How to digitalise a small business: where do you start?

Step 1: spot what costs you the most time

For a week, write down the tasks you keep redoing: copying sales, recounting stock, chasing payments, preparing a report. The task that comes back most often is your best starting point.

Step 2: choose a single process

Resist the urge to handle everything at the same time. One well-tuned process, for example the till or the tracking of receivables, brings more than a big project that never lands.

Step 3: look for an existing tool before having one built

If ready-made software covers most of your need, it will be faster to set up and cheaper. Custom software takes over when the way you work does not fit any tool.

Step 4: account for field conditions

A tool designed for an air-conditioned office does not always hold up in a shop or on a site. Before choosing, check these points:

• Does the software keep working when the network drops?
• Does it run on the phones your team already owns?
• Does it handle mobile money as well as cash and bank?
• Is support easy to reach, for example on WhatsApp?

Step 5: involve the team and move forward in stages

Software that nobody uses is useless. Show the tool to those who will use it, give each person a screen limited to their work, and keep the old method running in parallel for a few weeks.

Once the first process is in place, move to the next. That is how a company goes digital: one module after another.