Money may make the world go round, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t save it when you can. With loans often hard to come by, small businesses tend to struggle more than others when it comes to maintaining healthy finances. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to cut costs without compromising the quality of your goods or services. Here are a few tips to tighten your company’s belt.Don’t be afraid to call in a favor.Whether it’s a friend, a friend of a friend, or just a perfect stranger, it never hurts to ask for a little help. Drawing on your network for favors or an exchange of services helps you get things done for free, but also keeps your connections in touch with your business. Whether it’s for design, editing, or just plain old advice, favors and exchanges can help you keep your company costs low while still accomplishing everything you need to get done. Just remember: don’t ask a person for a favor if you wouldn’t want to return the service.Never pay sticker price.All companies need certain tools and equipment to grow, which means you shouldn’t be afraid to pick them up secondhand if you really need to. Websites like Craigslist are great for finding used goods of all kinds. And if you don’t want to settle for secondhand items, consider purchasing older models of the products you need. They’re almost always cheaper and comparable in quality to the newer editions.Market your product online.If you’re running a small business, the Internet is your best friend. Access to the Internet offers a myriad of tools to expand your business. Looking to launch new marketing initiatives? Social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Tumblr, and WordPress are FREE services that offer unlimited possibilities to help your company go viral. Lacking the manpower to run your social media outreach? Try Hootsuite, an application that allows you to schedule posts ahead of time, so you can work on other projects while Hootsuite manages your brand. Want to see if your marketing efforts are working? Use Google Analytics and its easy-to-read charts to gauge how much traffic your site is generating and assess the demographics of the users that your site attracts.Communicate effectively.When it comes to effective communication within a small business, what you say matters just as much as how you say it. And this isn’t just about using proper spelling and grammar. To run your business most efficiently, there are plenty of apps to help you communicate and share information with your staff. Google offers an entire suite of applications to help you email, edit documents, sync calendars, and more. Dropbox helps you save and share all of your documents, images, and videos of any size such that you can access them on any of your Internet devices. And when your business calls for some pseudo-in-person communication, Skype and VOXOX also offer great options for voice calling and video conferencing.Account for everything.QuickBooks is a great accounting tool for small businesses, but at $200 a pop, it can be a bit pricey. Fortunately, there is a wealth of free accounting tools and cheaper alternatives to consider. Wave Accounting offers a completely free double-entry accounting app, as well as apps for invoicing, receipts, payroll, and more. Freshbooks, Outright, and Zoho Invoice also provide excellent free alternatives for small business accounting.Travel without breaking the bank.For an expanding business, travel is sometimes an inevitable expenditure. Get the best deal on airfare through a number of online services. Sites like Kayak are great for searching for the lowest fares, as they aggregate flight data from hundreds of websites to help you find the best deal. As airline prices are notorious for their daily fluctuations, price alert websites like Airfarewatchdog.com and Yapta are supremely useful. Sign up and they’ll notify you as soon as a flight you’ve been eyeing hits a low fare. And if you’re on the fence as to when is the best time to buy your tickets, Bing’s Price Predictor can help you decide whether to buy or wait for a lower fare.When it comes to cost cutting, business owners should think broadly. Saving money on your small business loan is just as important as saving money on your office supplies. What are some of your favorite cost cutting tips?
