Coffee News South Africa

Is Your Cow Getting Fat?

My dad used to say, “It’s the framers eye that keeps the cow fat.”

Meaning you must have your finger on the pulse. This is where I believe a program like QuickBooks is the answer to the success or failure of a small business. You cannot run a business without being in control. You need to weigh the business, measure and drive it from a cockpit and that cockpit can be QuickBooks.

Let me share with you why I decided to investigate QuickBooks:

• Our South African small business opportunity, Coffee News, sells advertising space to small to medium neighbourhood businesses. The ad rates are calculated on a weekly basis. And the advertiser can pay monthly or weekly for periods of more than thirteen weeks. A serious time waster is the time spend collecting advertising payments.
• And then when paid in cash, it disappears before it’s recorded. Well, not in all cases but it’s easy to just spend cash in hand.
• At the end of the month you have no idea what happened to all the collected payments.
• Also, the re-sale of a small business depends on a proven record to establish the value of the business.
• The professional will keep strict records of income and expenses.
• Experienced business people will tell you that keeping records and paying your taxes is better than not knowing whether you are successful or not. 

There is more than 1 100 Coffee News businesses worldwide therefore making it easy to do research on the pros and cons of QuickBooks:

This is what they had to say:

1. “I find it to be a great tool for keeping my accounts organized and doing my bookkeeping & billing, and ability to take credit cards too. It is great that I know what the current status of my business is at all times- but I also find that I am spending at least 1/2 a day per week reconciling”.
2. “My husband does my books and he only spends about 15 minutes a night doing them. We then send just a flash drive to the accountant who makes sure we did it right. Just do it each day when you are making your list of to do things for the next day.” [I suggest spending 15 minutes everyday rather than once a week]
3. “I find it to be a great tool for keeping my accounts organized and doing my bookkeeping & billing, and ability to take credit cards too.” [QuickBooks can take not only credit cards but you have many debit options and that’s what I suggest it for South African Small Business]

How Easy Is It To Get The Hang Of Quick Books? 

This is what our Coffee News experts had to say:

“Might be worth taking a Quick Books class… They are pretty reasonably priced by Quick Books Pros in your area. Reconciling is simple and takes minutes to do on your QuickBooks.  Once you perfect the program… like anything else… it will save you money and time and you’ll be the expert!  You can find the Quick Books pros in your area on the Intuit website I believe.  HMMMMM…Maybe you could barter a lesson or two and book her for an ad?”

Some Will Tell You That You Need To Focus On Your Business

“Keep Coffee News enjoyable and farm this out. If you love accounting then by all means do this. Also, think about the extra time and energy and motivation you will have to sell the additional ads to make up for the cost of the accounting service.” [There’s a lot of truth in this statement and many people will agree but others will tell you that you need to be very disciplined and most small business owners I came across need a cash flow cockpit and the time it takes to update QuickBooks is nothing compared to the time wasted collecting money].

Another Coffee News Licensee:

“I will say there is something to be said about doing the books yourself to see where the money is going, QuickBooks gives very good reporting that can give you several snapshots and trends of your business.”

For Small Businesses, Like Coffee News South Africa, I propose:

1. Get QuickBooks Pro. The last time I looked it was R2490.
2. Get training if needed and set-up your structure.
3. Get advertisers to agree to a debit order via the bank or their credit card.
4. Offer them a small discount and extra value.
5. Make the debit order open ended.

Let’s watch the cow become healthy and fat. Measure, weigh and tweak the levers that will make you a success.