Startups And Small Businesses: Consider Crowdfunding
A novel and effective way of raising finance
It is well known that finance is extremely hard to raise for small and medium sizes entities (SMEs). Banks are very conservative and prefer to deal with the larger, more established businesses. The venture capital market is small in South Africa and many SMEs fail due to a lack of finance.
Globally, crowdfunding has taken off and has also been successful locally in the past few years.
What is crowdfunding?
It consists of an online platform that puts investors in touch with any kind of organisation that requires funding – it can for example be a startup business, a one-off project or perhaps an N.G.O. looking for funding.
The online platform tracks how the required funding is being met.
It is best illustrated by looking at a crowd funding portal or two – see examples like Startme and Jumpstarter – Google for more.
How do I make use of it?
Many of the funding requests fail and one of the most successful United States platforms has some excellent advice for using a crowdfunding platform:
- You need to have expertise on the web and social media.
- Plan and prepare. This is crucial. You need to have a great strategy for reaching investors. A video is a good tool for this. The video should come from you or a member of the team to communicate your passion and commitment.
- Be transparent, honest and specific. The funding required should be detailed and not general. Thus, if you need R100,000 break this down into discrete amounts e.g. R20,000 for advertising, R20,000 for selling expenses etc.
- Get your friends or colleagues to contribute – launching on a crowdfunding site with some funding already secured is a key success factor. US platforms advise that having 30% secured funding makes a considerable difference to the campaign.
- Use influential people – well known bloggers, for example, can spread the message which can get momentum going
- Always be proactive as being in frequent contact with potential investors will enhance your credibility. Make widespread use of social media platforms – they can be powerful e.g. the recent strike in Zimbabwe was inspired by a social media video.
- Have set time limits for raising the funds. This creates a sense of urgency plus people have limited attention spans. Most sites recommend a one to two month fundraising cycle
- Reward your investors. It doesn’t have to be large sums but if you are, say, making a documentary, give investors free copies. If it is for an N.G.O. send funders letters of thanks from the beneficiaries.
- Have a good team in place as planning and executing the campaign are very time intensive
- Always remember that some fund raising simply does not work. However many of the failed efforts have brought benefits as it has taught valuable lessons. In one instance, a business relaunched its campaign with fewer, more simple concepts and was then able to raise their required funding.
Tax issues
There are many tax issues here – for example prepayments can fall into taxable income for the recipient. Speak to your accountant. This has the potential to derail a campaign.
Crowdfunding is up and running – it definitely works. Think about using it.
You Will Retire, So Get Ready Now!
Benjamin Franklin once said the only certainties in life are death and taxes. To that you can add retirement (assuming the Grim Reaper doesn’t interfere earlier). Yet research shows that no more than 10% of us can retire comfortably.
What to do in 7 steps
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Get rid of your debt. Remember interest on your debt compounds and you don’t want to divert your retirement income to paying off debt. Also if you are married in community of property or your heirs have signed as surety or guarantor, they will be responsible for your debt after your death.
The only exception to getting rid of your debt would be if the income and dividends you receive exceed the cost of your debt. Whilst this may hold now, you should ascertain that this will continue into the future.
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Save! As with the cost of debt compounding, so amounts put into retirement funding will also compound and realise more income on your retirement. Don’t forget there are generous tax incentives to help grow your retirement funding – you are allowed to deduct 27.5% of your retirement funding from your taxable income. Ask your accountant to help you find the most tax-efficient method.
Saving is a mentality. Once you get the habit it can be amazing how much you can save. So save now.
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Limit withdrawals. Be extremely prudent when you have to withdraw any savings – weigh up the cost to your retirement and only take out the minimum you require.
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Rainy days. No one goes through life without some form of crisis. We live in an age of uncertainty. Put aside funds for this as you don’t want to eat into your retirement funding to cover a crisis.
In the unlikely event, you don’t ever need to use this rainy day money, it will add to your retirement savings and improve the quality of your retirement. For example, you could even retire earlier.
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Keep retirement top of mind. It pays to constantly review your retirement funding, particularly when important events happen such as a decision to take on a new job or make a major investment.
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Plan and remain flexible. Be prepared to react if obstacles to your retirement arise. If, for example, the value of your investment portfolio declines and you discover you won’t have enough to retire comfortably, find out if you can work say one or two days a week on contract at your firm. Otherwise, see if you can land a part-time contract at another business.
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When is enough actually enough? Many people have doubts as to whether they have enough to retire and delay their retirement. You need to be disciplined about this – if you and your retirement adviser have set targets for retirement, stick to them unless unplanned events make it impossible to achieve your target.
This is a dynamic process and things can change quickly, so always keep this high on your agenda.
Don’t be one of the 90% – take steps to be part of the 10% who save enough to enjoy a stress-free retirement.
Staff Dismissals: Beware, There’s No Honour Amongst Thieves and No Short Cuts
“A plague upon it when thieves cannot be true one to another!” (Falstaff, in Henry IV Part I)
We know how time consuming dismissing staff can be. It leads to loss of productivity and extra legal costs can be incurred. But be careful if you are considering taking short cuts to get the matter out of the way. A recent case illustrates this.
The employer’s quandary
An employee’s position was terminated after the employee resigned (that, at least, was the employer’s version – the employee characterised it as an unfair dismissal/retrenchment in the CCMA). Soon afterwards, said the employer, the employee’s union asked the employer to change the reason for leaving employment to “retrenchment”. The employer was placed in a quandary – to refuse the request meant the employee would almost certainly approach the labour courts for wrongful dismissal. To agree to the union’s request would ‘make’ the problem go away as the employee would then be able to apply for and receive UIF benefits.
The employer agreed to the union’s request. The bad news was only just beginning as the employee promptly went to the CCMA claiming, amongst other things, that she had not been paid her retrenchment package. The CCMA arbitrated the case as a retrenchment dispute – the employer having agreed to present the “resignation” of the employee as a retrenchment during the arbitration – and found in favour of the employee.
Naturally the employer was furious – not only had it ended up in a labour forum but it had also been required to pay a retrenchment package. In essence, to appeal meant exposing the employer to the risk that that the case would be seen as fraudulent all along.
It just gets worse
However, the employer did appeal the case to the Labour Court. In the appeal the employer had to argue that the employee was never retrenched. The Court was understandably angry that a fraudulent claim had been entered and the employer had never raised this in the original hearing.
The appeal was dismissed with some strong wording: “The court turns its face against any fraud, particularly fraud perpetrated in respect of the processes that bear on the administration of justice……It is remarkable that the [employer] has the temerity to seek recourse from a court of law in the light of its admitted fraud. The conduct of the applicant is a perversion of the administration of justice.”
Don’t take the easy way out – there is no honour among thieves. The employer’s business not only spent far more time and money on two cases but also suffered reputational damage as well.
