Virtual offices help businesses cut costs

Costs and overheads are unavoidable - but there are ways to cut down and manage costs effectively, without losing out on performance or customer satisfaction. The virtual office is an excellent way to keep the appearance of an office whilst keeping your costs to a minimum. You'll get a business address, mail handing service, all calls answered, and discounted meeting rooms - and that's just for starters.

A virtual office also allows you to work from home or from a cheap local office, so you can cut down on commuting expenses, plus save valuable time travelling. Plus with the advantage of discounted meeting rooms in your virtual location, you still get the chance to meet up with clients or suppliers in a professional setting.

Where cost-cutting is concerned, businesses taking on a physical office will have maintenance and running issues to contend with. But with the virtual office, this is greatly reduced. You'll still have to maintain your working space - even if it is your spare room at home - but the scale is minimised. In 'Weathering the Storm', an article on smallbusiness.co.uk, Anthony Karibian, CEO of XLN Telecom, brings attention to some of the more easily missed overheads in a working environment: "Don’t forget about the secondary areas where cuts can be made. Target wastage in office supplies and invest in energy saving initiatives - from energy saving light bulbs, to making sure the insulation in your premises is up to date." You can also try to print on both sides of paper and stick to black and white printing, as black and white cartridges are often cheaper than colour.

One useful tip to help cut costs is to make a list of all your outgoings, and take a moment to analyse their worth. Do you really need it? Would your business suffer without it? Try to cut out anything that your business can do without - but take care not to impact your customers or performance. Anthony Karibian backs this up further, stating: "Explore ways to reduce those (costs) that don't affect overall efficiency of the business and its ability to win sales."

While you're at it, it's also a useful exercise to go through this list and decide where you can potentially make a saving. Then contact each of your suppliers and re-negotiate a better rate. It can be a long and tedious task, but it will be worth it in the end.

It's also worth spending time researching your competitors to find out what they're doing that you're not. Even better, send out a customer survey and encourage your customers to tell you where your weaknesses are. Business expert Robert Craven of The Director's Centre, writing in an article by businesszone.co.uk, 'How to beat the recession: 10 things to do in the next 10 days', says that businesses should run a customer survey "right now", as a way of finding out where your business drops short, but also to stop customers leaving: "simply talking to all your existing and past customers will generate more business, I assure you."

Craven also goes on to say that businesses should never stop still - especially in a recession. "Get more leads, say 10%. Go networking, find out about Google Adwords, get up earlier, and talk to people."

On the subject of Google, the internet is an obvious choice for businesses, especially where marketing comes in. As stated by smallbusiness.co.uk in their online article, 'Supercharge your online sales', "With the phenomenal spread of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, you now have a massive target audience at no cost." However, success isn't necessarily achieved overnight: "The trick is to do it intelligently so it’s not perceived as spam. Create an audience in groups and forums and gradually build your credibility. Then - and only then - hit them with your message."

Search engines offer a fantastic source for advertising, and if you can get it right, you can get it for free. Getting listed on the first page of a search engine is invaluable, and effective search engine optimisation (SEO) can be achieved with research and practise. But if you're new to online marketing, it's often more beneficial to call in an expert. In the meantime you can get up to speed by taking a look at Matt Cutts' blog. Matt Cutts joined search engine giant Google in 2000 and has been there ever since, so his blog is an excellent source of knowledge. In addition, try typing in relevant search terms relating to your business and see what sites come up - then take note of other keywords they're using that you could take advantage of.

We hope you've found this guide useful. If you have any cost-busting tips to add, please feel free to contact us.