As of April 2020, over 16 million American workers have filed unemployment claims, while more than 163,000 businesses have declared halt of operations as of August. These dire facts only show just how wide-reaching and serious are the negative effects of the ongoing pandemic on individuals and businesses.
If you own a business, you should be more circumspect in how you handle your finances if you don’t want to become part of the sad statistics. Specifically, you should be financially prudent and try to constantly find ways to save money, so you’ll have plenty of standby funds when the lean months come. Keep in mind that in such a trying time, getting every edge you can have could spell the difference between continuing your business and declaring bankruptcy.
Here are five simple and effective ways for your business to save big dollars while continuing your daily operations despite a pandemic:
Invest in affordable call infrastructure
Businesses rely heavily on constant communication with customers, suppliers, and business partners. If you want to save big, you should invest in an inexpensive call system, whether it’s a traditional landline or voice over internet protocol (VoIP). Whichever one you may choose, the idea is to go for the one that would allow you to make cheap international calls especially if you have foreign contacts for your products or services.
Make the shift to renewable energy
If you own a power-intensive business, you should seriously consider making the shift towards a renewable energy source. While they may initially cost a considerable amount of money, solar power systems are actually among the best investments that you can make for your business. If you intend to be in such a venture for a long time, a sustainable energy source is a wise way to invest in part of your operating budget.
Find inexpensive (or free) means to promote your business
Whether you are offering services or selling products, you will most likely spend on promoting your business to attract customers or buyers. Traditional marketing channels such as TV or magazine ads could cost a considerable amount of money and so do digital marketing solutions like SEO campaigns and sponsored social media posts.
If you wish to save money, you should find cheap marketing tools or ones that don’t cost anything (such as Facebook Marketplace). You have to strike a perfect balance between trying to save money and getting the exposure that you need for your business. Just keep in mind that there are things that you need to pay for and those that you don’t have to spend anything on.
Consider outsourcing some tasks or projects
When you hire regular employees, you have to offer them industry-mandated benefits that could bite a big chunk off of your budget. These days, there are millions of highly skilled remote workers that you can hire to complete small tasks and even full-blown projects. By hiring such service providers, you can enjoy the benefits of typical office-based employees and the savings and convenience given by a remote worker.
Relocate or downsize
Pandemic situations may call for some drastic business decisions and you have to be willing to make the hard choices to save money and survive. Among the tricks to achieve both ends is to either relocate to a smaller, cheaper location or to downsize the scale of your operations. You can also do both options for optimum savings but you have to first be 100 percent certain that it is the best way to go forward.
With these simple money-saving tricks, your business should have a better chance of survival in a pandemic crisis.
