VisualCapitalist below. It will show you which products are seeing a surge in sales this year compare to last year.
So which one here is getting more attention than usual? The numbers and items are incredible. So, besides the already established online shop, many people are now showing interest to build an online business on their own. Hence, you can also start a multi-vendor eCommerce shop.
Restaurant Business Isn’t Dead Yet
Though you can’t have a cup of Cappuccino in a roadside cafe in summer noon anymore. Your favorite chain of hamburgers may also be closed for an uncertain period of time. But still, restaurants are preparing food. People are buying it.
Food delivery apps like Uber Eats introduced new features that allow customers to track the whole delivery process and send food treats to friends and families. Also, you can have your favorite Starbuck drink or Mcdonald’s happiness through apps like DoorDash and GrubHub.
However, we still missed the old-days like the long-gone dreams of such restaurant gatherings, datings, and social engagements. But with the combination of technologies and home delivery services, food shops are sustaining for the time being. Even new entrepreneurs want to build a business surrounding exotic recipes and fast foods.
We can tell you the little happy story of Yohanes Sandy. Who is a media worker, has recently started his new Culinary Ventures in a part of Banten, Indonesia. He is preparing chocolate pudding and delivering them at people’s doorstep. He said, “the work-from-home policy allowed me to have more free time.”
Education System Is Facing New Challenges
COVID-19 has forced more than 1.2 billion children out of the classroom. Hence, the global education system is trying to digitalize. It is emphasizing more on e-learning.
The investment in global EdTech industries is projected to reach 350 billion by 2025. It has reached almost 19 billion only in 2019.
World Economic Forum
Online classes, digital media platforms, and online courses are on rising popularity. In this global outbreak, tools like language app, visual tutoring, video conferencing software are seeing a huge jump in sales.
How to Build a Business You Love During This Global Pandemic
When many people lost their jobs, most of them are now putting all their efforts into different mediums to earn a respectable living. Even if you are not an entrepreneur, the COVID-19 situation demands that you should become one.
You can always look for an extra source of income during these hard times besides your remote job. And in case if you have lost your job then you can dedicate your full time and energy to your new ventures. However, in case you are already a business owner and want to expand your reach to new opportunities, then this is the right time.
As e-commerce business is the most profitable industry right now, you maybe love to build a business that can deal with the internet. A WooCommerce multi-vendor shop can help you serve people with daily supplies. Also, you can help local vendors to sell through your multi-vendor e-shop.
To control the remote office, open-source ERP or WordPress Project Management Softwares are selling considerably well. You can turn your local business online through these types of tools. Hence saving money and time, and encouraging further for new investments.
Well, here are some expert tips that can help you to build a business you love.
Know Your Passion Before You Build a Business
Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.
Confucius
Wisdom matters the most. It’s the same for all the things you want to do in this strange world. You can truly accomplish something when it becomes the thing you love.
So if you think creating WordPress software should make you more money, you can’t just start hiring developers. Only when you have a deep knowledge of WordPress & open-source software and love the industry, to feel enthusiastic about it, then you can go for it.
You shouldn’t turn your business into a burden. Not now, not ever.
For example, Maria is a college graduate. She was about to enter a new job in a fashion house. She always wanted to become a fashion designer.
But in the wake of global pandemic and lockdowns, Maria didn’t make it to any organizations. But one day, Giles, one of her classmates gave her the idea of opening a YouTube channel.
She asked, ‘what on earth should I open a Youtube channel?’
Giles replied, ‘You have sound knowledge on fashion trends. Why not share your ideas and tips who are interested?’
Then Maria and Giles made a plan together. Opened a YouTube channel. They stayed back at their home working on their video content and keep posting them. Now both of them are enjoying the job and it isn’t even taking too long for them to grow consistent viewers and subscribers for their channel.
Choose the Right People to Work With
It is as simple as that, you can’t do business alone even in this global pandemic. So, after you have found out which business you want to build, the next thing is to choose your reliable business people.
The process should be similar to the story of Maria and Giles. You are lucky if someone comes to you and pitches an exciting business idea to you. But most of the cases, you should find out the right people for your business.
For example, if you want to build a WooCommerce Multivendor store, you need to choose the resourceful vendors, delivery systems, payment procedures. Each sector involves a lot of people. If you do not trust them or understand them, you will only turn your business process a little more complicated than your want.
What Is Your Offer
Competition is an integral part of any business. But the impending global economic crisis is giving a hard time for everyone. So whatever business you choose, you must face a horde of competitors for sure.
Thus, you should make an offer your potential customers can’t refuse. After you’ve followed your passion, and choose the business people around you, you must put a balance to your offer. Your business may stand over the combination of these three undeniable elements.
Suppose, you have made a WordPress Page Builder Addons that merge with Elementor. But there are tons of other page builder plugin available in the WordPress repository. Why would people choose your Elementor addons? The only way to stand atop your competitors is to add real value to the customers. Then put some extra benefits which are unique and inventive.
Branding Is Necessary to Build a Business
No one is going to watch your videos that much unless you do branding for your YouTube channel. Do you really think people would purchase your product online unless you assured your product’s quality?
A brand is a voice and a product is a souvenir.
Lisa Gansky
You can use social media marketing to spread awareness & prove the quality of your product or services. You can easily run email marketing campaigns to generate definitive leads and convert or re-target them for later. Also, there are google ads and influencer marketing that could work like wonders to promote your business in a quick time. After you have built a business, the first thing you need is to create the brand value of whatever you are trying to sell.
Setting Goals That Thrust You Further
83% of the population do not have goals. 14% have a plan in mind, but goals are unwritten. Only 3% of people have goals written down. Then 14% of people who have goals are 10x more successful than those who don’t have any goal.
Harvard Business Review
The last thing after building a business that you want to ask yourself in this global pandemic is, How far you want to go with your venture? This is not an easy task. There’s no certainty that your business would meet the desired result of making profit. If you are unlucky, it might go down as a loss project too. So, therefore, each type of investment requires different measures and time to turn into success.
So before you go for a business, check-out for your credit and balance. Then do the market research to understand whether there is really a possibility of success in the venture you love. Only after that, make up your mind to decide whether you want to invest your valuable time and resource for a certain time in it or not.
Your goals should be your motivations to run towards the future. So make sure that they have enough excitement, logic, and potentials.
Final Thoughts to Build a Business During Pandemic
The very first rope you should catch to sustain through this disastrous time is reasoning. Try to understand the changing landscapes of the global economy. Every industry is going through some significant changes due to this global pandemic that is going on right now. So when you decide to build a business you love, make sure it merges well with the current situations.
The next rope is to be aware of all the current trends and information. If you know the things that people may love most to fight against the pandemic, you can take part in their journey and make a solid business out of it. But doing business or making a humongous profit shouldn’t be your main focus all the time too in this epidemic, you might as well try to keep the price of your products or services reasonable so that all types of people with jobs or without can afford it in this global crisis. This is how you can act responsibly supporting the society around you in their bad times.
And lastly, in case if you are wondering how you can manage your remote team in this epidemic, then you may want to:
So that’s it, we are at the end of the content. We hope you have gained enough guidelines through this blog about how to choose a business that you love and make it profitable in a global crisis like this. If you still have any questions, feel free to ask us in the comments below. Cheers!
