Running a small or medium-sized enterprise comes with a whole host of challenges which larger corporations do not need to face. Growing the company successfully can be one of those challenges. Here are some business tips you can use when trying to grow your SME.

Focus on your niche

When you started your business, it would have been to focus on one particular area. You might have noticed a gap in the market for a certain product or service and started your company to build on that. As the business naturally grew, you might have been tempted to add in some others.

While this is sensible as it does encourage business growth, it can be dangerous if you try to add too much all at once. By limiting what your business can offer, you can focus on making those assets the best they can possibly be. It will nearly always be better for you to offer several specialised and expert services over many mediocre ones.

Have enough space

One problem a business can run into when they expand too quickly is that they can be left without enough space. Employees can end up cramped together in too-small offices or they may even be left without desks in some extreme situations.

Finding new office space can be difficult, especially if you are jumping up quite significantly to accommodate for a new influx of staff, so you might have to look into some alternate solutions. Self storage options can be great if you need somewhere to store office documents or supplies for manufacture. If you have a lot of new staff, you might want to start by offering them flexible working or a work-from-home schedule so they are always going to be as comfortable as possible.

Sort out your SEO

Frustrated with the amount of traffic your website has? If you want to grow your business then you are going to need the traffic to do so. Whether you are hiring an SEO specialist to be a permanent part of your team or you acquire the services of an agency for some quick fixes, there is plenty you can do to help.

There are several key areas you can make improvements without their expertise. For example, you should fill in your Google My Business information. This is a free tool from Google which can provide many key pieces of information to customers about your business. A description of the business, reviews, and opening times are all key areas which can be added to this. These can make your business all the more visible on Google and can be a great start when trying to actively grow your business.

Social media

The world of social media has many opportunities for businesses so it is important that you learn how to use them to your fullest advantage. Instagram is one of the biggest social media platforms of the moment. It allows you to reach an amazing number of people all while displaying and demonstrating your products fully. No matter what your business might be, if you have a product to sell you should definitely take a look at what Instagram can offer you.

Growing an SME is likely to be a marathon and not a sprint. Make sure that everything is planned out properly so you can be certain that an expansion like this is going to go off without a hitch. No matter how much you are planning to grow your business, it will always be worth it in the end. Use some of the tips listed above and get ready to expand your SME now.

Redistributing, or matching, the £4bn that is to be spent on the Houses of Parliament renovation to help with the UK’s housing deficit could instead build 40,000 three-bed houses. This could house 121,000 of the UK’s homeless based on the UK average of three per property, Pure Commercial Finance’s research finds.

Cities in Suffolk that were analysed include Ipswich, whose housing deficit could be improved by 67%, Lowestoft by 169%, and Bury St Edmunds by a huge 281%, if the money was matched and spent on building affordable homes.

The research also uncovered that the average price to build a three-bedroom house in the UK is £99,843.75, based on internal data.

Ben Lloyd, Managing Director of Pure Commercial Finance has commented on this saying: “We deal with professional developers every day and we are well-aware of the demand for affordable housing across the UK and the influence that Brexit is having on borrowing.

“Although we would never suggest cancelling the refurbishment of such a prized national monument, we were shocked to see how matching the refurbishment budget could help towards solving the deficit.”

Some smaller towns in the country could be housed four times over due to their smaller populations. Some of these towns include Caerphilly, Pontypridd, Barnstaple and Chichester.

Government figures reveal that 430,000 homes have been built since 2010, although housing charity, Shelter, estimates that there is still a deficit of 3.2m homes and suggests that there are still around 320,000 homeless in the UK – with 170,000 being in London alone.

Polly Neate, CEO of Shelter, has also commented on this by saying: “It is unforgivable that 320,000 people in the UK have been swept up by the housing crisis and now have no place to call home. These new figures show that homelessness is having a devastating impact on the lives of people right across the country.”

We here at the Suffolk Gazette are big fans of gaming, ever since playing touch the electric fence as children. Mild electrical burns aside, we’re happy to see the modern age is one which makes gaming far easier and more convenient than ever before.

From casino games to mobile video games, every facet of this hobby is now streamlined on an entirely new scale.

A potential major issue here, however, is the growing threat of the Tetris effect, a psychological issue which has been seeing a jump in prevalence throughout the county.

For readers unaware, the Tetris effect refers to a psychological phenomenon whereby continued heavy exposure to a game begins to modify a person’s cognitive patterns, thoughts, images, and dreams.

This concept stemmed from the international hit of Tetris after fans found themselves breaking into supermarkets at night so that they might better rearrange the bread.

As it turns out, this was just the start.

The Roulette Effect

A Halesworth man (David McGee), whose family wishes for him to remain anonymous, ran into trouble recently after he was taken by the excitement of playing roulette online. Following one particularly fortuitous run, McGee attempted to celebrate by removing his pants and painting the local livestock, having them run clockwise around a field in an attempt to increase the scale of the game. 

McGee was eventually restrained by local authorities, after which it was revealed that an accidental mega-dose of caffeine probably played the key part in his obsession.

The Pokémon Effect

Making international headlines was an Ixworth woman, 24, who had to be sectioned after starting what has widely been labelled as an animal-fighting ring.

Gathering over 40 different species from the surrounding area, the unnamed Ixworthian had removed her pants and set up a sophisticated arena and seating area within which she invited friends and media.

Luckily enough, no animals were hurt before the woman was apprehended. Only one fight went through and, as it turned out, fighting a bird type against a ghost type was a predictably harmless pursuit.

The Farmville Effect

Bob Handsaw, 45, was perhaps the most unusual case of the Tetris effect seen in recent years. This Ipswich native began his obsession with the Facebook farming game Farmville after being bedridden following a motorcycle accident.

While he originally claimed to play “as a joke”, Handsaw’s Farmville life continued well after his physical rehabilitation was complete.

After a non-stop 46-hour play session, Handsaw was spotted leaving his home in what appeared to be a drunken stupor. Three days later, Handsaw was found pantsless at a Hadleigh farm, having singlehandedly turned five open fields into fully fertilised and well-planted farmland.

It is currently unknown how he managed this without tools, nor is it known how or where he managed to obtain several tonnes worth of apple, lemon, and orange trees.

At this point in time, avoiding these effects seems as simple as two basic steps. The first is having a general limit on consecutive game time, and the second is not consuming enough caffeine to kill a gorilla.

Do this, and your roulette, Pokémon, Tetris, or Farmville and other gaming time will be far less likely to result in embarrassing your family or raising your trouser budget.