Cash Back Cards

One of the most sought-after rewards is the cash back reward. This rewards certain types of purchases, and sometimes all purchases, with a small percentage earned back in cash. These cards are a great way for small businesses to earn revenue for doing nothing more than making their routine purchases.

Australian cash back cards include Commonwealth Bank rewards cards, including the Commonwealth Bank Awards card, which has a cash back award system as well as a points award system. Commonwealth Awards, Gold Awards, Platinum Awards and Diamond Awards cards from Commonwealth offer varying credit lines. The cards award one point for each dollar spent. The ANZ Business One Cash Rewards credit card pays cardholders 0.5% cash back on all purchases. It also offers up to 40 interest-free days on each purchase.

Frequent Flyer Cards

Most small businesses have a need for travel, but that travel is a major expense. With most frequent flyer rewards programs, you earn airline points for making routine business purchases. Some give you extra rewards points when you use the card to book a flight with a specific airline and still more points for signing up for the card.

The Virgin Money High Flyer Card offers almost-free flights on specific Virgin Airlines flights after you have purchased a flight with the card. It also earns you 1.25 Velocity Points for each spent dollar. Purchasing flights with the card earns you free international travel insurance and interstate flight inconvenience insurance.

The HSBC Platinum QFF Credit Card offers two frequent flyer points with Qantas for each dollar spent overseas and one point for each dollar spent in Australia. It gives flyers two free invitations to the Qantas Club lounge annually.

The ANZ Frequent Flyer Platinum card offers an unlimited number of frequent flyer points, a free membership in the Qantas Frequent Flyer program and travel insurance when flying overseas.

The AMEX Qantas Premium Credit Card has an annual fee, but for each dollar spent it offers 1.25 Qantas Frequent Flyer points and transfers the points to your Qantas Frequent Flyer account automatically each month. Signing up earns you 5,000 points and an additional 2,500 points the first time you use it for Qantas services.

The ANZ Classic Frequent Flyer Credit Card awards you with 10,000 Qantas Frequent Flyer points upon acceptance and no limit on the number of points you can earn. If you don’t already have a Qantas Frequent Flyer account, you can get one free as a cardholder. The accounts are normally $82.50.

Store Rewards Cards

Some Australian stores have their own credit cards that offer a store-specific reward to cardholders. By choosing these wisely, a small business owner can earn free or discounted items at stores that sell what the business needs.

A Coles Myer Source credit card gives you the option of using the rewards points that you earn at any of several stores, including Coles and Target. These stores carry countless items useful to small businesses, including paper products, cleaning supplies and snack-room supplies. The Coles Myer Source card also gives cardholders a discount on fuel and has no annual fee. There is no interest on balance transfers for six months. Cardholders can redeem 1,250 FlyBuys points from purchases for $10 off a Coles purchase.

Rewards Points Cards

Rewards points cards give cardholders a specific number of points for their purchases, and those points can be redeemed for merchandise. That merchandise can include business machines and office supplies.

The Citibank Rewards Platinum card rewards each dollar spent with 1.5 Citibank rewards points. These can be spent in a merchandise catalogue or cardholders can request specialty items. The rewards points can also be redeemed for Qantas Frequent Flyer points. The rewards points never expire, and the annual points maximum is 250,000. When you spend internationally, each dollar spent earns you three rewards points. The card also offers free insurance on all purchases and international travel insurance.

Finally, another great option if you or your employees travel overseas frequently is the 28 Degrees Mastercard. It may not come with any loyalty programs but it does not charge any international transaction fees, currency conversion fees nor annual fees. This can’t be overlooked if your business requires frequent overseas travel. The 28 Degrees Mastercard also recently won the 2012 Choice award for Best Travel Money Card.

Kristy Alexander is a freelance travel and finance writer for HotelClub Australia where you can earn member dollars with every booking. Whether you are seeking a business hotel in Adelaide or a romantic hotel in Sydney you are sure to find something to suit your needs.

