Don’t Let a Recession Kick Your Butt Part One

So as most of you know, the United States has finally admitted that we are indeed in a recession and President Obama announced that things will only be getting worse for us here in the United States!  I personally know several families in our church that are now struggling because they’ve lost their jobs.  So far, I believe that most online business have been unaffected by this recession and hopefully will remain so throughout it.

However, you should be well aware of what’s happening and also take steps to prepare yourself and your business so that if we should start seeing the recession affect online businesses you’ll be able to make it through the recession.

In the first part of this blog post I want to talk about ways to prepare your business.  In the second part of this blog post (which will be posted a day or two after this one) I want to talk specifically about affiliate marketing and niches that I believe will be the niches to run during this recession!  In fact, they are the three niches that I personally have been setting up and will be running when it’s time for them!

1. Cut Back On Unnecessary Spending – During the good times, we tend to as business owners (yes if you do affiliate marketing you have a business) spend money on things that we don’t actually need.  If your anything like I am, you love spending money to check out the latest affiliate tools even if you already have 3 that do the same exact thing!  Also, we tend to love buying domain names that we’ll never actually end up using!  The point is we all love to buy things, even when it’s things we don’t need.  During a slow down you need to start understanding that there are things you go without that wouldn’t hurt the productivity of your business or affect your profits.
2. Have a Solid Plan, Know When to Cut – Going along with the first point, not only do you need to stop spending money on unnecessary things, but you also need to sit down and layout a plan on things that you could cut if later circumstances required it.  Knowing when to cut and already having the decision made will help alleviate the stress of trying to figure out what to cut and what to keep when the time comes.  Not having it already laid out will just cause you to end up getting rid of things you do need and keeping things you don’t!
3. Don’t Wait Till Later to Save – Now that you’ve started cleaning up your spending habits and aren’t throwing tons of money into stuff you don’t need you probably are starting to realize that you have more cash flow to work into expanding your core parts of your business.  However, while reinvesting back into your business is great, it also doesn’t hurt to plan for those rainy days!  Why not start a fund just for that?  Doing so, will allow you to have cash on hand if profits drop for a couple months, niches dry out, etc.
4. Don’t Get Scared and Miss Out on Opportunities – Now I know I just said to cut back on spending, start saving, etc in the first three points.  However, while you need to do those things, a lot of times we get too over frightened and when a gold opportunity presents itself instead of jumping on it, we freeze.  So while you are being cautious don’t let yourself miss out on any opportunities either!  You need wisdom to determine when something is unnecessary spending or when it’s an opportunity.
5. Increase The Value You Offer – If you want to continue to strive during a recession you need to increase the value of your product or service.   Does this mean lowering the price?  If it calls for it yes, but I’m talking about providing more quality as well.  During the good times, it’s easy to throw out a mediocre product and make some killer bank on it, however, when money starts drying up, people quickly become more leery on the stuff they spend it on.  They start to only buy the services or products that they believe offers them the most value for their money.  This could be things like price, time saver, quality information, etc.  If there are products or services that provide better value then you do, then you could potentially have a huge problem on your hands!  Heck, even if you provide the best value in your niche, it doesn’t hurt to increase it even more!

So there you have it, the 5 steps I believe you can take to make sure you recession proof your online business!  While we may never experience the effects of this recession in our online business, it doesn’t hurt to at least prepare yourself.  I’m not saying quit advertising, producing new sites, etc.  I am, however, saying think stuff through a little more before acting!

Popularity: 19% [?]

Related Posts

Don’t Be a Stat Whore!

Don’t Cut The Long Tail Short!

Don’t Forget!!!

Creative Vado Contest Ends Tomorrow!

Besides Your Affiliate Offer How Can You Make Money – Part Three