Angela Jean Ahrendts, DBE is an American businesswoman and the Senior Vice President of Retail at Apple Inc. She was the CEO of Burberry from 2006 to 2014. Ahrendts left Burberry to join Apple in 2014. This video is an extract from Khan Academy
This video is an extract from Khan Academy:
YouTube has to be one of most underutilised platforms for small businesses. Yet it is said to be the 2nd most used search engine used by potential customers. Why do most small business owners ignore this fact and not even have a business YouTube account?
We unpack some of the ins and outs of online video in this recorded webinar on YouTube.
Take some time to go through the video (30 min) take notes and get some of these things done to help improve your online footprint in the marketplace.
If you need help, give us a shout on email or call and we will assist you with some of the difficult things.
If you have missed some of the videos in the series then pop by our Expertise community page and catch up on your Social Media learning.
From next week in October, we start a new series on Business Growth Strategies. Join us for tips, tools and techniques that will help accelerate your business before the end of the year.
| Blogging is not as hard as you may think. Just get started, that’s how most experts today got it done. In this week’s master-class, we unpack some of the issues around blogging and share some secrets to get this working well for your online brand footprint.
Watch the video below for the full lesson (30 minutes). Next week we chat about FaceBook and how to leverage your page to grow your businesses. Register HERE
|
Financial statements reflect the health of a business as the life of every business is reflected in its books. It is very important that business owners familiarize themselves with the financial statements and not only leave it to the accounting team. The more you know about your financial statements the better, this enables you to be in a better position to make sound judgement in regards to the decisions you make when you know how your business is doing financially. It is very important that you do not exclude yourself as a business owner but familiarize yourself enough to at least have an idea of what is happening in your financial statements.
The statement of financial position also known as the balance sheet will reflect the business’s financial position or value at a specific point in time. It reflects the business’s assets, liabilities and equity.
The benefits of knowing what is happening in your statement of financial position includes:
It will assist you to review your business performance.
You will need to produce it when looking for investors for your business.
It is it vital for your business plan.
Required for Annual Financial Statement.
Business has its own language, just like any other career field. Knowing this language is crucial for every entrepreneur because information in business is communicated using certain essential financial accounting terms. As a business owner, it is important to familiarize yourself with these terms, especially as someone new to the business industry. They might seem intimidating at first, but when you get used to them, you will understand why you needed to know them.
Balance Sheet – A quantitative summary of a company’s financial condition at a specific point in time, including assets, liabilities and net worth.
Assets – Rights or other access to future economic benefits controlled by an entity as a result of past transactions or events.
Expense – Any cost of doing business resulting from revenue-generating activities.
Revenue – The total amount of money received by the company for goods sold or services provided during a certain time period. It also includes all net sales, exchange of assets; interest and any other increase in owner’s equity and is calculated before any expenses are subtracted.
Coupon – Rate of interest payable on a loan.
Enterprise – a business activity or a commercial project.
Equity – A description applied to the ordinary share capital of an entity.
Gross – Before making deductions.
Net – After making deductions.
Liabilities – Obligations of an entity to transfer economic benefits as a result of past transactions or events.
Liquidity – The extent to which a business has access to cash or items which can readily be exchanged for cash.
Profit – Calculated as revenue minus expenses.
Turnover – The sales of a business or other form of revenue from operations of the business.
Budget for marketing in businesses is not a one-size-fits-all. Hence many businesses find it difficult to allocate their budget and know just how much should go towards marketing. The thing is, not all businesses are the same. They all represent different industries and their turnovers are different. So is their marketing and audience.
There are factors that each business should look into when deciding on a budget for marketing. First, ask yourself these questions:
After answering the above questions, you can then decide how much you need to market your company. Bear in mind that companies that provide services spend a bit more than those selling products. And for small businesses, it’s a bit complicated than to just simply assign a percentage and sticking to it.
Business.com suggests that as a small business, the best way to decide how much of your budget should really go on marketing is to do your research. Take a look at your previous marketing efforts and continue doing what works while reducing your budget on campaigns that don’t bring enough money.
Also, remember that new and emerging brands are looking to capture new market share and develop brand recognition with an audience that has absolutely no idea who they are. So, the new the company is the more expensive marketing is gonna be. But, if you aren’t well funded, make sure your rands are spent wisely and tightly to specific deliverables. There is nothing worse than spending every penny you have to build something the wrong way only to have to start over again. So do it right the first time.
The well established companies / businesses – those that have been around for 5 year and more, don’t need a huge budget for marketing, because their brand is already well known and there is no need for awareness.
Marketing fees can range depending on the age and size of the company and local or global marketing goals.
As you know, this month is finance month and we are speaking all things numbers.
One of the key tools to a successful business is to have a “Financial Calendar”. In case you are asking yourself what that is, a Financial Calendar is a 12-month accounting period for a company or organization. It is a list of all the key dates and deadlines that your company has to comply with.
