Categories: Maintaining a Business

Business Basics: Maintaining Your Business

We cover a lot about how to start the business of your dreams, but what happens after you’ve been in business for a while? It’s typical for small businesses to go through a slump, or even, in some cases, to close. Here are three easy ways to avoid that, and start maintaining your business at the best of your ability!

Use an Online Accountant

Beside every successful business is a good accountant. They help to keep finances in order, and advise you on how to best handle your money- invaluable input for your business. Though, the days of a business owner are filled to the brim, so going to physically meet with your accountant is getting trickier and trickier. Thankfully, there are online accountant options these days. The days of scheduling a meeting with your accountant a midst your already very busy schedule are over! Keep track of finances at the click of a button and get back to what you should be working on: running a business.

Check in on Your Marketing Tactics

It’s easy to get into a marketing rut. You get used to using the same press release outlet, to more or less uploading the same statuses, and retweeting the same 5 twitter pages. Take a step back and look at your efforts. What’s working for you? What’s not yielding results so well? Take what’s not working and remove it all together. Play around with different methods until you find something that works for you. Say your Facebook posts don’t get very many likes. Try out the boosted post option for as much money as you’re comfortable with and see if that changes things. It’s all about trying different things until you find what gives your business the greatest reward.

Keep You Team Motivated

When you’ve been in business for a while, your employees could be feeling a little stale. All they need is some break in the routine! On a hot summer day, take an impromptu field trip to Starbucks for frappacinos all around. Bring in lunch if your sales team hits their monthly goal. Throw holiday parties whenever seasonally appropriate. Just don’t forget to keep the fun in running a small business!

Have you figured out your own tips and tricks to maintain the health of your business? Let us know in the comments below!

Deborah Sweeney

Deborah Sweeney is an advocate for protecting personal and business assets for business owners and entrepreneurs. With extensive experience in the field of corporate and intellectual property law, Deborah provides insightful commentary on the benefits of incorporation and trademark registration.

Education: Deborah received her Juris Doctor and Master of Business Administration degrees from Pepperdine University, and has served as an adjunct professor at the University of West Los Angeles and San Fernando School of Law in corporate and intellectual property law.

Experience: After becoming a partner at LA-based law firm, Michel & Robinson, she became an in-house attorney for MyCorporation, formerly a division in Intuit. She took the company private in 2009 and after 10 years of entrepreneurship sold the company to Deluxe Corporation. Deborah is also well-recognized for her written work online as a contributing writer with some of the top business and entrepreneurial blogging sites including Forbes, Business Insider, SCORE, and Fox Business, among others.

Fun facts/Other pursuits: Originally from Southern California, Deborah enjoys spending time with her husband and two sons, Benjamin and Christopher, and practicing Pilates. Deborah believes in the importance of family and credits the entrepreneurial business model for giving her the flexibility to enjoy both a career and motherhood. Deborah, and MyCorporation, have previously been honored by the San Fernando Valley Business Journal’s List of the Valley’s Largest Women-Owned Businesses in 2012. MyCorporation received the Stevie Award for Best Women-Owned Business in 2011.