Business Tips That Test "Positive" During Quarantine
Apr 06, 2020
Hi everyone.
Today, I’d like to share with you a quick run down of my FB Live last Tuesday with the topic: COVID-19 Q&A where I answered any and all business-related questions regarding how to navigate this “new normal”.
I’ll also be sharing with you a couple of business tips and best practices that are working for Pilates in The Grove and that would hopefully work for your business too.
Without further ado, here are some of our Q&A highlights:
1. What is the “CARES Act” stimulus package? 🤷♀️
The CoronaVirus Aid Relief Economic and Security act was passed last Friday, March 27th, with the guidelines yet to be official and applications to begin on or before April 3rd, Friday.
Under this act is the PPP or Payroll Protection Program that should help people keep their team and staff and pay for operating expenses.
The application duration would be from April 3rd to June 30th for companies with less than 500 employees. Independent contractors, self-employed individuals, and sole proprietors are also qualified to apply for this loan.
Basically, this program allows you to take your trailing 12 (your payroll from the time of application back 12 months), and then divide it by 12 to get your average monthly payroll. You can apply for up to 2 and a half times that amount.
Ex: An average monthly payroll of $10,000 will allow you to apply for $25,000 to cover payroll for 8 weeks to be used specifically for payroll, rent, and mortgage (interest, not principal). Whatever is leftover may have to be paid back with a portion that may qualify for “forgiveness” if you do not have the capacity to pay it back. Whatever is not forgiven may be turned into a 10 year note at 4% interest, which is still a good deal.
Additional notes: There is no prepayment penalty, you do not earn interest in those 8 weeks, and you can’t have applied for another SBA loan. But if you did, you may be able to transfer a portion of that into the PPP. There will also be certain businesses that will be fast tracked in terms of processing such as women-owned, minority-owned, and veteran-owned businesses.
My recommendation to you is to call up your bank and see if they provide small SBA loans and start collecting your tax documents or payroll taxes as early as possible.
2. What video sharing service/platform do you use? 🎬
Though we use Namastream, we always put our videos up on YouTube for a couple of reasons:
- The quality is relatively similar.
- YouTube rarely (if never) crashes.
- Namastream is still brand new and recently experienced technical issues.
- Namastream is a paid platform whereas YouTube is free.
To prevent people from stealing your content and selling them, you can set your video as “unlisted” and send that out to specific people which is easier to do on Youtube as opposed to Vimeo.
3. Can you track people who watch your videos? 📹
No, but you can embed them on your website and if you have “cookies”activated, you can retarget your website visitors through Facebook ads afterwards. You can also have a pop-up on your actual website which can ask to collect your visitor’s email address and link them out to another page or video. You can use an email template or Mailchimp to automate your blast.
4. Other small business loans & grants? 🤔
I have launched a resource page that will show all the different loans and grants available. Below are also some useful links to grants available for application:
For businesses that haven't actually opened for business and have no proof of revenue, you may be hard pressed for any type of SBA loan. But you may be able to apply for grants such as Hello Alice, a crowdsourcing program for women business owners.
I also recommend checking if you have received your General Liability Insurance with policies that include loss of business income or business interruption insurance. Depending on your lease, you may also want to try speaking to your landlords and ask for an abatement.
5. What is the EIDL or “Economic Injury Disaster Loan”? 🤷♀️
These loans are specifically for capital improvements for your business with 30-year notes and a 3.75% max interest rate which is great. You can also receive a $10,000.00 grant for each applicant payable in 3 days after the application with that portion possibly eligible for forgiveness. So, I suggest you call your bank directly and see how you can apply.
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT & FINAL REMINDERS:
My team and I are working hard to gather everything as far as resources go from team management, employment, unemployment, furloughs vs lay-offs, best practices to go virtual, filming, lighting, and everything in between. As I've mentioned above, we've put together a full-blown Resource Page with all the latest information and ideas on how to keep your business surviving during this time. You can check it out here.
As always, I wish you all safe, healthy, and productive time during this quarantine period. All my best to you.
