There are some basic ideas regarding efficient ways to manage a business that can apply and make our daily jobs much easier in the process.
How to Manage a Small Business Effectively
Certain rules need to be adhered to that help us to prosper and grow. These rules can help us avoid frustrations and turmoil in the future and make our daily grind smoother. Here are a few tips to consider and reconsider daily.
How to Manage a Small Business Successfully
How to Manage a Business: Hiring – how to manage employees in a small business
Never be fooled into thinking that you can do everything yourself. Running a small business is no easy task, especially when finding people who take direction remotely as seriously as you do.
I’m letting you know that it will be challenging; I’m going to tell you that right now, it’s not easy, but it’s not impossible either.
When you find dedicated people do your best to reward them and hold onto them because they will be challenging to come across
How to Manage a Business – Sales, How to Manage Growth in a Small Business
If you ever get to a position where you don’t have to do sales, you’re at the peak of your business. I was blessed enough to be there and was spoiled for several years.
Everything came to me, and I didn’t have to do any work. It’s a great position to be in, but it’s not going to last, and more importantly, you are missing a TON of valuable information that could help you grow.
You have to constantly make sure you’re improving your product line to continue getting sales, but you also need to keep in touch with your clients as they may change positions, and someone else may come in to replace them, who might be their assistant or secretary today.
Develop Business Relationships
By not developing a relationship, you have blown an opportunity to get to know them over the months or years. They may come in with their team of people and only be loyal to the people they have learned and communicated with. I’ve seen it happen more times than I care to remember.
It is effortless to be fat and happy and even to reinvent yourself, but starting from scratch is difficult. Stay in touch with your clients.
Visiting clients is a fantastic way to give you tips and tabs on how well you’re doing. They know what the industry is looking for, what they need, and who they need you to target. Don’t waste the opportunity of not doing client visits even if they’re in another state. Plan a trip. A lot of my clients are in New York and Los Angeles. I arrange lunches and dinners regularly to help me stay on top.
How to Manage Finances
In order to stay on top of your business finances, it’s a really good idea to have several bank accounts. You can literally have as many bank accounts as you want. I will talk about bank accounts in another article and the types that you should have, but for sure, you should try to have high-yield savings and business account. You can’t get both.
That’s just to start with. You want to make sure you have accounts where you will save 10 to 20% or more of everything that you make for your Business and for yourself (separate accounts).
You also want to make sure you have an account for your taxes so that you can pay each quarter for your business and your personal.
You also wanna have a working business account where all the income comes in and a main personal account. The benefit is that you can transfer the funds from your computer but having separate accounts makes it much easier not to comingle funds and to keep better track of your earnings.
Manage a Business – Schedules and Goals
Having a schedule to adhere to daily, weekly, and monthly is an absolute benefit. Keep a vision board that you can write on near your desk and write down your goals for the week.
Write down what you expect to make each week and what you expect to accomplish each day or each week. They certainly help you guide yourself to success. Having it written down in your handwriting and looking it up once an hour or whenever on the board will help you to achieve what you’re trying to accomplish for that day of that week. This works!
Keeping Track of Billing to Manage a Business
Billing can be tricky, and it also can be annoying there’s nothing worse than making money and then having to chase it. Your bills are always going to come in on time, but your money is not, and there are times when your invoices will be lost or sitting on someone’s desk, or they may be too busy to sign off on it, and this is going to affect your bottom line.
I’ve talked in previous articles about how important it is to make sure you have an emergency fund, where you take 10, 20, or 30% of every payment that comes in and put it in a separate bank account (pay yourself first). This can come in handy if you’re having difficulty collecting or on another rainy day.
I don’t believe in paying interest to credit card companies, so I pay my bills entirely off every month. Getting into the habit of paying the minimum amount on your credit card bills will have you paying forever and multiplying the amount you owe in interest. This is how credit card companies make money. Avoid the temptation to use your credit card to pay bills if you can, at all costs.
Stay Ahead of Trends to Manage a Business
Find time to pay attention to trends in your industry, even if that means taking a couple of young people out to lunch once a week. You’ll be amazed at what you can learn, and being ahead of the curve will help you stay relevant much longer.
This is an absolute necessity and running your business. Eventually, you’re going to get burnt out, you’re going to get tired, or you’re not going to be interested in what’s happening anymore.
About every seven years, you get burnt out, which is the maximum that most small businesses should have one owner (for 7 to 10 years). Anyway, which is the case you want to hang on longer, make sure you surround yourself with people who know what the trends are so that you can stay afloat
Staying on Top of Your Taxes
Here’s another important thing you have to take care of, just like the credit card companies where you’re paying multiple interests. You don’t want to get behind in your taxes.
Try to avoid this at all costs. You will be paying an amount for years, and it will look like your account has never decreased from what you owe because the interest constantly adds up when you have a payment plan.
Do yourself a favor and avoid tax issues. Make sure you pay your taxes can entirely and don’t disrupt the running of your business, and you don’t get away with anything but try your best not to be a flake or take the advice of people who are telling you to be slick
Building and Growing Your Business
It would help if you consistently were focused on building and growing your brand. There are opportunities for every brand to expand. Don’t ignore them in paying your taxes on time and getting income without making sales which leaves you free time to build another ad for a product related to your business.
This is something I did not do early on, but I do wish I would’ve done such as doing a conference or events. A part of me hates the politics of doing events, but I certainly could’ve increased my income. Am I relevant tenfold? By doing so, there are always opportunities to grow.
Have a Short Term Business Plan
The most crucial aspect of running a business is to have a plan, and an exit strategy, something else I should’ve done but didn’t. What happens is you end up in the middle of the ocean.
Are you just sailing forever? Make sure you know when you want to sell or when you want to make changes to your business and start something else. Map it out.
They use a column business plan, and it still makes sense to have a plan for the next 5 to 10 years where you want to be again. Once it’s written out on paper, it’s solidified, and you can achieve it much more accessible but make sure that you have the plan to end or wrap your business and start another one when you’re ready to start.
