Tag: small business costs

The components of a business model

As we discussed in our last post, a business model is a blueprint for the business, outlining how you’re going to run your business, and how you’re going to make money. It’s made up of five elements:

  • Business concept
  • Value chain position
  • Calculating customer value
  • Revenue sources and cost drivers
  • Competitive advantage

Let’s take a closer look at each one.

Business concept

A business concept is essentially a clear description of your business. It’s made up of:

Value chain position

Understanding the value chain, or more specifically, your business’ position in the value chain, is critical to further understanding your business on a larger scale.

A value chain is the series of activities that make products and services get from you to the end user. As products and services pass through the value chain, they gain value. For example, a leather bag involves researching the best design; designing the bag; sourcing leather; creating a prototype; tweaking the design; creating the final version of the bag; adding details such as pockets, straps or hardware; and packaging the bag for sale. All of these steps add value to the finished product.

In a value chain, there are two flows of activities: i) Upstream activities, involving the production or manufacturing of a product or service; and ii) Downstream activities which are associated with selling or marketing of the product or service, distribution of the product or service to the end user, product warranty and customer service.

If you’re going to operate a service business, your value chain is shorter because there is no manufacturing process. Most services are delivered directly to the customer only through downstream value chain activities like marketing, sales and distribution.

Where will your business sit in the value chain? Where can you add value for your customer along the way?

Calculating customer value

Are you 100% positive of the value you can bring your customers? Or are you only about 70% positive? It’s important to estimate the value of the tangible benefits your customers will receive through the purchase of your product or service.

After all, customers today are presented with a bewildering range of value and choice of products and services. They can shop for benefits and can buy from virtually any company worldwide. Figure out how exactly they will benefit from choosing you.

What does your customer value? What actual benefits will they get from doing business with you instead of your competitors? Once you understand customer value, you can better estimate what people will pay for your product or service.

Revenue sources and cost drivers

Next, it’s time to identify revenue sources and cost drivers (any activity that causes a cost to be incurred). A very healthy business model always has several sources of revenue from many different types of customers and multiple products and services. Diversification is good!

With multiple revenue streams, you not only reduce risk, but you also create several sources of income. If one revenue source isn’t doing so well, you have other sources to keep you going. Offering multiple products to multiple types of people also means you spread out your risks and minimize the costs of marketing and acquiring new customers.

Now – cost drivers. The most common ones are volume and time. The cost of an activity increases as more units are produced and the longer it takes to complete. For example, increased sales may also mean you have to hire a new employee – increasing your HR costs.

What are your cost drivers? How they can be improved and made more efficient?

Competitive advantage

Your business has a competitive advantage when customers believe you offer clearly superior products and service from your competitors. Craft a competitive strategy, which considers how your business will compete against others — either by being different, or by serving a niche market where there are no other competitors.

Why not just copy what others are doing? It seems like a good idea, but it can also get you into trouble. Why would customers buy from you if you’re the same as your competitor — one your customers already have history with?

Crafting a competitive advantage and clearly communicating your advantage to the customer will lower their risk and make them at least think about buying from you instead.

Small businesses can serve niche markets, or smaller markets with unsatisfied needs. For example, maybe your market research suggested that there were plenty of wedding cake bakeries in your area, but customers were complaining about not being able to find vegan or gluten-free wedding cakes. Sense a competitive advantage there?

Small businesses can change quickly; they can respond to changing market conditions faster than larger businesses, making them better able to satisfy customers. Understanding how your business will compete against the competition will help you stand out.

Share this post:

All about small business operating expenses

operating_expensesOne type of cost you need to estimate is called operating expenses. These are incurred by a business no matter how much product is sold. These are regular expenses like rent, salaries, insurance premiums, advertising and marketing costs, travel, interest, and miscellaneous expenses. In other words, the day-to-day costs you’ll expect to see when running your business.

You’ll need to estimate operating expenses in order to get a complete profit picture of your business. Operating expenses can be calculated per day, month or year.

Close your eyes and imagine you’re opening a flower shop and you want to figure out your operating expenses. Now, open your eyes and behold your sample estimated operating expenses:

Store rent (2,500 sq. ft. @ $30/sq. ft./year) $75,000
Florist salaries $60,000
Part-time florist salaries (x2) $50,000
Advertising $12,000
Supplies $24,000
Telephone/internet $1,200
Insurance $6,600
Utilities $3,600
Travel $1,800
Miscellaneous $12,000
Total annual operating expenses $246,200

Of course, you can’t be sure of actual costs until you’ve actually chosen a location, developed your marketing strategy and opened your doors. For now, though, this rough estimate of operating costs is enough to see whether it’s clear sailing ahead, or trouble brewing.

When estimating your start-up expenses, operating expenses and cost of goods sold, be realistic. Make sure to estimate all costs as well as the time you’ll have to pay those costs before your business starts making money. And try not to get carried away with your start-up cost estimate — think of only what you’ll need to spend to get to your opening day.

Share this post:

What are start-up expenses?

start-up expensesStart-up expenses, the one-time expenses you need to incur before you make your first sale, are one type of cost you’ll need to estimate when starting a small business.

What are start-up expenses?

Start-up expenses are made up of one-time capital expenses and monthly operating expenses. One-time capital costs might include purchase of initial inventory, purchase of equipment or furniture, improvements to your physical space, development of a website and deposits and fees.

Your start-up monthly operating expense estimate depends on your guess of how long you’ll be “operating” your business without any money coming in the door — we call that “Months to First Sale.” Imagine the T-minus 60 seconds countdown in a space shuttle launch.

The average number of months it takes to plan and start a small business is six, but it really depends on your industry. You know we love research, so we’ll say it again: the best way to find out how long you’ll have to pay your bills without any customers coming in the door is to ask a member of your industry, or someone who operates a business like the one you’re planning to run.

Start-up costs for a home-based service business are usually much less than those for a manufacturing business since you usually don’t have to worry as much about workspace or buying enough equipment to create a product.

Find the type of start-up costs that work best for your business

How you decide to pay will influence your one-time start-up expenses, because the objective is to estimate the amount of cash you’ll need to get to your grand opening. For example, if you need a $30,000 delivery van, you can buy it outright, which means you’ll need $30,000 in cash.

You can also lease it, which means borrowing money to pay for it, which means a smaller initial sum of cash for the deposit or loan down payment. This lets you pay over time when your cash flow is likely to be stronger. However, you’ll always end up paying more in total because of interest expenses and built-in fees associated with leasing.

Carefully consider your start-up needs, and be honest about how much your start-up costs will be. It’s better to make a mistake on paper than on opening day!

Share this post: