Foreign.
Speaker BHello, and welcome back to another episode of Getting Real with Bossy, the podcast that talks about what it's really like to be a business owner with Kelly.
Speaker ABush and Kelly Metris.
Speaker BAnd today we are talking about our favorite subject.
Speaker BMoney.
Speaker AMoney, money, money, money.
Speaker BNotice how I didn't say what I usually say when I say money, because I am trying to reframe how I talk about money, because it is.
Speaker BIt is just I need to.
Speaker BI need to stop being terrified of money.
Speaker BI think, you know, we.
Speaker BThere's so many songs.
Speaker BWe wanted to start this with music, but we don't own rights to any music.
Speaker BBut I go back to.
Speaker BThere are so many different money songs, and I just want to.
Speaker BI want to reference one of my favorite money songs by my.
Speaker BOne of my favorite bands, abba.
Speaker BI work all night I work all day to pay the bills I have to pay Ain't it sad?
Speaker BAnd still there never seems to be a single penny left for me that's too bad.
Speaker BAnd that is how so many of us feel.
Speaker BNot just women, business owners, but when we go over some statistics later today, you will see that it seems like that, but it is.
Speaker BIt is very sad.
Speaker BAnd money just, money just goes so quickly and if we're not on top.
Speaker AOf.
Speaker BCan be really dangerous.
Speaker BAnd that's what we're going to talk about today, how some steps that we can do and things that are really important in small business world to look at and make sure you have a good handle on, because money is a huge part of business, whether you like it or not.
Speaker BAnd as we've talked about in the last couple episodes, and Kelly and I talk about it a lot, generationally, certainly we have not been brought up necessarily to understand money as much as perhaps our brothers have.
Speaker BAnd we're trying to break that.
Speaker BWe're trying to change that.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd I think it's normalized for our generation anyways to be okay with it being in someone else's.
Speaker ALike, they.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AThey take care of it.
Speaker ALike, you know, even I don't want to mention names of big businesses, but the big businesses that we use, you got to check and make sure they're charging you right.
Speaker ABecause they could easily be charging you wrong.
Speaker AAnd you're missing out on that money because you're just putting blind trust because you think other people know what they're doing.
Speaker AWell, guess what?
Speaker AThe other people are not special.
Speaker BRight?
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BAnd I'm so surprised.
Speaker BAnd I think this will bring us to our first point.
Speaker BHow many people put that trust in professionals to do handle their books.
Speaker BAnd yes, you definitely need accountants and bookkeepers.
Speaker BThey're incredibly important.
Speaker BI have them.
Speaker BI can't do the work that my accountant does.
Speaker BBut you need to understand your books.
Speaker BAnd I am so surprised by the amount of small, micro small, even mid sized business owners that do not understand their books.
Speaker BThey put everything in their accountant's hands and they go about doing their business.
Speaker BAnd it may be seemingly a successfully ran business, but if you don't know your books and you don't know where your money is going, it's bananas to me as somebody who does the all of their own inputting and I know that that's not, that's my own personal choice.
Speaker BBut you need to know where your money is, you need to know what your books look like and it is a okay to have a bookkeeper doing that work for you.
Speaker BBut you need to be asking for your reports.
Speaker BP&LS minimum once a month.
Speaker BWe recommend at least once a week because Kelly and I look at our stuff all the time and we're always going through our percentages.
Speaker BDo they make sense and is it the right season?
Speaker BWhat's going on?
Speaker BBecause it's so important and there's so many things that can be changed.
Speaker BI had a subscription that I was paying for several months and it went up and I didn't notice it for a couple months because it just didn't register.
Speaker BIt wasn't a lot of money but it went up.
Speaker BI reached out.
Speaker BThe reason that it went up made a lot of sense.
Speaker BBut because I do really good business with them and I help them out with another arrangement, they were like, oh gosh, I had to go up because now we have to take taxes for that.
Speaker BBut because of the things you've done for us, let me see if I can get you some discounts.
Speaker BAnd I was able to get the same rate that I had before.
Speaker BMy, my accountant wouldn't know that and they would just think that's a reasonable, a reasonable thing to go up.
Speaker BAfter a year of using this, things go up and they would not know to look at that.
Speaker BAnd I'm sure a lot of these things are happening and that and those little things happen.
Speaker BIf you can save 30, 50, $60 a month on six or seven different things, that's a lot of money.
Speaker AAnd if you're getting the deal of a lifetime, read the fine print.
Speaker AAre they allowed to increase your prices without notice?
Speaker ARight.
Speaker ASo when you fight back, is it in the fine print?
Speaker AAnd I'm going to throw a little chatgpt.
Speaker ABecause you could take that fine print and dump it into whatever AI program that you prefer, even though I'm not a huge proponent of AI.
Speaker AAnd it will tell you what you need to, to keep your eye on.
Speaker AIt'll give you the bullet points, give you the overview and kind of just help you understand it.
Speaker AAnd you can ask specific questions like, does it say this in the fine print?
Speaker AAnd it'll actually look at it for you.
Speaker ABecause none of us actually want to sit and read it.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker ABut you need to know what the fine print says.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BAnd that's a huge.
Speaker BI mean, you cannot like AI and there are plenty of people out there that don't, but there are some things that it is really good for.
Speaker BAnd you and I have talked about that.
Speaker BI put the results of an MRI into, into ge and I, yes, Google, you can sponsor our podcast.
Speaker BAnd it's.
Speaker BIt spilled it out for me.
Speaker BI wanted to understand it more.
Speaker BIt was just for my ankle.
Speaker BIt wasn't anything serious, but I wanted a little bit more information before I went in and met with a new surgeon.
Speaker BAnd there are things that you can use it for.
Speaker BSomething like you just said, is the perfect thing to use it for.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker ASo know and, and get it in writing, right?
Speaker AAnything you're working on with another person, another company, whatever it is, get it in writing and ask all the questions.
Speaker AI am a huge fan.
Speaker AAsking questions in email so that they're answered in email and it's from like the company email.
Speaker AAnd then you just put it in a little folder in your email account.
Speaker AAnd if questions come up, you can be like, no, no, no, no.
Speaker AThis is what you said.
Speaker AYou have to hold, hold to that price.
Speaker AYou know, we're all raising our prices as we need to.
Speaker AAnd I don't want to like, push on other companies having to raise their prices.
Speaker ABut it's the, the not telling you.
Speaker AIt's the sneaky.
Speaker AThe sneakies.
Speaker AWe get a lot of those.
Speaker AI just had my, my menu software almost double in price with.
Speaker AAfter three years of being the same price, no word.
Speaker AAnd I was like.
Speaker AI saw it hit my credit card and I was like, what the hell is that?
Speaker ANo, it's just my software renewal.
Speaker ASo just keeping up on who's getting away with what.
Speaker AYou know, there's going to be things that you're like, yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker AYeah, my costs of food sometimes go up, but there's other times that it is a mistake by the person who's putting it in the computer and they're charging me too much.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AWhich is different than the cost of, you know, it cost them more to get the steak.
Speaker AIt's going to cost me more to get the steak.
Speaker ABut if someone's putting it in the computer wrong, I need to be able to catch that.
Speaker ASo I'm not paying for it.
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker BAnd I think another thing we talk about a lot in Bossy.
Speaker BWhen you start your business, you're doing that thing that you're really passionate about, and it's probably not reading financial statements.
Speaker BSo let's.
Speaker BLet's break it.
Speaker BWe talk about breaking taboos.
Speaker BWe've talked about this, and that's something we're going to talk about today.
Speaker BSo let's break that taboo that you have as a business owner, as you start out, or even 16 years in, as I am this year, that you need to understand everything about reading financial statements.
Speaker BAnd you know what?
Speaker BThrow your financial statement into ChatGPT.
Speaker BI haven't done that yet.
Speaker BOr Gemini and maybe.
Speaker BAnd ask it to explain it to you.
Speaker BThey're.
Speaker BThey are tricky, right?
Speaker BI mean, for a while.
Speaker BI mean, I remember our first year, I'm like, what a balance sheet?
Speaker BAnd P and L. Like, why do I need two different things?
Speaker BLike, aren't they essentially telling me the same thing?
Speaker BIt took me a while to kind of really figure out what, like, what I needed for different things.
Speaker BAnd they're incredibly important.
Speaker BAnd it is a.
Speaker BOkay if you don't know what the hell they mean or everything about them.
Speaker BThere are a lot of different reports that you can run, and they're all important for different reasons.
Speaker BAnd it's fine if you don't understand all of them.
Speaker BAsk for help.
Speaker BReach out to Kelly and I.
Speaker BWe will help you read through them.
Speaker BWe will help you understand them.
Speaker BWe've had other business owners.
Speaker BWe just sat down the other day and helped a woman go through P and L. We're totally fine to do that.
Speaker BWe don't care.
