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Cash Management – How to Prepare Daily Cash Position Report – Part 2

If your company maintained 2 or 3 banks for payment processing, we have to modify a little bit of the technique so that we can control effectively all the bank’s accounts and at the same time manage to earn extra income by carefully invest surplus fund in short term investment. Lets assume that your company has 3 bank accounts and we name it as Bank A, Bank B and Bank C. We should choose one bank as your major bank where you pool all your cash in that bank. Let’s assume that our major bank is Bank B. That means all your major collections must be deposited into this bank account. Your major payment which comprise big amount such as subcontractors and salary payment must also from this cash pool account.

Any payment prepared which is small in amount but the rate of recurrence is high such as utilities bills payment, petty cash reimbursement, staff claim and other payment should be prepared by using Bank A. We will deposited the incoming cheques into Bank A with more or less the same amount of cheques prepared so that the account balance in Bank A is always in ideal balance.

If we have specific payment pattern for the month, for example we only pay for our suppliers and workshop every 25th of the month, then we use Bank C for our cheque payment. Here we use ZBA technique which means Zero Balance Accounts technique where we will only transfer fund from our cash pool account which is Bank B to Bank C only once a month. That means there is no extra cash in Bank C, which means we have pool all extra cash in Bank B for our short term investment purposes. I will explain further the topic of short term investment when we reach to that topic soon.

All the suggested techniques above looks complicated but the reason behind that is we manage to prepare daily cash position more faster and accurate without spending your time to figure out the serial number for every categories if we use one bank only. From our example above, you will notice that bank A is for bills payment, staff claims and other payment. That means you only have to identify 3 series of serial cheque numbers for the payment using Bank A. Bank B only has 2 payments which is subcontractors and salary while Bank C meant for suppliers and workshop payment. The second reason of doing that is to avoid idle balance in Bank A and Bank C which do not earn any interest income. All our income has been pooled in Bank B where we can place short term investment placement from tenor of overnight to one week.

To reach our bank balance for that day, we just calculate by simply using simple arithmetic which is Opening Balance + Incoming Cheques – Payment made = Closing Balance. When place all the bank column side by side, we manage to get the total closing balance when we total up Bank A,Bank B and Bank C closing balance. This is what I call the cash dashboard where we can see all our bank balance with only one glance. Of course it is not complete yet because we still have not taken into consideration the available balance and cash & cash equivalent figure. I will explain in depth all this terminology later.

How To Prepare A Business Plan That Guarantees Big Profits

It is always said “If you Fail to Plan, you Plan to Fail”

Success in business comes as a result of planning. You have to have a detailed, written plan that shows what the ultimate goal is, the reason for the goal, and each milestone that must be passed in order to reach your goal.

A business plan is written definition of, and operational plan for achieving your goal. You need a complete but success tool in order to define your basic product, income objectives and specific operating procedures. YOU HAVE TO HAVE A BUSINESS PLAN to attract investors, obtain financing and hold onto the confidence of your creditors, particularly in times of cash flow shortages–in this instance, the amount of money you have on hand compared with the expenses that must be met.

Aside from an overall directional policy for the production, sales effort and profit goals of your product–your basic “travel guide” to business success–the most important purpose your business plan will serve, will be the basis or foundation of any financial proposals you submit. Many entrepreneurs are under the mistaken impression that a business plan is the same as a financial proposal, or that a financial proposal constitutes a business plan. This is just a misunderstanding of the uses of these two separate and different business success aids.

The business plan is a long range “map” to guide your business to the goal you’ve set for it. The plan details the what, why, where, how and when, of your business–the success planning of your company.

Your financial proposal is a request for money based upon your business plan–your business history and objectives.

Understand the differences. They are closely related, but they are not interchangeable.

Writing and putting together a “winning” business plan takes study, research and time, so don’t try to do it all in just one or two days.

The easiest way to start with a loose leaf notebook, plenty of paper, pencils, pencil sharpener, and several erasers. Once you get your mind “in gear” and begin thinking about your business plan, “10,000 thoughts and ideas per minute” will begin racing through your mind…So, it’s a good idea when you aren’t actually working on your business plan, to carry a pocket notebook and jot down those business ideas as they come to you–ideas for sales promotion, recruiting distributors, and any other thoughts on how to operate and/or build your business.

