...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
About Us Services Case Studies Blog Site map Contact us
© Exigent Consulting 2004-
...............................................................................
Grant funding is now being provided through the national Growth Accelerator programme, access to the programme is focusing on high growth businesses.
In order to get access to the funding you will need to apply to join the scheme. To do that you must demonstrate the will, opportunity and capacity to grow your business. The initial stage is to assess whether training or coaching is best suited to your needs.
We are both an registered coach and training provider under this programme.
Exigent Consulting
Property Services
A Property Services Business was experiencing servere cash flow problems due to a dispute over payment from a large creditor and slow payments from some of its larger customers. It was also losing money on its day to day operations.
The cash flow position was mitigated by the introduction of appropriate cash flow funding. Operational procedures were put in place to provide better management information on business performance together with daily monthly gross profit forecasts to identify how much income was required to break even.
Further refinements included job costing and profitability analysis, so that they could predict more accurately net income from bids for work.
Debtor days were reduced, cash flow funding has improved the overdraft situation and better operational procedures now enable them to undertake individual job costing and profitability analysis. Business performance has improved.
Retail
A retail business was suffering a steady decline in sales and the unscheduled exit of a partner together with the loss of substantial funds from the business had left it losing money and with many creditors pressing.
We undertook three key actions in parallel:
1. Reduce costs to get them in line with revenue
2. Manage the creditors and agree and stick to repayment plans
3. Undertake low cost marketing initiatives to increase revenues
The business is now at break even and performance is steadily improving with the
feed in of new sales from marketing and the improvement in cash-
Restaurant
A West Country restaurant business was experiencing severe cash flow difficulties due to poor trading performance and because the cash reserves were depleted due to unforeseen but necessary building repairs. Their relationship with their bankers had deteriorated to such an extent that they had been formally asked to close their business and mortgage account within 4 weeks or face foreclosure.
We took immediate action to reduce all unnecessary costs, either through extended repayments or by cancelling any non contract service. We liaised with their bankers and arranged a moratorium whilst we arranged alternative funding and banking facilities. Further investigation into the business operations had identified portion control as a significant hidden cost; we also moved to develop menu items that generated significantly high gross profit to deliver more income to the business.
Within 12 weeks and despite the very poor credit rating we arranged alternative funding and had set up new banking arrangements. The business was able to operate through the very quiet winter period without taking on further debt.
Lead Development
A marketing business was struggling to find the necessary growth it needed despite having over 29 channel partners, and delivering to them over 200 qualified leads, conversion rates were very low. It asked Exigent Consulting to investigate and implement a solution.
We reassessed all partners and only kept those who would commit to spending time selling the marketing services. We undertook a recruitment drive to attract properly qualified partners. At the same time we instigated a training programme to ensure they followed the sales process. To support this we implemented a number of measurement tools to ensure effective monitoring of leads and sales.
These changes lead to a 200% Increased in sales over 6 months with 75% fewer partners. We also made lead generation self funding by charging partners lead contribution fees.
Software Products
An IT software Product Business had got into serious difficulties because their sales had simply stopped coming in. Exigent was called in to urgently find out what was going on and what we could do to re energise sales
We identified two main issues: firstly the sales function was being poorly targeted and there was a significant loss of morale and confidence leading to low activity levels and poor decision making. Secondly, activity was being focused on a sector of the market that was highly cost conscious and in addition could not get the full cost reduction benefits from the product.
We set up clear targets for both activity and developed a strategy with sales to broaden its target base. This has lead to a quadrupling of the sales pipeline within two months and securing a major client whose spend is equivalent to the whole of their previous years revenues.
Online Music and Affinity Products
A provider of affinity consumer products was suffering badly depressed sales. An investigation identified a poorly constructed and promoted web site was not delivering the expected conversion of visits..
A review of their web site provided an action plan for subsequent site re-
Following the implementation of these ideas online sales rose dramatically and showed within a couple of weeks a tenfold increase over previous site’s performance. Customer acquisition costs were also dramatically reduced by using focused Campaign which dramatically increased the sites conversion rate.
Security Services
Manned Guarding is one of the most competitive markets in which to operate. Demonstrating a difference and a value add is very difficult. Sales growth at our client had been slow and there was an urgent requirement to provide effective support for their sales and marketing activities.
We identified the need for a proper marketing strategy using traditional methods and develop a brochure to use in mailings and as a sales aid. Having reviewed the opportunities for the business and examined their market sectors we undertook a detailed customer survey and published the results. In this way we could demonstrate our clients real commitment to customer service and benchmark them against their customers’ view of their business performance.
A by product of this survey was that it identified key weaknesses in their operations. We used this feedback to improve staff training and upgrade some key operational processes. Using this customer service approach as an offensive weapon has led to an increase in sales and customer retention. The customer service marketing approach has also enabled them to develop their profile in their chosen markets.
Contact Us
........................................
For a Free Confidential Discussion
Roger Napleton
Managing Director
“Exigent has worked closely with ViaSys Limited for five months and has injected
the “dose of reality“ that we needed to sharpen our focus on sales, marketing, profitability
and cash-