Benefits of a Personal Loan

Whether you need finance to buy a car, caravan or boat, whether you’re planning a holiday or a home extension a personal loan can offer you unique benefits such as:

?        A secured loan. A secured loan is one which has the item you are borrowing to purchase, as security against the loan. This means if you default on the loan and can’t make your payments your lender is able to seize the item to recover their costs.

?        A lower interest rate. A personal loan has one of the lowest interest rates of any type of financing and much lower than a credit card interest rate. A secured personal loan has an even lower rate than a standard personal loan as you are less of a risk if you are able to put up an asset as security against your borrowing.

?        A set term. Unlike a credit card which you can be repaying for an indeterminate number of years, a personal loan has a short set term, often five or seven years, so you have a clear end point in sight. You can also often choose your own personal loan term, for as short as one year in some cases.

How to Apply for a Personal Loan

The personal loan market is a competitive one and if you take the time to shop around and compare you can come up with a personal loan package with the lowest interest rate and the best choice of features for your needs.

To apply for a personal loan:

1. Check your credit. Before you apply you want to gauge your chances of approval because even a rejected loan application can appear as a black mark on your credit report. Therefore obtain a free copy of your credit report and look for any mistakes which could give you a poor score. These could be bills which you paid but were not registered or you may be the victim of identity theft. You’ll also be able to see, all in one place, how much debt you already have, and whether more is wise.
2. Aim for a secured loan. Applying for a secured loan will allow you to negotiate a lower interest rate and a higher borrowing amount if you need it.
3. Consolidate your debts. A popular use of a personal loan is to pay off existing debts such as credit cards or store cards. When you use a personal loan to repay bad debts you can be paying a lower interest rate and making just one monthly repayment, rather than one to each card.
4. Be a good personal loan customer. You can also use a personal loan to repair a bad credit rating because making your repayments on time every month shows responsibility and reliability when it comes to credit. At the same time, don’t forget about your other debts or financial commitments such as bills or rent and mortgage repayments.
5. Shop around. Don’t apply for the first personal loan product you find, from the first lender who will approve your loan. Instead, make sure you get multiple quotes on your personal loan needs; a comparison website is an ideal tool for this as you can enter your information once and receive quotes from the lenders and products which best suit you, so you know you are making comparisons on the same information, on a level playing field. 

Guest post by Eric Cheng, who is a regular personal finance writer and part of the team at Personl Loan Finder, a 100% free Australian personal loan comparison and application service. Visit the Personal Loan Finder website for more information on personal loans.

The Snowball effect

Before I go into explaining how this works, let me clear up an important fact that seems to cycle in people’s minds. Contrary to popular belief it isn’t easiest to get out of debt by paying off your highest interest rate debt first. This is what many debt-ridden consumers tend to believe, but they are wrong (at least partially because the maths proves otherwise).

Credit card debt is wrecking people’s lives as we speak. The lure of the “easy money” ruins a lot of families because the owners of the credit cards are too weak to refrain from buying yet another thing they really don’t need. So what can you do if you are left starring debt in the face – debt that could result in a possible bankruptcy claim or the possibility of a divorce because money issues are so big and your family can’t handle them?

The answer is: use the snowball method

With the debt snowball method you put everything on hold financially, except the minimum payments and of course your utility bills and essential living expenses (and no, that does not include a subscription to Pay TV).

Before you start minimizing your financial expenditure try and save money for an emergency fund. Speed is of the essence here because remember, the interest clock is ticking.

Assemble all of your debts and create a spreadsheet where you list them in order of size. Start with the smallest debt first and work your way toward the biggest (most likely your mortgage). This is not the time, nor the place to worry about interest rates as the idea is to start paying down your smallest debt as soon as possible, then move on to the next, and so on.

The snowball starts rolling…

The moment your first debt is paid off – which shouldn’t take too long if you are dedicated – your snowball will gather pace and you will feel a massive sense of achievement. This will drive you to keep going.

Seeing results is psychologically important. It helps us to stay focused and result-driven.

…can you feel the rush of wind in your hair?

As you pay off more and more small debts your snowball will gather massive momentum. You will feel elated and actually start believing that is is possible to be debt free.

But it gets even better than that. If the exhilaration of the wind in your hair isn’t enough, how about the fact that you will start to compound your remaining payments as you pay off more of your debts. Money is funny that way!