Later, when you’re actually working on your business plan, you can take out this “idea notebook” evaluate your ideas, rework them, refine them, and integrate them into the overall “big picture” of your business plan.

The best business plans for even the smallest businesses run 25 to 30 pages or more, so you’ll need to “title” each page and arrange the different aspects of your business plan into “chapters.” The format should pretty much run as follows:

Title Page Statement of Purpose Table of Contents Business Description Market Analysis Competition Business Location Management Current Financial Records Explanation of Plans For Growth Projected Profit & Loss/Operating Figures Explanation of Financing for Growth Documentation Summary of Business & Outlook for The Future Listing of Business & personal References

This is a logical organization of the information every business plan should cover. I’ll explain each of these chapters titles in greater detail, but first, let me elaborate upon the reasons for proper organization of your business plan.

Having a set of “questions to answer” about your business forces you to take an objective and critical look at your ideas. Putting it all down on paper allows you to change, erase and refine everything to function in the manner of a smoothly oiled machine. You’ll be able to spot weakness and strengthen them before they develop into major problems. Overall, you’ll be developing an operating manual for your business–a valuable tool which will keep your business on track, and guide you in the profitable management of your business.

Because it’s your idea, and your business, it’s very important that YOU do the planning. This is YOUR business plan, so YOU develop it, and put it all down on paper just the way YOU want it to read. Seek out the advice of other people; talk with, listen to, and observe, other people running similar businesses; enlist the advice of your accountant and attorney–but at the bottom line, don’t ever forget it has to be YOUR BUSINESS PLAN!

Remember too, that statistics show the greatest causes of business failure to be poor management and lack of planning–without a plan by which to operate, no one can manage; and without a direction in which to aim its efforts, no business can attain any real success.

On the very first page, which is the title page, put down the name of your business-ABC ACTION–with your business address underneath. Now, skip a couple of lines, and write it all in capital letters: PRINCIPAL OWNER–followed by your name if you’re the principal owner. On your finished report, you would want to center this information on the page, with the words “principal owner” off-set to the left about five spaces.

Examples: ABC ACTION 1234 SW 5th Ave. Anywhere, USA 00000

PRINCIPAL OWNER: Your Name

That’s all you’ll have on this page except the page number -1-

Following your title page is the page for your statement purpose. This should be a simple statement of your primary business function, such as: We are a service business engaged in the business of selling business success manuals and other information by mail.

The title of the page should be in all capital letters across the top of the page, centered on your final draft–skip a few lines and write the statement of purpose. This should be direct, clear and short–never more than (2) sentences in length.

Then you should skip a few lines, and from the left hand margin of the paper, write out a sub-heading in all capital letters, such as: EXPLANATION OF PURPOSE.

From, and within this sub-heading you can briefly explain your statement of purpose, such as: Our surveys have found most entrepreneurs to be “sadly” lacking in basic information that will enable them to achieve success. This market is estimated at more than a 100 million persons, with at least half of these people actively “searching” for sources that provide the kind of information they want, and need.

With our business, advertising and publishing experience, it is our goal to capture at least half of this market of information seekers, with our publication. MONEY MAKING MAGIC! Our market research indicates we can achieve this goal and realize a profit of $1,000,000 per year within the next 5 years…

The above example is generally the way you should write your “explanation of purpose,” and in subtle definition, why you need an explanation. Point to remember: Keep it short. Very few business purpose explanations justify more than a half page long.

Next comes your table of contents page. Don’t really worry about this until you’ve got the entire plan completed and ready for final typing. It’s a good idea though, to list the subject (chapter titles) as I have, and then check off each one as you complete that part of your plan.

By having a list of the points you want to cover, you’ll also be able to skip around and work on each phase of your business plan as an idea or the interest in organizing that particular phase, stimulates you. In other words, you won’t have to make your thinking or your planning conform to the chronological order of the “chapters” of your business plan–another reason for the loose leaf notebook.

In describing your business, it’s best to begin where your statement purpose leaves off. Describe your product, the production process, who has responsibility for what, and most importantly, what makes your product or service unique–what gives it an edge in your market. You can briefly summarize your business beginnings, present position and potential for future success, as well.

