Did you read that part one? I mean of course you did right? Why would you read part two before you read part one…

Anyway read part one if you havn’t yet.

Now that we have stream lined your business, and reduced its expenses during this difficult time of uncertainty what is the next step?

The next step is… Try to get through now.

That’s right, we need to get through right now. Now this article has a bit of a twist for it. You need to think in regards to your own business how to solve your problem.

Every business is different, they all have different focuses and do different things. I will have a few examples of basic businesses and what they can do to try to survive a bit longer.

Can you make your business “Essential” ?

Is there something you can add, or do differently to make your business more essential. So you are allowed to stay open, and generate some income? If legally allowed in your area you live in, you might be able to pivot or change an aspect of your business. Even if its just for now. To make some money.

If I ran a bakery or café what I would do…

If I ran a bakery for instance, where normally my customers came in, bought a scone and a muffin, and a tea. Sat around for an hour playing on their phone then they wandered on with their life. I would change my business, where I would for instance offer a weekly bread delivery. I have found bread and milk to run out before anything else, and despite not really wanting to risk my life going food shopping, I am forced to go because at some point you want some bread!

If a bakery offered to drop off a fresh loaf of bread at my house once a week, Sterile and safely handled of course, with no direct contact. I would gladly pay for it. Despite many advancements in the digital era, we still can’t get bread by mail. A possible opening for an internet start up? I doubt it.

I know this system actually works, because locally there is a milk delivery company that I have met through work. I contacted them about getting milk delivered to my house. As I didn’t want to go out, get COVID-19 and die, and I was informed that their route is infact FULL. They are at max capacity. They have never reached that level before. Honestly I would kill for some eclairs delivered to my house right now. To a bakery where their only other option might be going out of business Why not try it?

If I ran an advertising business.

Now I am going to assume that thankfully most creative businesses such as an advertising business can infact still run, without direct customer interaction, so they might have actually managed to stay open although they might be working from home.

But there are still bad times all around. Most businesses have cut their advertising budgets. Since nobody can actually come to the businesses anyway no doubt these types of businesses are going to suffer.

In fact I believe I actually advocated cutting expenses such as advertising in part one. Well now I am on the other side of the trade. Although your customers might not want you right now, They have never needed you more.

You are kind of like the parent picking their kid up walking down the street , after they were embarrassed in front of the whole school at high school prom. (No I am not talking from experience. )

Your customers need business more then ever, and you can bring it to them. But they don’t want to pay you.

COVID-15 has destroyed business around the world. We are all hiding in our homes or scuzzy apartments waiting for bankruptcy and death. But maybe there is something you can do beyond just eating all day and watching netflix. Here are 5 ideas that you can do, right now. To actually save your business fro the COVID-19 outbreak.

How can you get your business more business? Well that’s the business of today’s post (I was trying to use the word business a lot as a joke.)

Every business needs customers, they need more money, they have to keep the machine humming along generating money. But sometimes for one reason or another, there is a slow down in the system. Your usual work rate slows down and everyone stops and looks at each other and thinks “Is this the end of the business?”

Your employees might be rejoicing about the prospect of sitting around and getting paid to do nothing. (foolishly not considering the fact that if it continued for any amount of time they will be laid off, have their hours reduced or fired.)

So what can you do, right now to get your business?

Well you might not like it, you might find it uncomfortable, even unsettling. But you should….

Handsome guy my wife wishes I looked like

If you want business, call your customers and ask for it.Rich Cunningham May 2020

That’s right. You just have to call your customers on the phone and say hello. Most people know what you are looking for already. I have phoned customers before and the first thing out of their mouth is “Im planning to come in I swear!”

Well good, lets book an appointment then. Whatever you do for business, your customers must like you, or at least need you when it comes to business or how are you still here? Under that assumption, we are free and clear to begin generating our business by giving people a call. If your business is big enough, and your employees capable enough you might even be able to delegate some of this to an employee. But don’t expect an employee to do very much work which generates them more work.

These employees need to be closely supervised, why do you think they spy on people in call centres like its the cold war? They know what they are up to.

