It’s time to review the payment process in your business to ensure the money is in the bank.

Selling when you get payment at the time of sale is the best possible way to set up your business, and it doesn’t matter whether the sale is cash or on a credit or debit card. But for some businesses, particularly when you are selling to another business, it’s quite likely that you will be asked to provide an invoice and payment will be made at a later date.  

There are a few traps for the uninitiated in business with this scenario:

DON’T JUST PROVIDE AN INVOICE TO EVERYONE WHO ASKS FOR ONE.

Firstly, you should be asking them to complete a credit application where you can ask a series of questions about their business, get directors guarantees and ask for references.

Once you have this information, phone the references, do a Google search and see whether you can find out any information about them, good and bad, take into account your instincts if you’ve met the person or people involved a...

I spent the month of October traveling around, attending conferences, surrounded by people, and at a certain level, that is very tiring. You've got to be on your A game the whole time, talking to people, making new friends, making new connections, introducing yourself, all those things that introverts tend to struggle with. It's just full on. It's all day, every day, and it's very tiring.

Then I've come back, and I'm back in my office, where I work by myself. I have a team but they're remote, so they all work from their homes, and I'm now working by myself again, and I'm finding it a bit of a challenge.

I'm finding that it's a bit lonely. I'm finding that I get through part of the day and I think, "Gee, I want to have someone to talk to."

I want to have that human connection and interaction, and I found last week that I didn't even leave the house.

I do work from home, so it's a separate office. It's kind of in the basement, and the living quarters are upstairs, so it's a complete...

Organisation is essential. Not just in your business but especially around your numbers. Putting a system in place to get a clear and accurate picture of your numbers at any moment.

I'm guilty of having papers everywhere and of having a desk that it's neatly organized in its piles, and I do know where everything is, but it's still this clutter on my desk, and today I've been forced to tidy my desk because I have a client coming in to see me and that means that I want to make the place look nice. So I have tidied my desk. I now can see the desktop and it feels so much better. I still have the papers, they're still in piles, they're just not on my desk, and when I need them I can go and get them and bring them onto my desk, work on them and then put them back again.

I was thinking about how that relates to our numbers, and it's exactly the same thing. It's about being organized and having particular places for paperwork.

If you're a paper type person, it may be that you have either a...

I love to travel, and I’ll use any excuse to get on a plane.

So, if there’s an interesting conference in an overseas location or a speaking opportunity I’ll be itching to go, and even better when I have clients in far-flung locations around the world. And the sad thing is, it doesn’t even have to be an exotic location, although those are more interesting and fun.

OVER THE YEARS, I’VE TRAVELLED FREQUENTLY FOR BOTH BUSINESS AND PLEASURE, AND I’VE DEVELOPED MY FIVE MUST DO’S TO REDUCE STRESS FOR ANY TRIP I TAKE, WHICH ARE:

1. Arrive at the airport well before your departure time. I got caught out once arriving at a US airport for a domestic flight to Los Angeles with a connecting international flight back to Australia.

We arrived about an hour or so before the flight to find a very long queue for the check-in machines. By the time we got to them, it was just under an hour before we would travel, and we were told that because we were flying Internationally, we had to check in an hour a...

Around Valentine's Day, we all think of love as relationships with loved ones... but you have a relationship with your business too.

You need to love and be in love with your business for it to thrive, and survive into the future.

I'm sure when you started out, you were super excited, passionate about it, loved what you were doing. That's why you started, right?

After you've been in business for a little while are you still jumping out of bed with the same enthusiasm?

Do you still love what you're doing with the same passion and energy that you started?

Probably not as after a little while reality kicks in.

The reality of having enough money to pay the bills.  The reality of the hours you need to put in to make it work.

In order for a business to succeed you have to love your business, and you need to learn to love your numbers too.  Because the numbers are everywhere.

Numbers are part of everything you do - they're the lifeblood of the business.

Whether it's the number of cl...

How do you feel when you walk into a group where you don't know anyone?

Whether that's a networking event, chamber of commerce, a new job even, or in my case what I'm talking about is a MasterMind event.

I went to the situation I'm talking about a few months ago.  I walked into the room and I didn't know anybody. What was interesting at the time for me was that everybody seemed to know everybody else. I was the new kid on the block.  They hadn't seen each other for quite a while and they were all hugging each other and all, "Hi, how are you," and, "Oh, it's so great to see you."

The excitement level was great - everybody was welcoming each other warmly but ignoring the few of us who were new.

I think interestingly because it's a high-performing group, the majority of people that were new were fairly introverted.  Speaking to some of them afterward about this was quite interesting because I thought I was the only one.

I thought I was the only person who felt like an outsider. I tho...

Often the focus in business is all around revenue, but there is one crucial number that service-based businesses need to focus on even more.

Break-even.

Break-even is the minimum amount of income you need to cover all your costs.  It’s the bare minimum number you need to keep your head above water each month.

So how do you figure it out?

Oddly enough, we’ll start with your non-business expenses. Your personal expenses.  While break even is all about the business, we need to understand what you need to be drawing out of the business to look after yourself.  Think of this as your personal break even!

1. Start by writing a list of your personal expenses

These are your portion of the household expenses to keep the house running smoothly. We’re talking mortgage, rent, electricity, telephone, clothing, entertainment, schooling, food. 

If you're already drawing a certain amount out of your business - as a salary or drawings – this is a good chance to check that what you are drawing is ...