Why communication is important in business

This voice, or brand persona, should be consistent across your message, your marketing, and every aspect of communications.

Communication is key when it comes to building strong relationships and will ultimately benefit your business. Using positive language in emails and negotiations is a good way to keep a potential customer happy and feel comfortable with you. Sending personal notes or offers to a prospect on their birthday or another significant date without attempting to sell them anything is a great way to build a solid client relationship and keep them content while doing business with you.

Giving your employees and customers the freedom to express ideas without the fear of judgment is important when it comes to business communication. This way creativity and innovation can develop and good business ideas can become great ideas. If something is not working as it should, the problem is only likely to come up if your employees feel comfortable sharing feedback. Open communication is also crucial when it comes to creating new promotional sales, improving products and services, analyzing customer feedback, making informed decisions, and sustaining business.

Encouraging feedback from employees and customers is incredibly valuable to maintaining and improving your business. Customer reviews can also put your business out there to new potential customers and help your company grow and profit. Communicating with your customers about their experience with your product or services not only gives you the opportunity to develop further, but also helps build trusting relationships and returning business.

Customers are not the only beneficiaries of effective communications. Your employees benefit as well, and it shows in the numbers. The increased employee engagement that comes with open communication can positively impact your bottom line. With focused communication skills, you can build your customer knowledge and make your customers feel heard and valued. Effective communications focus on these areas:. Start Growing Your Business.

Face-to-face communications are great, but not always practical. Here are some methods to consider:. Web chat is a great way to address customers when they need help most. They come to your website seeking answers, and a web chat agent can answer common questions immediately. If you use effective communication strategies, you will earn their trust and loyalty over time. That means you must anticipate their needs and keep reaching out to them after the initial handshake or sale.

Follow up to make sure they are still happy, and if not, find solutions to the various hiccups that can happen after an initial business transaction or decision.

Companies who show clients that they understand them, know their needs, and want to help, are more successful every time. There is nothing worse than getting negative feedback about your customer service.

It only takes one of these unhappy experiences to turn a loyal client against a brand forever. Be sure your team understands the importance of business communication in customer care.

How they react and attempt to solve customer issues will directly impact the company positively, and just as easily affect it negatively. The truth is, so many companies fall short in this department due to poor communication on the company's end. The best brands are those known to take care of their customers well after purchase. Not every unhappy client will get on the phone to let you hear about it although we all know many will do just that!

Transparency and effective communication will help you manage client expectations and reduce negative reviews by teaching you how to deal with angry customers and solve problems. Same with your workforce. If you are upfront and open, your employees will be more likely to voice unhappiness or concerns in certain situations that could otherwise bring down the entire team.

In turn, they will be more inclined to trust upper management's decisions in the future. What is the easiest way to get new business? Have a good rapport with existing customers! If you shine in their eyes, they will recommend you to colleagues, write a glowing review, or leave positive feedback on your website. It all starts with how well you communicate from the beginning and how you maintain that communication throughout the business relationship. Being transparent in business communication is paramount to ensure that people are following policy.

Whether it's an employee that must use a specific process to complete a task or a client who signed an NDA for a business dealing, you must initially communicate well the intent of your brand and the policies you wish to enforce.

Written communication of some form that explains your business policy, as well as expectations of employees and clientele, is beneficial for consistency across the board. Not to mention, it provides a legitimate reference point if ever you need to reiterate a particular procedure, rule, or general conduct guidelines.

The critical function of a manager is to relay information from the higher-ups to their team. It could be as simple as a notice of a company-wide meeting or news on an upcoming project to get ready.

If the manager doesn't deliver the right information or doesn't understand it himself, it won't take long for a total communication breakdown. An example of creating a foundation for success could be to send a prospect a note on his birthday without trying to sell him anything. The language in an email to a vendor who has increased prices could cause the vendor to come to the negotiation table or to walk away from the deal.

Positive communication environments provide security for people to share ideas, without being judged. By giving employees a platform in which they can share ideas with one another, creativity and innovation emerge. In this scenario, employees are more likely to share what isn't working in a operations procedure or to discuss new ideas for sales promotions.

This all starts when someone feels as if he is able to communicate ideas to co-workers or leadership, and that his voice is valuable.

With more than 15 years of small business ownership including owning a State Farm agency in Southern California, Kimberlee understands the needs of business owners first hand.

When not writing, Kimberlee enjoys chasing waterfalls with her son in Hawaii. By Kimberlee Leonard Updated March 07,