Speaker BWe'll show you ours first.
Speaker BIf there's any.
Speaker BIf you're, like, shameful about your numbers, I'll show you mine.
Speaker BYou can see mine.
Speaker BI'll show you anymore, actually.
Speaker BBut, like, ask for help with these things.
Speaker BBecause if the reason you're not going through your panels is and your balance sheet and your financial reports and statements is because you just don't really understand them.
Speaker BThat is.
Speaker BThat's just silliness.
Speaker BLet's get over that and reach out and ask for help.
Speaker BBecause according to score in 2019, I hope this has changed a little bit.
Speaker BSince the pandemic, and we all had to do a lot more reports, only 12% of women, women business owners felt very confident in their ability to read financial statements.
Speaker BAnd that is not okay.
Speaker ANot okay.
Speaker BSo we need to make that, we need to make that better.
Speaker BSo we're going to talk about some tips at the end, but reading those.
Speaker BPull a P and L as often as you can.
Speaker BPull a balance sheet as often you can.
Speaker BBare minimum, once a month.
Speaker BAnd we will, we will happily be your accountability partners.
Speaker BWe can just set up reminders for you.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker AWe'll just, we'll call you, send you some DMs.
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker BSo, yeah, I'll get off my soapbox about that.
Speaker AGotta know your numbers, and, and it's important to know your trends, your seasons, when things are gonna go up and down.
Speaker AI always, I look at my numbers monthly because the way things come in and out of the business fluctuates so much depending on the day that I pay certain things.
Speaker ABut then also because of that fluctuation, my monthlies might fluctuate month to month.
Speaker ASo I, I really like looking at the quarterly, and I compare to the years past, you know, the six months a year past, you know, two years past, and see where I am comparatively to other times I've done business to see those.
Speaker AIf those seasons are changing and those fluctuations are changing.
Speaker ABut more specifically, looking at your percentage, like whatever your percentage is, and it's not the same for anybody.
Speaker AEverybody knowing what you want your percentage to be and watching those numbers, because if they do spike, it's something you need to catch early on and figure out why.
Speaker AI mean, you may have an employee, you may have an employee stealing time.
Speaker AWhy is this person, you know, why is my payroll up?
Speaker AAnd then you actually deep dive and find that someone's working 10 hours more than you have them scheduled.
Speaker AThat's theft, right?
Speaker BYes.
Speaker ASo I want to pay my employees well, but I still have to hit a budget, right?
Speaker AExactly.
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker BAnything else we need to hit on that before we move on.
Speaker AKnow your percentages, check your numbers.
Speaker AHave your hands in the book somehow.
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker AYou can't have your hands in all the time and you have someone else doing it.
Speaker AYour hands need to be in it at least once a month, minimum.
Speaker BYep.
Speaker AAnd it's okay to have a cocktail when you drink.
Speaker AWhen you drink, when you drink about money.
Speaker AIt's okay to have a cocktail when you talk about money.
Speaker AIt's been a long day.
Speaker BIt is encouraged.
Speaker AI hope my ice.
Speaker AI hope my ice doesn't Distract people from.
Speaker AFrom listening to this important topic.
Speaker ABut it was easy.
Speaker BI think it's helpful, actually.
Speaker BI do think it's helpful.
Speaker BI like the clinking of the ice.
Speaker BOkay, let's talk about roi.
Speaker BReturn on investment.
Speaker BIs time and yours, your time and money paying off.
Speaker BIt is so important.
Speaker BWe don't have a of either these days, time or money, so we need to start making sure that it is paying off.
Speaker BWe put so much money into things.
Speaker BI mean, we could talk about this with home and business, really, but we're going to stick with business.
Speaker BToday.
Speaker BWe put a lot of money into a lot of things, into subscriptions, into memberships.
Speaker BIs that actually paying off?
Speaker BYou need to take a look at these things.
Speaker BI know so many people who belong to different groups or chambers or things just because, oh, they're just such good people.
Speaker BI love what they do.
Speaker BThat's great.
Speaker BThen that is called charity and that falls into a different.
Speaker BThat's in a different line item.
Speaker BIf you want to do charity, that's wonderful.
Speaker BMemberships are things that should be getting return on and you have to find a way to be able to track that.
Speaker BAnd if you're not doing that, then that's not a really good use of your time.
Speaker AAnd I think return is a specific thing.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker ASo like when I join a new group, I have an outcome I want upon joining.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker ASo bossy.
Speaker AYeah.
