4+ Reasons Why Your Business Needs An Accountant

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Finances Article |Why Your Business Needs an Accountant|4+ Reasons Why Your Business Needs An AccountantWhether you’re starting up a new business or have a successful one already, you may feel like you don’t need to use an accountant. After all, if your financials are simple enough to calculate, why pay for the services of an accountancy firm?

Well, whether you may wish to admit it or not, there are actually several reasons why it makes perfect sense to use an accountant for your enterprise. Here are seven of the top reasons to enlist the services of a local and reputable accountancy firm:

1. You can ensure your tax affairs are all in order

Let’s face it: one of the reasons anyone hires an accountant is because they want to lower their tax liability. The thing is, if you attempt to manage your firm’s financials yourself, you could be in danger of paying too little tax. It’s for that reason alone that an accountant can make sure your tax affairs are all in order, especially with things like IR35 and capital gains tax.

2. You find dealing with finances rather boring

Trawling through tens or even hundreds of documents to determine things like turnover, profit and loss, and tax liability isn’t the most fun job in the world. If you haven’t got a head for numbers or just find the idea of dealing with company accounts boring, you are most likely to make mistakes in your calculations. That’s why it’s best to leave such tasks to professionals.

3. You can get advice on improving your business

It goes without saying that accountants have an intimate insight into the financial health of each client’s organizations. With that in mind, when an accountant works on your firm’s financials, they are best placed to advise you where you could improve things in your business to increase profitability. For example, they can suggest ways to save money by cutting out certain expenses.

StrategyDriven Managing Your Finances Article |Why Your Business Needs an Accountant|4+ Reasons Why Your Business Needs An Accountant4. You want to raise extra capital for your business

If you’re planning an ambitious growth project for your business, you may find that you need to secure funding from a third party such as an angel investor or your bank. Before you can ask anyone to lend you some money, you need to provide a detailed insight into your company’s financial health. You will also most likely need to provide financial forecasts to show that your business is a viable one. An accountant is the best person to ask for help with such requirements.

5. You need to have an audit

There are times where businesses must legally oblige with audit requests from government agencies such as a tax office. Some business owners panic when they must comply with audit requests, especially when they’ve been taking care of their financial paperwork themselves. Luckily, an accountant can make it easy for you to provide the required documentation for any audits.

6. You want to sell your business

If you’re planning to retire soon, you are likely going to sell your business and use some of the proceeds to have a comfortable retirement. An accountant can help you determine the value of your business.

Business Management Tips to Help You Boost Profits in 2020

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StrategyDriven Entrepreneurship Article |Business Management Tips|Business Management Tips to Help You Boost Profits in 2020Company profits are derived partly on hard work, and partly by the decisions made about the direction and focus of that hard work. This article focuses on the latter, inspecting how you, as a manager of a business, can make better decisions, and manage your resources more wisely, in order to improve growth, boost profits, and please shareholders. In the modern age of business, you need to be sharp to manage your business towards having a competitive edge.

Read on to learn how to sharpen the tools in your management kit in 2020 and beyond.

Think Staff

With so much chatter across the business world about digital technology and automation, it can be difficult to refocus back on staff – the people who get the job done for you and your company. All the most successful companies, you’ll have seen, are those that instill a smart, professional and motivated workplace culture – a code of ethics and responsibilities by which everyone abides.

As a manager, it’s your responsibility to see these values upheld, in order for productivity to be boosted, and workers maintaining loyalty to your project and your goals.

Software Steals

Nonetheless, there cannot be a business article in 2020 that does not mention the oncoming tide of technology that’ll make your business double-digit percentages more efficient in the 2020s. You only have to look to the technology news that’s published across the internet to read a host of fascinating stories about software and their use within companies large and small. Your responsibility as a manager is to make sure your business is the first to enjoy these benefits – using software and automated tools to boost your productivity this decade.

