TOPIC

Business Operations

After all the questions about how to finance, staff and market your business have been answered, you still have to know how to make the shop run. Here, we discuss the nuts and bolts of day-to-day business concerns.

Features

Lease or buy?

Should you lease or buy equipment? This sounds like a complicated business decision. It’s not. It’s a math problem. But this might be an interesting emotional decision, because the answer depends on how much you think you can use a dollar in your business right now.

How depreciation works

How does depreciation work on business equipment? Depreciation is the government's way of rewarding your business for using increasingly cruddy stuff. Somehow, that makes sense.

Articles & Advice

Do small businesses have different sales outsourcing needs to larger businesses?

Whether you're Verizon Wireless or Jim's Tin-Can-and-String Phone Store, your needs are, on some level, just the same. Revenue in, reputation up. And not necessarily in that order.

Factoring: A faster path to cash after a sale

Account receivables factoring companies provide funding or payments due to you from your customers. You sell the debt to a factoring organization at a discount, the factoring company gives you cash and collects the full debt from the client when it's due. You get paid, your customer gets time.

Cash management

How should you manage your cash properly? First, you better know how much you've got, where it is, and where it's coming from. If the information is in your accountants head, that's a start. If you need to improve your cash flow, you might look at accounts receivables funding or the judicious use of credit. Read our primer on understanding cash flow.

Alternative Sources of Business Financing

If the bank won't lend you capital, how do you finance your business? We're assuming you don't have a rich Uncle Tony and don't have a winning lottery ticket in your pocket. Your choices after that are institutional lenders, private lenders, account receivables funding, or selling a part of your business. Finding capital can be tough, but here's how to find a few, and how to be professionally prepared to answer the tough questions a lender might ask.

Credit Cards - What's The Upside of Paying for This?

Cash flow is the life blood of a small business – any business, actually. Accepting credit cards transactions is one of the most important decisions your business can make. Sure, there's a cost of leasing or buying credit card processing terminals, and it should be taken into account -- but given the choice between paying with a credit card and deferring a purchase, many of your customers will choose to wait to purchase. That’s money out of your pocket.

Credit Cards - Do I need to Buy Processing Hardware?

A retail vendor will need a credit card processing terminal to manage the selling process operated by a salesperson. This is usually a card swipe machine hooked up to an online computer or the phone system, with access through banking software, to the cardholder's bank or credit provider. Your processing terminal provider should be able to ensure the hardware's PCI compliance.