Every single dollar you pay off your existing debt will help to compound the remaining amount. The more you pay off, the quicker your debt will shrink until there is…

… nothing left to pay. In which instance you would be debt free.

As long as you keep maintaining the minimum payments for your debts you will see results with the snowball method very quickly. It will be the start of the rest of your life and hopefully re-educate you on money management forever.

This is a guest post written by Timothy a personal finance writer for Credit Card Finder which specialises in providing credit card comparisons and information to help the consumer get into a better financial situation especially those in credit card debt.

Working from the comfort of their home is a dream come true for many people. Saying good bye to long commutes, snarly bosses and bitchy co-workers has its benefits. You can grab your own slice of this global behaviour shift by finding, and starting a business from home.

Common types of work at home business opportunities

When people talk about working at home they usually have one of the following opportunities in mind:

Call center work
Data entry
Freelance writing
Network marketing
Technical assistance
Task-based work
Consulting work based on your knowledge and experience etc.

Regardless of the type of work you are looking for, there exists a range of opportunities for just about anyone with a passion for starting out. You will need a healthy dose of entrepreneurial spirit and a willingness to work hard – especially in your first year.

Where do you start?

This is a very important question because it is the single-most reason people fail before they even get started. Due to the ever-changing landscape of the Internet it is very hard to stay abreast of the places that accept you for home-based work.

Generally speaking you can find them on job board websites such as Guru.com, Elance.com, or oDesk, or you can brand yourself on social networks in the hopes that people will come to you.

As you can imagine, that won’t work, unless you already have a solid online profile. It takes time and considerable effort to pull this off.

Your best bet as a total newcomer to work at home opportunities is to go with a reputable job network provider. This will save you a lot of time, headaches and money because these networks have available jobs for capable providers pretty much all of the time.

Theoretically you can sign up with them and find a job within the same day.

Reputable job networks

The following networks are considered safe and reputable as long as you stick to their guidelines and TOS. You can earn thousands of dollars with these job networks if you have a talent for one of the above work descriptions. Most of them are in hot demand all the time, so finding a paying job is really not that hard.

oDesk: oDesk is a company that acts as the mediator between you (the contractor) and the client. Membership is free and you will pay a percentage of your earnings to them for finding you the client.

Guru: Guru works in a similar fashion to oDesk, but is more geared towards technical jobs such as coding, website management, database collaboration, etc.

Elance: Elance is a good place to find writing work fast if you are prepared to stick to a lower pay rate. If you are good at what you do you should see repeat bookings from past clients, meaning it will become easier to find work since you won’t have to chase clients – they will chase you instead. Elance’s shortcoming lies in accepting service providers (and clients) who are unreliable and incapable of performing good work. This somewhat taints their professional image.

Short Task: Short Task looks like an interesting platform through which you can earn money for fulfilling short tasks. I’m not familiar with them myself so I will have to mark this site as “somewhat unproven.” Having said this, it seems the creators of the site have already received accolades for the idea, therefore I’m thinking it might be reputable enough. You will have to be the judge.

Demand Studios: As an emerging freelance writer you can’t look past Demand Studios. These guys are considered one of the best job resources for new and existing writers. You will be paid a set fee for writing articles for them. These range widely in topic. The hardest part of getting a job with them is to get accepted in the first place because they will only sign up new writers based on their requirements. The best way to find out is by applying.

Leapforce: Google’s Leapforce let’s you earn money by becoming an Independent Leapforce at Home Agent. In order to be accepted for paid work you need to pass a strict two-part test on your theoretical and practical comprehension of search engine evaluation. If you fail the test you will not be able to do it again.

Liveops: Liveops is a home-based call service opportunity that lets you dial in from your home. Inbound calls come from people who respond to infomercials; they might have questions, or they are ready to place the order then and there. You will be paid a flat fee and then commissions on top for selling more products.

This opportunity will require a weekly work schedule before you can start to help you stay organised.

