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Leaders explain why now's the best time to lean in on the latest movements. In the business world, if you want to be considered one of the most relevant leaders in your industry, then having a thorough grasp of today's innovations, or demonstrating your willingness to gain the appropriate knowledge to keep your company ahead of the curve in an ever-changing market is a crucial step in order for your brand to survive.  Prospective clients and loyal customers are likely to stand by organizations that continue to inspire revolutionary growth with new ways of engaging with consumers, handling the day-to-day business requirements and finding better solutions that are much more sustainable. Therefore,  a panel of experts from Fast Company Executive Board shares their top trends for developing new ways of thinking about how to run a business in 2022.

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The best content in the world won't have a positive impact on your audience—or your bottom line—if nobody sees it. Creating content can be difficult on its own, but sometimes an even bigger challenge is ensuring that it reaches the target audience. Careful content crafting must always be married to a well-planned marketing strategy; otherwise, those you hope to help or to draw to your business will likely never hear your message. The members of Fast Company Executive Board know that a successful content strategy takes more than just a clever way with words. Below, 14 of them share practical steps marketing teams can take to drive more traffic to a company’s published content.

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The holiday season may bring an influx of sales to your e-commerce business, but the right strategies can keep your customers coming back even in the off-season. With the increasing popularity of online shopping, e-commerce businesses look forward to some of their biggest sales of the year during the holiday season. The holiday sales rush is an important source of revenue for e-commerce businesses—especially with well-publicized opportunities like Cyber Monday—but it’s usually not enough to support them for the entire year.  Because every day can’t be Cyber Monday, online business owners need strategies to keep sales coming in between major shopping holidays. Below, 15 members of Fast Company Executive Board share advice e-commerce businesses can use to attract customers and bring in revenue during the “off-season.”

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If you're not sure how to begin bolstering your organization’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, take a page from the books of these nine companies. Consumers today are calling for increased transparency and honesty from companies about their diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Such efforts work to bring people from a variety of different backgrounds and life experiences into the workforce and recognize the unique knowledge, perspective, and skills each person brings. They also work to ensure equal treatment and fair outcomes for all employees and customers in an environment in which they feel welcomed and respected. Robust DEI efforts can not only help organizations build stronger, more effective teams but also show the customers and people they serve that they’re valued, too. If you’re working to improve your DEI efforts, it can help to look at organizations that have achieved widespread recognition for their DEI work. Below, nine members of Fast Company Executive Board each share a company whose diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts they’ve noticed and admired.

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Knowing what others who have been in your shoes wish they’d done can save you time, money, and effort. As an entrepreneur first starting out, you may find yourself seeking out business podcasts, books, articles, and more in an effort to feel prepared. While there are plenty of great resources out there, experience is what’s likely to teach you the most. Still, you’re not the first person to walk this path, and knowing what your predecessors would change if they had it all to do again can be invaluable. Your entrepreneurial journey is unique, and ultimately, you’ll write the story of your business’s birth and growth. But there can be a big benefit to weaving in the wisdom of others. Below, 15 Fast Company Executive Board members look back and reflect on what they wish they had done when they first began their entrepreneurial journeys.

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Your business isn’t wholly powerless to stop the impact of “The Big Quit.” “The Great Resignation,” also known as “The Big Quit,” is making headlines as millions of Americans quit their current jobs to find “something better.” While it’s true that workers are rethinking their priorities and desires in the workplace, it doesn’t necessarily mean your company is doomed to lose its top talent: There’s still hope for leaders who value their employees and are willing to do what it takes to retain their workforce. If you want to keep your team intact through this period of mass workforce turnover, it’s important to be proactive and take steps toward employee retention. Below, 16 members of Fast Company Executive Board each share one thing a business owner can do to make staying on the most attractive option for their workers.

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To accomplish a challenging goal, you've got to have the right game plan for your team. It's one thing to have an ambitious goal; it's another to have an effective game plan to ensure that goal is reached. Big goals are achieved through smart—sometimes small—habits. If a leader is to guide their team to the top of the mountain, they have to blaze a clear trail and give their people the tools they need to climb. It doesn't have to be a one-size-fits-all solution; leaders can leverage the right combination of strategies to fit their organization's unique purpose, procedures, and people. To get your ideas flowing, a panel of Fast Company Executive Board members has shared their best strategies for turning lofty goals into realities. Follow their advice to build efficient workflows that foster repeatable, scalable success.

