How to Avoid Big Fines
At SP Solutions we continuously strive to provide the best possible service to all of our clients, especially keeping their business and financial records up to date and accurate. One of the ways we do this is by working directly with ASIC (Australian Securities and Investments Commission) to submit formal changes within their strict time criteria. As ASIC is strict on time frames, failing to follow proper procedures could be costly to your business. If you are up to one month late in notifying them of any changes, a $69 fine is incurred. If you are more than one month [Read More]
Exit Planning. How to Build a Valuable Business to Sell
Business owners are different sort of people. We spend our days solving problems and embracing opportunities that others would balk at. We do it not just for the money, but because we love what we do. If you’re like most business owners, you can’t foresee a day in which you’ll be ready to leave your business behind. Your business is your baby; it’s your life. But what happens when things change? Some business owners simply fall out of love, some get burned out, and some just can’t manage their business once it reaches scale. This is normal, and it happens [Read More]
When Does a Business Fail?
Each and every day, new businesses begin, and old businesses fall to the wayside. We’ve all heard stories of big companies filing bankruptcy, going out with a bang, as well as small companies disappearing in the middle of a night, with more of a whimper than a scream. How does this happen? Is it a lack of customer satisfaction? Is it failure to deliver on time? Is it bad products, marketing, or employees? Maybe it’s a combination of them all? Or…what if a business stopped working simply because it ran out of money? That’s the real signal, the amount of [Read More]
Is Your Business Achieving?
Most business start with a dream, moulded by the steady hands of an entrepreneur into something tangible. During that time, it’s common for business owners to be excited about their dream – they’re off to the races, trying to turn that dream into a reality. But then something happens… By the time they get all of the paperwork filled out, raise money, build products, and start finding and servicing the customers, they get so wrapped up in the little things that suddenly those grand visions of bigger, stronger, faster get replaced with thoughts of just surviving until tomorrow. You might [Read More]
How to Double Profit without Doubling Debt
One of the greatest daily struggles of a small business owner is having to walk the fine line between paying the bills and investing in future growth. Many times, business owners look at their sales charts and see profit going up, but they don’t see their cash flow situation getting any better. They are making more money, but still not having any more to spend! So how does that happen? Well, what we have is a problem not necessarily with overspending, but with cash flow management. In order to grow, a business needs to be able to spend more cash, [Read More]
3 Truths About Why Your Business Isn’t Successful
One of the most dangerous types of small business owner is the one that’s afraid to look in the mirror and tell his or herself the truth. They often think that if they just keep their head down and grind it out, they’ll make it to the other side rich and successful. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. The cold reality is that if you don’t learn to deal with the facts, then these ‘tough times’ you’re dealing with now might not ever end. In my experience, I have found that there are three common lies a business [Read More]
How to create a pricing strategy
‘To successfully price a product or a service for your target market, you have to know your numbers“. Its a given that setting your price is one of the hardest decisions that all consultants and business owners have to make. You have to ‘know your numbers’. You have to know your labour and material costs, your fixed and variable costs and your desired margin. Once you know your numbers you then need to take a deep breath and come up with a price and understand that most of the time, the price you come up with will be wrong. If [Read More]
Get Off the Tools!
Are you stuck in your business? Is your business stuck at the same level? Same level of profit? Same level of growth? Have you ever asked yourself why you’re stuck? In my experience, the key reason a lot of small business owners get stuck is because they get stuck doing the same job over and over again. Most small businesses start in what I call a high performance, cheap labor business. Now, four out of five small business owners don’t get past the owner making a wage in their business. They don’t get past what I call the job stage [Read More]
Your numbers are screaming at you, are you listening?
Your numbers are trying to tell you something. When was the last time you had a good look at your numbers? Was it when you had a meeting with your Accountant last year, was it when you had to get your numbers ready to give to your bank, or when you sat down with your book keeper last month? Your financials are vital to get you bank finance, and they are vital to keep you out of trouble with the tax office. But the most important aspect of financial statements(Profit & Loss Statement and Balance Sheet) is to give you [Read More]
Have You Got 10 Years Experience or 1 Year Repeated 10 Times?
One of the things when we’re talking to small business owners about how long they have been in business and how much experience they have. A lot of them think that hey! I’ve been in business 10 years, I’ve got a lot of experience. I know what I’m doing… And in a lot of cases this is Not true! If you’ve got 10 years experience, is it 10 years experience or is it just one year repeated ten times. Why? Because when we start a business, we learn a professional skill, we start doing it for somebody else, we think [Read More]
What’s a good sales technique?