How to find more opportunities

Another great way to find reputable work at home job offers is by joining popular industry forums such as the Wahm Forum. The support on those forums is very strong and there are plenty of people in your shoes who are willing to help you find alternative solutions.

By being a member of a forum you will always have a support group of like-minded people around you at all hours of the day and night.

Stay clear of too-good-to-be-true opportunities

If you want to avoid tears, then you are best advised to stay away from work at home opportunities that sound too-good-to-be-true because usually they are. Stick with the reputable providers mentioned in this article and abide by their individual terms to avoid disenchantment.

Finding work from home is possible for the dedicated individual who is set to sack his boss for good. It is only a matter of time until you can do so. Good luck – and welcome to a world of better lifestyle choices.

Author bio: Timothy Ng is a personal finance writer for Credit Card Finder an Australian financial product comparison service specialising in credit cards.

Simple SEO applied to your writing can significantly improve the number of visitors to your article
Think about the lifetime of online articles – potentially years!

What is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Public Relations (PR) doing in the same sentence?

If we take the extreme view that Journalists simply copy and paste press releases as stories then it figures that the text being published (online) should be optimised for a search engine (ie Search Engine Optimisation). The logic is that an optimised piece of text will rank much higher on a search engine, and will allow your target audience to find that particular piece of text through a search engine such as Google.

In the example above it assumes press releases are simply copied or pasted, but in general this isn’t how the system works. Usually PR firms send their press releases and journalists look for newsworthy content that they can either add to, or change to fit their publication or angle. This example is much closer to the truth, so in this next example let’s assume that an optimised press release receives editorial changes of +/-30% to the original. This means that 70% of your optimised release is still being published, again you’re probably still sitting on a search engine optimised winner.

Following the rules of SEO while writing a press release in this example is a sure fired way to ensure you maximise the number of eyeballs on your carefully crafted message. This translates to more of whatever your object was when you wrote the press release, be it more enquiries, sales, awareness etc.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattsearles/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Isn’t SEO just for IT geeks?

This is where I think the topic gets really interesting. SEO has primarily been the domain of IT professionals who optimise websites to improve your ranking in Google, and also a bunch of dodgy email spammers who promise the world for only $12.95 a month.

However with standardisation of websites through things like templates much of the html (the framework for a website) has been optimised for you straight out of the box. In our example we are focusing on the content on sites that you have no direct power, so SEO for the frame work of HTML is pointless. So the only thing left for PR firms, Journalists and creative writers to focus on is what is actually being written. If you could look at all the information written on SEO in one sitting (which is impossible) you’d find that well over 40% of the suggestions made can be directly or indirectly applied to your creative writing, the hardest part is trying to find the information to apply directly to your own work. I look at SEO as a simple process, you spend a few minutes thinking about what you’re about to do, what you think will work and you begin the creative writing with this in mind. During the editing phase you spend a few minutes thinking over the guiding principles and again with the bigger picture/end result in full view you review your content and apply any finishing SEO touches to it.

How important is SEO to PR?

Very! The difference could be over 100,000 visitors(1)

This is a question of measurement, better put, what is the measurable performance benefit for the additional effort required? For the most part this has been unmeasurable, you generally do not  get a chance at writing two pieces of text, one optimised the other not and being able to measure the pairs of eyes that have read the article. Compounding the problem is that you don’t have the website statistics for your particular article on the newspaper website, and lastly what elements of SEO apply to writing a press release (this definitely isn’t taught in Universities that I know of – and if you can find a University that is willing, I’ll give a two hour lecture on how to optimise your writing for an online universe!).

Technology and measurement have come a long way in the last five years, for instance with a few clicks and a bit of cut and paste code you can measure the online performance of any text on your website. I am sure that Google Analytics has made a great many of people richer, and has helped an even greater many more deliver information to an audience that requires it.

What specifically do I need to understand about SEO and how I can apply it to PR?

You can optimise optimisation! Use the 80/20 rule to focus on the 20% of SEO that will deliver you 80% of the gain. The hardcore IT professionals spend their life refining their SEO techniques, but at the top end of SEO a 5% improvement can win them more business and a reputation. At the creative writing level if you have the beginners tricks under your hat then you’re 80% ahead of the pack.