Next, describe the buyers you’re trying to reach–why they need and want or will buy your product–and the results of any tests or surveys you may have conducted. Once you’ve defined your market, go on to explain how you intend to reach that market–how you’ll these prospects to your product or service and induce them to buy. You might want to break this chapter down into sections such as..publicity and promotions, advertising plans, direct sales force, and dealer/distributor programs. Each section would then be an outline of your plans and policies.

Moving into the next chapter on competition, identify who your competitors are–their weakness and strong points–explain how you intend to capitalize on those weaknesses and match or better the strong points. Talk to as many of your “indirect” competitors as possible–those operating in different cities and states.

One of the easiest ways of gathering a lot of useful information about your competitors is by developing a series of survey questions and sending these questionnaires out to each of them. Later on, you might want to compile the answers to these questionnaires into some form of directory or report on this type of business.

It’s also advisable to contact the trade associations and publications serving your proposed type of business. For information on trade associations and specific trade publications, visit your public library, and after explaining what you want ask for the librarian’s help.

The chapter on management should be an elaboration on the people operating the business. Those people that actually run the business, their job, titles, duties, responsibilities and background resume’s. It’s important that you “paint” a strong picture of your top management people because the people coming to work for you or investing in your business, will be “investing in these people” as much as your product ideas. Individual tenacity, mature judgement under fire, and innovative problem-solving have “won over” more people than all the AAA Credit Ratings and astronomical sales figures put together.

People becoming involved with any new venture want to know that the person in charge–the guy running the business knows what he’s doing, will not lose his cool when problems arise, and has what it takes to make money for all of them> After showing the “muscle” of this person, go on to outline the other key positions within your business; who the persons are you’ve selected to handle those jobs and the sources as well as availability of any help you might need.

If you’ve been in business of any kind scale, the next chapter is a picture of your financial status–a review of your operating costs and income from the business to date. Generally, this is a listing of your profit & loss statements for the six months, plus copies of your business income tax records for each of the previous three years the business has been an entity.

The chapter on the explanation of your plans for the future growth of your business is just that–an explanation of how you plan to keep your business growing–a detailed guide of what you’re going to do, and how you’re going to increase your profits. These plans should show your goals for the coming year, two years, and three years. By breaking your objectives down into annual milestones, your plan will be accepted as more realistic and be more understandable as a part of your ultimate success.

Following this explanation, you’ll need to itemize the projected cost and income figures of your three year plan. I’ll take a lot of research, an undoubtedly a good deal of erasing, but it’s very important that you list these figures based upon thorough investigation. You may have to adjust some of your plans downward, but once you’ve got these two chapters on paper, your whole business plan will fall into line and begin to make sense. You’ll have a precise “map” of where you’re headed, how much it’s going to cost, when you can expect to start making money, and how much.

Now that you know where you’re going, how much it’s going to cost and how long it’s going to be before you begin to recoup your investment, you’re ready to talk about how and where you’re going to get the money to finance your journey. Unless you’re independently wealthy, you’ll want to use this chapter to list the possibilities and alternatives. Make a list of friends you can approach, and perhaps induce to put up some money as silent partners. Make a list of those people you might be able to sell as stockholders in your company–in many cases you can sell up to $300,000 worth of stock on a “private issue” basis without filing papers with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Check with a corporate or tax attorney in your area for more details. Make a list of relatives and friends that might help you with an outright loan to furnish money for the development of your business.

Then search out and make a list of venture capital organizations. Visit the Small Business Administration office in your area–pick up the loan application papers they have–read them, study them, and even fill them out on a preliminary basis–and finally, check the costs, determine which business publications would be best to advertise in, if you were to advertise for a partner or investor, and write an ad you’d want to use if you did decide to advertise for monetary help.

With listing of all the options available to your needs, all that’s left is the arranging of these options in the order you would want to use them when the time come to ask for money. When you’re researching these money sources, you’ll save time by noting the “contact” deal with when you want money, and whenever possible, by developing a working relationship with these people.

If your documentation section, you should have a credit report on yourself. Use the Yellow Pages or check at the credit department in your bank for the nearest credit reporting office. When you get your credit report, look it over and take whatever steps are necessary to eliminate any negative comments. Once these have been taken care of, ask for a revised copy of your report and include a copy of that in your business plan.