Customers don’t get sold to, they buy what they want, not necessarily what they need. A good sales person helps a person to buy what they want to buy, by identifying their needs and desires or by solving a pain they have. Sometimes that pain might not be obvious to the client, but, once highlighted they want it fixed. Become a problem solver: you’ll stop selling and your customers will start buying. Do you have a proven sales technique?
How do I develop a Business Plan?
A business plan can be worth as much or as little as you like. Some pay a few thousand while others pay tens of thousands, some go DIY while some (in fact the majority) do absolutely nothing! In my 25 years experience of advisory, accountancy and property development: I have never seen anyone do a plan and not benefit greatly from the process, however, I must admit that a business plan is something you create for for bank finance or investors not to assist the business growth process. I always recommend that my clients do a Profit Plan. Most plans are either based on last [Read More]
Property Investment: the right way
Have you ever seen a potential investment property that you immediately fell in love with then without thinking anything through – called the agent with that sense of ‘I have to secure this property if it’s the last thing I do!?’ Have you, after viewing the property and falling in love with it, begun to negotiate a price? Did you successfully negotiate a deal, buy the property then wonder what to do next? Maybe your next logical step was to traipse off to the bank to get the finance you need then as an afterthought - you finally called your solicitor to complete the conveyancing, [Read More]
Business Owners: Are You Taking to the Cloud?
As the world of I.T. continues to evolve there is no doubt that the progress of the development of accounting software and hardware is unprecedented. I recently attended the ATSA2011 (Accountants Technology Showcase Australia), where I learned the latest developments in I.T. for the Accounting industry and it’s clients. After a couple of hours of hearing how cloud accounting was revolutionaising our industry, I began to get the impression that even the software providers didn’t know exactly where the I.T. world was headed. It seems that as soon as someone has announced a new exciting way for accountants to improve how they operate their businesses, another [Read More]
Remove your barriers to business success
Being a Business Advisory Accounting firm, our main focus is to help our clients develop their businesses and, in turn, develop their wealth by removing their barriers to business success. In my opinion, the principal barrier of the small business owner is their own mindset. In the beginning they feel they ‘have to do everything’. The key is that they have to do everything because there’s no one else to do it. I have seen so many clients ‘do it all’ just because their business has become that little bit more successful. They get stuck doing the same things over [Read More]
How Do I Grow My Business?
The best place to start is to know your numbers. Find out the 80/20 of your business. What 80% of customers, products & services produce 20% of your profits and results? This is the first step in taking your business to the next level. When you identify the 20% you can then use this insight to develop a strategy to move your business up a level. A business gets ‘stuck’ because the business owner doesn’t know how to take their business to the next level. Trends show that most business owners come from a technical background; they started their business [Read More]
Our Business Focus Philosophy
We are Business Advisory Accounting firm, so our main focus is to help our clients develop their businesses and then in turn develop their wealth – that’s basically our whole philosophy and focus. We’re all about advising and helping our clients to make their business strong. “Let’s get your cash flow strong. Let’s make sure we invest those moneys in the most tax effective way while we can, let’s build your personal wealth up”. Every service we offer is about how to enhance that value proposition, that’s why we’re strong on DIY Super and we’re so strong on property. We’re [Read More]
Fear is the enemy in business
There are many fears in this world and when it comes to business I believe there are only three. 1. The Fear of People 2. Fear of Rejection 3. The Fear of Success The only way to defeat fear is action, attack it head on and do what you fear and fear will retreat. Courage doesn’t mean you are fearless, it means you do it even though you are scared. Fear is a coward if you attack it head on. My advice is to do your best and your best is usually enough. Do you have any fears when it [Read More]
Entrepreneurial opportunities, are they real or just distractions?
This is a great question and one that business owners face every day. When we are young in business we feel as if we need to chase down every opportunity, and we get so busy jumping from one opportunity to the other, we don’t get any real traction on most of the ideas. When we get older the opportunities seem like hard work. In my mind the key factors that separate the opportunities from the distractions are: 1. Have a plan and a vision for your business, and ask does this opportunity fit my vision and plan? 2. Do we [Read More]
Partnership Agreements – they are more important than you think…
Why do so few SME Partnerships have Partnership Agreements? Primarily: the cost…. Business owners look at the cost as an expense that they don’t really need to incur because, lets face it, the business has just started so “why spend money unnecessarily, the business can’t afford it right now!” My response to that is you cannot afford NOT to have an agreement. The cost of dissolving a partnership outweighs the cost of setting up an agreement tri-fold. Believe me when I say that the legal costs can escalate beyond belief. Secondly: a Partnership Agreement can sometimes be viewed as a [Read More]