Financial Management

This tip is especially important for small businesses, which are perhaps more liable to falling profits, debt, and liquidation than their larger and more permanent cousins. If you’re managing a smaller company that’s on a growth strategy, you need to ensure that you’re working with the right tools to help you manage and understand your finances. With quickbooks authorize net integration, you can combine your accounting software into one streamlined system that provides instant and data-assessed access to your company financials, helping you make the snap decisions – about business deals and investments – that might prove profitable for your business in the future.

Think in the Long Term

Much of the news cycle is concerned with the here and now – and that atmosphere, of instant gratification and on-the-button updates can make business strategies myopically short-term. It’s the responsibility of a good manager to also direct workers’ perspectives to the longer term.

You can do this by setting goals, but you’ll also do this with a little blue-sky thinking about the future needs of your consumers, and the future pressures on businesses in your industry. By using this perspective, you can buy yourself breathing space and flexibility in the future, by making changes today that’ll boost your long-term competitiveness into the 2020s.

These business management tips will help all ambitious and thoughtful managers plot out a route to success in this new digital decade of enterprise and trade.

How To Prepare For Launching Your Niche Business

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StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Niche Business|How To Prepare For Launching Your Niche BusinessWhen you have always wanted to go into business for yourself, it can be such an exciting venture. But at the same time, it can be really nerve wracking. You may find that you need to make sure that you’re really prepared. This is always the case in business – it’s handy to put the work in first and see where it takes you. Not only that, but you may also find that when you’re looking to move into a set niche, that you have to be extra prepared. You can’t always follow general advice when you’re working in a set niche and it could be the case that you need to do extra research. So, when you’re thinking of getting things up and running, you may find that these following steps help to prepare you.

Do Your Research

You’ll always want to make sure that you begin with market research. Not only do you want to make sure that there is an audience for what you’re trying to create, but that you know your ideal customer well and can tailor everything you do towards that.

Create A Solid Plan

But the research is always just the starting point. From here, you will want to make sure that you create a business plan. It doesn’t always seem like you need one – but it can really help you to get to know your business idea better and give you a good sense of direction.

Know Your Strategy

From here, you’re going to want to make sure that you are aware of what kind of strategy you’re going to take with your marketing. It can be essential that you know just what kind of approach you’re going to take and even to start building up some marketing and interest in your company before you launch. So really make sure that you’ve thought over everything and you know what you need to do and when.

Build Your Network

You may also find that one of the most important things for you as an entrepreneur and your business altogether, is your network. Contacts can be everything. So making sure that you meet the right people for your business is essential. Whether you need mortuary supplies or a marketing team, branching out can help you to connect with the best possible companies and people. So start to do this as early as you can.

Focus On Growth

Finally, you’re going to want to make sure that you really do put the work in. If you are serious about making this work, you have to know that you are going to grow at the rate you want. It might be slow and steady, but growth is important. Even if it takes you two years to break even, you need to have that planned in. And, where possible, the more aggressive you can be the better. Because you’ll make your mark and establish yourself among your niche market sooner.

5 Ways to Show Customers They Are Valued

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StrategyDriven Customer Relationship Management Article |Valued Customers|5 Ways to Show Customers They Are ValuedA satisfied customer is all well and good, but if your customers do not feel as if you value them, you could be facing an uphill struggle for consistent growth. A customer who has bought from you in the past is up to 70% more likely to buy from you again, whereas new prospects may only convert at 20%. It’s not a question of whether or not you should be making your customers feel valued as, without happy customers, you do not have a business; the question is whether you are doing enough to make them feel valued. You must go beyond delivering customer service and take steps to build and nurture trusting and lasting relationships while recognizing them as individuals, not as sales.

Here are five ways you can show customers that they are valued and improve your relationship.