Speaker AYou're going to, you're going to see people utilizing your services just because we have amazing women doing amazing things and it's just like organically networking.
Speaker AThat's not the point of bossy.
Speaker AThe point is of bossy is using the support services.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker ASo that's going to look very different than if I join a group specifically to try to improve my catering.
Speaker ASo if I'm trying to get more catering contracts, then that group, I need to look and be like, okay, how many catering contracts at the end of the year did I get from this group?
Speaker ADo I want to renew my subscription?
Speaker AAnd did I actually put in the time and energy?
Speaker AIs it my fault?
Speaker BRight.
Speaker ABecause there have been years, especially during the pandemic, where certain things fell to the side because we didn't have the time and energy to do it.
Speaker AAnd I did stay on knowing that I was going to put forth the effort that this year, but making it an effort and, you know, a specific goal to make sure I'm hitting these targets.
Speaker ASo if you're spending the money, you have to put the energy forward, right?
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BThere's a, there's a business listing that we were a part of at one point, and it was like $200 a month.
Speaker BI only did it for like six months.
Speaker BI didn't get anything out of it.
Speaker BLuckily I canceled.
Speaker BBut there's a lot of thing.
Speaker BPeople that'll do that.
Speaker BSo it's $200 a month.
Speaker B@ the end of the day, if you're.
Speaker BIf you're doing a decent amount of revenue.
Speaker B$200, that's $2,400 a year.
Speaker BIt's a lot of money.
Speaker BWhen you sit and think of that, that you could do a lot with that money that could be somewhere else.
Speaker AIt could go into your business, but you could also be going on vacation.
Speaker BExactly.
Speaker BAnd if it's not doing you any good, then what's.
Speaker BWhat is the point?
Speaker BAnd knowing where.
Speaker BWhere to spend your time?
Speaker BI mean, people tell us all the time, oh, why are you not on TikTok?
Speaker BI'm like, do I need to be on TikTok?
Speaker BI don't think TikTok is bringing me restaurant customers.
Speaker BThere is.
Speaker BI gosh, I mean, you were not at the Rise Awards this year, but Rise Awards, it's recognized.
Speaker BIt's a group.
Speaker BIt's.
Speaker BIt's an industry award ceremony for restaurant industry.
Speaker BAnd Golden Corral, I think, in Brooklyn.
Speaker B1.
Speaker BBecause of their social media accounts.
Speaker BIt's.
Speaker BIt's Golden Corral.
Speaker BThey are.
Speaker BThey're huge and they're hysterical, and they have built up these.
Speaker BI'll send them to you.
Speaker BI'll say, I'll post a link.
Speaker BWhen we.
Speaker BWhen we share this.
Speaker BWhen we share this podcast, they're hysterical and.
Speaker BAnd they are definitely getting more customers because of their TikTok and their social media, but they work hard.
Speaker BThey work hard for.
Speaker AIt exists in a lot of different cities.
Speaker AYou know, if you have a.
Speaker ASomething you're selling in one location, and if you're not selling it online and being able to reach people everywhere, having a social media that the point is to reach people everywhere doesn't make as much sense.
Speaker AIs it like Wendy's?
Speaker ACause, like, I don't have a Twitter for the restaurant, but Wendy's does a great job on their Twitter, right?
Speaker BSo TikTok.
Speaker BTikTok is not going to get me more customers in Little Old Sea Rays.
Speaker BSo if I'm spending.
Speaker BSo it's not necessarily my time, but if I'm spending 10 hours a week trying to do work on TikTok, that's not use of my.
Speaker BThat's not good use of my time.
Speaker BI'm not going to get a Return on that investment.
Speaker BAnd my time is an investment.
Speaker BI don't have a lot of that to give either.
Speaker BSo you have to.
Speaker BDon't always think of return on investment as a financial thing.
Speaker BYou need to think about that as.
Speaker BAs your time as well.
Speaker AOr if that's a difficult concept for you, put money on your time.
Speaker AWhat are you worth?
Speaker AI'm worth a hundred dollars an hour.
Speaker AI'm sorry.
Speaker AI have way too much in this brain.
Speaker AI know way too much about way too many things and effective ways to do different things.
Speaker ATo waste my time exactly.
Speaker AOn something ineffective.
Speaker ASo put a number on it.
Speaker AEven if you say, okay, I'm worth 30 bucks an hour, think of that as 30 bucks you're taking out of your business every hour to do this.
Speaker AWould you pay somebody to do that?
