OBAM Consultants

10/08/2020

Pricing your product

When doing your market analysis you will have to identify your break-even point first, to see if the needed volume can be generated. Pricing and volume are intertwined. The lower the volume, the higher the price of your product or service will be.

In order to be competative you can add a value to your product (cleanliness, service, well-organized, uniqueness, follow-up/after care, or anything that influences the experience positively etc.)

Especially in the travel industry it is important to determine what your product or service will look like and how much it will cost the traveler. What kind of traveler is your business catering to? We can group travelers in 3 main categories:
Luxury
Budget
Experience

Luxury often requires extra personal attention and a one-stop-shop approach towards the traveler. Expanding your business does not necessarily mean getting more customers as this may actually cause the quality of your product to decrease. You may want to explore increasing the level of service that you provide and/or widen the range of services that you offer your clients.
Budget travel often gives low profit margins and thus the higher the volume, the lower pricing you can offer. Besides focussing on product quality, the focus will have to be on increasing the number of your potential customers. Strategic alliances with similar businesses elswhere or online sales may aid in increasing the number of potential customers.
Experience often goes hand in hand with uniqueness. The service that you offer MUST result in an experience that exceeds the expectation of your customer. This is nothing short of creating a 'wow' moment for each and every traveler. Because of the uniqueness that is required, the experience offered should be reinvented over and over again. Creating a variety of experiences will broaden your pool of potential customers.

When you have a product or service for one of these categories, your product or service may be enhanced by adding products or services at minimal cost that would cater to one or two of the other categories. This will significantly enhance your product or service. The value of the price that your customer pays has increased as the cutomer gets more for his buck and this will strengthen your position in the market.

30/07/2020

"...the biggest mistake people make is spending too much time on essential, but low-value activities. A great example is things like payroll, accounting, invoicing, scheduling — all activities that are essential, but can often consume way too much time for a business owner, the employees, and their office staff.” - Sam Pillar, CEO of scheduling software provider Jobber.

28/07/2020

When conducting a SWOT (Strengths-, Weaknesses-, Opportunities- and Threats) analysis, take a good look at the Weaknesses and Threats. Especially when these are related to the industry that you are in, you will find that there are Opportunities to mitigate these Weaknesses and Threats and even turn them into Strengths.

Innovation and creativity are often key in this. Together with analyses of trends from similar industries regionally and globally you can tweak, or even reform, your business to be a leader in the industry that your business is in.

To realize this, (re)forming the structure/organization of your business to be able to have a dynamic and flexible approach to the industry may be required. This has now become one of your Strengths.

27/07/2020

A turnaround process can be summarized as follows:

1. Recognize that there are problems/problem areas
2. Engage a Turnaround Specialist/Company to conduct a review
3. Identify problems and agree to a strategy to address the problems/problem areas
4. Implement the turnaround strategy

The paragraphs underneath address points 2 through 4.(Source: VantagePerformance)

3 Stages of Turnaround Management

Stage 1 – Assess Viability
This consists of a high level and detailed investigation of the business and its situation, and can take 2-4 weeks.
The investigation acquires a wide range of information including:
• Current and historical financials (P&L, balance sheet, cash flow and verification these are reliable including costing systems)
• Stakeholders and debtors
• Management capability
• Cause of situation
• Potential solutions
• Assess if business issues are controllable
• Assess if ongoing business is viable
• Develop SWOT analysis to provide clarity on options.
This is summarised to provide decision-makers with a concise assessment, including options, risks and priorities to consider in implementing a turnaround.
With current legislation in most countries, the directors have to make the decision on what to do with this information. The turnaround specialist’s role is to provide the advice and likely scenarios with the issues
Stage 2 – Stabilise and Develop Strategy
Once the issues and priorities have been identified and agreed to, Stage 2 focuses on stabilising the business and planning the recovery strategy. The timeframe can vary widely depending on the business situation and complexity and can take from 4 weeks to 3 months. In many cases the foundations of Stage 2 are being formed through the Stage 1 discovery.
The turnaround strategy consists of the following, and may occur concurrently and in any order:
• Crisis stabilisation – taking control, cash management, short term financing, first step cost reduction.
• New or improved leadership – due to inadequate skills, instability in management, need for fresh ideas, or to bolster a tired team.
• Stakeholder focus – advising and engaging stakeholders dependent on the outcome and includes financiers, creditors, employees, customers, industry associations and even government officers (sometimes a source for grants). The benefit of this aspect is often underestimated and often provides the greatest source of solutions and support.
• Strategic focus – redefining the core business, restructuring, M&A, divestment.
• Organisational change – engaging key staff, improving communication, improving morale.
• Process improvements – operational improvements that provides low hanging fruit, and focus on key issues that may be key risks.
• Financial restructuring – implementing tighter control and monitoring of cash (implementing a rolling 13 week cash flow forecast), equity injection, asset reduction or selling under-utilised assets to generate cash or use as security for short term funding.

Stage 3 – Implementation and Monitoring
Once Stage 2 is underway, the focus will be the detailed implementation and monitoring.
This may include setting up an advisory board to assist the owners, directors, or board to maintain focus on the implementation.
The business may bring on board a Chief Restructuring Officer whose prime role is to implement the turnaround strategy – this allows management to maintain focus on their core skills.
Stage 3 can over lap stage 2, and can vary from 3 – 12 months.

24/07/2020

Sometimes you'll have to go 'back to basics' and treat your business as a startup business and look at your business with a fresh pair of eyes. Do not be afraid to modify your product to cater to an ever changing clientele with ever changing needs.

In order to conduct a thorough market analysis, you need to cover a range of topics. In this article, we'll discuss several of the important ones — and what you should include in each.

23/07/2020

Besides Financial Resources there are other resources to start/increase a business. We can think of Human Resources, Educational Resources and Physical Resources. Look around and tell me what resources you see around you that you can use to the advantage of your business.

A few paragraphs from The AdvenTourist - Small Business and Local Tourism: What You Need To Know

While tourism may not be the complete solution to helping local economies, it is certainly a large part of it. If you have a small business, no matter where you are located, your business and your community can benefit. Tourism needs all kinds of businesses from services to products to retail to food to rentals and more. Be creative! You can build a business or grow an existing one simply by being mindful of the relationship between tourism and local business.

Why should I care about local tourism?
If you have a small business in a town that tends to attract tourists, you can benefit in a number of ways. For one, you can increase your business and build partnerships with other commercial enterprises which will remain past the primary tourist season. For another, you are helping your local community become self-sustaining and a travel destination. This in turn betters the economy for permanent residents of your community.

Isn’t it true that only certain businesses can benefit from local tourism?
No. According to the University of Wisconsin Center for Community Economic Development “Tourism strengthens a community’s retail base. Communities that sell to tourists have significantly more retail establishments and divers mix of products and services”. Thus, virtually any type of business is able to benefit from local tourism. Outside dollars stimulate the local economy overall.

22/07/2020

A small, yet reaffirming, survey with regards to the ever changing tourism market.

• What are you offering your possible new clients?
• How are you marketing this product?
• How are you marketing your company?
• What is the most cost effective way to execute, administer and analyze your sales?

21/07/2020

Office-, Business- and Administrative Management Consultancy

Innovative consistency in an ever changing environment with specialization in the tourism industry.

• Business planning
• Product development
• Market analyses
• (Re)structuring office procedures
• Financial Management
• Bookkeeping