Spring is a great opportunity to refresh your mindset and declutter your business — both literally and metaphorically. Spring cleaning your business operations can involve taking steps to improve your performance, reconfiguring your workspace, or discarding strategies, tools, and files that no longer serve your business. Dust off your approach to business as usual with these spring cleaning tips for businesses.
Review your finances
Dust off your business finances to make sure you have a solid foundation for the next nine months. The deadline to submit your tax return is the ideal time to make sure your books are in order. “Deep clean” your accounting by organizing your bookkeeping, reviewing files and accounts, sorting receipts, and digitizing what you haven’t already.
Get in the weeds of your accounting to get a fresh start for the rest of the year. Track down late invoices, record bad debts, and pay your expenses and bills that may be outstanding. Check your payroll to make sure all staff records are up to date, and update your budget to make sure you’re accounting for quarterly tax bills, if applicable.
Spring is also a good moment to review high-level metrics, such as gross profit margin, cost of goods sold (COGS), and operating cash flow. Get a handle on last year’s financial performance to make better decisions for the next nine months.
Refresh your website
Spring is a good moment to audit your website to make sure links are working, content is still relevant, and the site navigation still serves your SEO goals.
“Maybe there is some content on your business website that needs to be rewritten to better reflect your company’s offerings or target market. Or, maybe your website just looks completely outdated and needs a little love,” wrote Mike Kappel, Founder and CEO of Patriot Software, in Forbes. “Believe me when I say this … fixing little details (even CTAs or text) can make a huge impact.”
SEO best practices change fairly regularly; make sure your website follows the latest guidelines so customers continue to find you. If you’ve made changes to any policies, such as your returns policy or shipping policy, ensure your website has all the latest information.
[Read more: 5 Small Businesses Celebrating Spring With Creative Marketing]
A business changes as it grows; does your business plan still speak to your core strengths, or do you need to update your plan to reflect a new direction?
Assess your tech stack
Talk to your team to see what platforms, software, and equipment needs to be updated or replaced. Auditing the tools you use regularly helps improve productivity and optimize your budget. It may be that you need to add new tools to address the needs of your growing business.
“This process allowed us to refine best practices, eliminate tools that had become redundant, invest in new tools, and save money at the same time,” wrote Kathleen Lucente, CEO and Founder of Red Fan Communications, in Fast Company. “Plus, we surveyed our team to understand their work environment preferences and this allowed us to add an app so the team can use the office space wiser for reserving spots for group or individual work.”
As you review your tech, look for vulnerabilities in your data security and storage. Take a moment to purge any customer information that you’ve been keeping that you no longer need.
Reinvest in your core business
Leigh Burgess, CEO and Founder of Bold Industries Group, says she focuses her spring cleaning efforts on the core strengths of her business.
“Whether it’s sorting through paperwork, optimizing digital processes, or evaluating customer and client relationships, assessing what’s working in your company can open the door to lasting success,” Burgess told Fast Company. “By spring cleaning this year, I hope to both increase efficiency and strengthen the core. Then I can focus more on the bigger picture and create an even stronger foundation that will last into the future.”
One approach is to revisit your business plan, mission statement, and company values. A business changes as it grows; does your business plan still speak to your core strengths, or do you need to update your plan to reflect a new direction? Check in to make sure you’re still following your North Star.
[Read more: Updating Your Business Plan: A Guide for Growing Businesses]
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