Speaker ANo.
Speaker AThen you shouldn't be doing it.
Speaker BYep.
Speaker BAnd there are just so many simple ways to track things.
Speaker BA simple spreadsheet, going to events, make up a simple business card.
Speaker BYou don't need fancy things to be able to make connections and know what's coming back to you.
Speaker BYou don't need to create a separate email for each event or each membership that you belong to.
Speaker BVery simple ways to track.
Speaker BAsk if you have employees that are answering your phone.
Speaker BHow did you hear about this?
Speaker BJust simple questions.
Speaker BKnowing where.
Speaker BKnowing how people are hearing about you.
Speaker BAsk the questions, know if it works.
Speaker BIf it doesn't, let it go.
Speaker AYes.
Speaker ASame thing with advertising, right?
Speaker ALike, I put so much money last year into Google Ads.
Speaker AOh, God, Google Ads.
Speaker AGoogle Ads.
Speaker AHey, Google, you should sponsor us.
Speaker AAnd I finally was like, this doesn't make any.
Speaker AI'm not getting any hits on this.
Speaker AAnd a lot of it was, I was specifically targeting.
Speaker ATargeting our allergen menus and catering.
Speaker ASo those were two things that I could see if more people had ordered those things, you know, so it was a very easy overall thing to track.
Speaker AAnd finally I was like, yeah, this is not making any sense.
Speaker AI need to pull all of this money.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd put it somewhere else.
Speaker BI've spent money on marketing in 16 years, on so many different things.
Speaker BAnd it wasn't until we started doing radio, which I never, ever would have thought, and it just happened to be because a good friend of mine when we bought the Union in Irondequoit that does radio, and he's from Iranic Way, and he's like, Mr. Iranic White.
Speaker BI was like, well, at least this will get our word out there.
Speaker BI'll try it for a little while.
Speaker BAnd I've never had Such feedback from marketing, ever.
Speaker BSo I'm like, I guess radio is our thing now.
Speaker BNever would have thought that.
Speaker BWho the sister?
Speaker BJust because I don't listen to radio.
Speaker BBut there I've never.
Speaker BI hear so much.
Speaker BOh, heard your ad.
Speaker BI heard your ad on the radio.
Speaker BI'm like, you did?
Speaker BThat's great.
Speaker AThat's awesome.
Speaker BBut every time I just happen to turn on the radio, I hear it too.
Speaker BSo I don't know, I guess it works.
Speaker AYeah, that's awesome.
Speaker ABut, yeah, you got to find your thing, whatever your thing is.
Speaker BAll right, let's talk about revenue versus profit.
Speaker BAnd how can that be fooled by big numbers?
Speaker BBecause those two things are very different.
Speaker BI love people.
Speaker AIt's simple concept.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BYou can have six, seven figure revenue and spend double that.
Speaker BProfit and revenue are very, very different.
Speaker BAnd I was.
Speaker BWhen I was looking up some statistics and notes on this, I found this quote that says, revenue is vanity, profit is sanity.
Speaker AOh, I love that.
Speaker BSo that might be our shirt for this episode.
Speaker AYes, that is the shirt for this episode.
Speaker BOh, my God.
Speaker AI mean, because honestly, it doesn't matter what your revenues are.
Speaker AYour revenues could be a hundred thousand dollars if you're making $30,000.
Speaker AIf your revenue is 2 million and you're making $25,000, guess what?
Speaker AIt sounds like you just did a whole lot more work for less profit.
Speaker BExactly.
Speaker BExactly.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BAnd this is.
Speaker BI think everything that we've talked about so far goes into that is how you know, everything goes into your profit.
Speaker BAnd you cannot understand your profit if you are not understanding your ROI and knowing your numbers.
Speaker BBecause I think people just, dude, how much of money I made this year?
Speaker BI'm like, I don't care.
Speaker BHow much did you, like, what was the end number matter?
Speaker BI'm like, well.
Speaker BWell, I mean, kinda.
Speaker BI mean, I know none of us want to show that we made a lot of money at the end of the year because we don't want to pay a ton of taxes.
Speaker BBut like.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker AAnd are you paying yourself?
Speaker BRight, so good point.
Speaker AProfits are lower, but you're paying yourself a hefty livable wage, then fine.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker ABut if you're not paying yourself, I think that's where it gets tricky is where if you're able to pay yourself a percentage of your revenue, then, yeah, higher revenues are great.
Speaker ABut if you're not, that's where it gets.
