Weighing up a big investment in your business

Marcus Wolfgram • July 5, 2022

 Are you thinking about putting money into a new system to improve the efficiency or productivity of your company? Finding ways to maximise productivity is more important now than ever before because of the tight labour market. However, the cost of a new website, e-commerce platform, software system, or automations may be substantial. If you're weighing the costs and benefits of a significant investment, here are some questions to ask yourself.


How much will it cost up front, and how much will it cost in the long run? The design, creation of content, and development of a website, for example, all have significant up-front costs. It's easy to assume that once the costs are incurred, the job is finished, but that's not the case. It is possible to do this in-house, in which case a specific employee must be assigned to it, or to do so via an external vendor.


If you're considering making a significant investment, it's critical to take into account the long-term costs. You'll have to cut back on which of your current expenses. With a new system, some of your current costs may be eliminated. It could be as simple as cancelling an old subscription and no longer paying for it. The time saved by not having to manually enter data, process payments, or deal with customer issues that arise from an outdated system may also be a benefit to the company.

 

Calculating the financial costs of a project is straightforward. It's more difficult when it comes to time, but if you can, estimate how much time you'll save.

 In the long run, how will this affect your costs? Take a look at the future of your company and how it will operate in five years. Is it possible to increase your profits without expanding your workforce with this new investment? How much time will you be able to devote to finding high-value clients and how much time will you be spending on processes?


Your company should run more smoothly, increase output, and easily pay for itself with any large investment. How long will it take for this investment to pay off?

 

To get a sense of when the investment will pay for itself, you need to have all the numbers in order.



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