Archive For: February, 2010

Your numbers need maintenance

Once you’ve cleaned up your act and have your business numbers organised, you need a method of keeping it organised ALL OF THE TIME. In other words, ‘maintenance’. Just like you go on a maintenance program after losing weight in order to keep the weight off, so you need a maintenance program to keep your numbers organised.

Maintenance needs to happen on a weekly basis regardless of who is doing it. The first step is to pick a day. You need a regular appointment with yourself (or your bookkeeper) to keep up with the paperwork, so pick a day. Let’s say that day is Tuesday. Tuesday is selected because you have to pay your employees anyway so you may as well do everything in one hit!

So what tasks are required to stay on top of all of this paperwork?

1. Your paperwork needs a home before you enter it into your accounting software. For this example we’ll assume that you enter all supplier invoices before being paid.

2. This means you need a home for:

a. Supplier invoices to be entered
b. Supplier invoices paid
c. Supplier statements
d. Customer invoicing information (if invoiced after the fact) OR
e. Daily register and EFTPOS receipts (for retail)
f. Bank statements (I recommend Bookzkeeper)

3. I have always found that manilla files work well for a, b, c and d above. Using this system you would only have 1 weeks’ worth of information in the files at any one time.

4. With daily register and EFTPOS receipts I recommend an envelope to keep them in one place. Just write the date on the top left hand corner. This can usually be kept near your register so that at the end of each week, that week’s envelopes can be transferred to your office after doing the reconciling process.

5. If you keep the manilla files near the recycling bin, you can sort your paperwork into the appropriate manilla file as you open the mail and get rid of the junk (to be paper recycled) When Tuesday comes around take your manilla files and:

a. Enter your supplier invoices
b. Apply payments made to supplier invoices
c. Process customer invoices or cash register sales information
d. Reconcile bank and credit card statements
e. Make payments to suppliers – you should always have a day that you pay them
f. Pay your employees (if you have any)

6. Now that feels good doesn’t it? All sorted and empty manilla files! Of course, you have to do it again next week but if you follow this method it is much easier to keep on top of your paperwork.

7. On a monthly basis you will need to check your supplier statements against your system. I’ll be honest -this is not something I enjoy doing. I used to put it off and get in a mess with missing invoices and incorrectly applied payments etc, so I got someone else to do it.

8. The maintenance program above will only work if you’re willing to commit to the process. If you’re not willing to do it then look around for someone to do this for you and get them to commit to this weekly process. Really be honest with yourself here – let’s face it, you can probably earn a lot more money doing what you do best than spending your time doing a job that a bookkeeper can do much quicker and probably much cheaper than your hourly rate.

The Difference Between Publicity and Advertising

A recent conversation with a fellow business mum about recognising the difference between free publicity and paid advertising made me wonder how easy it really is to tell.

I have worked in writing, public relations and marketing for more than 10 years, so recognising material – particularly in print – which has been paid for has become second nature. However my friend said she found it difficult to spot the difference sometimes.

Here is a guide to media space and time that has been paid for, and that which is free and generated through public relations.

I think I can safely say it is easy to spot most advertising – it comes in breaks in your favourite TV programs, between music on the radio, down the side of a web page or sometimes pops up from the page, and surrounds articles in newspapers and magazines.

Where it becomes hazy is when the information is included in an article or advertorial (an advertisement made to look more legitimate as an editorial piece – these should carry the word “advertorial” and “advertisement” at the top), in a news or current affairs item or when the presenter speaks about a product as they would discuss the news, similar to John Laws’ Cash for Comment affair.

The job of a PR consultant is to generate publicity for their client. Their client isn’t paying for the time or space and the information considered more credible by the public. Examples include an article, news broadcast or TV segment. This media coverage is achieved through many avenues such media liaison, media releases, article marketing, public speaking, case studies and blogging.

Many of the articles you read in the paper, magazines or online and items you heard on the news or radio today would have been generated through public relations. For example after the federal government’s recent increase in the first home buyers’ grant a host a organisations, from real estate agents to banks, sent out press releases commenting on the grant and what it meant for the economy. They were positioning themselves as experts, or contacts the media could use when covering the story.

Whether the information came to the journalist via a media release or they chased it up through contacts, it is still from PR. The biggest difference between getting something published once because the media outlet liked your story, and getting regular coverage, comes from maintaining a good relationship with journalists, producers and editors. Good PR, whether done by you or a consultant you hired, leads to you being the contact the media calls on when they want to know something about your topic.

Advertising is about guaranteeing your message gets out there when you want through payment. It is seen as less credible because the organisation has paid for the space or time. However public relations is about communicating your message to your public, usually via the media. A company or issue receiving media coverage is seen as more credible because the journalist or presenter has endorsed the message.

This article first appeared on Flying Solo. See more by Johanna Baker-Dowdell at http://www.flyingsolo.com.au/p261050105_Joh-Baker-Dowdell.html