How do you measure success? After years of trial, error, training and research I have a management tip for you: the four top level measurements that I recommend everyone have in place across their business or team. They should be built into everyone's goals and objectives each year. Every department head should have improvements to one of them as a goal each year. They are: 1. Production: what did the business get from this department?...more
At a high level there are only two ways to grow a business: increase sales and decrease costs. Here's a simple management tip that will save you a lot of wasted effort. Before you start looking at the details of each method, you should understand the layout of a simple profit and loss statement and some basic terms your senior management team is very familiar with. These are the measurements that matter to business leaders.The Bottom Line...more
Sales is all about helping customers shop for and get what they need or want. It places focus on finding leads, converting leads, and closing the deal. Once those three things are done, all you need to do is deliver the product. So if sales minded people are focused on these 3 things, why separate the sales and orders functions within a business?The fact is many businesses, big and small, combine the sales and orders functions under one organization (usually called sales). Well this can work in some situations; there is an important case to be made for separating getting sales from taking orders.Management Tips for Creating a WIN-WIN ScenarioA widely recognized key to long term business success is building long term relationships with your customers. The simple fact is that it takes longer and costs more to get a new customer than it does to repeatedly satisfy the needs of an existing customer who already trusts you.It is very important to give your customers what they want to encourage them to come back to you again. It is equally important to give your business what it needs to survive, or you won't be around long enough to help your new customers a second time. You need to...more
The more efficiently you can fill orders the more money you get to keep from each sale. If you sell an extra $10 product you may only get to keep $1 or $2 after you finish paying for the product, warehouses, salaries, etc. But if you can find a way to do something for $10 less than you're doing it now you get to keep the whole $10. This is one of...more
A "Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure" is when a lender accepts a deed to the homeowner's property in foreclosure instead of continuing the foreclosure process and incurring more expenses to get the deed anyway. However, this does not mean the homeowner is no longer responsible for a loan deficit if the lender sells the home for less money than is...more
A secured loan is a loan that is available to homeowners, and this is because these loans are secured against the home. With equity levels rising steeply over recent years, secured loans have become a popular, affordable, and effective way for many homeowners to raise money, and the finance raised through this type of loan can be used for one of a range of purposes.One of the popular uses for homeowner loans is to consolidate debts, as many homeowners that are also juggling a range of debts with different creditors find that consolidating all of these debts with one convenient, low cost loan saves them time, hassle, stress, and money. Debt consolidation with a secured loan can mean that your monthly repayments are reduced by a significant amount in some cases, and you have fewer financial commitments and creditors to deal with.One of the main benefits of secured loans is that the borrowing power is greater than with unsecured loans based on your equity levels, and this means that even if you have a high level of existing debt you may still have the borrowing capacity to consolidate it all into one loan. Another benefit is that secured loans offer longer repayment periods than...more
According to officials from the Office of Fair Trading many people may be paying way over the odds for their credit card borrowing, and the lenders that provide these cards could be raking in around £400 million every year simply because of the...more
It is important that you do your homework before you make an application for a loan, as this will not only help to ensure affordability for you, but could also help to speed up the whole process, enabling you to get the loan you need without any...more
Many of us take our bank accounts for granted these days but it is important to remember that bank accounts are not available to everyone, and these accounts are vital in helping most of us to run our day to day finances. There are a number of...more
If you are a homeowner in the UK and you are looking to borrow money for one of a wide range of purposes, then you can enjoy an added advantage compared to non-homeowners, and this is the ability to use your home as security. Your home can act as a...more
Over the past few years secured loans have become increasingly popular amongst homeowners in the UK, and this rising popularity has been partly fuelled by rising property prices, which have left homeowners with higher levels of equity in their homes....more
Over recent months getting credit has become increasingly difficult for many people, as the effects of the credit crunch in the UK have resulted in far tighter credit conditions, with many lenders increasing stringency when it comes to their lending...more