Six ways for businesses to survive August on the Costa del Sol
August is a very strange month in southern Spain, where many businesses simply close and go to the beach, others work shorter hours, while tourism and hospitality related businesses make their biggest earnings. For B2B businesses such as ours, the summer months in general, but particularly August are quiet, with clients and suppliers on holiday and less emails and calls coming through. This can be a scary time, with low cash flow, and concerns about whether business will ever pick up again, or it can be a great time to reflect, relax, evaluate, plan, prepare and enjoy this beautiful place we call home.
How you feel about August on the Costa del Sol depends on your business sector, your cash flow needs, your outgoings and also how long you’ve been in business. If you’ve ridden this wave enough times and business has always returned in September, then you can enjoy it, if not or if cash is tight and overheads high, you may be biting your fingernails.
My advice for B2B businesses is always to plan for a slow summer and ensure that the business has enough money set aside to cover those months comfortably with limited earnings. Having a buffer means you can make the most of these down times and head to the beach with the rest of them, rather than panicking and trying to pick up clients at this very tough time of year.
Here are six more pieces of advice, which I hope will help for the rest of the month.
- Use your time wisely – When you don’t have so much to do for your clients, it’s the perfect time to do things for your own business. If there are things you’ve been putting off for ages like the filing, a new business presentation, videos or social media, stop procrastinating and use your time to good effect. Go through your inbox and give it a good clean out, catch up with old clients and prepare newsletters for September, so you’re on top of everything. Give your day a structure and stay disciplined, but do less hours if you can, so you’re not exhausted when the business comes back.
- Evaluate and plan – How was the first half of the year? Better, worse or the same as expected? Think what you could do better, what worked really well and what actions or clients gave the best ROI. Then make a plan for September to December, a crucial part of the year, and get things ready so come September you’re ready to swing into action.
- Schedule up social media – When you’re busy, social media posting can slip, so now is a great time to create loads of content – blogs, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and get the posts scheduled for the coming months. If you can do a few posts a week for September to November, then you will have a steady stream of content which you can then add to with current information as you go along.
- Minimise travel or plan for delays – The traffic is always bad in August and parking is a nightmare, so see if you can have meetings via Skype, or communicate on the phone and email over the month so you don’t spend your days stuck in jams. If you do have to travel, allocate plenty of extra time, or jump on your moped like we do so you can weave through the traffic and park with ease!
- Take a break – It can be hard for entrepreneurs and small businesses to take a break, because we’re always planning and focussed on the next big thing, however August is an ideal time to switch off and disconnect. If you don’t feel you can go away, take some long weekends, or take the afternoon off to go to the beach when you can. It may feel strange, and you may feel guilty, but you need to take advantage of the benefits of being your own boss and enjoy the summer too. Build up your energy reserves, put some distance between you and the business (and you and your laptop) and you will feel so much better when the pressure mounts once more.
- Trust that you will be busy again – This is a tough one, as I have spent the last eight summers worrying that clients won’t come back and that we won’t be busy again in September. However, this year I feel confident (at last) that work will come back with a vengeance in September, so it’s time to stop worrying and start enjoying the fruits of our labour. I hope you can feel the same way and believe in yourself and your business and accept the seasonal nature of the Costa del Sol. If you can, you will have a great summer, and be ready and raring to go in September.
Have a wonderful and productive summer!!