When a business makes a profit, it’s usually the result of at least a year’s hard work, on top of a lot of sacrifice in the owner’s personal life, and plenty of smart marketing tactics that put your company front and centre. Because of that, finally turning a profit is quite the celebration!
And it should be! But it should also be a time when you look back at everything it took for you to get here. After all, it probably cost you a lot of money. And that’s the main thing to be aware of; as a new, small business, you’re going to have to spend a lot before you make anything on top.
It Costs to Hire
You won’t find the perfect staff members just walking in through the door to hand you their CV. You need to put some time, effort, and money into the hiring process to reach the job pool in full.
This could involve hiring a third party service to recruit for you, or it could simply mean paying for job postings and covering an applicant’s travel for the day. Either way, you’ll then need to account for the costs of job benefits, payroll, and paid time off, which is why so many companies are concerned with hiring someone who’s worth it!
Payment Processing Can Be Pricey
Ironically, taking payment from customers can also cost you a lot of money. It’s not a matter of just taking some cash or change from those who shop with you anymore. These days most people want to pay by card, and you may also prefer this thanks to how simplified the process is.
However, many payment portals, gateways, and points of sale require working with a payment processor who charges a fee for their services. Providers like A2A payments try to keep these fees low, but with factors like the size of your business, the necessary levels of security, and the amount of transactions per day accounting for the price, there’s no saying what cost you’ll really come up against.
Doing some careful research is essential here. You want to find a company you can rely on to keep these processing costs low, especially if your profit is incredibly variable from month to month. Dig into the payment processors active on the market right now and see what deals you can find.
Marketing is Rarely Free
Very few companies have ever gotten their marketing for free. Some people are lucky enough to catch the attention of the algorithm and/or go viral, with the majority of shares done via word of mouth.
But even then, it’s likely that you paid for the original post that gained all this traction! You have an excellent ROI to be proud of, but you still had to make an investment in the first place.
For a business to make a profit, they’ve got to fork out for startup costs. Even business registration is going to cost you!