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Don't let multiple projects or big goals overwhelm you; instead, learn to prioritize and keep moving forward. When you’re growing your business, you likely have a lot of goals you want to achieve and projects on your plate. A significant challenge for any leader is prioritizing the work in process to ensure their team (and they themselves) aren’t overwhelmed. Further, if an individual or a single team is pulling in too many directions at once, they’re likely to go nowhere fast. You don’t have to give up on the goals you’ve set out to achieve—you just have to set up orderly methods and, usually, a way to “divide and conquer.” With the right strategies, you can identify and take the fastest, most promising path to success. To help 11 members of Fast Company Executive Board shared their own prioritization methods and how each lends itself to steady, consistent progress.

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Building a successful brand is all about creating and engaging a community around your business. Loyal customers benefit a business’s bottom line, but avid fans can actively increase it. Not only are they loyal customers, but they will often share their passion with others and attract new customers to your business. The secret to creating genuine fans is not just providing an outstanding product or service (although that’s an essential first step). It’s building a community that draws them together based on the interests, values and vision they share with both you and each other. Fortunately, now that the public can easily learn more about you and your company online, building a community of fans is easier than ever before—if you take the right steps. Below, 15 members of Fast Company Executive Board share their best tips for building an engaging community for your customers.

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Even in the growing gig economy, your business can still find ways to attract and retain top talent. Flexibility, independence, and work-life balance have become top priorities for many professionals in recent years. That's why, as the gig economy grows, many are turning to freelancing or short-term work rather than pursuing a role with one company.  The trend toward "gig work" can be challenging for businesses that need full-time help and want to build a dedicated team of talented professionals. However, you can still attract top candidates to your company—you just need to embrace flexibility on your side. Below, seven members of Fast Company Executive Board shared their top-recommended ways to find and hire new team members in the gig economy.

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Writing informative content can set you and your organization up as experts in your industry—but only if it provides real value to your audience. Gone are the days when producing business content simply meant writing copy for ads. With today’s broad variety of 24/7 media outlets, organizations have the opportunity to create messaging that will not only give them top-of-mind awareness but also showcase their expertise, boost their brands, and help them build real, meaningful relationships with their target audiences. By producing content that shares their knowledge with the public, a leader and the organization they represent can show that they’re genuinely interested in serving the public’s needs, not just in making a sale.  It can seem like an intimidating task to develop smart, meaningful content, but it doesn’t have to be. You and your team have plenty of valuable information to share; you just have to learn the best ways to uncover it and get it out there. To help, the members of Fast Company Executive Board have shared ways leaders and their teams can brainstorm and create content that not only demonstrates their expertise but also provides real value for their audiences.

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Today’s consumers want to engage with the human beings behind a brand, not faceless corporations. “People buy from people.” It’s an adage that has never been more true than it is in today’s digital age. The online economy places near unlimited options at consumers’ fingertips. Even so, people crave real connections and a personal touch in their customer experience. Businesses must develop ways to reach people on a human level to convert online connections into sales. Both B2C and B2B companies will see better results if they’re able to show the human beings who drive their brands. Below, 16 members of Fast Company Executive Board discuss ways business leaders can humanize their brands, no matter what product or service they sell.

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A basic understanding of consumer psychology can help you drive trust, connections, and ultimately, sales. Every business leader has heard the mantra: “If you want to boost sales, you’ve got to get to know your target audience.” Many companies limit this strategy to learning basic demographic information like age, gender, geographic region, and household income. But a smart leader knows that building an understanding of their customer or client base should also involve understanding human psychology. If you and your team understand basic psychological principles, you can form genuine connections with consumers, thereby building loyalty and trust (and sales). To help you achieve this, below the members of Fast Company Executive Board share 14 things every smart business leader needs to understand about consumer psychology.

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Customer retention may be cheaper than new lead generation, but you need the right strategies to successfully earn repeat business. One of the first lessons business owners learn is that it’s cheaper to retain an existing customer than to engage a new one. However, that doesn’t mean it’s easy—and failing to retain current clientele can lead to detrimental consequences for an organization. Fortunately, there are several simple strategies that businesses can use to help retain and engage their existing customers. Not sure where to begin? Start with these 13 tried-and-true tricks shared by the members of Fast Company Executive Board.