Writing an optimised press release requires a slight change in how you think about crafting your message, although the actual change to the press release or text is generally so subtle that to the general reader there is no difference at all.

Here are some really basic points on SEO that most creative writers do not consider, and at their own peril!

Step 1. Complete before you begin writing. In defining your message and target audience, have you defined what they’ll be searching for to find this information? Create a list of five or so keywords/phrases that you think sum up your press release, think about what people will be searching for both sets of keywords/phrases should be the same/similar (if you need to decide which ones to use go with your gut about what people will be searching for – if you don’t know, simply sit down at Google and try and find the information yourself, look at what your searching and how you refine your search – get creative!). Rank them in order of importance.

Step 2. When reviewing your title of the press release, does it contain the top two keywords/phrases you selected from step 1?

Step 3. Does the first paragraph contain the top five keywords, with at least one of them repeated once.

Step 4. Your keywords and phrases can be reworded – imagine a keyword was ‘search engine optimisation’ repeat it throughout the first few paragraphs but reword it like ‘search engine optimise’

Step 5. You should be bolding a few of the keywords, not all of them, but at least one or two in the first two paragraphs.

Step 6. You should always always include an image. Again using the SEO example, make sure you have an image with a name like ‘search-engine-optimisation.jpg’, give it a caption with similar wording.

Step 7. Include (where relevant) a few relevant links to websites that Google ranks higly – this is simple, Google search the keyword, and look at the first page of results, these are obviously what Google considers search engine optimised for your selected keyword/phrase. If Google sees you’re linking out to those sites then the chances are they’ll think you’re more of an authority as well.

Step 8. Review your creative writing, look for new opportunities. As you wrote the press release you may have included new ideas, thoughts, products etc that have a whole new set of keywords, maybe this should be in another press release – Search engine optimisation is all about focusing on a few keywords (also known as keyword density)

Step 9. This is the last step – once you get published, send the link to any websites that came up when searching your keywords. If they link to that article then chances are Google will look at you and think that if the current authority on that keyword is linking to your article then you too must also be an authority and worth putting on the front page of Google.

Step 10. Include your list of keywords (also known as tags) at the bottom of your creative writing. This will assist Journalists and any online publication to tag your writing for you, using the intended keywords. If you leave them out then they’ll make them up for you and you’re at their mercy.

If you’re enjoying this article please take a few seconds to Digg this article so more people can find it! It’ll take 5 seconds and it’s part of social karma Click here

Is there a way to tell if my writing is SEO optimised for online publication?

With websites like www.ReversePR.com.au you can simply add your press releases, let it do the magic, and at the bottom of the press release you can review how many people have read the article, the higher the number of views the more successful it can be considered as being an optimised press release.

Experiment! Write a few different press releases, and release them to online sites and see how they go, does one go better than another?

One of the best examples I can find is this press release – http://www.reversepr.com.au/2009/09/21/1397/alex-fevola-in-temelli-jewellery-for-2009-brownlow-awards/

It was released right before the Brownlow Awards (this means there is going to be lots of search traffic about ‘brownlow awards’, ‘alex fevola’), it’s about a celebrity and I think the title of the press release, along with the image and the first few paragraphs nailed this one home as an SEO winner! What keywords do you think the writer used? The writer of this should receive a pat on the back but I think the sheer number of hits is reward enough!

I (Matt Schmidt) will be writing more on this topic over the coming weeks, however if you want a hand, have a question or need some advice feel free to drop me an email matt@mylifemynews.com.au.

Lastly, did you notice this article has been search engine optimised? If done well you shouldn’t have noticed!

(1) Depending on what site it runs on, how well you’ve optimised it and what you’ve optimised it for (topic, keyword, audience, time of day, event driven, and timeliness). Obviously there are a lot of other contributing factors but the point is you have the power to significantly improve the number of people who read what you want them to read.

Which business name is best?

Regularly I hear people discussing business names and what they should choose, the ensuing debates can become comical as people slander each other’s choices, but I digress. It’s not easy and it affects a lot of things, from website domain names, search engine optimisation, recall ability, how to spell it, business name registration and availability – the list goes on.

