Is this the secret of successful growth?

In my role I’m always coming across new business partners, customers and suppliers and I often have to carry out checks on their financial standing in order to allow trading to proceed.

It strikes me that there are Companies that always seem to do things correctly. They always make profit year on year, they invoice on time and there is never any technical issues with the product and they are always, always, rigorous in their credit control procedures.

One such Company I have dealt with in the last few years is an online I.T equipment supplier called ebuyer. You’ve probably heard of them because their online marketing is excellent.

I bought some bits of hardware off them, paying up front as we were a first time customer. The price was right and the equipment arrived bang on time. Then I got a phone call asking if I wanted a credit account. I thought I might use them again so why not.

After jumping through my third hoop I gave up on the process. I got a phone call asking me why I had halted and I said I was not prepared to provide an original copy of our Certificate of Incorporation, the Company I was representing had a D&B credit rating of £100k so why so much effort. To be fair we didn’t buy a lot of I.T equipment as the I.T support company usually did it for us. You either went through a heinous process or you paid proforma. Their prices were so good you were prepared to pay proforma and to be fair a credit account was on offer for any credit worthy customer.

Recently I needed to buy a one off bit of kit and their continuous stream of e-mails reminded me of them so I decided to investigate.

They are based in Humberside, definitely not an advantage for a distribution company, but probably cheaper warehouse space than Grantham. Their turnover last year was nearly £200m and they’ve made bottom line profit year on year. Their debtors days was around 15 when most business to business companies would expect 45+.

And as previously mentioned they have a very strong grasp of e-marketing and obviously invest heavily in it.

So is it being good at your trade that enables growth or is it having a strong grasp of the start of the business process i.e. sales lead generation, and the end of the process, getting the money in the bank before you pay the suppliers, that leads to successful growth.

It’s no good being good at what you do without telling everyone and also making sure you get paid for doing it.

Simon Pickup

Director of Bluline Solutions Ltd