Management

small business accounting software

Budgeting is essential as it gives you a detailed view of the relationship between the multiple financial activities occurring in your company and helps you anticipate and get ready for changes that will inevitably happen in the future. Budgeting forces you to focus on you have to do better to enhance profit and gets you prepared for the future. A thorough profit budget highlights what movements you can expect in your cash flow.

The more cash you can extract from profit the better room you will have for manoeuvre when opportunities or issues present themselves. The best way to track how you are doing against your budget is to use the cash flow forecast reporting tools found in all good small business accounting software .

Better profits don’t directly relate to improved cash flow . Do not fall into this trap

You must continually track and immediately analyse any deviations from budget in your actual cash flow from profit. Any deviation from what you expected] you discover should be evaluated to work out if you have an opportunity or a problem.

small business accounting software most often contains reporting tools that allow you to drill down on the numbers and understand the contributing values.

Expenses consume cash and it is often the case that the higher the sales the higher the cash burn as the business uses more resources to fuel the growth in sales.

You should enter all expenses and sales activity into your small business management software as soon as they occur so as you can report an accurate forecast and make corrections or adjustments in line with your budget.

I cannot stress enough the need for vigilance when it comes to cash flow forecasting and budgeting without these essential disciplines you cannot maintain and grow a healthy business.

All the best with your business and the future.

small business sales forecasting software

More than 50% of businesses don’t survive more than 5 years. Check government statistics if you don’t believe me

The industry experts state the reason for death is the unfortunate ones simply ran out of cash. This description is not helpful and so I decided to find those directly and indirectly associated with failed businesses to see if I could determine the details, establish any consistent reasons for failure and publish them on the blogosphere in the hope that my results would help others avoid a similar fate. I discovered eight consistent reasons for business failure. Here are three of them:

No Vision, mission or strategy

“If you don’t know where you are headed then how are you going to get there?” You must have a clear picture of what you want to achieve and how life will be for your business if you achieve it. To achieve anything you must have a strategy. Strategy is like a route map it shows you how to get there. It’s a systematic list of activities. To make a strategy work you have to create a business plan that not only contains the key actions and milestones but can used to measure business performance against. A key instrument for tracking and measuring business perfomance is the sales forecast.

Lack of a system for marketing or sales

Marketing is about discovering markets and testing strategies to position your offering in the minds of prospects and directing them into your sales pipeline. Sales is about engaging the prospect and getting them to buy your product or service. Marketing is a process of measuring and refinement of the ways you employ to reach prospects. selling is the process of acquiring leads, forecasting sales and closing sales. In successful organisations a good marketing and sales system is consistently supported by a effective sales forecasting software system. Systems like these enable you to track and measure the activity in the sales and marketing processes. Outcomes arederived from reports created by the software which can then be used to compare what was planned with what actually happened. The bottom line is what gets measured gets improved or discontinued. This is the key formula for success.

Lack a system to get sales from their current customer list

There is a common saying that 80 percent of your sales should come from twenty percent of your customers. Your job is to achieve or exceed this figure. Customers that have already purchased from you are simpler and more cost effective to reach than prospects that haven’t. A combination of effective web based crm software and sales forecasting software will give you the insight of historical activity and enable you to discover opportunities in your current customer lists.

Insurance is vital in business, even those who have just started out will realise this pretty quickly. Pretty much everyone has insurance cover of some form for either themselves or their possessions. There are so many types it is staggering, from pet insurance to motorbike insurance. But they all have something in common, they aim to protect you. It is just as important to have office insurance if you are working in such an environment and here are three of the top reasons why this is the case.

Cover Employees. If you have anyone working with you or for you it is important that they are covered by your insurance. Accidents are actually quite common in the workplace and without proper insurance you might be picking up the bill for any medical costs.Additionally, it is not the most attractive thing for potential new staff to learn that you do not have them covered.

