• Return to our Main Site

    • Help with...

    How do I ensure my business can navigate a dip in trading?

    Despite the best laid plans your business may experience dips in trading every now and again. While these can be stressful periods for your business, and often feel outside of your control, with careful contingency planning and with strong strategies in place your business can navigate slower periods successfully and come back stronger when custom increases again.

    Ways to help you deal with it:

    Action plan

    Creating a cash flow forecast to navigate unpredictable times

    Effort: Medium
    Impact : High
    A cash flow forecast is an important tool to navigate periods of uncertainty. Our five-point plan explains how to refine your approach.

    ACTION PLANS are a structured list of steps designed to help you approach tackling a particular business challenge.

    • We explain why each step is important
    • Customise by setting your own completion dates and assign tasks
    • Helpful tools are provided for certain steps
    • A downloadable PDF version of each action plan is available

    Action plan

    Identifying and overhauling outdated processes

    Effort: High
    Impact : High
    Poorly performing processes impact productivity and sap employee morale. Follow our five-step plan to fix systems that aren’t working.

    Action plan

    Measuring whether an internal process is fit for purpose

    Effort: High
    Impact : Medium
    If you’re worried about how efficient a process is, our five-step plan can help you work out whether or not it’s fit for purpose.

    Action plan

    Predict future trends in your market

    Effort: Low
    Impact : High
    Follow our action plan to learn how to predict future trends that could affect your business.

    Guide

    An introduction to ensuring your business can navigate a dip in trading

    Dips in trading performance are part and parcel of business life, so it’s vital you know what actions to take.

    GUIDES break a challenge down, providing important context and real-world experiences.

    • Based on SME experiences, not corporate jargon
    • Filled with real-world stories
    • Achievable steps every business can take

    Other support that's available

    Navigating a slow period

    Navigating a slow period

    When business is quiet, it’s time to work on the areas you might otherwise overlook – such as looking at your internal processes or working on personal development. HubSpot has 13 core suggestions.

    Protecting your business

    Protecting your business

    From time to time, business can slump, but there are plenty of ways you can protect your enterprise from slow periods. See what advice Business 2 Community has.

    How other businesses have tackled something similar

    Real business story

    Small things businesses can do when revenue falls

    When a business experiences a fall in revenue, leaders might worry that the entire strategy is wrong. But often, making a number of small tweaks are all it takes to turn things around.

    Real business story

    Be honest and keep it simple when communicating financial performance to staff

    Communicating financial information with non-finance staff can be a daunting prospect. But done correctly, it can build trust, inspire innovation, drive efficiency and boost sales.

    Real business story

    Sharing financial performance with staff can lead to greater efficiency

    Galvanising staff around company performance can be a game-changer. Being open about financial reporting and using incentives tied to performance will help to build staff interest in business turnover and profit.

    The questions lots of businesses are trying to answer

    What issue is keeping you awake at night? A bit of targeted support is often all you need to overcome those challenges.

    Select a topic

    Digital

    How can I improve the digital presence my business has? How can I streamline and automate some of our business processes? How can I understand what digital tools or support my business needs? How do I effectively seek external digital support? How do I know if my technology is robust enough for growth? How do I assess and choose the right technology to improve business operations? How do I work out the best digital sales channels to use? How should I best budget and plan for new technology investments? How should I go about collecting data to improve my business? How should I use the data I have to improve decision making?

    Leadership & Strategy

    As a leader, how do I learn to trust others within my organisation? How can I balance short-term needs with long-term targets? How can I reflect on my own strengths and weaknesses as a leader? How do I learn to become a better leader? How do I improve the communication in my business? How do I apply learnings from other businesses to my own company? How do I get better at noticing and reacting to warning signs? How do I get staff interested in our vision and values? How do I give my team autonomy and get better at delegating? How should my role as a business leader evolve with the company’s growth?

    People & Team

    How can I develop career paths for my staff? How can I develop the skillsets of my workforce? How can I improve my hiring and onboarding practices? How can I increase staff engagement and motivation? How can I keep my best members of staff? How can I reduce employee turnover? How can I run a better appraisals process? How do I deal with a challenging member of staff? How do I manage an effective remote workforce? How should I performance manage my staff?

    Planning

    How can I balance ambition with setting realistic goals? How can I get staff interested in the financial situation? How can I work out what required skillsets are missing in the business? How can I define and communicate my vision for success? How can I get better at looking internally at my business? How can I make my business more resilient to change? How do I ensure my business can navigate a dip in trading? How do I better inform my business plans? How do I know when to invest in my business? How do I know when to scale up my business?

    Sales & Growth

    How can I get a better return on investment from my marketing? How can I identify new customers to target? How can we better serve our most loyal customers? How can we develop new products and services? How do I create targets and KPIs for my staff? How do I benchmark my business against competitors? How do I build a network to support my business? How do I develop a clear unique selling point? How do I financially plan for new opportunities? How do I make sure my team and processes are ready for growth?
    All