Become a Business Money Magnet - Even when times are tough

Is it possible to still make money even with the economy looking gloomy?

The short answer is yes, it's just a little more difficult to manage. So, in this episode, I'm  drawing on three decades of business experience and sharing practical, hands-on strategies for small business owners navigating the current financial landscape.

Forget the noise of negativity and scarcity, it's time to start fresh and focus on the positives and  prepare your business to for the inevitable upswing. 

It's time to get scrappy, refine your offerings, update your pricing, focus on your loyal client base and look at new markets. I'll walk you through the importance of solid systems and cash flow processes so you're ready for the opportunities for growth that come your way.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:35

You're listening to the Secrets of Successful Business podcast, your go-to source for business tips, tricks and proven strategies that will help you create a streamlined and profitable business. We chat to the best minds in business about their journey. It's my business and I'll do it my way, how they started, rather than going harder to get more focus on growing more with what you have, what they learned along the way. How long are you going to give this?

Speaker 2 1:03

What compromises are you going to make? Just because you can do it doesn't mean that you should do it.

Speaker 1 1:08

It's really important to remember that it's a long game and, of course, we'll ask them for their secret sauce for creating a successful business. If you're not failing, you're not doing it right. You should be struggling at times. That is part of the journey. Join us as we take a sneak peek behind the curtain, talk solutions for those business pain points, working smarter, not harder, mindset and the challenges of fitting it all in with the demands of today's busy lifestyle. If you're a business owner, side hustler or just starting your business journey, this podcast is for you. Now here's your host, business coach and content creator, justine McLean from Flossie Creative.

Speaker 2 1:48

Hello and thanks for joining me on the podcast today. In case we haven't met, I'm Justine, a small business owner on a mission to uncover and share the secrets of creating and running a profitable, sustainable and successful business. I've been in business for over 20 years now and I get to use all that I've learned along the way to help other women in business reduce the overwhelm, gain visibility around their numbers, charge what they're worth and make more money. It's about designing a life you love that fits into your definition of success. So if I can help you create the profitable business you deserve, please reach out Now without further ado. Let's dive into today's episode. Hello and welcome to the podcast.

Speaker 2 2:41

A few weeks ago, I sat down with a business bestie and we were talking about the state of business here in Australia and around the world, particularly small business, because, let's be honest, the economy everywhere, no matter what country you're listening to this podcast from, is a little bit funky at the moment. Things are expensive, people are not buying the way they used to and, as I've said before, it's definitely not business as usual. So I thought, between that and all the questions that I got after my Profit First podcast episode, and if you haven't listened to that one. Jump on back over and take a listen. Now it's episode 147. I thought I would jump on today and tell you that, although times are tough yes, I completely acknowledge that, and I know how tough they are for small business and the leads are not as prevalent as they once were, and the people that you are currently working with are probably looking for great bargains or discounts, this time will pass. In my 30 years of experience, I've been through this a couple of times before. It's definitely the winter of business, but rather than listening to all the doom and the gloom that surrounds us, I think it's a real opportunity right now to go back to business basics and get your business ready and set for when things do improve. Because one thing I know for sure things will absolutely improve and it will probably be faster than you think. So why not take this downtime to really take a deep dive into your business and look at some things that are definitely going to help you become the business money magnet that you deserve to be? And these are things that you can do even when times are tough and, who knows, they might just move the needle for you now, so that you won't be waiting for months or until things in business in general improve.

Speaker 2 4:52

So the first thing that I want to talk about is mindset, because, let's be honest, you just need to turn on the news and there's bad news about the economy and small business, or interest rates or the cost of fuel going up or insurances, or how health insurance is no longer affordable, or that you can't rent a room anywhere because it's out of reach and there is a lack of affordable housing around, and all that is true. Unfortunately, what happens when we're surrounded by all of this negativity? It starts to bring up for us all of those things that sit on the negative spectrum in our mindset. If you had a money story around scarcity growing up and tend to influence your money situation through that story, so maybe your mindset around money is a little bit fixed, or you feel like you'll never have enough money. There's that scarcity mentality or generally you're just worried about money all of the time. Those sorts of negative messages are definitely going to trigger a response that probably isn't going to be helpful right now, and while it's hard to just give yourself a pep talk and stay positive, the truth is that money mindset and a positive money mindset. Fostering that positive money mindset, especially during tough times, is really important.

Speaker 2 6:16

So one of the tips that I can give you right now is to watch how you speak about money and your business, because language matters. I heard someone say the other day that when we're talking about losing weight, we often say I just want to lose a few kilos. And the truth about losing something is, when you lose something, you probably want to find it again. The idea behind that sort of language was that if you lose weight today, then you might just gain it back tomorrow, because that sort of language is exactly what you're saying. So, rather than saying I want to lose weight maybe it's I want to release a few kilos. Release so that they go away, see you later and they never come back. So, while it might seem a little bit silly, just thinking about money in that positive sense, talking about money in that positive sense might just help your mindset, even when all the messages that you hear around you are not very helpful. So, instead of oh, I've got no leads, it could be. I'm actually working on this avenue and this avenue to get some more leads in my business right now, and I'm looking forward to that helping me. So it's very much a change in the way you talk about money, you talk about your business, and hopefully that fosters a more positive mindset.

