Archive for October, 2008

Talk hard with your bank

Published
by
Gail Geronimos
on October 21, 2008
in General
. 0 Comments

Hi

Have a look at the latest article in Smart Company about what SME’s are thinking about the coming 12 months. It’s not looking good.

I did a series of blogs  about what you can do to make sure that your company comes through these tough times. The key is access to ready cash - make sure that you collect all your debtors on a timely basis and keep in good with your banker and/or talking to other bankers.

Having cash is going to make all the difference. Don’t ignore cash from credit cards. It’s certainly not the cheapest money but when it makes the difference between staying alive and failure then it’s not a bad option.

Here’s an interesting story…

I am following my own advice and I called the bank to confirm my credit card details. Low and behold, WITHOUT my asking, they offered to reduce my interest rate by 7.25%. And that’s on a standard card. They probably thought that I was going to cancel the card. The only catch, I had to forgo ‘free’ travel insurance and frequent flyer points.  That’s a pretty good offer.

Now, I am a good customer and I make sure that all is in order with my cards. After all, these cards are my access to emergency cash.

And it gets better…

I have had 2 offers this week to transfer balances to other providers at rates as little as 10.99%. It getting very competitive!

My advice…

- renegotiate your credit limits upwards. But be very disciplined and only use in case of an emergency

- renegotiate all your interest rates. It will take time (you’ll be on hold forever) but at reductions between 7% and 10% it’s worth the wait.

Do it now. If you wait until you need to money you probably won’t get it. Everything is getting tight. You can’t afford to wait.

Banks are starting to be more flexible, take advantage of this opportunity.

Cheers

Have a read

Some relief…but stay tuned in

Published
by
Gail Geronimos
on October 14, 2008
in General
. 0 Comments

Hi

The markets have recovered some of the ground they lost last week. That’s a huge relief. Government action has given business and consumers a higher level of confidence and we’re seeing that flow through.

We’re not out of trouble yet and there may still be surprises in the US. Life is very tough there and both consumers and businesses are going through very difficult financial times. That will continue to impact on our markets. Any further crisis in the US will erode confidence.

In today’s paper I read that China is cutting back on steel production. Not good news for us. We are currently being cushioned by the resources boom with China as a major customer. Changes here will slow our growth.

As well, our PM expects unemployment to increase.

To help get through think about:

- make sure you have access to ready cash. Talk to your banker and make friends with an alternate banker just in case your bank says “NO”

- watch your debtors. Check your Debtor Days at least monthly. Don’t become a banker for your customers.

- reduce your debt as much as possible.

- read the papers. Keep in touch with what’s happening in the markets and review your own financial position.

Business insolvency has increased significantly over the last 3 months. Make sure your name is not on the list.

Cheers

It’s getting very bad

Published
by
Gail Geronimos
on October 7, 2008
in General
. 0 Comments

What a night it was. Staggering losses on stock markets around the world. And Iceland has frozen bank trading. Who knows what might have happened if the bailout was rejected!

It’s easy to sit back and think that the impact in Australia will be minimal. After all, our 4 major banks are in the top 20 in the world. That’s pretty impressive. Our system is well regulated and  Australian financial institutions did not engage in some of the wreckless lending practices as those in the US.

But, this is not the time for that sort of thinking. The impact will come and it will affect many businesses.

Cash is now more important than ever to get businesses through the tough times ahead. Here’s what you should be thinking about:

- get a few sources of ready cash right now. Before you really need it. Look at increasing your overdraft, get increased limits on your credit card, make friends with a few bankers

- check your debtor days. If your customers are taking longer to pay then that is a bad sign right now. They hold your cash. You are not their banker. Tighten up your debtor controls.

- manage your cash out as well. Look at every conceivable way to retain cash as long as possible.

- check your cash flow weekly. And I don’t mean looking at your bank balance. Work out a simple spreadsheet where you track your debtors and creditors for the next few weeks. Keep it simple. It doesn’t need to be perfect. But you will have a better idea of your cash a few weeks to a month into the future. Update these figures every week. It will take just a short time.

Lack of cash is going to slow growth and/or send a lot of companies broke over the next 12 months. Make sure you do everything you can to so that it doesn’t happen to you.

Cheers.

3 Ways To Get Into the “Good Books” with Google

Published
by
Christian Bowman
on October 3, 2008
in General
. 0 Comments

 Google Webmaster Tools

There are lots of things related to Search Engine Optimisation to get good rankings on Google. But sometimes it’s easy to forget the basics. Here are 3 ways very basic ways to ensure your website is in Google’s good books.

1. Sign up for Google Webmaster Tools.

This will enable you or your website techy to see what Google sees on your website.  Why do this? Well using webmaster tools allows you to identify broken links, broken pages but more importantly tell Google what it should index to increase your visibility in the search results.

I worked with a client who had a website which was coming up as  “Warning, do not view this page” in the Google search link to their site. By using webmaster tools, it was identified that there was a vulnerability with  their CMS software from not updating it. I could then use Google webmaster tools to check and verify all of the links and connections of the site with Google’s “Goggles” so to speak. I was even then, via the webmaster tool console, able to contact a Google admin to review the site after I had patched the CMS software.

I also use Google webmaster tools to ensure Google uses the primary link achaeus.com.au opposed to www.achaeus.com.au. What’s the difference? I’ll write up a blog post about that next week.

2. Use relevant descriptive titles for your page headlines, page names and Heading (H1,H2 etc) tags.

It’s fairly basic in terms of making sure Google gets what it wants from your website. It’s all about consistency. If you have a title of a page about your company’s services with the name untitled.htm instead of services.htm then page is less relevant than another site. This applies to page titles and headline titles.

Here is an example of your site structure should look like for a page called Company Services:

Page name: “services.htm” (depending on if you’re using html site, could be .php, .asp etc)

Page title: “Company Services - ABC Company” (Have the name of your page before your company name in the page title)

Headline name: “Company Services” (Make sure its a H heading tag instead just paragraph made bold and bigger)

These seem very basic, but it can be so easily to just put aside for “next time”.

3.  Don’t make your site a “dead end”.

Whilst it’s great to get heaps of relevant sites linking to you, it’s also good practice to link to other sites. The web is about sharing information, and if you don’t want to engage and share then the web doesn’t want to know about you. From a Google point of view, they can see if you are a “dead end”. And like driving through the back streets of the City, nobody likes trying to navigate through roads dominated by signs with “No through road” on them.

If there is anything you reference, whether it be venue, event, or something that may not be in your audience’s vocab, help them out. If you’re scared they won’t come back, make the link appear in a new window. Your techy will know how to do this. Otherwise people will appreciate showing them the way, and they too will keep you on their “Good Books”.

If you want to take this further and enter the world of Search Engine Optimisation, then sign up for the weekly newsletter at SiteProNews, I’ve been on their mailing list for over 6 years.