Are you a delightful person to be around? If its acceptable, you might benefit from inviting some of biggest clients out for lunch. (Once we are allowed to go to restaurants again. I wrote this in May 2020 after all)

You see, although I haven’t experienced this much in my personal life. I am to understand that people like people more, who like them. It is the reverse of modern dating. If one of my biggest customers or suppliers invited me out to lunch with them, I would be very flattered, and feel much better about them as a company as a whole. I would probably go as far as to give them preferential treatment in the future. I certainly wouldn’t mind a phone call checking up on my business and seeing how I am doing during a traumatic event, like a giant global pandemic for instance.

So to summarize, if you want business today. Reach out to your customers, directly and let them know something. Let them know how you changed some thing that helps them, let them know about a new product that might help them be more successful, let them know you are still available to help them.

Let them know you are ready for business!

Your friend,

Rich E. Cunningham

A friend called me yesterday on the telephone, yes it still does occasionally happen believe it or not. He actually was seeking some advice from me. I swear this has never happened before, but these are strange times we live in my friend.

“Rich, I have no money coming in, The government has closed my business. I still have bills coming in. What should I do?”

“What no small talk?” I exclaimed. “Fine lets get right to it then.”

I got up on my high horse and gave up some good ideas, deep down I am a good guy I guess. Here is a summary of what we discussed.

The most important thing you can do to save your business, is to keep as much of your money as possible right now. Rich Cunningham, May 2020. Talking about COVID19 Pandemic

It seems obvious I know, there is nothing we can do now to go back and be more prepared, and every business is going to feel a lot of pain right now

Nobody knows how long this thing is going to last, so the most important thing right now is to make sure you last longer then everyone else. You need money.

Cut all your expenses you can

Cancel anything you can’t use.

This one might seem obvious, but you need to cut back all the expenses that you can. If you were going to advertise a big sale, but now your business is nolonger open you need to try to get some of that advertising money back and cancel any future plans of course.

Get rid of excess labour.

If you have employees standing around, in a closed business it’s time to let them go. Government programs and pay them for awhile. Hey that’s what our taxes are for isn’t it? Is your business is some what functional, why not cut hours if you can? Only you know.

Do everything you can do yourself.

This one seems pretty obvious, all those nice little things you pay people to do are over now. You can get your own damn coffee for once! Everything you can do, and im sure you got some free time now is one thing you don’t have to pay another person to do. Remember those scrappy days when you first started where you did your own payroll? well maybe start doing that again.

Did you work on your own ads back in the day, before you farmed it out to some internet hot shot? Well get cracking. You need to save money. Start doing things again.

Try to sell anything going to expire or not be useful anymore even at a loss.

If you have product that is going to expire, or nolonger be useful, what can you do to get rid of it? Are you stuck with a bunch of gardening supplies this spring, but nobody can come to your store?

Do you have a fridge full of food, and nobody is going to buy it?

You need to try to at least get some money back from these products.

Call your best customers, have a giant sale, just try to get your money back as best can. If you have to deliver to the customers house, then do it.

Offer Gift Certificates, or Rain cheques.

Believe it or not, most of your customers probably want your business to survive. Unless you are a debt collector (Stop calling me already).

Your customers probably intend to come back and support your business when this is all over.

Give them the chance to. You can offer gift cards online with services like www.giftupapp.com. My business did it, and it has been moderately successful. I highly recommend the service,

Although I am known to be a negative person since kinder garden. Now that the world has been destroyed, the economy is collapsing and the chance of dying at the super market has increased about 10,000% I can’t help but find a few benefits to this whole crazy pandemic thing for business owners.

As always, different rules might apply to your country and your area, you should do any research before you follow any of my suggestions, infact I would go as far as to recommend you do not infact follow my advice! Try to sue me on that one!

#1

This pandemic is going to “Clean up the forest.”

Despite what people who own beautiful expensive houses in the forest believe, fires in forests are actually normal and common, many species of plant only reproduce more effectively after a fire, something about pine cones or something I can’t really remember. You see the fire, although terrible, cleans up the area of the old brush, trees and leaves an open view of the sky for any new enterprising seedling that comes along.