Speaker 2 7:36

The next thing that I think is really important right now is to take the time to focus on the financial foundations in your business. So for this term in Business, money Magnet my 12-month program, which you can join at any time, by the way we're focusing on profit. So we started off by addressing the elephant in the room and talking about our mindset, and we've done that. And over the last few weeks, what we've done is we've really taken a deep dive into our business. So we started off by looking at this business ideology that making a profit in business is as simple as getting the revenue up and the costs down. So what were ways that we could get our revenue up and get our costs down?

Speaker 2 8:22

And we began the process by really taking a deep dive into our pricing and by that, pulling together all of the elements that create the price that you need to charge for your service or your product and making sure all of those elements were right, but, most importantly, thinking about things like what do I want my profit number to be? Because, again, when business is slow, we probably forego profit. What do I want my salary to be as we walk through business? What do I want my salary to be as we walk through business? Probably you're the last person who gets paid when the cash flow isn't coming in.

Speaker 2 9:00

So we looked at all of those things and then what we did was start to pull apart all of the expenses that go into not just our businesses, but there was an exercise where we also jumped into all of those personal expenses that we had as well. People were saving money on insurance and phone plans, both business and personal. It was a really valuable exercise Building those financial foundations, really understanding what it costs you to run your business, understanding how to read reports to know what sort of profit that you want to make, to get that cash flow management set up in your business, to have a regular date with yourself a money Monday, a finance Friday so you could explore all of those things and complete all of those tasks that you need to complete in terms of the financial side of your business. All those things were important because when you have them in place, when you have those firm financial foundations, you're more likely to make great business decisions because everything is in place.

Strategies to Thrive in Challenging Times

Speaker 2 10:08

The next thing that you want to think about, particularly now and this goes back to profit is making sure that you do that exercise that I was talking about, where you're really having a look at what your expenses are, the salary that you want to earn, the profit that you want to take in your business, how much you need to save for taxes and into your rainy day account, and then looking at that jumping off point for your pricing, because most us, when a business is slow, will have a knee-jerk reaction to just discount our products, discount our services, and while I don't mind a good discount, I'm as on board with that as the next person. You can't run a business that's model is always discounting or competing against someone else via discounts, because it's just a race to the bottom. So don't get involved in that. Look at your pricing. Look to price for profit, regardless of whether you have 10 new leads coming through the door or one, so that every time you deliver a service, every time you sell a product, that you're actually making money that's going towards covering your costs, and that you're making money and profit in your business.

Speaker 2 11:19

I think one of the things in addition to discounting, that people tend to do when things are a bit slow is they almost become paralyzed. They're not sure what to do about their pricing, whether they should slash their prices, discount, put prices up. But maybe it's as simple as looking at all of the different things that you're offering to your clients and really streamlining those offers so that what you do offer has absolute value. It's absolutely packed with value for your client and you're delivering that in a way that is easy for you, effortless for you, but that is going to give them the most bang for their buck. It could be that when you do your pricing exercise, when you have a look at the offers that you've currently got going and you're thinking to yourself people aren't buying my $2,000 offer, for example, my $2,000 service package, or my offer at $199 a month. Maybe they'll buy at half that price or maybe they'll buy at a third of that price. So what is it that you can package up and deliver that is still going to keep the lights on in your business but is going to help those customers that need your help right now, because people still need help in their business right now.

Speaker 2 12:33

As I said, this is really a time to set those foundations, to get everything firing inside your business so that when business does pick up, you're ready to go. And through this time, through this lean time, you're also fostering those relationships where you're developing relationships with people so that you can really start to push the needle when things improve In my business. For example, I've got a $27 offer that I am going to be sending out in July. That offer is in conjunction with a business buddy of mine and we're doing it because we know that we've got products that are genuinely going to help people. So the idea is that we do low offer, high volume. We hopefully then collect a whole lot of clients who are interested in working with us in the future. So that's one way. I've got a book that is available right now for pre-sale. So I have got a whole series of offers around that book to encourage people not only to buy but to potentially buy and experience what it's like to work with me as well.

