Corporate Finance Strategies For Small Businesses by James Giovinazzo

James Giovinazzo is the Best Finance Advisor in New York. When small businesses are formulating strategies for their corporate finance needs, they increasingly need to account for a changing landscape involving their lenders. These changes will potentially require small business owners to revise their approach to almost everything because of the widespread financial impact. Although managing such change is often challenging, it can lead to business growth when accomplished successfully.

As noted, banking changes will force small businesses to adjust their previous corporate finance strategies. Here are some of the most pressing banking issues that will impact several business areas in most cases:

• Zombie Banks and Other Troubled Banking Institutions
• The Need to Fire a Bank and Banker
• Difficulty for Refinancing Commercial Mortgages
• Fewer Working Capital Loan Options
• Decreasing Sales and Net Income

Even small businesses which think that everything is fine are likely to encounter the need to consider one or more of the problem areas just noted at some point. It is preferable to do engage in some advance planning rather than waiting for difficulties to emerge. The need to refinance a commercial real estate loan in particular now requires more advance planning than it did in past years.

There are several variations of four corporate finance strategies that are likely to be the most helpful for small business owners:

• Business Negotiating
• Contingency Business Planning
• Business Development and Marketing
• Improving Public Relations with Bankers

Business Negotiations Can Help the Bottom Line Immediately

The good news is that more effective negotiating can help improve the financial condition of a company in multiple and often unexpected areas. The bad news is that most business owners hate negotiating, and this is even more true when negotiations with their bank is involved.

Contingency Business Plans Should Be Formulated at the Earliest Possible Point

The whole purpose of having a contingency plan is to prepare for the possibility of something going wrong before it happens. It is literally impossible to do this essential planning too early.

Successful Business Development Can Make Everything Else Easier

While it might not be easy to accomplish, increased sales and revenues achieved through business development can minimize problems in many other areas. For example, the need for more working capital can be reduced or eliminated by increasing sales with new business proposal writing efforts.

Can Public Relations with Banks Be Improved?

Now more than ever, the use of public relations strategies by small businesses should be used to tackle all five of the pressing bank issues mentioned previously. These challenging problems will not solve themselves, and a specialized public relations approach is warranted in most cases.

How to Go About Raising Finance For Your Business

James Giovinazzo is the Best Finance Advisor In New York. James Giovinazzo Say's Every business from its commencement and through its development and growth will need finance. But what type of finance is best suited to the development of your business, and who should you approach for funding?

Finance is very often necessary but consider what it will entail. Additional funding requires a commitment in terms of capital and interest payments. Embarking on this course of action must therefore be planned carefully.

The business must be capable of sustaining any additional commitment to growth or expansion, and consideration will need to be given to effects on manpower, materials and space.

Before seeking outside finance, a business must consider whether it could improve its working capital from within. Particular attention should be given to stock and debtors to ensure that both are kept to a minimum. Consider how long it takes to bill customers and collect debts and look at ways to reduce this time.

If there are periods of time when surpluses of cash arise, review your affairs to try and ensure these are being used to generate income by investing on temporary short term deposit.

Business plan

Assuming external funding is necessary, planning is essential in achieving success. A well drawn up business plan not only crystallises in your own mind the nature of the project and the timing of any required funding, but is vital to any lending institution. They are unlikely to provide any assistance without a properly drawn up business plan.

The plan will include details of:

• the objectives and aims of the business

• the purpose of the required funding

• the business ownership and history

• management and responsibilities

• products and market share

• sales plan and strategy

• the financial position of the business with detailed cash flow forecasts and past accounts.

General Finance

Finance is available in many forms, but it is important to make sure that it is right for your business. Onerous terms and inflexibility can often hinder a growing business.

The more obvious sources of finance include bank overdrafts and medium to long term loans and mortgages, but rates of interest can vary considerably.

Specific Finance

Specific methods of finance are available for acquiring assets or releasing cash from debtors. Carefully consider the options available which include:

• leasing assets

• hire purchase

• outright purchase

• debt factoring

• invoice discounting.

Each method of funding has advantages and disadvantages including implications for tax purposes.

Other

Vincent james Giovinazzo say's Other means of finance may be available for your business from government sources, through the issue of shares or even your own pension scheme. Government assistance can be in the form of grants, loan guarantees or an enterprise capital funds. Other grants may be available on a regional or local level. Raising finance by issuing shares may be another option to consider.

Security

Whatever form of finance is offered, the lender will always require some form of security. However the level of security sought may vary beware the lender asking for unreasonable guarantees.

Fixed and floating charges

Most bank loans and overdrafts are secured by way of a fixed charge over land and buildings with floating charges over other assets of the company such as stock and debtors.

Personal guarantees

For some businesses little security may be available because of insufficient assets. Consequently the security will be given in the form of personal guarantees.

Take extreme care before signing these guarantees as they can be difficult to amend at a later stage and many have suffered as a consequence.

In particular, personal guarantees are best if they are limited by time or amount. Unlimited guarantees are the most dangerous.

