Every small business owner and freelancer wants the edge; that thing that’s going to set them apart from their competitors. That magic quality that is going to make their business the success story instead of the cautionary tale. But making it is never as easy as it sounds. In todays completive, fast paced marketplace small business owners and freelancers are faced with many challenges on the way to success.

Many small business owner or freelancers don’t realize that a huge part of attaining success lies in the way you manage your businesses billing and payment collection. It seems almost a no brainer to have efficient systems in place to deal with invoicing, payment collection and management of bad debit. But all too often I come across businesses that overlook this aspect of their success entirely.

Discover the secrets to making your business more profitable, robust, efficient and cost effective.

Keep costs low: Shop around

Chief among the challenges the small business owner or freelancers faces is keeping the cost of operation low. This is doubly true when it comes to keeping the costs of billing and payment collection to a minimum.

Use creative online tools and systems automation to keep the amount of staff you need to employ in your accounts department to a minimum.  There are many systems on the market today that allow you to automate recurring invoicing giving you maximum control over your daily operations with an almost skeleton staff.

Always shop around for payment gateways with the lowest fees. Many payment gateways do not give you the ability to easily export your client’s payment details. This prevents you from switching gateways readily. Shop around for a payment facilitator that stores client payment details on your and the gateways behalf. This makes it easy to move between payment gateways or have more than one, so you always have the cheapest rates and you clients the most choice.

Nurture trust: Look professional

It is easy to projecting a trustworthy, professional image to clients, but just as easy to project a sloppy, unorganised one. Sending out poorly formatted quotations and invoices in Microsoft Word or Excel format is not professional. You may be surprised, but a poor quality invoice reflects negatively on your client’s option of the services you offer.

Get software or start using an online service designed to issue professional looking invoices. Always check spelling and formatting on invoices. Ensure the client’s details are correct and that if it is a tax invoice needs to be issued it contains all the legally required fields.

Get paid: Help them help you

Now that you have issued your professional looking invoice you need to collect payment for it. Allowing your clients several ways to pay your invoices is always recommended. The easier it is to pay you the more payments you will receive. We recommend having the following payment methods available to maximize your ability to collect payment:

-  A credit card payment gateway where clients can immediately and securely pay for your services online

- A payment gateway that automates recurring billing via debit order from bank account or credit card

- A facility to capture and process electronic funds or wire transfers as well as direct or bank deposits

Healthy cash flow: Control bad debit

With any business comes the need to monitor and control bad debit. To keep your cash flow looking healthy the best offence is always a good defense. By this I mean, keep your clients informed every step of the way. Put them in the best possible position to pay you and allow them the greatest degree of access to their billing and account information.

This calls for communication on an organised, automated scale. Sending text message (SMS) and email reminders to clients throughout your repayment, due and past due periods will increase your chances of getting paid. We suggest sticking to a basic warning schedule for at least 30 days after issuing of an invoice. If funds on not recovered on COD invoices within 90 days of issue we suggest making use of a professional collection service to handle recovery of funds.

Stand out from the crowd: Provide a quality service

Small businesses and freelancers need to work hard to set themselves apart from the competition. Standing out from the crowd means more business. The only way to genuinely stand out from the crowd and keep clients coming back is to provide a quality service or product reliably.

Granted, limited success can be achieved through other means. But the only way to build long lasting client relationships and create vocal positive advocates for you brand is to give your clients consistent, exceptional service and quality products and services that meet their needs and expectations.

So there it is. Now you know the secret to making your small business a success. What are you waiting for? Go out and achieve it!