This is the beginning of a ten-part blog series where I’m going to share 10 best practices I advise my clients to adopt when sales figures are down and they need to boost their bottom line.
The recession of the past four years has made it difficult for middle market businesses to produce positive sales figures to support company value. Maximizing your company’s value in a period of declining sales is a very difficult task. There are, however, some key ways to improve company value in the eyes of your financial institution, investors or potential buyers.
When the top line is down, it’s the bottom line that matters, so focusing on increased efficiency and reduced costs are the ways to improve financial health. The most important thing to remember is that you need to plan ahead and begin work now, before the situation worsens.
My tips are: reduce customer concentration, reduce and refocus SKUs, focus on key suppliers, do an IT system checkup, review marketing and advertising ROI, reduce overhead expenses, institute a means to track financial performance ratios, reduce COGS expenses and develop new products.
Bookmark this site and look for my first tip next week: how to effectively reduce customer concentration, or else!