Well, what I’m about to write isn’t earth shattering and I know I’ve heard it before, however I think this technique is brilliant and really shows your willingness to let the customers and the data make the decision for you.

Below is what I believe to be a sure fire way to find a business name or product/service name that resonates with your customers:

1. Create a short list of your names, more than three and less than ten.

2. Get yourself a Google Adwords account if you don’t already have one, if you want to outsource it then try a Google Certified Adwords Professional – in Australia we have www.GoogleProfessional.com.au

3. Create an add for each business name you’ve selected – you can even test the slogan of each business name as the second line of the ad.

4. Using the Google Adwords keyword tools create a list of keywords against each ad. The ad’s can either go to an existing website, or register your favourite .com or .com.au for under $25 and point visitors to a blank page – at this stage it doesn’t really matter, you’re just testing.

5. Ensure you apply the same dollar value to each ad and the same dollar value for each click (this ensures that statistically each ad had the same chance). For 5 business names I think a budget of around $100-150 would give you a good indication of which names will be successful.

6. Give it about a week of advertising across a regular week and weekend, then review the click throughs percentages for each ad, also review impressions (if one ad has significantly more impressions than the others get a feeling for why – is it misleading, does it fit better with your industry etc).

You now should have enough data to determine your next winning business name – you’re starting as a customer driven business from day one.

I think this is a great way to determine what works and what doesn’t, and for those that haven’t used Google Adwords it’s a great way to dip your toe in the online marketing phenonemon that surely you’re new business will need to use in the near future.

Best of luck, and if you give it a shot let us know how you go!

Finding the right recruiter to help you sort your way through job applications is a cost effective and logical solution for all businesses.

An outsourced recruitment agency will assign a consultant to find the right person for your organisation, freeing up your valuable time to concentrate on what you do best – your core business activities, whatever they may be – mining, contracting, consulting or architecture.

Here are seven tips to help you find the right recruiter:

1. Get to know the agency – spend some time with the consultant who will be working for you to ensure they understand your individual needs, the industry in which you operate and the role you need filled. It’s also imperative that the consultant knows exactly what you need in an employee, including interpersonal skills, education level and salary expectations.  The most important information that is needed cannot be found on a website, it is the culture and environment of your business that makes the difference with finding the “right fit”.  It is a waste of your time and money if the candidates the agency sends to you are completely wrong for your business.

2. Check the agency’s first impression – it is a common phrase, but we all know first impressions count. Look at how quickly the agency responds to email and telephone enquiries and the language and manner used by the agency staff. How do the agency staff dress and are they punctual and reliable? Assess how this reflects on your business because, after all, this will be your prospective employee’s first introduction to your organisation.

3. Research the agency – find out whether the agency is a member of the relevant industry bodies, such as the Recruitment and Consulting Services Association (RSCA) or Australian Human Resources Institute (AHRI) and, if applicable, your sector’s association. Read the agency mission statement, vision and values on their website or in their office to ensure they align with your business ideals.

4. How does the agency recruit? It is in your best interests for the agency you choose to have the best candidates for your industry on its books. This goes further than just advertising your position, some recruiters will utilise innovative methods to go further than the “norm” and could include representation at industry networking events so they know what is happening in your industry.

5. What recruitment methods does the agency use? Ask how consultants select candidates before they are sent to their client. Do they just interview the candidates, check references or ask them to complete skills and values tests? Also find out whether these services cost you more, or are included in your fee.

6. Do your own reference check – often agencies have testimonials on their websites, or in their marketing materials. Ask for the contact details of clients in your industry so you can see how the agency really operates.

7. Good value – get a full run-down of all expected and potential costs so you know exactly what you will be up for. Itemised lists are also helpful for you in evaluating whether you are getting good value for money from the agency.

A good recruiter will listen to your needs, devise an individual recruitment plan and interview appropriate candidates on your behalf to ensure the ideal candidate is found. When choosing a recruiter it is important to remember that while the services do cost money, it saves you time, which every business person knows has dollar value.