There is a whole lot of key dates and deadlines that a lot of businesses forget or miss, and have cost them a lot of money in paying penalties and interests. So please know those key dates. Things like: VAT returns, Tax return, salary related issues – all those form part of a financial calendar.
It is best that you know all these dates to avoid paying penalties that you don’t even understand, or worse, to get your company de-registered. If you would like to know all about the important dates that your company should comply with, we will be talking about all of that in our finance workshop later on this week. To know more about the workshop please drop us an email on bruce@em-solutions.co.za or visit our website www.em-solutions.co.za
In case you were not aware, March is termed the Financial Month, so we will be talking a lot on finances this month.
In this articles we would like to give you a few tips on how to handle your finances as a new entrepreneur. A good understanding and management of finances should be your priority when you start a business. Even if you decide to hire an accountant or bookkeeper to manage the books, you still need to familiarize yourself with basic bookkeeping and money management principles and activities.
Here are 4 tips on how to handle your finances if you have just started a business:
1. Open a bank account.
Once you have registered your business, you will need to open a commercial bank account. Start by selecting the bank you want to work with – a bank that will be small-business-friendly. It should be easy to open a bank account for your business, nothing complicated is required. The next step will be to deposit funds into your new account
2. Get a professional.
Accountants and financial advisers have always been trusted and respected helpers of small business owners everywhere. Their intimate knowledge of the profession as well as tax laws in their jurisdiction will save you money almost every time. The thought or temptation to do it yourself so you can save a buck or two will creep in sometimes, but it’s almost never more cost-efficient in the end. An accountant will almost always find more deductions and keep you penalty-free. Just make sure you have the cleanest records, and be more organized year-round. But when things get technical or taxes are due, save yourself the money, time and headaches and call in a trusted professional.
3. Accepting cash and online payment services.
In today’s competitive business world, you must provide customers with many ways to pay, including cash, debit card, credit card and electronic cash. There is a cost to provide these payment options – account fees, transaction fees, etc. So make sure to shop around for the best service with the best prices. Not all banks and payment processing services are the same, and fees vary widely, so do your research and compare prices.
Online payment services: PayPal is one of the most popular online payment services with more than 40 million members in 45 countries, offering personal and business account services.The advantages of online payment services are that they’re quick, easy and cheap to open and you can have the funds deposited directly into your account.
4. Establish payment terms and conditions.
Every small-business owner needs to establish a payment terms policy. You may want to standardize the way you get paid, at the same time you will also have to be flexible enough to meet clients’ needs on an individual basis. Setting payment terms covers deposits, progress payments and extending credit. It’s important to establish a clear, written payment terms with clients prior to providing services or delivering product. Your payment terms should be printed on your estimate forms, included in formal contracts and work orders, and printed on your final invoices and monthly account statements.
The marketing month – February is almost over, we are now entering into a new month – March the financial month. For many companies March means the beginning of the financial year. In preparation for setting your budget and financial goals, we are allocating this whole month to you. We would like to help you with all your financial matters.
Before we go any further, allow us to share exciting news with you. We have grown so much as a company in the past few months. We are now a big company with THREE core offerings that we take to the market. Entrepreneur Incubator & Academy has merged with Michelle Davidson Business Solutions to form one big company. We are now Entrepreneur and Management Solutions (EMS). This is such an exciting time for us. We specialize in this three key areas:
To find out more about the services we provide and about our new company, please visit www.em-solutions.co.za.
How do you show up for work? No this is not about your fashion or dress sense, but more about the emotional engagement you have when you walk in the door at work.
The Gallup surveys tell us that the majority of the work force in USA is not engaged in their day to day activities at work. More to this is that a vast amount of available time and energy goes towards covering their backs and hiding their mistakes from colleagues and superiors. All this reduces the input and impact on the businesses output. How sad it must be to not want to go to your place of work where you spend up to 40% of your time.
Running a small business requires the same if not more energy to keep afloat. There is a constant battle to keep the ship upright and headed in the right direction. There is no time to be disengaged of distracted from the task at hand. A business owner and their staff need to be focused on the vision, lead by the mission and guided by the values and keep the eyes on the prize at all times.
But this is not always possible; things do go wrong. People have off days, get sick and have personal issues with each other. During these times the balls get dropped and issues fall through the cracks. It is a business that has well defined business procedures and processes that will thrive even in bad times. Simple well rehearsed drills, similar to a good sports team, will keep the ship on course.
As a manager, take time to flow chart the processes within your department and reduce, where required to paper using lists, flow charts and forms. Introduce these to the staff through training sessions and then encourage and enforce their use until they become automatic and part of the everyday life in the office.
Then sit back and manage by exception rather than fighting fires. This just makes your life a little easier and allows your staff to be more engaged with the purpose of the business not their personal agendas.