Are you looking for a way to expand your business while keeping your costs low? Let’s be honest here, who isn’t going to be doing that in business? After all, it’s the mantra of every successful company that you need to do things faster, better and cheaper (something adopted by NASA way back in the 1990s) and if you do it right means that you can produce a quality product for a lower cost at a greater benefit to your customers. Win-win, right?
When you look at the term ‘cutting costs’ it doesn’t mean that you need to slice pay or reduce the benefits for your employees – and you don’t even need to take anything away from your products or services. No, what the term cutting costs means is that you take an innovate approach to looking at your business, with the sole aim being to reduce your overall costs. Sometimes when you look a little closer, you will find that a process can be costing you money purely through the number of steps that you need to take to get a job done, or the amount of people who need to work on it. Other times you’ll find that an office is costing you too much money – and in that case you would take the step of switching to the convenience and flexibility of a Virtual Office.
Let’s take a look at the top three ways for you to cut costs and to expand your business.
Step One: Reduce your overheads
When you take a look at what is costing your business the most money, it will probably be the staff, followed by the office space that you’re renting. While you need to keep your staff in order to provide the work that you do to your clients or customers, you can shuffle things around a little bit in order to get the best outcomes. Take a look at the staff you have and consider whether any of these staff would consider working on a contract role and working from home. This can be a great way to kill two birds with one stone, in that you reduce the overhead of having someone working in the office, and you’re only paying your staff for what they are actually working. Many people will actually actively embrace flexible work; for various reasons. Why not consider putting it to your staff and finding out what they want to do? You might be surprised.
Step Two: Talk to Your Suppliers
Part of doing good business is always opting for the best possible suppliers that you can get – and ensuring that they’re giving you the best possible price. It doesn’t hurt to play your suppliers off against one another if you need to in order to get the best price, so consider this as a bargaining tool. Don’t back down from a good deal if you feel that you deserve it – and be sure to know what the market price is before you begin negotiating so that you can get the best outcome.
Step Three: Bring work in-house
Part of running a business is knowing when to hire people to take on the work you just can manage or aren’t equipped to do yourself. It can be tempting in this digital age to consider outsourcing – possibly to an offshore location. Often this can be a highly detrimental option, as the costs associated with managing and running an outsourced or offshore staffer can be higher than the money saved by not employing a staffer. Consider getting someone who can work remotely, but who is in your city so that you can have regular updates and meetings.
Good luck with saving money while you expand your business.