When you first start your business, it’s very important, actually, it’s vital that you reinvest the profits into the business to help the business grow. However, as your business continues to grow more and more, your net worth becomes enmeshed in the business. Consequently, your net worth becomes illiquid and inaccessible. And that has a direct impact on your cash flow.
As business owners, we face many challenges at various times throughout the year: how to increase revenue or increase sales, how to decrease expenses or overhead hiring people. Currently, it’s very difficult to hire people, and more importantly, it’s difficult to get the right people for the right position. One common thread challenge that all business owners face either consistently or at various times throughout the year is how to increase cash flow.
Today, we’re going to talk about how to increase your cash flow as a business owner and we’re also going to show you how to do it without increasing your sales and without reducing your overhead expenses.
When you first start your business, it’s very important, actually, it’s vital that you reinvest the profits into the business to help the business grow. However, as your business continues to grow more and more, all your net worth becomes enmeshed in the business.
Consequently, your net worth becomes illiquid and inaccessible. And that has a direct impact on your cash flow, which has a direct impact on your ability to continue to grow your business on your ability to take care of your personal obligations, as well as your ability to procure financing, to grow your business, or even just to operate it.
In every business, there are seasons of good cashflow and bad cash flow and for the business owner, the typical diagnosis is something like this: “If only I could make some more sales, if only I could earn some more revenue, then I could finally feel the cashflow relief that I’m looking for.”
You see, typically business owners usually correlate lack of cash flow to one of two things, either too little sales or too much overhead. What we found that the real culprit is how they are using their money. How they use their money is really going to have a huge impact on a consistent basis on their cash flow.
About all the competition we have for our business checkbook. We have vendors, we have consultants, we have taxes. We have insurance. Everyone is trying to get into our checkbook and they’re trying to get in there on a consistent basis. So it’s really important that we make our cash flow as efficient as possible so that we as business owners don’t feel pinched when we need more money.
Exactly. And understand that all of those competing industries or those competing vendors are very good at what they do. And because of that, we’re giving up control of our money unknowingly and unnecessarily. But the good news is that’s where the opportunity exists for you to really increase your cash flow.
Because once we bring the awareness that knowingness, that you’re doing things in a less efficient way, we’ll be able to bring that awareness and make the changes necessary to give you the relief you’re looking for. Here’s a perfect example. A few years ago, a business came to us for some consultation on some business succession planning. Basically they had some partners that were looking to retire and they didn’t have the cashflow to buy them.
After a thorough analysis, we determined that the major culprit in pinching their cash flow was that they were in a race to get out of debt.
And what happens when you’re in a race to pay off your debt is all your disposable, monthly income is leaving your control and going into the control of a bank or a finance company.
Now understand the bank loves that because the bank was taking that money and turning it over. And literally by paying off their debt quicker, this business was making the bank’s position better and their position worse.
So what’s the moral of the story. Well, we’ve said it once and we’ll say it again. It’s not what you buy. It’s how you pay for it. That really matters.
And to underscore that point, let me share with you an analogy that we share with our clients. Let’s say that you want a special drawing to appear in the masters golf tournament in the spring of 2022. And you came to us to improve your chances of winning. Well, we point out to you that there’s really only two approaches. Number one, you can purchase the clubs of anybody who’s ever played on the tour or approach number two would be to have the swing of anybody who’s ever played on the tour. Which strategy do you think would improve your chances of winning?
Well, the obvious answer is to focus on the golf swing, how you’re using your money in our example is so much more important. And whoever has the control of your money controls your life. Sometimes we get hung up on things like loan terms and interest rates, and we take our eye off of what’s really important controlling our cash flow
When you control your cash flow, and that becomes your major focus, all of your decisions become much clearer.
