By Garry Bartecki – GB Financial Services LLC
Technology Rules. Every business or industry publication you pick up states….IF YOU DO NOT START TAKING ACTION NOW YOU WILL QUICKLY FALL BEHIND. Makes sense. But once you are in GET SET mode you have serious issues to deal with.
- What should you do?
- Who should do it?
- Can you fund it?
- Will the results improve profitability and cash flow?
If you take steps to improve the business and it does not work, you may be in worse shape had you done nothing. Nothing is easy these days.
Interestingly, those three books I referred to you last month deal with the doing and measuring side of the project. As a reminder the books were BUSINESS WEALTH WITHOUT RISK, HOW TO LISTEN WHEN MARKETS SPEAK AND NOT HOW BUT WHO.
The Wealth Without Risk book covers ways to find and buy businesses and how to increase the size of your business with minimum risk. Buy small businesses because the multiples are MUCH smaller. Buy two or three small businesses and suddenly you have a large business that provides much higher multiples. Not interested in buying a business then enter joint ventures or partnerships where different businesses can bring added value to the table for minimum cost. In other words, what else could your customers buy from you? You can sell it directly or via a referral program. I always liked the “menu” approach to help customers where I share in the profits resulting from my referral program. And the menu is a great way to lock in your relationship.