Speaker 2 13:42

So really important to look at your pricing, look at your offers and get those foundations set up so that you have got everything in place when things improve. Now, of course, behind the scenes, the back end of that it's having all of those systems and processes in place to support your offer, to support your business, so that, when things do escalate, when business does improve again and I said it will, I promise you you're ready to go you don't have to worry about suddenly finding a VA or getting that new system in place or gosh, how am I invoicing here, or what's the payment gateway that I'm going to be using. All really important things to think about now, when business is a little quieter and you might have that time on your hands. The other thing to think about now is really cash flow. So, in a business crisis, when things are a little slower, cash flow is one of the things that dries up the fastest, and it's also the thing that can stop us in our tracks when it comes to running our business. So cash flow is about making sure you've always got money in the bank, knowing what's coming in and when and, more importantly, knowing what your liabilities are, what is going out and when, and so I think, right now, it's super important to have a look at your expenses, make sure that you are not paying for something that you really don't need right now, something you could pause, even if it's just for a few weeks or a few months so that you just make sure you've got that cash flow in your business to not only pay for your business to keep running but to pay for yourself. Really important that you keep paying yourself to pay your superannuation and also to pay your staff, because they're the things that are going to keep your business going. The other thing that I want to mention about becoming a money magnet a business money magnet when things are not business as usual is that some of the biggest success stories come out of the lean times in business. It's the businesses who can look at what's going on around them and adapt that are going to be the most successful.

Speaker 2 15:59

I was talking to a business owner the other day and she had actually been talking about talking to another business owner, so it's a third or a secondhand story. But she'd been talking about someone who bought a winery and then COVID hit and so people weren't coming to the cellar door. They didn't have that opportunity to walk in and try the wine in the region which was obviously that tourist element was a big part of the sales for their winery. They didn't have a great distribution model, they weren't really well known, and so this particular business owner thought okay, how can I adapt, how can I change things now when business it's not business as usual, so that I can keep going? I can keep my business surviving and hopefully thriving through this period until COVID is over and things start to open up again. And so that particular business owner started a couple of side businesses that not only helped other business owners in the district but also meant that she could deliver information about her winery and wines online. Such smart ideas and those couple of side hustles are now businesses that are just as big as the winery that she bought.

Speaker 2 17:18

So there's always possibilities to do something different, and I'm sharing this because you might be sitting back looking at your business right now and thinking, well, what is it that I can do? Nobody's buying what I'm selling. I might as well give up, I might as well walk away and I've heard that a couple of times over the last few weeks, that's for sure. But I think now is the time to really take a moment and look at your business and see where you might be able to adapt, where you might be able to change your business or add something extra to just to navigate these tough times, if you've been in business for a while or you've been doing something for a while, then you've got more experience than someone who's only been doing it for a month. Perhaps share a mentoring session or give a free workshop on your area of expertise. Keep giving to your community. Start a newsletter, reach out to people, resurrect an old newsletter. Look at platforms like LinkedIn or Pinterest, where you can actually have a bit more of a say and collect the sort of customers that will be interested in buying your thing and buying your new things as you adapt during this time.

Speaker 2 18:37

I think resilience is one of the most important parts of being a business owner and, let's be honest, you definitely need to have a thick skin in business. But being able to really become that money magnet to thrive in business when everything around you is going pear-shaped often comes back to consistency and resilience, and I think that when you look at your business now, rather than feeling negative and despondent about what's going on and I totally acknowledge and get that might be the default now I think you just need to pull on that resilience muscle, exercise that muscle and instead flip the story, flip your mindset and think okay, what is it that I can do right now. That is going to set myself up and set my business up for success when things improve. So, as I said, it's mindset. It's looking at all of those financial foundations making sure you know what you're talking about, that you've got all the things in place that you need to have in place. That could be just dedicated business bank accounts. That might be setting up a cloud accounting file like Xero, myob, quickbooks something like that.

Speaker 2 19:55

Looking at your pricing, making sure that you are really focused on the profit element in your business. Whether you are turning over $40,000 or $400,000, profit is the key to business success. So make sure that you're pricing for profit, that you know what your profit number is and that you've built that into your business. Looking after your cash flow, getting rid of some of those expenses that you don't need. Making sure that you are continuing to pay yourself, not just for now but for the future as well, and looking for those opportunities to adapt and thrive when everyone around you is sitting with their head in their hands rocking back and forth.

Speaker 2 20:38

So, whether it's a new offer, whether it is being an affiliate for somebody else, whether it's a collaboration with your business buddy, no matter what it is, have a look at what the low hanging fruit is, where you can adapt right now, where you can potentially add that extra income stream to your business, and all of those elements are definitely going to help you go into this next phase in business, ready to completely fly. So I hope you've enjoyed this shorty episode about how to become a business money magnet, even when times are tough, and, as always, if you've got any questions, please reach out. We would love to hear from you. My book Become a Business Money Magnet Simple Habits to Manage your Money and Supercharge your Profits, is available now, and I would encourage you to grab a copy, because there's lots of good stuff in there that I know will help your business thrive. Until next time.

Speaker 1 21:42

Thanks for listening to the Secrets of Successful Business podcast. For more information on all things business, head to flossycomau and make sure you hit subscribe on the show so you don't miss another new episode. If you're enjoying the show, please give it a quick rating or review, share it on your socials or with friends who might enjoy it. Catch you next time.