Small Business Valuation and Its Benefits

If you watch the TV show Shark Tank, you often see business owners who lack an understanding about small business valuation. It is estimated that over 80% of small businesses have no financial estimate as to what their business is worth, nor do business owners seem to care. This is like me asking you how much money you have in the bank and you have no idea what I am asking you. You would not run your personal financial life this way; so why would you run your business with no understanding of the value.So why should small business owners care about valuation? The answer is simple: The personal wealth of every small business owner is directly linked to the valuation of their business. If you expect to be worth a million dollars, then you better have a business that has a valuation of one million dollars. This is important because at some point every small business owner must retire and your retirement is based on the value of your business. Consider the fact that 70% of private companies in the United States will be put up for sale by 2030 and according to the National Federation of Independent Business, only 30% of all businesses that are put up for sale are sold. This is because most small business owners never pay attention to the valuation of their businesses.Where does valuation come from? Valuation gets assigned based on the benefit stream of your business. The most common benefit stream is Earnings Before Interest Taxes Depreciation and Amortization or EBITDA for short. When you go to sell your company and retire from your business, you will sell your company for a multiple of your EBITDA. The bigger the company, the higher the multiple and the higher the valuation. The key is to get the multiple up which will increase your valuation. This requires an aggressive growth strategy linked to the valuation of your business.The good news is that financial professionals are now offering cloud based solutions that empower any small business owner with a road-map for increasing value. The bad news is that this road-map can take five years or more to implement. Additionally, most road-maps require a strong professional team to facilitate the process. Having worked with various solutions, I would recommend small business owners consider one of two solutions:1. Value Opportunity Profile – This is a comprehensive assessment of your business based on interviews with your management team. Specific recommendations are made on how to increase value in three phases.2. Value Builder System – This is a 12 month program that starts with your own self-assessment, allowing you to decide if you want to embark on the program or not. Exercises are used each month to improve the valuation score of your business.Regardless of how you get there, it is imperative for every small business owner to recognize how important valuation is to their own personal wealth. Because so few owners seem to grasp valuation and how to increase it, having a professional outside team can help. You need someone to orchestrate and facilitate the process while everyone else runs the day-to-day operations of the business.

Branding – How to Succeed – Part 3

Brand Equity – When a product has its own brand name, certain benefits will be associated with the product. On the other hand, should the same product not have such a brand name, then the associated benefits will be greatly reduced.Consider the following example which illustrates Brand Equity:In the early 90s, the Ford Motor Company decided that all new or redesigned cars should have brand names that began with the letter “F”. This corresponded with the previous tradition of naming all sport utility vehicles manufactured since the Ford Explorer with the letter “E”. Following this strategic decision by Ford, an analyst expressed concern that renaming the well known Windstar with the name Freestar would lead to a certain amount of confusion amongst the consumer which would subsequently affect brand equity. The aging Taurus, which became one of the most significant cars in American auto history would be dropped in favour of three entirely new names, all starting with “F”, viz. the Five Hundred, the Freestar and the Fusion. The result of this change was that, by 2007, the Freestar was no longer in production, the Five Hundred name was no loner in use and the Taurus was brought back for the next generation of that car. The “Ford Five Hundred” brand was recognised by less than half of the people interviewed, whilst an overwhelming majority were familiar with the “Ford Taurus” brand.The three most common ways of measuring a brand, i.e. quantifying its brand equity, are as follows:In Terms of the Firm – This approach measures the brand in terms of it being a financial asset. A calculation is made as to how much the brand is worth when treated as an intangible asset. This can be done by considering the value of the firm, in terms of its market capitalisation, and removing the total value of all the company’s tangible assets and any measurable intangible assets. The corresponding residual value would be that of that company’s brand equity.In Terms of the Product – The traditional product brand measurement compares the price of an unnamed or private label product to a product that corresponds as much as possible. The difference in price is therefore due to the brand.In Terms of the Consumer – This approach strives to measure the awareness, in respect of recall and recognition, and brand image, which refers to the overall associations that the brand has, in the eyes of the consumer. Techniques that are commonly used to discover the real and intangible attributes of the brand, consumer attitudes and their intentions concerning the brand include tests involving free association and methods of projection. The outcome is that brand that have attained high levels of awareness together with strong, positive and particular associations are considered as high equity brand.Brand equity is brought about by the application of appropriate marketing techniques. This incorporates the bringing together of effective advertising, public relations as well as product promotion. As the value of a company’s brand equity increases, it is likely that the company will use a strategy based not on individual branding but, instead, on the application of family branding. The reason for this is that family branding allows a company to leverage the value of the equity which has been built up in the core brand. Brand loyalty, product awareness and the appreciation of quality are all characteristics that are intertwined in the concept of brand equity.Branding – How To Succeed