Speaker AThat's where I think where people have a difficult time navigating that line.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BAnd I think you have to understand that too.
Speaker BAnd the kind of what we're going to go into talking about next too, because banks and funding people want to see big numbers.
Speaker BAnd I think we feel like we need to achieve these great big numbers.
Speaker BBut when you understand what profit actually is, that, and sometimes we have to go in and explain that.
Speaker BI've had to go in and ask for money.
Speaker BOr when we go in looking for a mortgage for a big, for a building, they're like, well, you know, you only made this much.
Speaker BI'm like, right, but look at, but look at what we made.
Speaker BLike, but here's our percentage profit.
Speaker BLike that's, that's a really good number.
Speaker BLike in restaurant world, that's like, we've done well just because our numbers aren't in the seven, you know, whatever, seven digits.
Speaker ABut.
Speaker BUnderstanding that is incredibly important.
Speaker BIf you're just going for the highest number in revenue, you're, you're kind of doing this wrong.
Speaker AAnd there's a happy medium, right?
Speaker AWe all want a high number in revenue and a high number in profit, right?
Speaker ABecause in theory, the higher the revenue, the higher the profit.
Speaker AIf you're paying attention to your numbers, it is very easy to lose your profit margin when you're not paying attention.
Speaker AAnd that profit margin is not only fixing things that get broken, it's not only paying yourself, paying your mortgage on your home, buying your kids food, right?
Speaker AWhatever that is that you're spending your money on.
Speaker ABecause let's be honest here, small business owners, it's all interconnected.
Speaker AOur home lines, our business lives, our money at both.
Speaker AIf I don't have any money at the end of the year, that means I didn't make any money.
Speaker AAnd at the end of the year you gotta pay taxes.
Speaker AIf you don't have money in the bank, how are you gonna pay your taxes, right?
Speaker ASo it's all a very fine.
Speaker AAnd that's why accountants and CPAs are very important.
Speaker ABut you have to know what they're talking about so that you can be working on it throughout the year and you aren't surprised at the end of the year.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BAnd you need to have those mid year check ins, or at least maybe even quarterly for some people.
Speaker BYou need to understand, hey, this is where I'm at.
Speaker BBecause that can change.
Speaker BYou can have a really great season.
Speaker BIf all of a sudden your summer is a banger, you need to be checking in with your accountant because you may want to be setting some of that money aside because your fall may suck and your wager may be worse.
Speaker BAnd then all of the sudden all of that money that you made is gone.
Speaker BAnd then you still have to pay a ton of taxes.
Speaker BAnd you can prepay a lot of these things, too.
Speaker BAnd your accountant can get you set up with some of that stuff.
Speaker BAnd there's ways that you can hold back.
Speaker BIf you are making money at the end of the year, depending on how you're incorporated, you don't have to take everything.
Speaker BYou can hold things back and you can set things aside.
Speaker BAnd that's where accountants are really, really important.
Speaker BAnd again, we never said they're not.
Speaker BWe just.
Speaker BYou just need to have a really good relationship with them, and you need.
Speaker ATo understand what they're doing and why.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker ABecause you're the one.
Speaker AYou're the one with your hands on the money every day, not them.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd a lot of people do it so blind that it's scary.
Speaker BMm.
Speaker BSo know your books.
Speaker BKnow your books and know your books and make sure they're clean.
Speaker BJust because your accountant is doing that, you're probably still keeping some type of ledger or QuickBooks or something.
Speaker BMake sure those things are clean.
Speaker BBecause at the end of the day, if you're audited, your accountant is going to be probably doing most of that work in dealing with the government.
Speaker BBut it's your business.
Speaker BThey're not going to be paying your fines, and they're not going to be potentially going out of business.
Speaker BThey're not going to be in trouble.
Speaker BYou are.
Speaker BYou need to see your books, because clean books are your responsibility.
Speaker BClean books also get you loans, get you grants, get your investors, and also help you potentially sell someday.
Speaker AStrategies.
Speaker BNeed to have an exit strategy, and you cannot have one without clean books.
Speaker BYou can't fake.
Speaker BWell, I'm sure people do.
Speaker BYou should not be faking your books for an exit strategy.
Speaker BAnd you need to have.
Speaker BYou need to be able to.
Speaker BWhen you're going into situations where you need funding or, like I said, looking for an investor, you have to have clean books.
Speaker BAnd I think that's a lesson a lot of us learned during the pandemic.
Speaker BThere was one loan or one grant that went out for the restaurants, and I know another one went out for entertainment and theater and arts, and it was very quick.
