The COVID-19 pandemic has taken its toll on businesses around the world. They have had to deal with many hardships, including being forced to shut their doors. With the right strategy, your business can weather the storm, and eventually emerge out of it stronger than ever.
Here’s a go-forward business strategy you can follow:
Take stock of the damage
In this unprecedented time, business interruption is highly likely. In fact, if you’re not running an essential service, business interruption is highly inevitable. If you’re one of the unlucky ones who were forced to shut down, as early as now, you should be devising a plan for your recovery.
Start by assessing the financial damage. If you haven’t updated your financial documents like profit, loss or cash flow statements, it’s helpful to do that now. You can then compare them to last year’s numbers to see how much your business may be down. Aside from the hard numbers relating to profits and sales, examine other ways in which your business has been affected. For example, if you’ve had to lay off some or all of your employees, you’ll need to factor that into your rebuilding plan.
Revise your business model based on COVID-19 data
As an entrepreneur, you need to be proactive and predictive in your decision-making. Pre-COVID-19, your business model may have worked to perfection, but we’re in a completely different situation now.
Analyze how your industry has been impacted by the pandemic. Pay attention to the trends and focus on finding opportunities. Finding a gap or “need” that your business may be able to fill could be vital to reclaiming (and expanding) your customer base moving forward.
Right now, food, fitness solutions and medical supplies are just some of the things that are in high demand. See where you can adjust or improve to remain competitive. The point is, there will always be new opportunities for businesses, no matter the situation.
Consider whether you’ll need funding to recover
Unless you were able to set aside a large amount of cash in a savings account online before the outbreak, it’s likely you may need some working capital to help your business recover.
There are a few programs that can help. For example, the Economic Injury Disaster Loans helps by providing short-term financing loans if you need money to fund your business. However, one challenge for federally-mandated programs like the one above is that its funding is limited. For this reason, it’s important to consider other sources of funding, like:
Small business term loans from banks, online lenders and credit unions
- Business credit cards
- Business lines of credit
- Merchant cash advances
- Accounts receivable financing
- Inventory financing
If you’re considering getting a loan to help your rebuild, remember that borrowing may be competitive, as banks want some sort of reassurance that loans can be repaid. Take a look at your business and personal financials to help you gauge how likely will you get approved for a loan.
If there’s one thing the pandemic has taught businesses, it’s learning how to adapt quickly. Having a plan B, C, or D can improve the chances of your business’ survival, and eventually, thrive again.
