You’re not the only merchant who’s struggling every now and then, especially considering the situation in the world right now. Times are tough but it doesn’t mean you can’t do anything to make things better when it comes to your business.

What the best-performing businesses do differently is that they really understand their financial numbers and they make all decisions based on actual data – whether their goal is to grow or to survive. In e-commerce business it can often be very frustrating that you can track your e-commerce performance and digital marketing metrics in real-time, but the financials – profit and loss statements, balance sheets and so on – are put together by the accountant and these are always based on historical data. This means the actual financial reports are always way past their best before date as these numbers tell you how your business performed last month or the previous month.

All of this leads to a situation where these financial reports are not highlighting the current situation and especially not predicting the future. This in turn leads to a situation where many e-commerce businesses end up overlooking the financials and focus only on e-commerce metrics and that can be a costly mistake to make. During tougher times it’s even more important to understand what’s really happening with your business. Budgeting and especially cash flow management should be in the tool box of all businesses big or small as these are the tools to ensure the profitability of your business and make sure there are no unpleasant surprises. Here’s our top 4 tips for future-proofing your business:

1. 1. Make sure you have all the important data available
2. 2. Understand what drives your business forward
3. 3. Make sure your cash flow is on a sustainable level and budget is based on realistic expectations
4. 4. Make decisions based on data and keep grinding. Act before it’s too late and don’t hesitate to contact us in case you need a sparring partner or a helping hand.

P.S. We want to help businesses weather the storm and we have created a cash flow forecasting template we are now giving out free of charge – let us know if you are interested to get your cash flow straight!

Photo by Earl Wilcox on Unsplash