If you own any patents or copyrights, include copies of these. Any licenses to use someone else’s patent or copyright should also be included. If you own the distribution, wholesale or exclusive sales rights to a product, include copies of this documentation. You should also include copies of any leases, special agreements or other legal papers that might be pertinent to your business.

In conclusion, write out a brief, overall summary of your business- when the business was started, the purpose of the business, what makes your business different, how you’re going to gain a profitable share of the market, and your expected success during the coming 5 years..

The last page of your business plan is a “courtesy page” listing the names, addresses and phone numbers of personal and business references–persons who have known you closely for the past five years or longer–and companies or firms you’ve had business or credit dealings with during the past five years.

And, that’s it–your complete business plan. Before you send it out for formal typing, read it over once a day for a week or ten days. Take care of any changes or corrections, and then have it reviewed by an attorney and then, an accountant. It would also be a good idea to have it reviewed by a business consultant serving the business community to which your business will be related. After these reviews, and any last-minute changes you want to make, I’ll be ready for formal typing.

Type and print the entire plan on ordinary white bond paper. Make sure you proof-read it against the original. Check for any corrections and typographical errors–then one more time–read it through for clarity and the perfection you want of it.

Now you’re ready to have it printed and published for whatever use you have planned for it–distribution amongst your partners or stockholders as the business plan for putting together a winning financial proposal, or as a business operating manual.

Take it to a quality printer in your area, and have three copies printed. Don’t settle for photo-copying..Have it printed!

Photo-copying leaves a slight film on the paper, and will detract from the overall professionalism of your business plan, when presented to someone you’re trying to impress. So, after going to all this work to put together properly, go all the way and have it duplicated properly.

Next, stop by a stationery store, variety store or even a dime store, and pick up an ordinary, inexpensive bind-in theme cover for each copy of your business plan. Have the holes punched in the pages of your business report to fit these binders and then slip each copy into a binder of its own.

Now, you can relax, take a break and feel good about yourself..You have a complete and detailed business plan with which to operate a successful business of your own. A plan you can use as a basis for any financing proposal you may want to submit..And a precise road-map for the attainment of real success…

You just complete one of the important steps to fulfill of all your dreams of success.

How to Prepare Yourself for CFP Exam

Certified Financial Planning is the most recognized, prestigious and internationally accepted degree course. Material for CFP exam is easy to verify on-line. Stay updated via E-services and download latest CFP course and list of best authors for certain subjects. Make the best approach to crack CFP exam as it is a tough nut to track yet hard work and proper knowledge could enable you to grab far better degree of CFP course.

Postgraduate Certificate of Financial Planning is a mystery, but it opens all doors of success and evaluation of their abilities. To request a certificate of CFP course is used in many approved course providers need to take care of some things before taking a responsible course. The list is a consideration in the selection process and raises the benefits associated with the certificate of CFP exam:

The title is written in an accredited university, is an “accredited university”, which was approved by the Ministry of Education accreditation accredited explained that the license, see the course schedule online subscriptions check, compare the cost of education, reviving the style of education and a careful analysis and comparison of all databases, select the most appropriate and continue to use the CFP course certification.

Instant credibility and respect of clients, employers and colleagues is available. Provides the same competitive advantage over other financial advisors impressive. A complete analysis of the skills and knowledge of complex financial planning. Belonging to a global network of professional trainers certified financial planner.All are united in a celestial facts certified financial planner to be.

Certified Financial Planner have different functions, including not only basic financial planning for the management of social security benefits, pensions, real estate and tax planning, insurance planning and risk planning. Everything strengthen opportunities for huge growth and big profits

Educate family physicians; you can take your career to great heights. The correct choice is the key to some ideas for assessment for selection and certification of their financial advisers to help education.

The benefits of a certified financial planner depends on many factors such as education, skills, certifications, customers, the stock market and other investment vehicles, experience and desire.

Anyone can sell insurance and annuities, stocks, bonds and mutual funds – but only a global financial planner can add value to their financial security through various tactics.

A better understanding of the origin of the CFP course, you can understand the logic and the importance of proceeding in this way. Enter all necessary information on-line access to different places and with many years of experience available 24 / 7 for the address.

The designation of Certified Financial Planner certification is important for financial planners, CFP exam is Board of Standards in the United States and recognized worldwide by other financial institutions associated with the planning of customized global business.

Prepare yourself for CFP exam with best developed technological tools to upgrade your knowledge status and acquire internationally known CFP course degree. Grab best possible material and keep in mind above points while preparation and make best efforts.

News Media Interviews – 7 Tips on How to Prepare For Mainstream News and Feature Media Interviews

Today, many business people are focused on social media, new media and on-line media. While these efforts are important and necessary for marketing, traditional media outlets are still important and can play a major role in your business success.

So, the question is, “Will you be ready when Oprah or Donny Duetsch from The Big Idea calls?”

You will be if you prepare now. Following are 7 tips for conducting successful media interviews:

Define your agenda: decide what you want the audience to do. Buy your services? Attend your event? Support your cause?
Know your story: to effectively assert your agenda, you must deliver your message confidently, calmly and concisely. You are the expert on your topic. Stay focused on your agenda during the interview.
Develop key talking points with supporting proof points: prepare three key points you wish to make during the interview. Then support each talking point with three points that offer tangible proof including stories, case studies, and other examples.
Know the interviewer and the media outlet: before agreeing to an interview, do your due diligence. Research the media outlet and the interviewer. A quick Google search will give you an idea of what to expect and how to best prepare for the interview.
Prepare the interviewer: reporters are very busy and anything you can do to help them is greatly appreciated. To this end, provide background information as well as sample questions on your topic. You will often find that they will use these exact questions.
Anticipate questions and controversy: Your preparation is not complete without anticipating questions and controversies that could arise in the interview. Create a list of all anticipated questions. Then answer each question. Be sure to include the ones that could be asked – remember; “if you dread it, you’ll probably get it.”
Practice, practice, practice: nothing takes the place of practice. It alleviates pre-interview panic and post-interview remorse. To hone message points and to prepare for actual interview questions, even the most polished spokespeople find there is simply no substitute for practicing out loud. Better still, role play with a buddy or coach. Are your answers coming across? Are they concise? Are they believable or do they need more support?

Follow these tips and you will master mainstream media opportunities. And, who would not want to be interviewed on the Today Show?

Profitable Business Ideas – How to Prepare a Solid Business Plan For Home Based Internet Business

Today, new Internet businesses are struggling to find a profitable business idea and niche. As per the recent study it is found that an estimated 90% of the new Internet businesses failed because of either lack of planning or improper business plans. If you have a solid business plan you can start earning in hours.Here I am going to tell you about the missing link in Home based business success that is Business plan for home based Internet businesses. In brief you have to be clear about the action and research part before starting any Internet business.

Your Home based business plan should contain the following elements.

Niche: The goal here is to find a profitable niche which has the potential to start bring sales in days for this you have to drill deep to find a hungry desperate niche,while selecting the niche the only formula is starting from Need moving to Want and then to Hobby. Need niche has a success rate of 80% but the competition is very high, want is the niches were in you required a killing sales letter to achieve success and the last is Hobby niche in which again the success rate is very high although the traffic is low but the sales conversion rate is more than 50% of per clicks.

Keyword: Building a good keyword list is an important element of business plan, there are multiple combinations and the guiding factors are Demand, Competition and All in title. The best combination is Demand >3000 per month, Competition

Finding the best product:The best affiliate product market places are click bank, pay dot com and e-junkie and the product should be based on your selected keywords.

Driving traffic to achieve: The best method to start traffic drive is Article marketing and no doubt Ezine article is the best place for submitting article and driving traffic, the advantage with article marketing is that it is free. Apart from the free method there are some paid methods and the quickest method to start earning is to use the pay per click engines which will submits your listing in a few hours or days, with Google Ad words being immediate. This requires an ongoing cost and you will need to monitor results and regulate your bids if necessary.

Action Plan: The actions plan to start with.

1) A hosting account.

2) A domain name.

3) A Squeeze page.

4) An auto responder account.

5) The link to your affiliate offer.

Hence the plan should contain detail analysis of Niche, Keywords, Product and methods for driving traffic.