If you have spent any time on Google recently, which everyone is including me as a business coach, considering they are forced to stay home and are not able to work, you will often see a little informational logo at the bottom of Google.com. This is the “Do The Five” logo and the goal of this campaign is to slow the spread of the Coronavirus. As our nation makes an attempt to open back up and tries to save what businesses are left in the rubble of this economic crisis, the campaign urges us to “STAY HOME. SAVE LIVES.” What this is not taking into consideration is the repercussions that will take place from forcing an entire nation to stay home and stop working. As parking lots remain empty and wallets are thinner than ever, we are encouraged to protect ourselves more from this invisible enemy over maintaining our financial stability.
The “Five” that we are supposed to do are:
- STAY home as much as you can
- KEEP a safe distance
- WASH hands often
- COVER your cough
- SICK? Call ahead
Although by doing these you, more than likely, will indeed avoid getting infected by a virus that has proven to be far less deadly than Influenza, you will be causing the end of the United States Economy as we know it. I would like to suggest that we do in fact follow the “Five” but instead, we should “Do The Five… Saving The Economy Edition”.
As a business coach I am here to tell you that The “Five” we should be doing to keep our country and your business BOOMING
STAY vigilant about gathering Google reviews, calling your leads, and setting appointments for when the country is back in business.
As we receive funding from the government through the Payroll Protection Program and through other means, we will still have a staff that is able to work. We can not let everything backslide during this war on the invisible enemy. We have to keep our good habits so that we don’t lose our flow when we reopen the country. Google loves consistency and now would be the worst time to get on the bad side of Google when we need customers the most.
KEEP your business open for as long as you can.
If you live in a state where your business is deemed “Essential” (Aren’t all businesses essential considering they keep money in employees’ bank accounts so they can feed their families…? Hm… Food for thought…) you have to keep your doors open. If you own a taco truck and sales are down because all of the craziness in the world has caused people to incarcerate themselves in their own mini house-prisons, things may begin to seem bleak. You could look around and say to yourself, “Things are so slow… I should shut it down so that I don’t lose any more business… Right? I mean, all of the other taco trucks have started to shut down so I as a business coach should probably too.” This is the exact opposite mindset from the one you must have. If you look around and see local business owners closing up shop, you should see an opportunity. This is an opportunity to gain a monopoly on the market. You can gobble up market share so incredibly fast when you are the last taco truck open for miles. As long as there is still some sort of demand for your product or service, the demand will just keep increasing the longer you stay open and the consumer’s options plummet.
WASH out your expenses and remove the unnecessary spending that is sinking your business boat.
Over time, we accumulate little unnecessary expenses that often come out of our accounts on a monthly basis. Sometimes we just find ourselves or someone in our business making large one time purchases on items that are not necessary to the growth or maintenance of the business. Every time we add an unnecessary expense to our business boat, it is like adding a small leak into the floor of our boat. Your overall expenses add up over time and your boat starts to sink faster and faster until it eventually goes under.
COVER all of your bases.
Most business owners have discovered many things throughout this entire process. One of the most important bases that you want to cover involves relationship building with certain professionals that have been able to make this process easier for business owners. There have been a few stimulus packages that have gone out to help aid in the recovery of our economy but they have been proven to be hard to obtain. Your banker, your accountant, and your bookkeeper make receiving the stimulus packages and navigating this crisis much easier. Without regular meetings with these three, you won’t be able to depend on anybody when another crisis appears.
SICK of all of the propaganda, false news, and negative headlines?
Stop spending all day on Facebook and other social media platforms and focus on your business. Take this time to finish that list of action items you have been putting off. Create systems and checklists so that you can provide an even better and consistent service for your customers. I as a business coach have even been able to help business owners rebuild their entire pay structure during this shutdown. There is no better time than now to make adjustments to payroll and implement merit-based pay with your team.
If you want to not only stay safe from the invisible enemy, the Coronavirus, and you also want to make sure that our country keeps BOOMING, make sure you “Do The Five”.
