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Spend Vs Splurge: Can You Afford Not To Invest In These Areas Of Your Business?

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In business, a company owner will often take steps to try and reduce spending, but there are certain areas where cutbacks should be discouraged. Often, it is possible to reduce overheads, but lowering spending could put you at risk. Before you make any budgeting decisions, consider whether you can afford not to invest in these key areas.

Legal advice

Even if you run a very small business, it’s beneficial to have legal experts in your corner. You never know when you may need to make that call and take advantage of expert advice. Running a business isn’t always as simple as sealing deals and selling wares. There are many legal aspects that you have to take into account as a company owner. If you employ people, the last thing you want is a personal injury case brought against you because your office doesn’t comply with health and safety regulations. If you’re launching a new product, you don’t want a rival firm to rip off your idea or customers contacting you complaining about the quality of the item. If issues arise, and you need to investigate insurance fraud, take action against a competitor or find out more about compensating a customer, it’s helpful to have people in the know at the end of the phone. It is sometimes possible to handle your own legal affairs, but cases can be very complex, and if you hire a professional, you’re much more likely to achieve a positive outcome.

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Accounting

There are few things that are more important than getting to grips with the numbers when it comes to managing a company. If you own a business, you may not have the time or the expertise to manage the books, and if this is the case, it pays to join forces with an accounting firm. If you have no idea what’s going on in your accounts, you may encounter cash flow issues, and your balances may be much lower than anticipated, which could result in missed payments or failure to hit growth targets.

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Photo courtesy of Ken Teegardin via flickr

Training

If you manage a team of people, investing in training can help you upskill your employees, promote health and safety and increase productivity. In the short-term, you’ll be parting with cash, but in the long-term, you’ll be adding value. Training enables your employees to develop new skills, which could prevent you from needing to hire additional workers and enable you to diversify the services you offer. Think carefully about the programs you choose for your team, and have a look around at the opportunities that are on offer. Ask your employees what kinds of courses they’d be interested in undertaking, and read some reviews to find the best training providers.

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Photo courtesy of All In One Training via flickr

When you run a business, balancing the books is key. While there are some areas where you can save money, it’s wise to invest in legal advice, accounting services, and training. This will enable you to act swiftly if legal issues arise, keep an eye on your books, and upskill your workforce.

Ring Fence: 5 Ways To Prevent Theft On A Construction Site

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StrategyDriven Tactical Execution Article
Photo courtesy of Matti Mattila via Wikimedia

Construction is booming at the moment as more people realize that manual labor is a suitable career. Of course, you have known that for a long time but are only now reaping the benefits. However, it isn’t all picnics and bouquets of flowers. When you run a site, you have to put up theft. Whether it’s your employees or burglars, it happens on a daily basis, and it costs the firm a lot of money. So, it needs to stop, and it needs to stop as soon as possible.

For those of you that won’t put up with it any longer, you have come to the right place. Below are five tips that will help you prevent of types of theft in the workplace.

1: Install Cameras

The obvious thing to do is to invest in construction cameras and create a high-tech security system. Now, if you think that cameras are reactive, that isn’t the case. Yes, they great tools for looking at incidents and figuring out what went wrong. But, they are also useful in the moment. For one thing, the majority of thieves don’t bother targeting a site which has CCTV. Because they are opportunists, there is too much risk even if the rewards are high. Plus, advanced systems allow you to monitor any incidents and take control in real time. A real time alert, for example, warns you of any suspicious behavior so that you can call the police or inform your people on site.

StrategyDriven Tactical Execution Article
Photo courtesy of Pixabay

2: Light It Up

Let’s stay on the topic of prevention for a moment. Cameras prevent theft because they add an element of risk, and lights do the same thing. Powerful lights take away a thief’s most treasured tool: darkness. Burglars use it all of the time to creep around in the shadows unnoticed, which gives them more time and a better chance of success. With spotlights, there aren’t many places a person can hide in the grounds. As long as the lights are bright enough, it should illuminate the entire site. And, if they sweep the area randomly, it only makes everything safer. If there is an incident, the light also helps identify the culprits the next day on CCTV.

3: Lock It Up

Construction sites are prime targets because they house lots of valuable materials. It isn’t uncommon to work with everything from copper to steel, and these have a high resale value. So, a common criminal won’t think twice about shifting as many raw materials as possible. Obviously, you need to make this as hard as possible, which is why lockers are essential. All you have to do is place anything of value in the lockers and keep it there until the morning. As long as the lock is strong enough, it should deter any person with light fingers. A safe is also a good idea if you can find one that is affordable. Regarding machines, there aren’t many ways to keep them under lock and key. Instead, stack materials around them to block off the path. Also, fit an immobilizer that cuts the ignition.

