Small businesses don’t have a lot of capital in reserve. This means that you must weigh the pros and cons of every business decision carefully to see if it benefits you financially. The good news is that there are many ways to get your business, old or new, off the ground.
New Technologies for Manufacturing
A large payroll can consume much of your business profits. For instance, if your business is in manufacturing and requires the use of a plant and heavy-duty machinery, there are new technologies to reduce overhead. In the past, companies would need several employees to operate each piece of machinery and someone to oversee the operation. However, today things are beginning to change. New, tech manufacturing developments such as robotics are slowly eliminating the need for many humans to perform these tasks. This helps to drastically reduce business costs.
Why Outsourcing Works
In the past, small business owners handled just about every aspect of the business from inventory to payroll. Today, however, outsourcing many of these tasks is becoming the norm. Outsourcing things such as payroll and IT support frees up the valuable time that you can use to expand your bottom line.
Getting the Word Out
You may have a terrific product or provide excellent service. However, if no one knows about your company, you won’t ever realize your true growth potential. Thankfully, unlike just a decade ago, costs for advertising and launching a successful marketing campaign are relatively cheap by comparison. Using social media sites to place ads will direct more traffic to your website. Also, don’t discard older, tried and trusted measures like handing out business cards and sending out emails in bulk.
Excellent Customer Service
Many businesses fail to protect their image. They attract many customers, make the initial sale and then it ends. If you lose as many customers as you gain, you end up flatlined. Unfortunately, once you acquire a bad name, it’s hard to remove the branding. Thankfully, you can prevent this from happening by putting an emphasis on excellent customer service from the onset. One way to provide exceptional customer service is to add a line on invoices for comments or by sending a followup email questionnaire regarding service.
Loyal Base Equals Growth
When you develop a loyal base through product/services offered, it will, in turn, prove a valuable tool for saving money. Here’s how it works. You have a customer who’s satisfied with your business. As a result, they tell their family, friends, and co-workers about it. This will bring new business at no additional cost to you. If you want your loyal base to become aggressive at bringing in new sales, offer incentives such as a small monetary finders fee or discounts on your products and services.
Track Your Inventory
There may be an abundance of waste when you initially start up your business. However, if you put most of the focus on sales, versus tracking your inventory, you will lose profits. You should track and assess inventory each quarter to see what supplies you use and those that sit idle. By doing this you won’t have a warehouse or a basement filled with items of little or no value.
Know Your Competitors
Knowing your competitors is a good thing for any business. First, it lets you expand your product line or services to cater to the needs of your clients. Secondly, it ends complacency, something that can drive a business to ruin. One way to find out about other businesses and the strategies they utilize is to secure a booth at a trade show.
Whether you’re deciding on a startup business or an existing small business, there are a number of ways to cut costs and improve your bottom line.
Check out my guide on how to start your business right with tons of useful tips I learned by successfully starting, building, and selling multiple companies.