By Stelanie Alexander, Director of Corporate, Clements Recruitment

About the Author

Clements Recruitment, a member of the Total Recruitment Group, is a specialist recruitment, labour hire and HR solutions provider. Clements provides premium services focused on the corporate, health, industrial and HR industries throughout Australia. Clements was founded in Adelaide in 1972 and has since grown to become a leading Australian recruitment provider.

Peak cashflow:

One key ingredient is the principle of peak cashflow. This is understanding how, at certain times of the year, and even at certain times within a month, the flow of cash into the business can ebb, if not dry up completely. Being prepared for this eventuality is what can make the difference between a business staying afloat or going under.

The business owner who gets this right can plan ahead so that finances can be balanced, and banking and credit facilities can be geared to cope.
The cashflow killer:

Late payments are the curse of the small business owner, especially if payment periods extend to 90 days, as is more common since the recession. This clearly has a knock-on effect on cashflow, because the small business owner also has bills to pay, but these may not afford the same 90-day grace period. Where possible, however, that is exactly what the business owner must strive to achieve – deferring his or her own outgoings to more evenly match the cash that is physically coming into the business.

Slack banking habits must also be avoided. All money coming into the business must be banked as soon as possible. A cheque sitting on the desk may count as paid, but it will have no positive effect on cashflow until it is in your business account.

Ideas to increase cashflow:

Make certain that requests for payment are clear and that your business banking account details are plainly understood. Offer as many ways to pay as possible to facilitate the customer’s ease of payment.

If possible, delay large business purchases until one of your historically better cashflow periods.

Keep a single dedicated business account.

Talk to your bank about setting up a special overdraft facility to easy cashflow worries and carry you through the tough times.

Make use of your own interest-free credit period by using a business credit card rather than petty cash. Just make sure you keep track of purchases so you don’t get a nasty surprise when the statement arrives.

Offer incentives to customers to pay early, such as discounts for those who pay within 7 days, or even within 30 days – no matter whether you believe this should be the norm.

Charge late fees to customers who exceed your mutually agreed payment period.

Consider legal advice if payment periods are being routinely flouted.

Do a background check on new customers to ensure they have no troubling credit history. If necessary, request references.

Send out invoices the same day as the product, not weeks later, and never send out new product to customers who are not up-to-date with their payments, however good their sob-story sounds.

Try not to hoard inventory unnecessarily. Product sitting on factory shelves does nothing for your cashflow.

As a last resort, consider selling your unpaid invoices to a debt collection company. You will get a reduced figure, but if it makes the difference between continuing to trade and liquidating the company, it might be worth doing.

This article was written by Jeremy Cabral who is a regular writer and part of the team at Credit Card Finder, a 100% free Australian credit card comparison and application service. Visit the Credit Card Finder website for more information on the available Business Credit Cards, or Subscribe to their RSS feed for more practical articles.

After failing to last not even four weeks studying Dance Education at University Clint decided that it was time to get a “real” job but knew he wanted to work in the field of entertainment. In 2007 Clint was offered a role at The Harry M Miller Group as their receptionist. While making coffee and answering the phone wasn’t his idea of the ideal job he used this experience as a training ground and gave himself a six month time frame to get promoted. It only took three. Clint moved through the ranks at the agency and has now been an Agent with the company for the past two years.

Clint became restless after completing a Diploma in Marketing and wanted to get back into teaching dance so sat on his computer for hours looking to find a directory of dance studios in the area he had just moved to but besides the outdated Yellow Pages couldn’t find anything. This is where his next business idea came from.

In July 2008 Clint launched DanceLife. Australia’s only specialist directory and social network (community) for dancers and performers. Business owners can list their company or search for businesses in their comprehensive directory. Members can read up on the latest industry news through the weekly newsletter and blogs, stay up to date with the hottest auditions and jobs and create a member profile that promotes them as a Dancer or Performer. There was nothing like it in the market and with the dance industry growing rapidly in Australia it was the perfect time. Clint knew if he didn’t do it, someone else would. That alone inspired him enough to get the ball rolling.

