Generating business in the COVID landscape

If you can believe it, we are now less than two months away from the end of the JobKeeper program, and now is the time to be planning and preparing for life after stimulus.

 

Of course, JobKeeper 2.0 will kick into gear after 28 September, but there are some significant changes to eligibility criteria that business owners have to be aware of, to make sure they are not caught out.

 

The most important is that you will have to already be on JobKeeper, and then to qualify for the next round you will have to show a 30 per cent decline in revenue in both the June and September quarters.

 

That is the requirement to receive payments until 3 January 2021, at which point you will have to re-qualify for the final three months of the program.

 

So it is vital that business owners get their books in order and be ready to provide this information, because a number of businesses I’ve spoken to were not aware of the new eligibility requirements.

 

Of course, as business owners, we can’t rely on government subsidies forever, so it’s also important to start planning for life without them, and that means maximising your opportunities.

 

There’s an old principle in business that 80 per cent of your sales comes from 20 per cent of your customers, and this is the situation that business owners need to identify.

 

Who are the customers that are generating up to 80 per cent of your sales? What are you doing to educate them on your product offering and how you can help them?

 

This sort of work needs to be identified now and have your plans put into place before JobKeeper payments cease, whether that is in September, January or March.

 

One last point for business owners regarding the wearing of face masks.

 

As you would know, masks are now mandatory in metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire, and it is well within your rights as a business owner to deny entry to your business to anyone who fails to comply with that directive. Full stop.

 

The only exception to this is for people who have a legitimate medical reason. So, for all our sakes, please ensure your business is doing the right thing and enforcing the mask policy so that we might eventually make our way out of this mess!