Cash Flow

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Keep Your Sales Pipeline Flowing

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Business owners spend a great deal of time and money marketing to many, in the hope of attracting the few to their business. This process can be likened to a pipeline with a wide mouth narrowing as it goes along. The wide mouth represents the number of prospects you need to get interested in your product, so as to end up with enough conversions to hit your sales targets – the (much) narrower end of the pipeline. If the pipeline isn’t constantly topped up with new prospects who are then moved through it to be converted into customers, sales become uneven, income is inconsistent, and running the business becomes crisis prone.

Classify and monitor prospects

The stages in a sales pipeline can be different from business to business, and particularly between business-to-business (B2B) and business=to-consumer (B2C) type businesses, but there are some essential similarities. In all businesses there is a need to generate inquiries. The technique may be through advertising, shopfront display, cold calling, word of mouth or networking.

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Analyze Your Product And Services Profitability

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Given the number of times we've had clients ask for help evaluating their product or service mix this past year, I figured it was time for a bit more of a technical discussion. So get that fresh cup of coffee and use this entry to begin to ponder how your products or services help -- or hurt -- your business.

Knowing the profitability of each individual product/service you provide can help you make decisions to improve your bottom line. You may want to discontinue products and services that aren’t particularly profitable while promoting the ones that improve your overall results.

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Use financial ratios to review your Company's results

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Financial ratios can be helpful tools in understanding your company’s financial health. They are a benchmark by which you can compare your business to industry standards and analyze changes over time.

In fact, benchmarking and comparing to your competition is so important to business success that I provide all my business clients with an annual report on the benchmarks and results for their particular industry or profession. Without this it can be like traveling back roads without a map.

One warning though. If you begin comparing your results and calculating your ratios with incorrect accounting information from your business you just may wind up making the wrong decisions. All of the financial review and performance measurement we can discuss is of no use if your business's basic

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Making the Most of Your Aircraft Deductions

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More than ever, the media, IRS and the Securities and Exchange Commission have expressed their disapproval of private aircraft use by businesses. They each hold a general perception that personal use of business aircraft is extravagant and difficult to justify. But, your purchase, lease, or charter of an aircraft by you or the corporation you own (remember if you’re married, “you” includes your spouse as well) can still create open the opportunity for significant tax benefits.

As you might imagine, the IRS does not take as kind of a view of the tax benefits of aircraft ownership as you or I might. The American Jobs Creation Act of 2004 reversed the favorable aircraft deduction strategies previously available to you as identified in a key Tax Court case (Sutherland Lumber-Southwest, Inc. v Commissioner).

An IRS notice now restricts certain aircraft deductions, requires specific treatment of business owners, and requires stricter, more detailed records of aircraft use. Even with these restrictions though, you can still increase your financial wellbeing by making the aircraft rules work for you.

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Time IS Money So Get The Best Return On Your Investment

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Have you ever reached the end of the day and wondered where all your time went? Playing catch-up to retrieve wasted time is what keeps many business owners welded to their business premises way outside of ‘normal’ business hours.

For many business owners a number of their customers, suppliers and employees are likely to be friends as well as business acquaintances. This overlap of private and business relationship can lead to requests for assistance or for special deals that can make serious inroads on their time. A lot of small business operators go slowly broke doing work for friends at discounted rates or for free. ‘Discounted rates’ translates as ‘at less than your market value’ and that means more hours you have to put in to make up for the lost profit.

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12 Days for a Start-Up Business

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The holiday season is around the corner and while recovery from the global financial crisis is, well, not exactly in full swing… I thought it was time to address the vital question of what it takes to start a new business. Much like the larger-than-life gift-wielding icon from the North Pole, many people question whether or not starting a new business on the back end of recession is a good idea … or the figment of over-active entrepreneurial spirit?

Well in some ways it’s a better time and easier than it ever has been. The competition has been winnowed out, and many businesses are quieter and less obtrusive in their marketing. New technology options including the Internet, e-marketing and outsourced suppliers offering SaaS (software as a service or "cloud computing") make it possible for you to do a lot without emptying your bank.