Loss and damage. The majority of offices house expensive items and equipment that often adds up to a substantial amount. If you are insured then you will be able to continue trading and will have financial back-up if things get damaged or stolen. Further to this, having cover means that you do not need to be constantly worrying about what will happen in the worst case scenario.

Credibility. Quite often, being able to say that you are fully covered by even small business insurance, shows your clients and other businesses that you are responsible and professional.In most cases you will make more money via improved client confidence than your insurance cover actually costs you. Just ask yourself this, would you do business with a company that didn’t have the money or effort to arrange insurance cover?

Choosing the right steps on safe work is important. Venturing to improve job safety starts with an audit. From then on, it’s a step by step matter of engineering out the hazards, changing methods and materials to safer options and in the end you’ve a reduced risk.

Having shrunk the risks of the various hazards it’s then the role of hazard signs and PPE to manage the risk remaining at that time. So health and safety signs are important as they support all the safety steps that have preceded them. It’s like safety signs are the “third man” of safety, forever watching and reminding of the necessary action for safe work.

In the main, workplace hazards can be designatedidentified and marked by the standard selection of safety signs that are readily at hand. And surely this is the most expeditious way to source your needed safety signs. But in many situations, there’s a special size, wording or notice that you need that’s relevant just for you . With the latest technology, your workplace hazards are quickly located and marked by these custom warning signs . There’s a tiny additional amount for their special text and that’s all, after which they’re of a low cost.

This service is invaluable when you can’t fit into the choice of standard designs.

And for many companies these days, danger signs are more than just legal compliance.  It’s about being a good organization; quite simply, caring for your local and broader community.  Within the normal gambit of safety signs, there are always a proportion dedicated to environmental care; managing spills, emissions to air and appropriate storage. With the increasing prevelance of green production processes, it’s no great shock that the text on an enviro-friendly hazard sign is not the only environmental story .

This jump in eco-friendly production of safety signs, is a gain for the environment in more than one direction and a sign of greener times as businesses look for reduced environmental impacts from their activities and purchases. 

sales forecasting software

Gathering the basic sales forecasting information you need

Every business should have a sales forecasting process. Sales forecasting should receive just as much attention as cash flow management. Sales are the life blood of any business as cash is the oxygen supply. The cash flow and sales forecast reports are inextricably linked. The adoption of good sales forecasting software and a well enforced sales forecasting policy can make an big difference to the health and performance of any business.

Key inputs

There are three key inputs or factors to consider when creating a sales forecast. The sales person, the customer and the product. Good sales forecasting software should allow you to report on these inputs and give you a clear assessment of the activity in your sales pipeline and what is and isn’t going to come in when.

1. Getting sales people to gather accurate sales forecasting information.

Sales people vary in their levels of skills, experience and knowledge of your target market or industry. But with a small amount of training, encouragement and discipline they can be made to submit accurate sales forecasts. Make sure your salespeople are acutely aware of what information you need them to extract from the sales process and make sure they pose the correct set of questions to the correct people at the correct time in the correct way. Therefore the first discipline sales people should have drilled into them is planning. Don’t even think about calling or meeting a customer unless you have planned it. The plan should contain what information is needed and what questions will be asked in what order. Their call plan should be recorded in the sales forecasting software for later review. Unfortunately a lot of sales people go to calls with a list of well documented questions and something to record the answers.

2. Gathering Customer information

Keeping detailed information about the customer’s organisation, the market they operate in and the progress they are making is really useful when it comes to assessing the basis for the salespersons sales forecast assumptions

A good example of this is the customers credit rating. Customer records should be stored and available in the sales forecasting software. Therefore every sales person should develop a habit of finding out as much as they can that is in the public domain about the customer. Naturally this information is good content for conversation when the sales person interacts with the customer. It will always lead to questions and most customers are impressed by sales people who appear to have a genuine interest or good working knowledge of their customers. Remember the art of the sale is about solving the customer’s problem. The more problems you can spot in your customer’s business, the more creative you will become and the more you might sell if what you have can address these problems.