Speaker BYou had to have be able to turn your information in quickly.
Speaker BAnd, like, I don't know if I think restaurants.
Speaker BIt was like 45 minutes and all that money was gone.
Speaker BIf you didn't have clean books and we didn't know, we had an idea about what the application would look like, but we didn't know exactly.
Speaker BAnd if you didn't have all of that stuff ready to go, you did not get that money.
Speaker BAnd it was a sizable amount of money for a lot of us.
Speaker BSo we learned.
Speaker BA lot of people learned a really hard lesson during the pandemic by not having very clean books, not understanding their financial statements, and having a lot of their.
Speaker BA lot of the resources in their accountants hands.
Speaker AThere's a lot of having to wait on your accountant to turn around things when you need them.
Speaker AThat.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AWhich will hopefully never happen again.
Speaker ABut never say never.
Speaker BRight?
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker BBut there's a lot of little grants that pop up on my.
Speaker BThrough my emails every once in a while that I'll.
Speaker BI'll put out for.
Speaker AYeah.
Speaker BI don't think.
Speaker BI don't know if they're ever real or not, but I'm like, I might as well try.
Speaker BAnd I've gotten some of there that could.
Speaker BThat doordash grant that one time, it was like a $5,000 grant.
Speaker BAnd I have no idea.
Speaker BI'm like, I'll just, I'll give it a try.
Speaker BBut if I had to get that stuff from my accountant, I never would have gotten it in time.
Speaker BYeah, I had to be quick on it.
Speaker BSo.
Speaker AWell.
Speaker AAnd I think something along these lines that follows with knowing your books is emergency planning.
Speaker AIf you know where you are in the year and something big happens, you know all of your inventory can get destroyed.
Speaker AAnd that doesn't matter what business you're in, as long as you're selling a profit.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker AOr a product.
Speaker AWow.
Speaker AMaybe I should hold off on the cocktail.
Speaker ABut you need to be able to make solid decisions at a moment's notice and not reactive.
Speaker ASo in those situations, you may take on excessive debt or not understand your cash flow.
Speaker ASo you take on a high interest loan when you could have done it differently or rolled something over or borrowed from somebody out and just knowing all of your options and how that looks in your business and in your books.
Speaker ASo when these things happen, you can react in a calm manner and be prepared.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BBecause there is time to spend cash if you have it.
Speaker BThere's also time to save and hold on to cash and utilize a line of credit.
Speaker BAnd those things are important.
Speaker BAnd that is your accountant's job.
Speaker BI think that's one of the things we'll send you to after this too.
Speaker BLike if your books are messy, ask your accountant to clean it up.
Speaker BIt is literally their job.
Speaker BIf you want your reports, ask them.
Speaker BIt is their job.
Speaker BIf you have a question on I need to, you know, Replace my roof as I do right now.
Speaker BI may have the money to do it, but should I get this line of credit, what is the right decision?
Speaker BAnd the answer is hold onto your cash.
Speaker BBecause right now is a tricky time in the economy and the government.
Speaker BHold onto your cash and get a line of credit that makes more sense financially for us right now.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker BWhere 10 years ago I would have been like, I will not take on any credit because we did not have any debt.
Speaker BBut right now, debt is something that is.
Speaker BIt is for us okay to have right now.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker AAnd being okay with that and not being scared of it.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd honestly, debt allows you, if you know your books and you know your.
Speaker AYour business, and by knowing your business means knowing your money, you can actually strategically plan growth.
Speaker ARight.
Speaker AAnd that involves debt a lot of the time.
Speaker BYeah.
Speaker BDon't be scared.
Speaker ARational choices.
Speaker BMm.
Speaker BBut as far as funding goes, here's a little stat from you, for you, for from bids to credit.
Speaker BWomen are approved for business loans at a 33% lower rate than men.
Speaker ABut we also ask for less money than men.
Speaker BAbsolutely.
Speaker BBecause where is the other stat?
Speaker BWomen entrepreneurs are 63% more likely than men to bootstrap their business.
Speaker BSo we are often just self funding our businesses and just mostly because we just assume we're not going to get the funding.
Speaker ABecause funders suck and they're sexist.
Speaker BYep.
Speaker BAnd I've got.
Speaker BI've got a bunch of stats that I think I want to go over.
Speaker BWell, not a bunch, because some of them are just sad and depressing.
Speaker AWell, I mean, throw it out there because sometimes we need to be slapped in the face.
