Planning Your Biz for the Slow Times

All businesses have downtime. There are periods where business is just slow, no matter how much you advertise or how good your business is doing. Your business may be directly operating seasonally, such as concession stands at sporting events or neighborhood ice cream trucks. It may also indirectly operate seasonally, by manufacturing a product that is only bought and used during a particular time of the year. For example, building materials may not be in high demand during the winter, or antifreeze during the summer. And still, there are times where even business that are viable year-round just have downtime. It is essential to plan for slow business, predicted or not, so that your company can survive them financially and be prepared for good business when it comes again.

Your best bet is to use this downtime to reorganize the business if needed, clean up (either figuratively of physically) and generally get things in order. Jacqueline Edwards, Business Development Specialist for BusinessPipeline.com, suggests several ways one can tune up a business during downtime, such as checking annual goals, finding ways to cut costs, updating databases, scrutinize marketing and business development strategies and taking a looking out for yourself by perhaps taking a vacation or relaxing.

If your business is truly seasonal, however, and shuts down for planned downtime, there are things you can do to help ensure your business will be ready to go again when the season is right. Use the downtime to plan the next year's cash flow, find better financing and readjust the level of employment you need for your business. Marketing even during the downtime can make sure your business is successful when you start up again - for example, billboards or other advertisements that better help people associate a certain season or time period with your business, so that when you do open your doors again, customers are practically waiting for you.

There are many other things you can do, depending on your specific business, so be sure to use the downtime to discuss with your business partners and employees what would make the business more successful when business is good once again.