Recession Busting Tips No4 - Negotiating With Suppliers

Don’t shy away from asking for a better cost price from your suppliers, even if you have been working with them for many years, don’t just assume, you already get the best deal you can, because you may not!

To strengthen your bargaining power try to establish your competitors selling and cost prices if possible, if you cannot get costs at least get the sales price, it will allow you to make some judgements about margin etc ready for your negotiations with your supplier.

Use all your market information to its maximum potential to assist you in reducing your buying price. If you cannot manage to get price reductions across the board on all your products, at least target your most popular selling items and get a reduction on those.

Recession Busting Tips No3 - Check & Double Check

In a recession it is essential that you get credit checks on all your customers. It is good practice at any time, but it is even more important in a recession.

If you have not been doing this, it is never too late to start and if you have customers who do repeat business with you, get them checked out as well because things can change in their businesses too.

Also get a credit check on your suppliers, you do not want to spend time and money promoting a product that could disappear or have an intermittent supply line.

Try to take as many of the risks of doing business away, to make your position as strong a possible.

Recession Busting Tips No2 - Show Me The Money

Your customers are vital to your business, without them you have no business, but so is the money.

Money is critical to your survival, and a steady flow at that, so it is absolutely vital that you get your invoices out on time and that you get paid for the work /products you have supplied.

Good cash flow is critical to your continued survival in this difficult climate and is what will set you apart from the rest.

Very few of us like to chase our customers for payment, but a little time spent now will reap the rewards in the New Year.

Recession Busting Tips No1 - Count Every Penny

It is a challenging time at the moment for small businesses, staying a float and ready for the New Year with all the additional expenses that Christmas brings from a business and personal perspective mean everyone is looking for ways to economise.

So, the first of our recession busting tips is:

Count Every Penny
Take a little time to investigate where every penny you are spending is going. It will be more than worthwhile to spend a little time on this as you will find some money you can save.

Re-evaluate your business; closely examine all the expenses you have, look at the things that have become old habits, those that just happen because they always have.

Check if you can streamline any of your processes, if you can purchase any better, if you can cut-out anything unnecessary.

The real surprise is that most businesses can cut costs without customers even noticing and without it affecting their high levels of customer service.

So start now and enjoy the benefits.....

.....more tips to follow, look out for No 2 SHOW ME THE MONEY.

Discover what is happening in your business & take control today

Do you run and hide at the mention of book keeping or sales analysis?

One of the most daunting tasks for most small businesses, unless of course you are an accountant, is the prospect of having to do your own book keeping and organising your records.

However this can open a wealth of opportunities for you and your business to grow and capitalise on some hidden gems.

If you are a sole trader you will need to keep track of monthly expenditure and income as well as VAT, if applicable.

Take charge today

The first thing to do is take charge, don’t be frightened and get yourself organised.
It does not have to be a complicated system when you are first starting up, but good organisation is vital for your business.

It can be as simple as 1, 2 3

1. Put every invoice and receipt for each month in a clear plastic envelope, clearly labelled expenditure with the month and year in question.
2. Now take another file or folder for income and add all your invoices that you have raised on your customers, again label accordingly.
3. Now you have that organised in two files, the next step is to transfer this to, for example, an excel spreadsheet and then keep it up to date with just a few minutes a day.

You can develop an easy to use spreadsheet with columns for income, expenditure and if applicable VAT. As you grow there are lots of software packages you can consider that include product records, stock control, Vat calculations, automatic statement runs and much more. But for now, we are just looking at the spreadsheet option and some of the benefits.

Benefits
This will allow you to quickly see all your suppliers and how your monthly expenditure is against your monthly income and where that income is coming from. Now you can see the profit you are making each month.

With these important figures to hand, you can see if you need to make adjustments to your expenditure or if you are doing well and could consider spending some money on marketing and growing your business even further.

Big businesses do a huge amount of analysis on turnover, profit and loss, gross and net margin %, customer segmentation, product analysis and much more, every month.

As a small business it is very important that you also know where you stand, as small changes have a big impact on your business and your cash flow.

You really cannot afford to wait for the end of the year when you give a big box of paper to your accountant to sort out and then, eventually he tells you if you did ok or not!

Your hidden gems
Here are some of the advantages of getting things under control and being more organised

• You are up to date
• You can meet your deadlines
• You can see how your finances really are at any given point in time
• You can give the VAT man all the information he needs when he arrives for a spot check
• You can defend your position when the tax man demands a large sum from you, if you have no records, you have no proof
• You know how profitable your business is
• You know which customers are your big spenders and which spend little, but take up all your time
• You know which customers have paid and who has not
• You know how much you owe suppliers
• You know which suppliers you spend a lot with, so you can ask for more discount
• You know which products sell well and which are gathering dust
• You know where your stock is going and when to reorder
• You have the facts and figures to make the necessary adjustments to protect and grow your business
• You know, you do not have guess or panic anymore

“A few simple steps and you are in control of your business, your business is no longer in control of you.”

There are many things you can do with the extra time and money and even more important without the extra worry, so take control and move forward to a more organised, proactive and confident you.

7 tips when using email in your business

7 things you must know about using email in your business. As a new business you have many things to learn and it’s easy to make mistakes when you are rushing around trying to do too many things at once.

You may see email as an easy and cheap way of communicating with prospects and customers and you would be correct, but you must do it well. There are a few things to remember, do not be lazy because you think it’s not the same as a letter.

Here are some good disciplines to get into early on and then it just becomes automatic.

Spelling and Grammar
Spelling and grammar are very important in all your correspondence, so remember to spell and grammar check everything, don’t risk losing a potential customer because of a poorly written email.

Reply Quickly
Always respond as quickly as possible to an e-mail. Even if you do not have all the answers or have to investigate the question or complaint, at the very least acknowledge the email, preferably the same day, saying you are looking in to it and will reply within 24, 48 hours whatever time frame necessary. If for some reason that is then not possible, don’t leave the person in the dark, tell them what you do know and what you are doing about it, keep them informed every step of the way. Recommit to solving the problem within a new time frame and make sure you do so, they won’t wait forever.

Re: Subject
Make sure you always complete the Subject box; you do not want them to guess or delete it because they don’t know what it is. Don’t mislead people with the subject box either, it should be about the content of the email.

Recipient
Use the recipient’s name, it is much more professional and personal to address the reader by their name, it makes them feel more valued and important, it show you care about your customers, little things matter.

Format
The format of the email does not have to be as formal as a business letter but should still be similar in style and must be grammatical, not text speak, not written in all CAPS or all lower case and do not ramble on without punctuation. It should cover all the necessary points from their email, don’t gloss over things or miss them out completely.

Who are you?
Always include all your contact information, preferably below your signature. You can mention in the email “please contact me if you require further assistance, see details below” or similar just to reassure the person that you are not a faceless, nameless entity. You should add your full name, title, company, address, telephone, email, fax, web address, everything they may need without having to contact you again to ask for it.

Their Message
When you respond to someone and are answering their questions or complaint either include the previous e-mail, or be very specific and include their questions/complaint when answering. This will enable them to quickly relate to what you are saying, we are all busy people and don’t have time to waste trawling our emails to find the one to which your answer refers.

Using email is an effective ways of communicating with all your prospects and customers, but remember in all communications be accurate, honest and professional and put your customer first, offer valuable, useful, informative content and you will reap the rewards.

Social Media - Here To Stay?

Some really amazing facts and figures on social media......






I would love to hear what you think...

Do you agree or disagree "In the future we will no longer search for products and services, they will find us".

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