Let me tell you a story about a client of mine.  She reached out to me at the recommendation of a friend, another client of mine.  She expressed she was just confused and knew there had to be a better way to do things.  She asked if I could take a look at her QuickBooks because it was stressing her out at that moment and our friend knew I could help. 

So in looking at her QuickBooks usage I did determine her gut was right.  She was using QuickBooks desktop and her assistant came every Monday to process everything for her.  She wondered if there was a way to have her assistant work remotely if she was sick or on vacation so we opted to move her QuickBooks operations to QuickBooks Online.  Not a problem right?!  Well, that ended up uncovering a lot of things.  To sum it up, her current assistant did not set up QuickBooks correctly to begin with and was also not entering things in correctly..  Reports were all over the place and information was missing.  Upon further investigation, we uncovered there were other things her assistant was not completing correctly.  To accomplish the owner’s goal of utilizing QuickBooks more efficiently and “making things work better” we decided to:

1. Move her to QuickBooks online and utilize more of the tools it offered
2. Look for another assistant who was better qualified and showed more initiative
3. Put in a custom timekeeping system to streamline her weekly payroll

Now before you say it, I know it sounds like a lot right?  But guess what by making just those 3 changes here’s where the client benefited:

1. By getting a better qualified assistant and upgraded her systems a bit she reduced not only her workload in half EACH AND EVERY WEEK but also the assistant’s time in half EACH AND EVERY WEEK
2. She sent me multiple thank you notes stating she could sleep at night again.  She knew that things could run smoother and better but did not know how to do it or have the time to figure it out.
3. By replacing her assistant and reducing the admin workload in half she saved over $12,000 alone.  

Yup!  You read that right!  Over $12,000 gain without ever making another sales with  just these 3 changes.  In full disclosure her former assistant was family and she felt what she was paying was fair. But what she discovered was she could pay the SAME EXACT RATE to someone who had the right skill set but who accomplished everything plus more in half the time and still save that kind of money! 

Who doesn’t love some extra cash right?  Did you know that there could be lots of hidden money in your business right now?  You could find extra money and profit without ever making a single sale!  But, sometimes it can be a little tricky to find so I wanted to share with you some tips and ways to search for the extra cash!  

Like my client above, if she just looked at her payroll alone she would not have seen that kind of savings.  If she just looked at her systems she had in place, she would not see that kind of savings.  But by looking at all of her operations (systems, workflows, team members, etc) together we were able to find a more optimized solution for her and her particular business that not only fixed her current problems but has allowed her to grow by 25% without changing anything else!

So what can you do to find your hidden money?  Here’s a few tips and tricks:

1. Start with the obvious places you spend or receive money.
   1. Take a look at your bills.  Are there any services or expenses you don’t need anymore?  Not sure?  Maybe it’s time to take a look at all of those things and see how they fit into your overall operations.
   2. Take a look at payroll.  I’m not suggesting to cut anyone’s pay rate or drastic measures like that.  But use this as a way to evaluate your team, their duties in comparison to the entire operation.  Are there changes that need to be made in the team or team structure?  Are there savings that could be the result of that?  Strategically having the right people in the right places can actually save you money than having not quite the right people in not quite the right places.
   3. Next, take a look at money coming in.  this could be in the form of sales of services or products or even in the method that they are coming in?  How many sales platforms do you utilize?  Do you need them all?  Are they costing you money you don’t need to spend?  Do you need to take a look at pricing?  Have you reviewed pricing for your products or services to account for changes in overhead and production costs?  
   4. The next part goes along with #1 and you may have fully looked at it there but not necessarily.  It can be a little trickier to think through all of these objectively and strategically.  Take a look strictly at all of the softwares and systems you utilize to do all of your day-day operations.  Financial systems, CRMs, websites, email, project management systems, POS systems, social media management platforms, etc.  the list may be getting a little long now huh?  It can very quickly but taking a deep look at all of the systems you have in place and identifying if there are redundancies and overlaps or just some that are used for 1 or 2 tasks only can be eye-opening and allow you to consolidate and streamline those systems saving not only subscription fees but cost of your employee’s time in suing them.  Streamline the processes = streamlining payroll = hidden money found for you!

Most everyone I work with finds money in any or all 4 of the above areas but since money can be hidden anywhere in your business and can be hidden in a combination of any or all of the above, I always recommend doing a periodic thorough business review.  I would say the word audit but it sounds so scary but essentially taking the time to look thoroughly through your operations on a regular basis can help keep your operations streamlined and cost effective! Hint: Having a trusted third party look at things from a birds eye view can be invaluable!

If you are interested in learning more about the Blueprint to Find the Hidden 5 Figures in Your Business with expert help, I would love to speak with you! Schedule a call here!