Fortunes are going to be lost during this time, don’t get me wrong. But fortunes are also going to get made. Which one are you going to be? If you and your business surivive this whole pandemic thing, boy what a great place to be in. Maybe some of your competitors have gone out of business, that would be a great situation to be in.

What a great time to advertise to their former customers with a special introductory deal, buy up their old customer lists from your new desititute competitors, or even buy some of their products or equipment at bargain basement prices.

Maybe you are on the other side, you over extended yourself and you are looking at a tough time? I will write another blog for you shortly.

#2

What a great time to expand your skillset, or your businesses offerings.

Nobody asked for this fantastic time off, except for maybe polticians who bungled the quarrtine and let their entire country be infected by this terrible life ending virus. (the sad part is, I don’t even have to be specific, almost all of them did it!)

But it is what it is, We now have a lot of free time to do things maybe we always wanted to do, but we have never got the chance to do until now.

Is there a new skillset you could learn to increase your business? I don’t know what you do. I am not very popular I guess and you don’t write very much anymore. But I bet there is something. What a great time to learn how to use QuickBooks or another business program, or maybe some web design? Or a better advertising course? Now is the time.

Turn off Netflix, that was so last month… close the door, and learn something! You will be glad you did I bet!

#3

It is time to clean house.

I don’t mean actually cleaning your house, but maybe after a month or so stuck at home it could use it! Every business gets some employees, products or systems that.. Well how can I put this nicely… ?

A little “Long in the tooth?”

“Not as optimized as previous” ?

“Redundant” ?

If that isn’t good enough for you. Message me with whatever modern term people use these days. If nobody buys the fish sandwitch, if you have an employee who doesn’t pull their weight on the best days, if your computer is older then dirt, It’s a good time to replace them, or remove them from your business.

Nobody expected this pandemic to happen, except maybe Bill Gates, the Chinese government and my uncle with the tin foil hat who doesn’t think the moon landings happened. But here we are now, and this is what we have to deal with.

It is a strange time for business, most of us feel like we need to do something, anything to save our businesses. But at the same time most of us can’t really do anything. Our goverments have closed most of our businesses and we have been forced to do an extended vacation. If you are essential, such as a pizza place then you are very fortunate.

But for all the doom and gloom there are two things you can do for your business today, which will help you succeed down the road.

The #1 to do for business during a pandemic

The first thing to do during a pandemic for a business is to do everything you need to do so your business will be there when the time to reopen comes again, it wont be hell.

This isn’t the first plague to hit humanity, nor will it be the last. But businesses over time have survived and thrived. Maybe not some hippie coffee shop that needs a lot of foot traffic, but banks, insurance companies and things like that will last long term will need to be reopened and as a business owner or manager it is your job to make sure it is done.

I can just imagine the amount of food resturants have rotting in their fridges, so to use a very bad metaphor.

“During this pandemic as a business person you must clean out the old food in your fridge”Rich Cunningham – 2020 during the Pandemic virus.

When you come back to open up your restaurant, (your metaphorical restaurant that is.) You don’t want a fridge full of spoiled food waiting for you, you also don’t want piles of old garbage that have been rotting at your location for months laying around, or other things over your head, such as bills, expenses and bad customers. Get the dishes washed, the machinery oiled, the money counted.

You get the point, have everything ready for you to start over when businesses open back up. At the time of writing (April 2020) we don’t know when this will be.

But trust me you will be glad you don’t have a giant fridge of rotting food waiting for you when you get back to work.

The #2 most important thing to do for your business during a pandemic

Once you have the first thing done, it is time to move on to the #2 most important thing to do for your business during a pandemic.

Get Ready for the new normal, its going to suck!Rich Cunningham, 2020

Things are not going to be the same, at least for awhile. What are you going to have to change for your business for it to be able to function in this new business environment?

Every business is different of course, but their are a few questions that pop in my mind that every business person should ask themselves.

* What safety procedures do you need to keep you, your customers and your employees safe? Changing hours? Moving the office around? Split shifts? A giant plastic bubble? Now is the time to decide what needs to be changed to keep your business going during the post pandemic era of business.

* Are you going to have to change what your business offers to stay in business? Maybe selling coffee and hippie flowers isn’t going to cut it anymore. What else can you offer that people still need?