Are you a business owner and you are thinking of expanding your business but the issue is that there is no available cash at the moment?
Everyone is familiar with the fact that establishment, or acquiring business requires money.
It’s no doubt. One might be limited to strict spending when one wants to start a business but this does not mean that one will have no other options.
Steps To Expanding Your Business Without Money
There is a possibility that one can start a business with very little or no money. It just takes the right combination of work ethics, ability to relate, doggedness, skills, and marketing know-how.
These are steps/things one can do to expand a business without using money.
Engage Your Employees
Your employees are not slaves, and they are one important factor if you really want to expand your business without cash in your hand.
One characteristic of a leader of any company or organization or association is his ability to stabilize and give confidence to his employees during times of unrest.
A leader should be a stream of motivation for the employees.
One thing you should not do is to stay behind closed doors, If you stay behind closed doors, it may raise fear and suspicions. You should remain honest with the challenges you face, but just continue remaining optimistic.
Nevertheless, when the job markets suffer, it affects also productivity. It is the leader’s duty to be able to balance the situation. If not, either of the extremes can be dangerous to productivity.
Doing this, you increase your employees’ hope and confidence in you, and in return, they work with all they’ve got to ensure your hard work and the business succeeds.
Engage Your Customers
This is one of the best ways of expanding your business without involving money because customers are the life-blood of any business. I don’t mean literally engaging your customers here.
What I mean is getting to know your customers and getting them to know you.
You can do this in different ways. Take a survey on your customers to find out if they are enjoying your services. After all, your customer’s health drives your business health. Be caring for them.
Show them that you care, inquire about the ways you can help them. You can even go as far as organizing seminars for them. Invite experts and professionals in the field who can educate them on important things they need to know.
Be humble when approaching your customers, and spend time listening to them. Be proactive.
By doing all these, you not only create a relationship with them, but you also encourage them to patronize your business more and give you feedback on how you can satisfy them better.
Lead With Balance
To expand a business without money, it is more beneficial to lead with balance, especially during harsh economic times. Strangler rarely maximizes their business’s growth potential.
Do your best in staying balanced irrespective of any economy or business waves. There are always beneficial opportunities for growth during times like these. Be watchful to possibilities and stay open.
Speed Up Your Flow of Information
We are in the information age and one needs to be fast and alert to whatever information that can help in growing one’s business. Examine the condition of the micro economy and your specific industry.
Firstly, think of three things that your business needs to make money.
Afterward, proceed to get the data into a report. Update information as fast as you can and regularly.
Compare these facts to the things your marketing and salespeople are telling you. Question their assumptions, work with them, and modify projecting, based on the facts. With this information in your hand, be proactive and decisive.
With this, you can be sure of increasing the growth of your business.
Protect Your Balance Sheet
Protecting your balance sheet is another sure way to expanding your business without money.
Difficult economies push many businesses into a typical condition that affects revenues leading to negative cash flow and operating losses which in turn produces a weak balance sheet and a lack of ability to invest.
As it necessarily becomes important to avoid the cycle, one must look oneself in the eye and be honest with oneself about the state of one’s business. If your salespeople are incented to introduce poor credit business, it might mean shifting your sales commission to reward cash flow and not revenue. Do not let this happen.
In protecting your balance sheet, follow the simple rule of business capital which is, “do to your vendors the way your customers do to you”.