My business advice

Your Office You have just got your bank loan and it’s time to start buying your first office equipment, but what should you buy and what must you avoid? It is not an easy answer and to make it harder new technologies keep on appearing and the rate at which they are developing is getting faster. But to get you heading in the right direction here is an overview of the type of things that you are going to need to buy. Telephones For many businesses they are one of the most important things that you can buy, so don’t be afraid to shop around for a good deal on rates. British Telecom is everyone’s first thought so use them as a barometer for how expensive calls should be. Make sure that you also have a messaging service, as a telephone that just rings and rings is both unprofessional and could mean that you miss out on a vital call. Read more on telephones Computers Some companies are entirely office based and it may be necessary for everyone to have their own computer. Howeve...

Half of all new businesses fail during the first two years. All too often the cause of failure is not the quality of the product or service, the effort and talents of the people, or the sales and marketing. It is quite simply financial failure - running out of money - which leads to closure, if not bankruptcy. In many cases, this failure could have been avoided by simple but effective planning from the outset. In too many new businesses well-qualified people enthusiastically develop their goods or services but pay insufficient attention to cashflow. Late payment erodes profits and stifles growth. A sale is not really made until it has been paid for. The discipline of ensuring prompt payment is called credit control or credit management and it has to be a priority if a business is to succeed. Granting credit to a customer involves the risk of non-payment and so should only be done after checking and assessing that risk. A bad debt means that a company could have to make sales five...