Cutting costs is likely to become a necessity when running your own business, allowing you to spend less on the necessary regular business expenses and freeing up more funds to invest in company development and growth. However, just like your necessary personal expenses, it can often seem like there’s little choice but to pay those bills. Although you might never be able to completely eliminate the monthly expenses of running the majority of businesses, the good news is that there’s usually always a way to save. And if you’re struggling to find a way to save on a certain expense, the good news is that you’re probably already getting the best deal. Here are some of the best ways to save money on your essential business running costs.
Get a Better Utility Deal
Shopping around for business utilities on a regular basis allows you to ensure that you are always getting the best possible prices. You can use sites like utilitybidder.co.uk to find the best prices for your business water rates, business gas, electricity, and telecoms. Since these essentials are often subject to significant price fluctuations over time, it’s worth using comparison sites on a regular basis to ensure that you are not currently paying more than you need to for these essentials. Over time, the savings you make can seriously add up.
Reduce Utility Use
Taking steps to reduce your own utility usage in the office and asking your employees to do the same is a good way to save more money over time. Along with regularly shopping around to ensure that you are getting the best deal, taking additional measures in the workplace such as using energy-saving lightbulbs and conserving water can also add up to big savings over time. Not only will this help your bottom line, but it can also help you to run your company in a more environmentally-friendly way and encourage your employees to notice how much energy, water, and other utilities they actually use.
Consider Alternative Energy Sources
Another way of running a greener office while saving money at the same time is to consider alternative energy sources such as solar panels. Solar panels generate energy from the sun, meaning that, over time, they cost you nothing compared to energy from the grid, helping you to make massive savings. Although solar panels require an upfront investment, this will pay for itself over time with the energy savings that you can make. Additionally, you also have the option of storing the energy you generate and making money from it by selling it back to the grid.
Relocate to Reduce Premises Costs
You may be able to take advantage of lower priced office spaces and moving your business to somewhere less expensive, depending on the commercial property market in your area. Consider how much you actually need your commercial premises to be in the area where you are currently, and whether you could benefit from being somewhere cheaper. In most cases, unless you have clients coming into the office every day, it’s not necessary for a lot of businesses to have a pricey city centre location, and you could benefit from moving to the outskirts of the city. It’s also worth determining if you actually need an office space at all. With more and more employees working from home this year, consider if your business could work with a fully remote workforce instead.
Buy in Bulk
Every penny that you save is a penny earned when it comes to supplies, and there are several things that you can do to cut the expense of these essentials. Buying in bulk is an ideal option since many suppliers will offer deals that you can take advantage of if you buy a certain amount of the same item. If you need to buy office essentials such as pens, paper and printer ink, you can often save a lot by purchasing them in bulk amounts a few times per year rather than only buying a few at a time. It’s also worth asking for discounts from your suppliers, especially if you have established a good relationship with them.
One important aspect of cost reduction in business operations is optimizing office expenses, such as printer toner consumption. If you’re curious about how long printer toner lasts and how to extend its lifespan, you can find useful insights in this article on Sell Toner
Work with Freelancers
Consider whether or not your small business actually needs to hire employees full-time. While this might be the case for more established businesses, if you’re running a very new business, then hiring full-time employees prematurely can actually do more harm than good. You might be able to work with freelancers or self-employed contractors instead, allowing you to get the work done and save money since these professionals tend to operate on a per-job basis rather than paying a full-time wage. In addition, working with self-employed people gives your business the chance to support other small businesses and sole traders in the area and beyond.
Working from Home
Over the last year, employees in every industry have been working from home as much as possible due to the COVID-19 crisis. And as a side-effect of this, many companies have realised just how much money this can save. When employees are working from home for all or some of the week, there will automatically be lower business costs as a result due to less use of the office and its facilities.
Invest in Accounting Services
Hiring an accountant might seem like an unnecessary extra expense for your business when there’s software available that you can use yourself, but it’s certainly worth making the additional investment in order to avoid potential extra costs in the future and ensure that everything runs smoothly in regard to your business’s finances. A good accountant can make sure that you are saving money by ensuring that you are not paying any more than you need to when it comes to your tax bill, and that everything is always above board so you’re not dealing with any surprise tax expenses.
Outsource Larger Business Functions
Sometimes, certain professionals like IT support and human resources staff are simply too expensive for a small business to take on, but it’s difficult to run the business without their support. However, this usually means that certain employees end up doing a lot of work that isn’t actually in their job description. The good news is that you can find companies that are dedicated to providing these services to small businesses, often at prices that are lower than you would expect to pay for just one professional. Outsourcing IT to a professional company should be a priority since not only is this cheaper than hiring an in-house IT team, but it can also help you save money in the long-run by avoiding IT breaches, hacks, and other potentially costly events.
Advertise for Free
Advertising and getting the word out about your business doesn’t always come cheap, but the good news is that these days there are several marketing methods available to you that are free of charge. For example, social media is a free way of engaging with your customers and sharing new information about your business, and you can get a lot of great results from asking happy customers to leave positive reviews about your business and to recommend you to their family and friends.
Whether you’re just starting up a new business or are looking for different ways to save money with an existing company, these are some of the best ways to slash the necessary expenses and free up more money for company growth.
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