General

James Giovinazzo say's It may be possible to use other assets as collateral such as life insurance policies or by taking a second mortgage over your home.

Whatever the means of security pledged, it should be carefully considered and advice from an accountant sought.

Finance is very often necessary but consider what it will entail. Additional funding requires a commitment in terms of capital and interest payments. Embarking on this course of action must therefore be planned carefully.

Structured Trade Finance - What Does It Mean

Structured trade finance (STF), a type of debt finance, is used as an alternative to conventional lending. This form of finance is utilized regularly in developing countries, as well as, in relation to cross border transactions. The objective is to encourage trade by making use of non-standard security. STF is generally used in high-value transactions in bilateral trading relationships. As a more complicated type of finance, STF is commonly related to commodity trading.

Within the commodity sector, STF products are most prevalent. It is used by producers, processors, traders, as well as, end-users. These financial arrangements are tailored by banking organizations to meet the precise needs of the clients. STF products are primarily working capital financing, warehouse financing and pre-export financing. There are also some institutions that extend reserve-based lending, as well as, finance the conversion of raw materials into products, along with other customized finance products. In order to promote trading activities, STF products are extended across the supply chain.

STF structures are sponsored by limited recourse trade finance lines. The structure aims at offering better security mechanism and to act as an enhancement on the position of the borrower when viewed in isolation.

How Has Technological Advancements Complemented STF?

Trade credit insurance, bank assurances, letters of credit, factoring and forfaiting are some of the STF products that have been positively affected by the latest technological advancements. These products have changed due the recent developments. The massive progress in communication and information domains have also helped the banking institutions to track the physical risks and events in the supply chain between the exporter and the importer.

Why are STF Facilities Used?

Structured trade finance products are used so that the risks related to trading in specific country and different jurisdictions can be mitigated. Any transaction together with STF products help to add resilience to the trade and the same cannot be said when looking at financing the individual elements of a trade. Moreover, it allows for lengthening the payment time, strategizing procurement, diversifying funding and enhancing the ability for clients to boost the facility sizes.

What makes STF extremely attractive is that the borrower's strength in the transaction is not scrutinized as closely as compared to a vanilla loan. Here, the focus is more on the structure and the underlying cash flows. Another reason for STF's popularity is that the transactions are not reflected in the balance sheet of a company and the presence of this financing option has helped several importers to maintain flexible credit terms with exporters.

Sales First Culture is Imperative for Business Growth by Jim Giovinazzo

Jim Giovinazzo is Best Sales person in New York. Businesses that are determined to survive in the modern era need to be devoted to the "sales first" approach of business. The unfortunate truth is that in the digital era, the tried and true sales methods of even a decade ago are no longer turning into a sale. In fact, statistically, 80% of marketing qualified leads are not making the conversion to a sale.

That's a large number of missed opportunities for a business. While there is an obvious problem, there are also solutions available for businesses. When a company takes the time to connect with their sales team and better understands what is needed for their long-term success, changes can be implemented and the bulk of those missed opportunities can be rectified.

The First Steps Towards Being More Successful in Sales

Marketing and sales need to be intertwined for the long-term success of the company. The efforts of the marketing department should carry over to sales, allowing the sales team to meet the higher expectations of educated customers using the internet for research to build an understanding and better define the questions they ask. Each call and interaction should add value to the consumer and build trust.

There is also a need for an executive level professional to step in and work closely with the sales team. This individual should review the department, implement training and look for problems and weaknesses in the current setup and make certain the sales process is highly effective.

Changes Need to Happen Now

Overlooking a problem doesn't make the problem go away. With more companies noticing the disconnection between the marketing and sales departments, a need to create a balance is recognized. Creating this balance begins with reducing the interference by high-level executives concerned with driving sales through commitments to numbers. A better approach is to have a senior leader work on creating an alignment designed to help to drive sales.

Marketing Automation and CRM Aren't Enough

One of the problems is a heavy focus on CRM and marketing automation. While this can help close some of the gap between marketing and sales, since they can help to better define situations, they won't give a complete snapshot of what is still needed. It is important to do more than supplement a sales call with CRM information and provide a full understanding of the information coming out of both departments and working together to become a sales first culture is going to close the 80% of missed opportunities.

Information is Critical

It's important to understand as the world continues to change and as information becomes more readily available to your customers, you need to be armed with information to help you provide fast, accurate information to satisfy their curiosity. At the same time, creating a bridge between marketing and your sales team to create a sales first culture is imperative for the long-term success of your business.

Closing the Deal

In B2B sales, selling a high ticket, complicated service or product is often a struggle for many marketers and sales people. The hardest step is reaching decision makers and once that's complete, a sales person must tailor their pitch to get everyone on board. Since these c-suite level employees all have different needs, tailoring a product or service to appeal to everyone is sometimes difficult. A CMO is concerned about how much traffic it'll bring in. A CFO cares how much it'll cost and what kind of revenue it'll produce. And a CEO is concerned about the potential your product or service carries for the investment. Learn how to tailor your pitch to meet everyone's needs and close the sale faster!