Category Archives: Business Development

How Does Social Media Affect or Impact Business?

Leave a reply

Learn how effective social strategy can help to grow an engaged audience, and how we can help you maintain your social presence and engaging with your company’s followers.

Tuesday, December 11 from 12 to 1:30pm

Location: 403 Madison Avenue, Suite 240, Bainbridge Island

Presenter: Mick Credere | Director Technical Services | Valor Marketing LLC.

Hosted by: OfficeXpats Coworking and Conference Center

This FREE event is brought to you by Accelerate Kitsap, a nonprofit whose mission is to bring educational business workshops to small business in Kitsap. Continue reading →

What makes or breaks a successful small business?

Leave a reply
business colleagues high fiving

What makes or breaks a successful small business? There are several key commonalities among businesses that succeed, according to several studies polling entrepreneurs.

Here’s a closer look at four things successful business owners do right—and one thing they need to do better.

What successful entrepreneurs do right

  1. They start strong. In a poll of 500 successful entrepreneurs, a whopping 84% of respondents say their companies achieved profitability within their first four years in business. In fact, 68% became profitable within the first year. Only 8% became profitable after their fifth year in business, suggesting that the first years in business are make-or-break ones for most entrepreneurs.
  2. They focus on finding new customers. Small business owners in the survey say finding new customers is their top business challenge—far ahead of cash flow issues or dealing with the competition. Smart entrepreneurs stay focused on continually generating new leads and closing new business.
  3. They put cash back into the business. Forty percent of business owners say whenever they have surplus cash, they put it back into the business rather than paying themselves, a separate study found. What’s more, 47% tap into personal savings to finance their businesses at one point or another.
  4. They work hard. Never let it be said small business owners are slackers. Some 86% work on the weekends; 23% take fewer than two vacation days total all year long; and of those who do take vacations, 75% work during their time “off.” Continue reading →

How much cash should a small business keep in reserve?

Leave a reply

piggy bank cashCash is the fuel that makes a business run. It is needed to pay salaries including your own, fund marketing programs to acquire and retain new customers, invest in equipment and facilities, pay rent, supplies and many more day-to-day activities. Most financial experts recommend three to six months of operating expenses, but using this for every business in every situation is misleading.

To determine how much cash you need, you must look at the following key areas.

How Much Cash Have You Been Using?

If you’re an established business owner, look at your monthly cash flow report (or go to the next paragraph if you’re a start-up). This report will provide an historical and seasonal perspective. Note the cash received from sales and the cash spent. The net of these two is often referred to as the “net burn rate.” For example, if you have $50,000 in sales and $30,000 in expenses, then your net burn is +$20,000

Your “gross burn rate” only takes cash expenditures into account; in our example, that’s $30,000 and is the more conservative amount, since it does not assume any sales are made. Historical spending patterns are a good starting point in considering future spending plans.  Continue reading →

Success in scaling your business.

Leave a reply

by Kelly Deis of SoundPoint Consulting

First, what does it mean to scale your business, and how does it differ from growing your business?

Consider scaling a business:

“growing sales at an exponential rate while only adding costs incrementally by developing a replicable system for delivering goods and services.”

with simply growing a business:

“increasing sales coupled with increasing costs with little improvement on profit margins.”

The difference is clear. There is nothing easy about scaling your business, particularly for small businesses. It takes intention, strategy and investment.

Often business owners are caught in a Catch-22. They know they can sell more if they hire a Vice-President of Business Development. But, they can’t afford to pay for this this new position until they have increased sales.Yikes.

The larger your business, the easier it is to scale. Larger businesses may have multiple revenue streams, fungible staff and banked capital which can help see them through the ramp-up phase of accelerating growth. Smaller businesses often do not have this luxury.  Continue reading →

Get your products ready for e-commerce success.

1 Reply

ecommerceBefore the Internet age, small business startups had little opportunity to showcase their products right alongside major national brands. Online marketplaces have leveled the playing field for small businesses, effectively helping them leap geographic boundaries and sell their products in markets that would never have been possible.

Whether you are selling your products on Amazon, eBay or directly from your website, it is critical for you to efficiently manage your product setup and ensure you can be easily discovered by consumers. Many of the same best practices that lead to in-store success can be applied to e-commerce, with a special focus on providing consumers with a well-rounded view of your product prior to purchase.   Continue reading →

10 reasons to keep your business blog active.

Leave a reply

Publishing a business blog is an important part of any marketing strategy, but many businesses launch one, not realizing that maintaining it is just as critical. Quality content is key, and if you’re a business professional you have lots to offer based on expertise in your field.

Here are 10 reasons why you might want to use that expertise to keep your business blog active.

1. Drive Traffic to Your Business Website

Customers who read your blog are 97% more likely to click on your website. That improves your website’s search engine optimization (SEO) making your website more likely to rise to the top of organic searches. In addition, the more you blog, the more traffic you get. Here are five steps to build a website if you haven’t got one yet.

In addition, blog sites that post daily get almost double the traffic than sites that post monthly or less.  Continue reading →