Many businesses never realise their full potential, often because the owner loses their motivation and entrepreneurial flair after reaching their first goal. Businesses can grow in different ways. Some may increase the range of products or services they sell. Others may increase the quantity of customers they are selling to. You may even diversify vertically. Producers or manufacturers may expand into distribution or retailing. Retailers or distributors may start producing some of what they sell.
This course will help you to see the possibilities for expanding your business; and understand how to make better decisions, with a greater chance of success in moving your business forward.
COURSE CONTENTS
Lesson 1: Recognising Problems – Where Things Go Wrong?
- How to Recognise Problems
- What Do Most People Do?
- Focus on the Issues
- Comparing Your Business to Your Competitors
- Maintaining a Balanced Perspective
- Recharge Your Batteries
- Always Run Your Business as if it is For Sale
- Checklist for Identifying the Problem
- Finance
- Product Range
- Customer Service
- Staffing
- Marketing
- Know your Competition
- Checklist to Identify a Problem
Lesson 2: Changing with the Times
- How Do You Do This?
A) Understanding Control
B) Adapt to Technology
C) Predict the Future
D) Know when to Get Out
E) Keep Learning - Some Golden Rules of Business
Lesson 3: Revise Financial Management
- Initial Start-up Finance
- Financial Difficulties in Business
A) Financial Service Providers
B) Spending
C) Payments - How to Borrow Money and Get the Best Deal
- Business Costing
- Pricing
- Cash Flow
- Ensure as well as Insure
- Budgeting
- Bookkeeping
- Options for Improving Your Financial Position
- Up-scaling a Business
- The Cash Cycle – Cash Flow and Liquidity
- Managing Bad Debts
Lesson 4: Revise Your Marketing
- What Do We Mean By Marketing?
- Raising Awareness
- Convincing Them to Buy
- Closing a Sale
- Collecting Payment
- Do You Understand the Basic Principles of Marketing?
- Target Marketing
- Supply and Demand
- Competition
- Know your Competition
- Opening and Closing a Sale
- Building a Client Base
- Visibility and Impact
- Billboards
- Social Media
- Websites
- Newsletters
- Aggressive Advertising
- Blogs
- E-zines
- Discounts
- Competitions
- Networking
- Re-focus Your Marketing
- The Law and Selling
- Marketing Strategies
Lesson 5: Revise Your Product
- Choosing a Product Range
- Why is the Product Not Selling?
- Analysing the Product
- Customer Feedback
- Deciding to Drop a Product
- Staff Awareness of Products
- Use Accounting Practices for Stock Tracking and Stock Control
- Product lines and mixes
- Product life cycle
Lesson 6: Revise and Engage Your Staff
- The Individual as Staff
- Employ Staff When Needed
- Employing Permanent Staff
- Employ the Workforce You Need, Not the Workforce You Want
- Legal Obligations and Moral Obligations When Employing Staff
- Who Do You Employ?
- Employing Friends and Family – For and Against
- Motivating Staff
- Incentives
- Giving Staff Responsibility
- Avoiding Stress in Your Staff and Yourself
Lesson 7: Using Business Systems to Improve a Business
- Sales funnels
- What is a Sales Funnel?
- The Process
- Ways to Create Sales Funnels
- What Does a Sales Funnel Look Like?
- Retail Sales and Sales Funnels
- Keeping the Momentum Up
- Setting sales targets
- Sales analysis
- why a Sales Analysis?
- Other business systems
- inventory Control
- Striking a Better Deal – Optimising the Supply Chain
- Budgeting and Budget Types
- How Do You Make a Properly Considered Decision?
- Solving Problems Systematically
- Business Problem Considerations
- Conclusion