3. Educating the Customer

This is where the third factor, the product comes into play. The easiest way to sell a product or a service is to make sure your customer is educated as much as is possible about what you do. I am not talking here about thrusting brochures into their hands. Here I would recommend using the timeless art of the story. Good story tellers will always get an audience’s attentions. Stories about how other customers have uses your products and services to solve their problems are invaluable. I like to think of a testimony or a case study as a good story, it has more appeal. These terms are tired and worn. You will get so much more information back from a customer if you tell detailed and carefully woven stories as they paint good pictures of the possible outcomes of using your product or service.

All of this information rigourously fed into a good sales forecasting software system should give you the insight to make more accurate decisions and avoid errors of judgement in cash management.

NetSuite Pricing

All of the technology and business people I regularly talk to keep telling me cloud computing. But what is it, what does it really mean for business and what are the financial and tangible upsides?

Cloud means Internet. The computing takes place on the Internet – in place of the software you use executing on your computer, it’s hosted on the Internet on a server installed in a data centre usually staffed by people who are adept in managing technology. This type of “cloud” software is sometimes called “on demand” or Software as a Service (SaaS).

Some typical examples of popular Software as a Service are:

Web based CRM Software (Customer Relationship Management) – Salesforce.com pricing approximately $9 per user/month.
Small business management and accounting software (small business ERP) – Salesorder.com pricing $45 per user/month.
Medium sized business ERP software – NetSuite pricing around $99 per user/month.

There are 3 significant benefits for every business here:

Time, cost savings and reliability

Businesses do not need a dedicated systems expert to help them identify, implement and maintain the hardware and software platform thus pushing down operating costs and time to deploy. The effort of vigilantly backing up information is taken away as this is almost always an inherent feature of the “cloud” software. Cloud software “operators” often have stand by systems that can be switched on in seconds should a significant issue occur.

Easier selection and wider choice

Using a web browser, businesses now have immediate access to a huge range of software packages they can in most cases immediately appraise and effectively determine if the software fits their needs at zero expense. This makes it effective for people in large enterprises to get around the restrictive information technology buying processes and easily assess and prove their business case.

Superior user experience

The web provides immediate feedback to application vendors and has driven significant progress in user interface design resulting in more intuitive software thus reducing learning times and improving user satisfaction. This of course means faster adoption and better productivity.

One of the top sales management trainers is Jon Berghoff. Jon is founder of Global Empowerment Coaching and has a history of teaching leadership, creating sales, and causing entrepreneurial success through ‘harmonic influence,’ which gives you control over yourself, your business, and the world in general. Jon Berghoff is speaker and bestselling author of the “Cutting Edge Sales Book.”

First it was the false rumor about Steve Job’s health… Apple’s stock nose-dived, millions of dollars down the drain.

Now, Steve Jobs -for real, not a rumor – pulls out of his perennial role as keynote speaker at the high profile Macworld trade show.

Again, Apple’s stock plummeted as much as 5.5% during after-hours trading.

What does this indicate? An unfortunate reality or a symbolic reminder of what real leadership is.

While Apple may not have the problem I’m about describe, the above scenario serves as a great wake-up call.

When a leader’s worth is so high that her lack of presense translates to instant panic, it says something about the kind of leadership at hand – where personality, rather than process, drive a profitable business.

I’m not saying personality isn’t important, but the order of priority is worth looking at.

I meet thousands of managers, leaders, and sales professionals each year, and I see this regularly: a person leads with personality and with charm at the top of the priority list.

The issue?

Personality is not always duplicatable, instructable and certain.

So what is?

Process.

In any leadership job, the executive/leader/manager should be focused on getting processes in place, before relying on personality to drive the business. Processes can be thought out, documented, taught, practiced, retaught, and ultimately duplicated. Personality, often can not.

Personality can create energy, attraction, and excitement, while the processes can leave a legacy.