Speaker AKelly.
Speaker BAll right, let's see.
Speaker BAll right, so yes.
Speaker BAbout Disney.
Speaker BYep.
Speaker BWomen and business owners, 33% small business owners getting loans even though we are owning.
Speaker BI'll see if this one's a little bit old.
Speaker B42% of US businesses, even when approved, women receive smaller loans on average 56,000, where men are getting 94,000.
Speaker BThat's just in that one ratio.
Speaker BThere's.
Speaker BSee?
Speaker ABut it's important to also ask, right?
Speaker AAsk for lower interest rates, ask for a higher loan amount.
Speaker AAlways ask for more first.
Speaker AI learned with our not for profit, I could not get $50,000, but was told if I would just ask for a million, I could have it.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd I was like, that doesn't make sense.
Speaker AAnd I can't do that.
Speaker BI don't need them.
Speaker AAnd, you know, maybe if I could go back, I would do it over again, you know, and it would have made A bigger difference.
Speaker ABut I thought that was crazy and I, I understand it on a certain aspect, but as a business owner, like, that's just a ridiculous feeling.
Speaker AEspecially for women and small businesses to be like, oh, I'll take on a bigger amount of debt.
Speaker AWell, sometimes it's easier to get a larger loan and negotiate.
Speaker BMm.
Speaker BWhen women do get funding, they outperform Women led startups deliver $0.78 revenue per dollar invested compared to $0.31 for men.
Speaker ABecause we're amazing.
Speaker ALet's just talk about how amazing we are.
Speaker AWomen should take over the world.
Speaker AYeah.
Speaker BIt matters.
Speaker BInvestors who fund women get a better ROI.
Speaker BThey need.
Speaker BListen to this episode.
Speaker BIn 2024, 49% of new US startups were funded founded by women, up from 29% in 2019.
Speaker BIt matters.
Speaker AYou know what matters?
Speaker AWomen are successful.
Speaker AWe are powerful, we are decision makers.
Speaker AAnd yet we are still scared to talk about money.
Speaker BAnd you don't have.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BBecause you don't have to be a financial expert.
Speaker BYou just have to be the boss.
Speaker BAnd the boss means knowing what's going on with your money.
Speaker AYep.
Speaker BAnd don't be afraid to ask questions.
Speaker BPlease ask us.
Speaker BWe'll help you.
Speaker AAnd you can always search it on the Internet.
Speaker BMm.
Speaker AThere's no reason with the technology we have in our pocket everywhere we go that we can't have the knowledge to allow ourselves to feel confident enough to walk into a room and talk about our numbers.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AAnd it doesn't always feel good because we're not used to doing it.
Speaker AAnd this is a vague statement.
Speaker AThis is not.
Speaker AThis is for anybody that's not used to talking about money.
Speaker AAnd this could go for men too.
Speaker AAnd there's probably women out there that are like, no, I have no problem.
Speaker AAnd that's great.
Speaker ABut for those of us that struggle, you need to know your numbers.
Speaker AYou need to know what the words mean.
Speaker AAnd if they're words you don't know, you need to search them up.
Speaker BYep.
Speaker AAnd talk about it to yourself if you need to, before you walk into the room.
Speaker AJust so you're confident saying those words and knowing what the answer is.
Speaker ABecause you do.
Speaker AYou.
Speaker AYou have all of the information at your fingertips.
Speaker AYou have the ability to know all of the things.
Speaker AThere is nothing that makes you less important or special than the person who owns the multi trillion dollar delivery service that's probably driving past my house right now.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker AOther than he has multi trillion dollars.
Speaker BExactly.
Speaker AThat is the only difference.
Speaker BMm.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BIf you don't understand your money, what you earn, how you spend it.
Speaker BWhat you're spending it on.
Speaker BHow to borrow, how to invest.
Speaker BYou're leaving money on the table.
Speaker BWhen women do access capital, they outperform.
Speaker BSo let's close the gap.
Speaker BLet's break the taboos.
Speaker BLet's make sure you're the one who's in control of the narrative and the numbers.
Speaker AHell, yeah.
Speaker BBe brave, be bold.
Speaker BBe the boss.
Speaker AFollow us at Bossyroc.
Speaker AEmail us bossyroc gmail.com.
Speaker Atag us.
Speaker AAsk us questions.
Speaker ACome on the show.
Speaker AIt's important.
Speaker ALet's keep talking and send this episode to someone you know that needs it.
Speaker AYes, we'll see you soon.