Many small business owners find themselves stuck behind a desk for hours just to keep up with payroll and HR compliance. Sound familiar?

By Cassie Yatcilla, PrimePay

You may think it would be too expensive or that you have too few employees to outsource your payroll. However, it is quite the opposite. The time you’ll gain back to focus on your company’s needs will surely reward your bottom line and give you and your employees peace of mind.

Here are five ways you can improve your business with your new free time:

1. Learn Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

   SEO is the process of increasing website traffic by gaining a high rank on the list of search results in search engines like Google. With a majority of people researching products and services before they buy, it is key for your business to be seen.

   For example, if you run a small remodeling business, you want to be at the top of the search results when someone Googles “remodelers near me.” This allows the potential customer to easily find your business.

   The good news? You don’t have to be a computer whiz to make a difference in your search results ranking! You can improve your ranking just by adding a few keywords to page titles on your website.

   Having basic knowledge of SEO can drastically improve your websites search ranking, thus increasing traffic. A good place to start is by reading The Beginners Guide to SEO and begin to implement some tips and tricks into your website design.

2. Take Google Analytics and AdWords courses

   Don’t know where your web traffic is coming from? Consider joining Google’s Analytics Academy to learn how to grow your business through data collection and analysis. This will allow you to find out if people are accessing your website from their phones or desktops and where people are looking for you. For example, let’s say you run an appliance showroom and find out that most of your website traffic is coming from people ages 45–54. They’re finding you from their desktop computers, are within a ten-mile radius, and are visiting your website on evenings and weekends. You can assume they are searching “appliance stores near me” from their nearby home.

   Use this knowledge to target advertisements to those people when they search for appliances on Google. You can do that by using Google AdWords. The Academy for Ads is where you will gain new digital skills, create new awareness, and learn how you can succeed with Google Ads. This will allow you to create ads that appear on Google, as well as have ads pop-up on other websites when your potential buyer is browsing the internet. Google Analytics will then help you measure your conversion rate to see what is working and what is not. Hello, future!

   

3. Talk to your target market
   

   Nothing is better for a business than keeping a great relationship with your target market. Make surveys and interview your top customers to discover what they love and what their biggest pain point is for your line of business. There are plenty of free survey tools, like Survey Monkey, that you can use to get answers to your business questions.

   This will help you stay in line with your current customers and help you gain new ones. Don’t forget to confirm who your target market is with Google Analytics. Remember, Google Analytics can show you who is searching for you and through what medium they are finding you.

4. Outline a hiring plan

   Many small businesses feel that hiring new employees is one of their biggest challenges. Take time to campaign your open position on social sites like Indeed or LinkedIn. Learn new interview questions to ask, like the Behavioral Event question, and what personality traits and skills to look for in your ideal candidate.

   Just because the perfect candidate agreed to join your team doesn’t mean that they are planning on staying for the long run. Make sure to have seamless employee onboarding to present your company as professional and organized to the new employee. Check out three ways to implement employee onboarding that increases retention.

5. Hold weekly brainstorming sessions with your team

   You may think, “Why do I need to do this? We see each other every day.” As a small business owner, you have the unique advantage of being able to get to know your employees on a more personal level. Because of that, it is important to carve out time to speak to your employees weekly. Use these brainstorming sessions to follow-up on projects, learn about trends your employees are noticing, and how you can better help your employees succeed. This will create an open conversion where employees should not be afraid to state their opinions and explain their new ideas.

Outsourcing payroll can improve your business.

Think about your current process for handling payroll. How much time are you spending on managing time sheets, tracking down employees to confirm their hours worked, and cross-referencing federal and state regulations to ensure you’re reporting taxes properly?

When you remove those duties from your work schedule, all the extra time gained can be spent experimenting with the tasks outlined above, improving your business. PrimePay's all-inclusive payroll, tax, and HR bundle lets you get back to business quicker. Get 60 days free today!

And be sure to check out more exclusive MBAKS member benefits with PrimePay.

MBAKS held its annual Housing Solution Breakfast on October 17, gathering elected officials, industry leaders, city staff and housing partners to elevate the importance of successful middle housing implementation. The event emphasized the partnership it will take to do it right. We used the program to strengthen our messaging on middle housing policy and acknowledge the hard work ahead for many cities.

This year we were joined by 140 guests with over 35 public officials in attendance. The program opened with a video featuring MBAKS homebuilder members and Redmond Mayor Angela Birney. The video highlights the importance of our shared work implementing House Bill 1110 at the local level.

Our Keynote speaker, Morgan Shook, Senior Policy Analyst and Partner at ECONorthwest, provided an overview of Oregon’s middle housing efforts, what’s working and what’s not. Key takeaways include:

• Graduated floor area ratio (FAR) limits encourage the development of more small units.
• Removing minimum parking requirements is another way to facilitate middle housing.
• Local governments should use caution when regulating frontage improvements or other infrastructure upgrades. These costs are substantial and impact financial feasibility, creating an unsurmountable barrier and resulting in fewer homes.
• View the full slide presentation here.

Attendees also had the opportunity to hear from Josh Brown, Executive Director at Puget Sound Regional Council and Cathy MacCaul, Advocacy Director at AARP of Washington. Each brought their unique perspective and emphasized why this work is so important for meeting our region’s housing needs.

To learn more about MBAKS’ efforts on Middle Housing implementation, please see MBAKS Middle Housing Implementation Plan.

And don’t forget to read about middle housing in the news! MBAKS and members partnered to publish three editorials this year in support of successful middle housing implementation. Read more here.

Homing in on Our Region's Housing Statistics

By MBAKS Senior Policy Analyst Allison Butcher

Snohomish County’s median home price for single family homes and condos combined reached a new high of $800,000 in April. Meanwhile, the median price of a single family home in Seattle surpassed $1 million, with King County not far behind. According to data from the Northwest Multiple Listing Service, King County’s median single family home price rose to $995,000 in April, a 20% increase from a year ago.

Please contact data@mbaks.com with questions or feedback. We want to know what data would be useful to you!

Months' Supply of Housing Inventory

As of April 2022

	King County had 0.69 months' supply of inventory (up from 0.65 months' of inventory a year ago).
	Snohomish County had 0.64 months' supply of inventory (up from 0.49 a year ago).

Many industry analysts consider a four-to-six-month level as an indicator of a healthy market.

Source: Northwest Multiple Listing Service

Median Home Price

April 2022

	The median price of single-family homes and condos was $880,000 in King County and $800,000 in Snohomish County.
	For single-family homes only, the median price in King County rose 19.88%, from $830,000 a year ago to $995,000. The median price in Snohomish County rose 24.34%, from $675,000 to $839,298.
	In Seattle, the median price of single-family homes and condos was $888,000. The median price for single-family homes only was $1,019,950, a 16.57% increase from $875,000 in April 2021.

Source: Northwest Multiple Listing Service

Building Permit Activity

Jobs

	The seasonally adjusted Washington unemployment rate for April 2022 is 4.1%; for Seattle/Bellevue/Everett, it is 2.9%.
	Construction employment in Washington increased by 200 between March 2022 and April 2022. Total construction employment is 231,000 statewide and 108,100 for Seattle/Bellevue/Everett specifically.

Source: Employment Security Department: WA Employment Estimates (Seasonally Adjusted), April 2022 and Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Population

The Puget Sound region's population as of April 1, 2021 was 4,330,400. Over the past year, the region added 66,200 people, as follows:

Source: Office of Financial Management

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