Don’t forget to lock up your personal items, such as your jobsite radio. To learn more about these radios, read this review of the The 10 Best Jobsite Radios.

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Photo courtesy of Max Pixels

4: Background Checks

The biggest assumption bosses make is that they can trust their workers. That isn’t always true because employees are opportunists, too, especially if they think it’s a sure thing. As a result, the credentials of the people on your site must come into question. No one is saying that you need to grill them like a suspect under questioning, but you should look into their past. By talking to previous employers, it is possible to learn more about their personality and analyze whether they are a perfect fit. Also, a criminal background check should alert you to any major incidents in the past. No one likes to tar a person with a brush, yet you have to be careful. After all, it is your livelihood.

5: Security Team

Technology plays a massive part, but so do the people that walk around and stay on guard all night. The problem with a site is the size. It is too big to install cameras all around the perimeter, which leaves you vulnerable. Thankfully, boots on the ground can cover the places that technology misses. It is tempting to think that tech is infallible, particularly with recent advancements. The truth is that it is far from perfect, and that makes retro features like a security guard even more important.

The site is much safer when you put the new age and old school methods together.

5 Important Checks To Be Made Before Your Assembly Line Starts Operating

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StrategyDriven Marketing and Sales Article
Photo courtesy of Pascal via flickr

Running a business is not easy, but running a functional assembly line is almost as difficult. It may seem easy upon first inspection, especially if you’re a new firm. Just hire the factory space and equipment, hire the staff, maybe even outsource this process, and you’ll be good to go, right? You’d be wrong. No matter how well staffed, how large your operation, or how trustworthy the firm is that you’re outsourcing to, it falls to you as the responsible business owner to make these 5 checks to your assembly line before you give the go-ahead for production.

Factories are intricate, with many working parts, working systems, and working employees all applying themselves to produce your intended material good. This is where the quality, safety and reputability of your firm is crafted. It pays to go over the various implements with a fine-toothed comb, so you can be sure that everything is functioning exactly as it should, to the most minute detail.

Here’s what to look for upon your first inspection:

Duly Staffed

The product line needs to be correctly staffed. There needs to be an understanding of how many people are needed to operate the machinery, how many people need to be there in quality control, and how many are responsible for storage. Outsourcing will help you with this, and depending on your output this could differ. Make sure you’re not stretching yourself thin and that you’re adhering to the correct laws.

Factory Hygiene

The factory you outsource to, or the factory space you rent should be completely free of pests and an overabundance of grime. Pests can spread disease and grime can be a flammable hazard. The nature of factories are that they’re generally messy, smell bad and create plenty of refuse, but that doesn’t mean the employees shouldn’t adhere to a strict cleaning schedule, or a cleaning service is there to take care of it.

Factory Safety

Arguably the most important point on this list. Your employees should be safe. Even if they’re being outsourced, they are still ‘your’ employees by proxy. You might not face direct legal ramifications for an accident through negligence when you weren’t there to see it, but you have a moral and ethical responsibility to make sure your money is funding a correct, responsible operation. This includes gearing the employees in the correct safety gear, giving them regular breaks, a well ventilated and well lit workspace, along with realistic shift patterns.

Equipment Maintenance

The machines that comprise your factory space need to be well maintained and observed during any standard work week. You should have a rota dedicated to regular machinery lubrication, machine cleaning where appropriate, and health and safety operational assessments that can keep future users protected.

Quality Control

You need a solid quality control team to make sure that your products are made adhering to strict safety laws, and are tested as such. Ideally, you should have a team of your own people responsible for making sure that the products are correctly made and handled. Don’t be afraid to lose money in the pursuit of positive, responsible material. This is your name on the line, and the health of your consumers.

Having a solid assembly line with great quality control goes a long way in providing your employees with great products, no matter what category of sale they fall into. Check these items regularly to maintain a well-functioning assembly line.

Business Admin Online: Making Sure Your Business Is Functioning As It Should

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StrategyDriven Tactical Execution Article
Photo courtesy of medithIT via flickr

Keeping your business operational online isn’t as easy as it first sounds. For the uninitiated, it might seem that just purchasing and keeping the website domain name is enough, and as long as you have an attractive internet site, the money will start rolling in without any more thought put into the matter. This is simply wrong. Many things go into the functioning of a great business website, and simply letting the site tend for itself is not one of those considerations.

