As 2021 rounds the bend into Fall, it’s safe to say we’re all looking forward to huddling indoors with a warm cider and hibernating through the rest of this dumpster fire of a year. But wait! There’s one thing you can’t forget about this time of year — your budget! There’s still time to balance those books before the year comes to an end.
In reviewing your company or department’s finances, you may find you have money left to spend. Cha-ching! Now, the question is, where to invest it? With only limited time left, you’ll want to ensure you’re investing strategically to maximize your remaining budget and best position your company for success in 2022.
This may seem like a daunting challenge. Don’t freak out. As a gift to you, our loyal readers, our experts are sharing free advice on getting the most value out of what’s left in your budget. Yes, you heard that right: FREE advice. Sure, budget allocation can be vexing, but TheoremOne is here to help!
Here are five strategies we recommend for spending the last of your 2021 dollars:
- User experience (UX) research. It can be tempting to throw your remaining money at your latest “big idea.” But you wouldn’t buy a new car today without first reading a million reviews about the best make and model, right? Before you invest in that super cool new product you’ve been dreaming up during quarantine, get the facts.
User experience research can validate even the craziest of business ideas to ensure that your time and money are being spent well. Getting users involved in the process is key to uncovering data that will drive your decision-making. Our UX experience research strategy works like this: We facilitate stakeholder workshops and interviews to learn about your goals, challenges, and expected outcomes. Then we engage your target audience to get their perspective and what is required to satisfy their needs. The outcome: an actionable vision and plan that enables your team (and ours) to make good on your goals.
- Usability testing. You’ve done your homework. Now it’s time to take that car for a test drive. Usability testing is a critical component of any launch. It’s the mirror that helps product designers ensure that they don’t have egg on their face. Will the market embrace your new product? All the internal data in the world won’t be able to give you a definitive answer — you need an outside perspective for that.
No one likes surprises when money is on the line. TheoremOne’s rigorous usability testing can ensure a solid return on investment where the rubber meets the road of product development. Send us a screen today and we’ll give you a free warts-and-all assessment of your product’s functionality and ease of use. We use proven usability principles in order to give you a no-B.S. assessment of what works about your product and what needs some fine-tuning. The result: high-performance software that gets the job done.
- Environmental, social, and governance performance. One look outside at the leaves on the ground will tell you: the environment isn’t waiting on us to change. Environmental, social, and corporate governance can’t afford to be an afterthought for modern businesses. In a competitive labor market, the best employees want to know that their company's leadership takes ESG seriously. And as the need to disclose ESG performance accelerates, more savvy investors are going to put their money behind companies with proven track records of sustainability. But meeting more ambitious ESG goals is going to require more sophisticated metrics. That means investing some of that leftover cash in your budget, not just in sustainability and cutting edge data collection, but the right strategy and technology to meet your business’s ESG goals. So, now that you’ve kicked the tires and road-tested your idea, it’s time to safeguard your shiny new investment. Which brings us to...
- Site reliability engineering audits. Conventional wisdom has it that in order to be bold or innovative, you have to sacrifice site reliability. Well, you might want to sit down for this, but it turns out the conventional wisdom is wrong. Site reliability engineering is an integral part of innovating, and we’re here to help you make it happen. Here at TheoremOne, we balance ambitious product innovation with technology scaling, reliability, and security, because we believe innovative products and companies are at their best when users can actually depend on them. Our site reliability audits can help you build with confidence while still putting enough spring in your step to help you leapfrog competitors. Your company isn’t afraid to challenge the status quo. You probably want a partner that’s cut from the same cloth.
- Prototyping a new user interface. The great thing about getting an outside perspective is that it’s deceptively simple — but has the power to change the way your company operates. By exposing yourself to usability testing, or site reliability audits, you gain a clear process for vetting, validating, and prototyping both new products and old mainstays.
Whether with functional prototypes or production software, the best way to determine where to optimize is to test with the user’s real data. TheoremOne experts often bust out an analytical toolkit to put the data and ideas we’ve collected from workshops to the test. In launching the acceleration phase, we cut ideas down to just a handful of Most Valuable Ideas (MVIs) and then validate and prototype selected MVIs. This type of performance analysis ultimately helps businesses invest in the best tactical implementation.
So, there you have it. Don’t get caught off guard by the changing seasons. A little money right now will go a long way toward shoring up your business prospects a year from now. In a constantly changing business environment, the question isn’t: is winter on the way? The question is: do you have a jacket?
Don’t let your remaining budget burn a hole in your company’s pocket. Let’s create a plan together that uses data, design, and cutting-edge technology to maximize your investment.