What do you see in your business that can be duplicated, automated, and put into a repeatable process, that will help leverage your ability as a leader?

Companies that are part of the supply chain such as manufacturers and wholesalers can often benefit enormously by conducting their own b2b customer satisfaction survey.

Improving the relationship between wholesalers and their suppliers and also between wholesalers and retailers brings potential benefits that will help improve the product in terms of:

• Quality, range and design
• Delivery method, speed
• Communication, method and level of service
• Payment, quality of documentation and settlement time
• Prices, wholesale and retail price

A manufacturer can improve the relationship that they have with their wholesalers to the extent that the wholesalers would need to think long and hard before they switched to a rival supplier. For example by improving the communication and being proactive in automating much of the paperwork they can add value to their entire product range and that may be just enough to encourage a wholesaler to invest time in resolving any potential problem as opposed to making it easy for them to dictate terms by threatening to switch to a rival supplier. By adding value to the business relationship the product that is supplied moves away from just becoming a commodity item that can be sourced from anyone.

Wholesalers are often doing themselves a disservice if they only focus on price and do not adequately value the many benefits of working with a professional and well organised supplier, a supplier that will deliver on time, will supply products that meet strict the agreed quality and that have invoice and delivery documentation that is clear and accurate.

By conducting customer satisfaction surveys aimed not at the end user but at those involved in the supply chain there are many rewards to be had. By understanding and taking into consideration the requirements of both parties the business processes between any two organizations can nearly always be vastly improved and all parties benefit by keeping costs to a minimum.

For manufacturers it is in their interest to establish long term contracts that will allow them to plan and reinvest, confident that their customers are interested in the benefits that long term relationships can bring. Most wholesalers would be able to benefit from a just in time supply model where they reduce the cost associated with holding large volumes of stock on site but to achieve this they need to work with their suppliers to improve the whole fulfilment process.

The starting point for such an exercise is an exchange of information that can be obtained easily by utilising online customer satisfaction survey software that is now widely available and that makes the whole intelligence gathering process quick, easy and cost effective.

I am not happy. The printer has still not been fixed and now my chair is broken. The company is falling apart. The boss really doesn’t seem to have a clue as to what is really going on.

And on it goes.

These are the sort of thoughts that start to play on the minds of individuals when a company loses touch with their employees; the broken chair, the lack of appreciation, the blaming of ‘management’, even questioning the futility of what they are doing. Minor problems fester and a cynical and destructive mindset develops. Can you be sure that this isn’t the sort of thing that is going on right now in your organisation?

What should be social events held outside the office become no more than a forum for complaints and negativity grows among people who feel unable to effect change. Dissatisfaction will often synthesise into a demand for an increase in remuneration, as though like a cheap fix more money will momentarily lessen the pain.

If ignored by management the concerns of this employee will inevitable find empathy with their colleagues own individual concerns, where the only common demand might well be a demand for an increase in remuneration, more paid holidays and a reduction in working hours, all of which will not fix the broken chair, ensure that new personnel are in future properly introduced, trained and managed nor help management identify areas of inefficiency.

Organisations have a habit of pigeon holing people, physically through offices, cubicles or workstations and also in terms of responsibility. With strong and effective management to support this structure it can be productive, but as an organisation grows, weak or inappropriate management can infiltrate the management chain and it is only to then be expected that cracks will begin to appear.

Looking at an organization from the top down all the corporate garden can appear to be in full bloom as middle management either disguise or are just unaware of festering problems.

Experience shows us that relying on a limited number of indicators gives a skewed perspective just like a person with only one eye has difficulty judging distance. Good management will therefore establish procedures that sample the mood throughout the organisation from different perspectives providing a rounded picture.

There are both direct and indirect benefits of establishing good, frequent and extensive communication channels.

Greater respect will be given to a senior management team that is known to have their ear to the ground and where they keep the middle management honest by knowing that middle managers can no longer shrug away the senior manager’s searching inquiry “How is everything going?” question with a non-committal “Fine”; It is my experience that if someone replies with “fine” you need to dig deeper and ask if they really know what is going on.