But what does your online team do all day? Refresh the website to make sure that everything is functioning as it should? Thinking that way is simply an insult to them because a site that functions correctly, especially one that operates properly under demand is one that is multi-faceted and requires a diligent eye to keep operational. Remember, your website is the forefront face of any beginning consumer interaction with your firm, and if it’s unattractive, unresponsive, or simply has repeated and extended terms of downtime, your business will look unprofessional.

But how do you stay on top of everything? These tips will show you how:

Software Testing Tools

To keep your business online and operational, there will be some software packages that your business employs to directly aggregate the data they receive from the consumer use. This includes social media profiles and also installed software you use to manage your online postings securely. It’s important to use software testing tools like QASymphony to easily navigate the health reports of your software, and schedule your maintenance tasks more efficiently. Your online team will thank you for the considerations here, and it will also give you as a business owner added respect for what they do.

Department Synergy & Communication

Communicating and taking the advice from your departments is a sacred activity of any successful business owner because it’s those staff members who are in the trenches and arguably know the intricate responsibilities of their department much better than you do. Talking to these departments is absolutely no cost to you so you should keep that in mind when it comes to taking on advice that could help them perform their roles better.

At the end of the day, your staff is only trying to fulfill their roles more effectively. Usually, if a solution makes life easier for them, it makes life easier for you, too.

Reliable Server Hosting

Whether or not you hold the server hosting as part of your firm, or you outsource it (likely,) you need to have a stable and dependable service that is unlikely to go down, and relatively secure against hacking attempts. DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks are always going to get through if you’re unlucky to be the victim of one, but if the regular functioning of your server hosting service is failing you, you should look towards more stable areas of operation.

The online world is where all the important business action happens these days. It’s important to stay on top of modern trends and keep sharp with your maintenance if you want to stay relevant.

It’s Not A Race: Don’t Rush Launching Your New Product!

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You’ve done the hard part, you’ve come up with that perfect product idea, or at least, you think that you have. The fact is that although coming up with the initial product idea and developing it can seem like the hardest part of launching a new product, that isn’t necessarily the case. There are also various other factors that come into play when launching a product, which is why it’s so important not to rush the process and to ensure that you take your time launching your new product.

That being said, what you don’t want to do is take so long that your competitors beat you to the punch – it’s all about finding the right balance between rushing the launch and taking too long. To help you ensure that you don’t rush the launch of your new product but don’t end up being beaten to it by your competitors, below are some useful tips and pieces of advice to take note of.


Photo courtesy of Pexels

Be clear on aesthetics

Let’s talk aesthetics. The product itself aside, because you will most probably have already dealt with the aesthetics of this, but what about the aesthetics of the branding. From the packaging and logo to the stock images you plan on using, it’s vital that you ensure the aesthetics of your product are on point. What this means is making sure that when it comes to the designs of your product packaging, for instance, or the layout of your product photos, that they will be appealing to your target audience. To do this, it’s worth investing in packaging research, as well as doing research into the types of styles and designs that appeal to your target audience. What you want to be clear on is that your products, their packaging, and any stock images that you have created, appeal to your target customer base.

Make time for focus groups

A simple way to ensure that your new product, its packaging, and various marketing materials will appeal to your target audience is to hold focus groups. This is where you bring a group of people together – usually five or six people – and ask them to discuss something, in this case, it would be your new product, and it’s branding. You can then use what is said in the focus group, such as what the attendees like and dislike about the product design, as feedback to improve the product and its aesthetics. Focus groups are an incredible tool for ensuring that before you launch a product, it’s a perfect fit for your target customer base, so it’s worth making the time to run them.

Use social media to build excitement

The key to success when it comes to launching a new product is social media, as well as a fabulous product launch, that is. But going back to social media, social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, are the key to your success with a new product. You see, these sites can be used to help build excitement surrounding your new product with tweets about it, sneak peek photos, and competitions, you could even create your own hashtag for the product and attempt to get it trending. Learn to use social media effectively to build excitement around your brand and the launch of your new product, and you can significantly increase the product’s chances of success.

It’s important to take your time when launching your product, to ensure that you don’t rush things and make an error. That being said, what you don’t want to do is take too long launching it, as else a competitor may beat you to it and launch something similar.