The first couple years of a startup business is when you will be tested the most. You spent months pulling all the pieces together and finally got your door open. You popped the champagne cork when you made your first sale and now you're down the road a few miles getting slammed with all the little surprises you had not considered when you first put your plan together.
Are You Ready To Take On The Challenges?
Now is when you are at a turning point - are you a real entrepreneur with the intestinal fortitude to make it over the hurdles or will you tuck tail and run for cover behind the safety of a 9 to 5 job again? When your business bank account starts to run low is when you will be forced to stretch the most. If you are truly an entrepreneur you will welcome every challenge as an opportunity to hone your skills and get better at running your business.
When your cash flow starts to get tight, consider the following tips - it might be the difference between making it or not:
•· Are you selling the right product? You may need to survey your target market and previous customers again and find out if what you are selling is really what they want. It could be that a minor adjustment will make all the difference in your sales.
•· Stop spending money. Call for an immediate halt on all spending and only pay for the necessities. Absolutely no large expenditures at this time.
•· Promote like crazy. Review all the promotional campaigns you have done in the past that were successful and do them again. Use the ones that gave you the best results.
•· Cut back on your payroll. Sorry, but if you are spending more money on paying your staff than they are producing it's time to outsource for the services you need and look for ways to automate certain operational functions.
•· Make your business credit payments. Do not ever miss a credit card payment, a line of credit payment or a business loan payment. Your business credit score is more valuable than gold.
•· Obtain payments up front. If you have been offering some form of term payment from you customers, stop doing it. If at all possible get the payment in your hands before you give them the service.
Stop giving in to the words "not now". You created a product that will improve the quality of a person's life or business. They need your product so don't be a pushover when they tell you why they can't buy it now.
Be the Example for Your Team
You will also need to look at where you can tighten your own belt. Public transportation may be the answer to paying too much money for parking for a while. It could be time to pitch in and start doing sales calls yourself. This will inspire your sales team. You may need to wait a few months before you can buy the new dream gadget you really want. Brown bag it and save your restaurant luncheons for closing a sale with a prospect. Talk your business up everywhere you go. Don't quit. Go for the wall with everything you've got.
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