If you are like many business owners, you’ve have had some tough times in this economy.

So it’s not surprising that you may be trying all sorts of things to increase your profits.

Despite the technological advances we experienced in the last two hundred years, the fundamentals of doing business have not changed much.

How to grow my business now:

Have a Plan: Many business owners tell me that their business plan is in their head. So their “plan” is competing with e-mail, phone calls, client orders, employee needs, family matters and God only knows what else. If you don’t have a written plan, you really don’t have a plan.

• Get your mission, values, goals, strategies, tactics and a timeline down on paper.
• It is essential to review your plan regularly to compare your progress against your timeline. If you don’t, your chances for success diminish significantly.

Know Your Numbers:  Determine the numbers you must track weekly to know how your business is doing. At a minimum, you’ll want to know your profit margin and break even. You should also routinely review profit and loss statements. Metrics are the lifeblood of a small business.

Market Smarter: Marketing doesn’t have to cost a lot. It does have to be consistent, targeted at your most likely customers and measured to determine what works best.

A simple rule of thumb: Any marketing activity must bring in enough new business to cover its cost.

There are some great low-cost or no cost tools out there.  Try a few of these:

• Use social media to your advantage.  Facebook can be very effective.
• Email Blast your database
• Get customer referrals 
• Network strategically - don’t just meander around events. Plan out who you want to meet, review the organization’s membership and leverage the staff to get the right introductions. Business success is largely about who you know and who knows you.

Hone Your Sales Skills: If you’ve never taken a formal sales training course, you should.

The notion of the “born salesperson” is a myth. Truly great sales people hone their skills every day.

We all sell in some capacity—whether it’s ideas, products or services. Becoming a more proficient salesperson will make you a more effective businessperson in every way.

Be an Effective Manager:

• You need a written job description for every position in your business, for both full-time employees and 1099s. That greatly ups the odds your people will understand their role in helping your company achieve its goals.
• Do a twice-yearly performance review so employees know how they are doing. Most people want to do a good job. In the absence of written job descriptions and feedback, they’ll do the job their way, which may not help you.

Manage Yourself: You’ve only got a certain amount of time in a day to get through all the things you need to do to run your business. The more time you spend on things that waste time, the more likely your business is going to suffer.

• Create a default calendar and stick to it.
• Focus on the things that will make you money and shun anything that wastes time and costs money.

The economy is tough and competition is relentless. Unfortunately, it looks like this’ll be the norm for a while. But even if fairer winds blow tomorrow, you would still benefit from tuning up these fundamentals.

How to grow my business now….Utilize the fundamentals  listed above or contact one of our business coaches and build a healthier business today.