How Small Businesses Should React To Covid-19
max kalles • March 17, 2020
For many small businesses the current Covid-19 pandemic is going to cause difficult challenges in the upcoming weeks.
Some businesses unfortunately will not make it through.
Others will find a way to buckle down and push on or at least bounce back faster than others.
And a few will find a way to pivot, adapt and even thrive.
But first, as business owners we must ask ourselves some tough questions.
Not all questions are equal though.
Some will keep us trapped as a victim of our circumstances while others will empower us to take immediate action.
Don't ask yourself questions like "why me", "why now", continuing with a victim mentality that doesn't serve you.
Instead, focus on the question "what now".
This is the situation, and now I have to determine how I'm going to respond to it.
What can I do to help my family, my community, and my business during these times?
I've worked too hard to build my business to just let it disappear.
What do I need to do NOW to make sure my business gets through this?
In almost 20 years of business I've never had something like this happen before. I was called by a lead that was looking to launch a new business idea as a pivot to their business. We setup a meeting and got some initial information but had a few things I needed to research before recommending the best marketing strategy for them. After putting together the proposal based on the research I did we had a zoom call to go over the information. The CEO let me know that he was interviewing other agencies, but he would get back to me once he made his decision. Typically, prospects never get back to you when you didn't get the business. A week later I received a letter in the mail. It was a hand written thank you letter from the CEO himself. He thanked me for spending the time to research his business and wanted to let me know that he had chosen to remain with his existing digital agency. As a token of appreciation, he gave me a gift card for spending the time to put together the proposal. I was the one trying to sell him something, yet he still took the time to show his appreciation for the work that I did. Wow, I thought to myself. If this is how he treats people that are trying to get his business, I can only imagine how he treats his employees and customers. I think that we can all learn an important less from this on the power of showing appreciation and maintaining strong relationships.
One of the worst challenges that we go through in life is that we dwell on our failures. We allow the losses we’ve had to get in our head inhibiting our ability to take action like a deer caught in the headlights. “What if I fail again,” we think to ourselves. “Maybe I’m not good enough.” Or “Maybe this idea isn’t going to work.” And then we freeze. Our actions seize and the progress that we have made falters. This thought pattern, the voice that is in our heads is one of the biggest dream killers out there. How many people out there have been so close to success, they only need to push a little more and in that crucial moment they gave up? So how do you get yourself out of this mind trap? The secret is to re-frame your failures. Your belief about failure is holding you back. You actually think you failed. You think that since you didn’t win yet, you’ve lost. We need to realize that there is no such thing as failure. You either win or you learn. There is no lose. You didn’t fail, you’ve learnt important lessons which are all critical steps on the journey to success. Thomas Edison is famous for saying that he didn’t fail, he discovered thousands of ways that don’t work. With this mindset you realize that success is a process. And part of that process involves setbacks and challenges. The only real failure is when you give up and stop trying. You throw in the towel and pretend that your dreams weren’t really that important anyway. So stop “failing” and start learning, and before you know it, you will find success. And then looking back, you will realize that it was all worth it.