Most principals of organisation will not have the luxury of spending time walking the floor and discussing the issues of individuals but through online employee surveys they can achieve the same benefits.

Online surveys are the perfect mechanism for establishing effective employer/employee communications. Using a survey hosting service they can now be created and published with ease and speed.

Surveys can be deployed in seconds by utilising the Internet and intranet, they can be completed easily by employees and the results analyzed in real-time exposing the ‘problems’ and giving early warning towards common themes of dissatisfaction.

Online employee satisfaction surveys have the ability to get to the heart of an organisation, confirm not only that the engine room is working but that there is sufficient coal in the bunker.

There are considerable benefits to conducting online surveys, real issues can be identified and employees feel that they have a forum to express their concerns.

Online surveys will not in themselves resolve a problem but what they will do is give senior management the opportunity to address the problems and concerns of their employees, if people then leave the organisation they will at least hopefully be doing it for the right and not wrong reasons.

Although monetary concerns can often be cited as the main reason good people decide to leave a organization dig a little deeper and it is often found that it is more to do with one or more of the following:-

• the workplace environment;
• a lack of accomplishment
• limited training and feedback;
• lack of a career path;
• over work;
• lack of trust and respect with their senior managers.

Good communication between the employer and employee can help identify the individual and common concerns of the employees and will give the senior management team the opportunity to address root problems and not just the symptoms of employee dissatisfaction, enabling them to demonstrate to their employees that they are valued as an important resource.

Employee surveys need to be customised so they are relevant for each individual organisation. To get an idea as to how effective online surveys can be try completing the sample employee satisfaction survey, then view the results of the satisfaction survey and just think of the benefits to management being able to measure so easily the heart beat of the organization.

Whether you are a decision-maker in a large corporation, a small business owner, or simply a homeowner or renter with a lot of stuff, it might be a good idea to consider using asset tags to keep track of your assets. Asset tags in conjunction with a well-maintained database can help you keep a handle on all your valuable assets.

What are asset tags?

Asset tags are labels. Made from metal, polyester or plastic, they can have unique barcodes and can be customized with your company logo or just your company information.They are very durable, waterproof, and can be made to prevent easy and complete removal.This way no one can remove a tag from one asset and move it to another piece of equipment.

What are they for?

Properly used, asset tags can help prevent employee theft, can simplify equipment records and processes, and can make it very easy to file a claim with your insurance company, should something happen at your business. Your bank may even require them to verify your assets for loan purposes.

Some examples:

• Your company buys all new computer monitors and distributes them to each employee.At some point an employee leaves or gets laid off or even fired, and then you notice the new laptop is gone. With no asset tag, you cannot know for sure exactly which one of those new monitors is gone. With an asset label and a well-maintained database, however, you can be sure that the monitor missing is the one assigned to that employee. If your database is robust enough you can also have easy access to any insurance or warranty you hold on the item.
• You have a fire at home and most of your possessions are lost. With an asset tag system along with an updated database, it’s a two-click process to get your claim information together for your insurance company.
• As an employee, you come into work one day and some of your equipment is missing. With an asset protection system, your employer can verify that you are not responsible for the missing items.

How do I make asset tags work for me?

Buying the tag is the first step. Beyond choosing the color, material, and look of your label, you will also have to decide if you want sequential numbering and barcodes.Suppliers would say use both, so that each tag will be unique and so you can use the barcode system to make your asset management program more powerful.

Even if you do not plan to use a scanning system right away, it is better to label once, even if you’re going to categorize twice. Additionally, using a scanning system is surprisingly easy. A little bit of legwork on the front end insures that your assets are tracked and managed. Just apply asset tags, scan and record their data into a database, and keep it updated as you add or remove assets from your inventory.

It doesn't matter if you are starting an asset management system at your business or your home, please don't forget that it starts with the asset tags.