It wasn’t all fun and games for this young entrepreneur. Clint’s setback came right at the beginning when he created this grand idea and had no real concept of how much it was going to cost. He met with a number of website companies until he found one that fell in love with his idea and vision. The challenge was the money. Clint applied for loans and got knocked back, didn’t get approved for the amount of money he needed etc. Clint’s mum ended up getting a loan and he got two smaller ones to start DanceLife.

Clint quickly realised that you can only think of so much. He has recently sat down with a few people from different areas including online marketing, SEO, experts in start up businesses. He’s a big believer investing the revenue DanceLife generates into growing the company. He also needed fresh eyes on the project, someone who hasn’t been living, breathing and eating it for the past nearly two years. His advice is to work out where you could improve or need assistance and ask for recommendations from others you know have been in similar situations. He thought for the initial 6 months that because he had invested all this money in a project and am passionate that he deserved a mentor. At the end of the day mentors are hard to find, everyone is busy. He says “You will need to pay for your advice but remember it’s not a cost, it’s an investment. You will end up making back more than what you paid for their services in the first place”.

Clint’s main piece of advice is to ‘get yourself out there and be known’. While he has been in the dance and entertainment industry most of his life, he was a no one to the big wigs in the industry so he emailed, called and told them all about his idea and that he would like to meet with them. “No one turns down a free coffee and the people that do aren’t worth being involved in your awesome business venture” says Clint. This touches on another one of Clint’s points – surround yourself with supportive people. Clint mentions “While questioning what you’re doing is great and your ideas should be challenged, the last thing you need is negativity”. Clint’s last tip is to believe in yourself. “Yes, this is the advice most people give and you think ‘it takes more than that’. You’re right, but believing in yourself is the first and most crucial element to a successful business. After the belief then you worry about everything else. If you’re reading this and have been sitting on an idea for a while now but haven’t made any moves… do something about it!”.

And the reason – it’s all down to the boss. 72% of Australians say a decent boss is the most important aspect for employee work happiness, with 47% admitting a bad superior would be their main trigger for quitting their job, reveals the study by free online classifieds website Gumtree.com.au.

Whilst getting on with your colleagues (59%) and having a good pay (43.2%) topped the poll as employment pros, job perks such as a gym membership, parking, and free tea/coffee were deemed as insignificant in comparison to having a good and fair manager.

And when it comes to sick leave, half (51%) of those surveyed have “chucked a sickie” from work, with a fifth (20%) admitting the reason was to attend a job interview.

However, it’s not all bad news; 52% of those interviewed declare they are happy in their current job role, although two thirds of survey participants (64%) plan to look for a new job within the next 12 months.

A spokesperson for Gumtree Australia says: “Companies need to become increasingly aware that managers play such a major role in staff retention and happiness. Free classifieds website Gumtree.com.au has noticed a large volume of users advertising and searching for jobs online since Easter, with jobs ads growing at over 50% compared to the same time last year.”

* Research carried out among 935 adults Australia-wide by Gumtree.com.au – full survey results on request

About Gumtree.com.au:

Gumtree.com.au is your local community online. Launched in Sydney in 2004 after its overwhelming success as a London-based classifieds website, Gumtree has quickly become a highly popular site in Australia, created to help people connect with each other and find whatever they might be looking for, whether that be a new job, place to rent, furniture for the home, car to drive or even a fitness instructor.

The online classifieds website, which is a part of the eBay family, attracts over 500,000 unique visitors per month in Australia.

As a faster, easier and more convenient alternative to other costly sites, Gumtree offers everything you need in one location. And as well as providing conventional classifieds, on Gumtree likeminded individuals can share favourite interests, hobbies and local info about everything from social culture to the latest events.

From its beginnings as a London classifieds in 2000, Gumtree has grown massively over the past eight years. It now covers over 76 cities, from the U.K. to Poland, South Africa, New Zealand and Australia.

It is so named because the gum is native to the three nationalities at which the site was originally aimed (Australians, New Zealanders and South Africans living in the U.K.), and who helped make it the success that it is today.

Outside of Sydney, there are 9 other ‘local gums’, including Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Newcastle, Perth and Tasmania, and 2 recently launched sites for Darwin and the Gold Coast.