Holistic Approach to Pet Health Care – Preventing Disease in Dogs and Cats

Preventing Disease in Dogs and Cats with Holistic Health CareHolistic health care uses knowledge of what causes disease to make preventative lifestyle choices. For people, holistic health has a history that goes back 5,000 years to India and China, but for pets, the concept is modern.Often times, Western medicine hasn’t been on the same page as holistic health care. In Western medicine, scientists identified germs as outside causes of disease, and created synthesized chemicals to destroy them. People made unhealthy lifestyle choices and assumed health problems could be “fixed” if they got sick.While it is wonderful to be able to cure disease, wouldn’t it be a better approach to prevent disease in the first place?Promoting optimal health and disease prevention are the main goals of holistic health. As a pet owner, you can choose to use holistic health with your pet. The benefits include:
Lower overall health care costs (prevention is cheaper than curing)
Pets with greater energy and freedom from infirmity
Having a disease-free pet who lives a longer, healthier lifeHolistic Health Care Diets for Dog and Cat Holistic health care for dogs and cats is simpler than it is for people. Why? Because dogs and cats are have simpler needs and are easier to satisfy.For many people, the most challenging aspect of maintaining holistic health is consistent emotional balance. The human mind creates its own worries in the over-stimulated world we all live in.However, a dog or cat that has a bed to call their own and gets exercise and belly rubs on a regular basis is likely quite content. For owners, the simply purity of our pets happy state of mind is one of their great charms.The food we give our dogs and cats, however, is dubious from the holistic health perspective. Many dogs and cats go their entire lives eating nothing but processed food. This creates imbalances with essential nutrients, fatty acids and digestive enzymes.Providing a well-balanced diet for our pets can be challenging but is the most important factor in achieving optimal health. Many people barely keep up with cooking healthy for themselves, much less their pets. Although commercial pet foods are convenient to serve and most pets gobble them up, they are often quite poor in nutritional value and can even lead to many adverse health conditions such as allergies, skin problems and digestive disorders.Nutritional supplements can provide a consistent means for ensuring your pet receives the nutrients they need to lead healthy lives.Natural Support for Anxious Pets While dogs and cats don’t sit around worrying about bank accounts or politics, being part of the human world can be stressful. Unfortunately, we have also bred traits into dogs and cats that leave some animals susceptible to not only physical problems, but also anxiety disorders.Holistic health offers help for nervous pets. Herbal remedies are similar to giving a nervous dog or cat a soothing cup of tea. This calming effect allows your pet to learn how to deal with anxiety provoking events like being left alone or loud noises.Holistic Health and Everyday Choices Every day you make a variety of choices about how you live your life – what you choose to eat, whether you exercise and how much you sleep, how you handle stress, etc. Your pet cannot choose a holistic lifestyle. It is up to you as the owner to make everyday decisions that have a cumulative, long-term effect on your pet’s health.Exercise and attention are everyday essentials for holistic pet health. With a complete diet, your dog or cat will be happy, active, and require fewer trips to the vet.The average pet owner usually has little choice but to use processed foods. Adding nutritional supplements is an everyday choice that ensures your pet is getting essential nutrients in their diet. Over your pet’s lifetime, you will spend less on health care and have a healthier pet.

Cats Health Care – Natural Is Best!

Cats health care is complex, but simple at the same time. This seemingly contradictory statement stems from how humans view the world. All humans have a belief system set up, that is personal and based on their upbringing, their culture, their environment, their education, their religion, etc. When any of this is challenged, it can feel very uncomfortable, unsafe even.Cats health care is complex because every aspect of your cat’s life needs to be examined. No stone can be left unturned. This is regardless of what you feel is good for your cat or not. Your preconceptions must not get in the way. You need to be very open minded.So when you feel that you cannot examine an aspect that perhaps you need to, that may be necessary to get to the route of the problem your cat may be suffering with, you may be challenging your current belief system. Scary stuff indeed!Cats health care is simple, because when you look at the whole picture, in its entirety, it can be easy to see where and why your cat may have a health issue.Let’s first look at how cats in the wild live. This is how they evolved. This is why cats are so successful today.At least three things spring to mind immediately – diet, freedom and health care.Let’s deal with the last one first, as most people would be asking ‘where is health care in the wild’?Animals seek out medicinal plants and herbs, to cure a variety of problems. They know which ones are good for any given ailment. They are far more savvy than the average human. Grass is a good example – cats use it to clear a digestive problem.Animals also know that rest and sleep can cure a large number of problems. Field doctors in a war zone discovered this too. They found that the patients they were unable to help immediately, fared far better than those they got to first.There is a magic to life that most humans know little about. Self healing is very strong in every living being.The second item, freedom, may not be optional for many cats for safety reasons. However, cats are free spirited and do suffer without some freedom. It is well known that cats confined indoors all the time are less healthy and life shorter lives, than those who have free access outside.How you go about addressing this depends on where you live. Securing a safe back yard may be an option for you. Some breeds take well to walking on a lead. Just making a closed run where they can feel the grass and the sun, may make all the difference to their lives.Probably diet is the most important aspect of everyone’s health care. Yet diet is dismissed by many as being irrelevant to health. That’s a bit like saying that the type of fuel you put in your car is immaterial to how it performs.The fact is that the typical commercial cat foods fed to most cats is the cause of most of their health issues. It also means that by changing the diet of your cat to a natural one, it is highly likely that they will improve or even recover from their health problem.Cats health care begins and ends by looking at the whole picture. Start by feeding your cat real, quality, nutritious food and watch the results.
For more information on a natural diet and health care for cats, click on the link below.