1. Respond to and engage with customers

We all know the frustration of trying to get in touch with a brand and waiting days or even months to get a response. You may feel that you are too busy and push them to the bottom of the list, but when you consider that customers are the lifeblood of your business, this is crazy. Whether you’re a startup with no staff or a huge corporation with thousands of employees, you can make time to reply to your customers in business hours. When you receive messages on social media, positive and negative reviews, or comments on your blog, use it as an opportunity to open up a conversation and show them the human side to the brand.

2. Establish a relationship of trust

Your customers need to have confidence in your brand, which does not happen instantly. If you are considering two products and one salesperson has bombarded you with features, benefits, and prices while the other has taken time to ask you questions about what you are looking for, which are you most likely to trust? When a customer trusts a brand, they are more likely to return to that brand in the future.

3. Try to get to know them

Brands and customers are closer than ever before, and much of this has been made possible by social media platforms. We can get to know people in a very personal way through social media interactions and digital marketing analytics, which will tell us where they are in the world, their gender and age, their interests, their profession, and even their relationship status. With this information, you can tailor not only your marketing but also your product development to reach them on a much more personal level. Find out how to use social media for market research.

4. Give your brand some humanity

Humanizing your brand is incredibly important when it comes to building positive and meaningful relationships with customers. You need to maintain yours professionalism, but allowing your brand’s personality to come through can help to deepen the brand-customer relationship. Customers will see you as more than just a money-making machine and be more inclined to engage. You can do this very effectively through social media such as sharing profiles of your team or behind the scenes photos. You could also give your product packaging a handmade, personal finish with crafted labels using letter stencils or a handwritten note of thanks.

5. Thank them

This leads on nicely to the final but crucial tip – thank you, customers, as much as possible. Whether you include thanks on a contract or invoice, on a written note with the product, in an email, or on social media, you need to make sure that you acknowledge how important your customers are to your success.

How to Make Your Office a More Vibrant Place to Work

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Vibrant Workplace|How to Make Your Office a More Vibrant Place to WorkIf your business is going to succeed, it needs to have a base from which to operate that reflects its values and facilitates good work from your employees. A workplace shouldn’t be dour or boring; you get the most out of people when they’re working in a place where they enjoy spending time. There’s nothing wrong with a workplace being vibrant; in fact, that’s the way it should be. Here are some ways to make your office a more vibrant place to work.

Use an Open Plan

One of the quickest and easiest ways to make your workplace more vibrant and dynamic is to break down barriers. You can do this by making the layout open plan. That way, people aren’t shut away in their cubicles away from what other people are doing. It makes communication and teamwork far easier and more viable. So, if you want to switch things up, this is one of the ways of doing it.

Make it Bright and Light

A workplace needs to be bright and light if you want people to feel positive there and you want them to enjoy working there each day. A dark and dingy workplace is never going to help you achieve the things you want to achieve because people will hate being there and lack motivation. So, make the most of natural light and ensure the place feels bright and welcoming as soon as you step inside.

Redecorate It

Maybe it’s time you redecorated your office too. If it’s been a while and the place is starting to look a little dull and uninspiring, changing things up with wall art could have a huge impact. You can make use of Custom Made Stencils to put your stamp on the office walls with your logo or brand name. Simply make it feel fresh and bright once more. It might not sound like much, but it’ll have an impact, that’s for sure.

Hire the Right Personalities

Hiring the right people is another thing that’ll help your workplace to feel a little more vibrant. People with the right personalities will help the company to shine and they’ll bring people together. You don’t want too many negative or divisive people working for your business because that’ll just make success harder to find.

Encourage Team Working

Finally, you should think about how you and the other people running your business might go about encouraging everyone to work together a little more closely as a team. It’s not always easy to make this happen but it’s worth at least making an effort. When everyone’s collaborating, the place immediately feels more vibrant and alive.

As you can see, there are tons of ways of making your office a more vibrant place, so all that’s left for you to do now is start putting some of these ideas into action. By doing so, you’ll turn your workspace into a place your employees enjoy being each day of the week, and that can only be a good thing.