3 THINGS YOU CAN DO RIGHT NOW TO STOP BLEEDING MONEY
We’re getting down to the nuts and bolts today, diving into 3 things you can do today to start taking back control of your money, bank account, and spending.
First thing I want you to do is go through your credit card and bank statements and make sure that all those recurring charges for software or subscriptions are for things you ACTUALLY use. I remember about 8 years ago when I was just starting out, I had big plans of launching online programs so I could reach, support, and impact more people. I enrolled in a program to help me get there and signed up for a course platform software to make it all happen. Spoiler alert…I never launched those programs, yet for over 2 years I paid for that GD software. Every month I saw the charge go through and I got a pang of shame that I still didn’t do anything with it. I did eventually use it to send emails to clients, but really, I did NOT need a course software just for that. Finally, one day, I admitted my defeat and canceled the subscription. It was WAY more emotionally driven that logically that I kept paying for it month after month and year after year. I’d set a goal and couldn’t follow through; it sucked. I’m in a much different place these days and I’ve started paying for a new software, and this time, dammit, you will see the fruits of my labour!
The next thing you can do to stop bleeding money from your business is to pay yourself. I’m not suggesting that you have to have a 5-6 figure salary from your business, but what I don’t want you to do, is use your business bank and credit cards as your personal piggie banks. Every time you put that grocery trip or coffee run on your business card, you’re messing up the budgeting and planning you’ve done to reach your profit goals. If you’re thinking – whatever – it’s probably only like $100 a month, I challenge you to take a deep look at it…is it really as low as you think? And if it is, then why not just take that $100 a month and transfer it to your personal account and spend through there? I think the BEST thing you can do, in treating your business as the empire-in-progress that it is, is to treat it as a business. You would lose your mind if you had an employee that put their personal expenses on a corporate card, so why should you get a pass? When you start respecting your business as its own temple and its money as sacred, you’ll find you’ll gain back control over your profit goals.
Finally, and this has way more to do with psychology than actually reducing wasteful spending, I want you to open savings accounts. And you’ll notice that there’s an “s” on that…I’m a little over the top, but I have 5 different savings accounts. Each has a purpose:
GST Savings
Tax Savings
Profit Savings
Annual Expense Savings
Rainy Day Savings
The purpose of some of these is pretty obvious – GST/Tax is to put money away each month for the eventual bill at the end of the year and rainy-day savings is just like it sounds, putting money away for those expenses you didn’t expect. Annual expense savings are for those things you pay for once a year that usually take a big bite out of your bank account. I’ve got a few of those subscriptions, that at $2-5K/yr I need to plan for them. But even the $100-200 ones are nice to squirrel away so that when your credit card bill is a bit more than expected that month, you don’t have to stress about it. The final one, profit savings, is one that I can’t encourage you enough to have…PAY YOURSELF FIRST! We’re not running our businesses to JUST get by; we want to have a positive balance at the end of the year! Whether you take that money as a bonus for all your hard work, or invest it into something for your business, having that profit account ensures you have the option to grow.
So how does moving money to a savings account eliminate the bleed? Well, I don’t know about you, but if there’s money in your bank account, you don’t feel as worried about spending it. By moving money into these savings accounts, you not only prepare for your year end and growth plans, but you reduce that bank account so that you don’t have the false sense of security in spending it.
And there you have it! Head over to your online banking NOW and start working through the list!