Posted by Glenn on July 30th, 2010 in Research
The joint second biggest issue facing SME businesses over the course of the next year was the ”lack of sales“.
This is interesting as with only 22% of respondents stating “lack of sales” as their biggest issue it ranks some way behind the 71% of respondents that stated a cash or cash flow related issue as being their biggest forthcoming issue.
Whilst finding sales is obviously an issue, financing sales seems to be much higher up the agenda of SME businesses in the UK.
Posted by Glenn on July 28th, 2010 in 1 - Invoice Finance, 2 - Factoring, 3 - Invoice Discounting, Research
In my previous post I mentioned that 49% of SMEs said that the biggest issue facing their business over the course of the next year was having insufficient cash.
A further 22% of respondents, the joint second largest category, said that “cash flow” was the biggest issue facing their business over the next year.
This means that when combined, 71% of SME businesses see the biggest issue for their business being cash related - and something that could be erradicated through using a cash flow product such as factoring, invoice discounting or invoice finance.
Posted by Glenn on July 26th, 2010 in Research
In our recent research survey, 49% of the SME businesses that were interviewed said that they expected the biggest challenge facing them this year to be having insufficient cash.
This should present a huge opportunity for the invoice finance industry - the need for cash is apparently the biggest issue facing small and medium sized businesses which confirms there is a need for the products that invoice finance companies provide. The products release cash against unpaid invoices.
Posted by Glenn on July 23rd, 2010 in Research
We recently conducted a poll of 100 SME businesses and one of the questions we asked them was to name the biggest challenge that is facing their business over the course of the next year.
The research results were interesting and will be published over the next few days on this blog.
Posted by Glenn on July 21st, 2010 in 1 - Invoice Finance
Building on the recent theme of why the factoring industry isn’t selling more invoice finance to new clients, I recently had an interesting discussion with a recruitment consultant that specialises in the commercial finance industry and has numerous vacant roles on his books for BDMs (Business Development Managers) the term used for sales people within the factoring industry.
The recruitment consultant is convinced that there is a huge gap in the market for the provision of sales training to BDMs as the quality of the individuals putting themselves forward for sales management roles is often very poor. This would be an interesting niche for someone to address - providing pre-recruitment interview training to BDMs specifically within commercial finance and also training specifically around the invoice finance sales process.
Two points are of interest here. Firstly that there is a training gap in the sales function that feeds the factoring industry generally, but also that there are so many unfilled vacancies being advertised. Both of these factors undoubtedly contribute to the factoring industry failing to take its rightful market share within the commercial finance marketplace.
Posted by Glenn on July 20th, 2010 in Management, Uncategorized
I have just seen first hand the perfect example of how poorly organised credit control can lose you a customer.
We bought some goods from a small local company at the end of last year. The product was excellent and until this morning I have taken every opportunity since to sing their praises and recommend them to other people.
Almost 5 months ago now they phoned to say that we hadn’t paid their invoice. We had no record of ever receiving it so we arranged payment immediately and asked the girl that we dealt with to call us back if they had any further issues with our payment. We heard nothing further, and the money left our account, so we assumed all was resolved. Then this morning, I received an agressive call from someone at their company saying that they were going to take legal action against us if we didn’t pay their invoice. I immediately phoned him back, to reassure him that it was not a case of not being able to pay, and I received a further torrent of threats about legal action.
The invoice was paid immediately and I received a very courteous message from a lady at the firm thanking us for our payment and confirming receipt.
They have lost us as a customer. They have also lost us as an advocate to other prospective customers as a result of the aggressive, disorganised way that they went about their credit control.
Every business is entitled to be paid promptly but every business also has a responsiblity to conduct their credit control activities in a timely, organised way.
All it needed in this case was methodical follow up IMMEDIATELY the payment wasn’t received and we would have resolved it as soon as we were aware of the problem. Instead of that, they left it for months on end and then incorrectly assumed the worst.
This whole process could have been used to get closer to us to secure future business instead of alienating us with threats regarding what was a banking error that was resolved immediately it was identified.
Posted by Glenn on July 15th, 2010 in 1 - Invoice Finance, News
I am sure that is a question that many invoice finance companies would like answered!
Well, I have had a bash at putting together another article for the next issue of Commercial Finance Today called ”The Secret To Selling More Invoice Finance“ which attempts to answer that question by setting out what prospective invoice finance customers seem to say they want from invoice finance. I will post a link to the article once Commercial Finance People publish it - watch this space!
Posted by Glenn on July 14th, 2010 in 2 - Factoring
We have set up a Cashflow Acceleration YouTube Channel where you can view our videos about factoring, invoice discounting and credit control.
Follow this link to view the Cashflow Acceleration YouTube Channel
Posted by Glenn on July 13th, 2010 in 2 - Factoring
I was just in the process of updating the list of factoring companies in the UK on the Cashflow site and was struck by the number of acquisitions that have taken place over the last few years and the number of new entrants to the market.
You can see our List of UK Factoring Companies on the main Cashflow site.
Posted by Glenn on July 12th, 2010 in 2 - Factoring, Research
As part of our recent research into the factoring market, we asked 100 SME businesses to name the first invoice finance company that they could name. From their responses we compiled the following list of the best known factoring companies:
- 42% - Could not think of a single invoice finance company!
- 24% - Lloyds TSB Commercial Finance
- 13% - RBS Invoice Finance
- 8% - Barclays Sales Financing
- 5% - Bibby Factors
- 3% - HSBC
- 2% - Close Invoice Finance
- 2% - Venture Finance
- 1% - GE
For the full article visit the Cashflow Acceleration site at: http://www.cashflow-acceleration.co.uk/list_articles/list_factoring_companies_artic.html
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