IAM2264 – Author Shares the Proven Cash Flow Techniques for Collecting Payments

In this episode, Dee Bowden, author and creator of “Collect the Cash.” She discusses the critical importance of cash flow for small and medium-sized businesses, noting that 82% fail due to cash flow issues.

Dee shares her experiences recovering $6 million in unpaid invoices in just 60 days by emphasizing problem-solving, customer service, gratitude, and relationship building.

Dee explains the importance of self-management and continuous learning before managing others.

She discusses the difficulty many business owners face in acknowledging areas where they need help, especially when transitioning from corporate roles to entrepreneurship.

The conversation highlights an effective leader involves understanding the various aspects of business operations, including finance, customer relations, and collections.

Website: Dee Bowden – Collect the Cash Biz

LinkedIn: Dee Bowden

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Transcription:

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Dee Bowden Teaser 00:00

Which is why the tracking system is important and I use a cell phone because everybody has one and what I just described or how I said you got your cell phone that's the process.

There is a sale, there is a contract, there is order entry, there is order fulfillment, there is invoicing, they're going to ask you when do you want your bill you tell them and then you're going to pay them.

And I do say if you don't pay them, they got this magical button called services temporarily disconnected.

Intro 00:22

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview?

If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:49

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast and I have an awesome guest back on the show today. I have Dee Bowden. Dee, excited to have you back on the show.

Dee Bowden 00:58

Gresh, it's great to be here. I'm glad to be back on the podcast. I'm excited to have this conversation about Collect the Cash, especially for business owners.

Gresham Harkless 01:06

Yes, absolutely. We were talking before we jumped on and it's such a great conversation that Dee had last time.

And I know it's gonna live up and exceed and do all the awesome things that the business community definitely needs.

So of course, before we jump into that conversation, I wanted to read a little bit more about Dee so you can hear about all the awesome things she's been working on.

And Dee is the author and creator of Collect the Cash. She teaches small and medium sized businesses to solve their cash flow problems by using her 4 keys to collect the cash.

After collecting $6 million in 60 days while working part time for a small IT company, Dee recognized businesses can fall prey to revenue loss if they don't collect the outstanding invoices and track payments.

Her revenue recovery strategies were featured in Forbes and Black Enterprise magazines. And as I mentioned, she was also a guest on the I AM CEO podcast episode number 320.

She has a phenomenal story and I'm sure we're going to delve a little bit more into her book as well too on what got her started.

But one of the really alarming things I read was that score called cash flow the number one reason small businesses fail. 82% of small businesses fail due to some type of cash flow problems.

And throughout her career, I read that she collected over $45 million in unpaid invoices. But before I was preparing for this, I was listening to one of your interviews, Dee, and she said, there needs to be a paradigm shift.

As confident as you are to ask for the sale, you have to be just as confident to ask for the cash.

Dee, excited to have you back on. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Dee Bowden 02:35

I'm so ready to talk to them. My tagline is collect the cash. The sale is not complete until the money's in the bank, but you must collect it first.

You must know that the sales cycle is not complete until you actually get paid for what you sold.

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Gresham Harkless 02:49

Yeah. Actually, could you give us a little insight? What got you started? I would love to hear that story, but I want people to get a little bit more context on why.

Because I think your story is so powerful on why it's important for people to know about how on-boarding is to collect that cash.

Dee Bowden 03:03

Sure thing, well there's two things. First of all, thank you for the opportunity. So I'll tell y'all a little bit about me through a story.

So about, actually next year it'll be 20 years. It's crazy like how fast the time has gone. But basically 20 years ago, I used to work for a small IEC company outside of Boston where I'm from.

As a matter of fact, Gresham mentioned that in the bio. So I work for the small IEC company. For those of you who have ever worked in corporate, for a government agency or government contract, you know how it is.

It's welcome aboard. Here's your cubicle or your office. In my case, it was welcome aboard Dee. Here's your cubicle. Here's your box. Here's your plan. And here's a listing of accounts that have $8 million in outstanding invoices that are owed to this company.

Gresham, you can imagine when I popped up and I was like, y'all have how much? They're like, yeah, we just sold $8 million with the IT services.

So, that's laptops, that's software, all the things. And this company had a collections team. So when I got hired, I'm like, so y'all, nobody's trying to figure out how to get this $8 million.

They're like, nope. And your resume says, you know how to collect the cash so we hired you to help us get this done.

So I sit at my desk in my cubicle and I'm like, okay because I'm a problem solver so I first thought was okay, how did how did the sales happen.

And so the sales person who sold this who sold the IT services? How did they not know that the payments hadn't come in? That's the first question I had.

The second question was, I had, here's a team of experienced collectors. And I'm like, so none of y'all figured out how come these people haven't paid you?

They're like, nope. So I'm old school. So what I did was I literally took my accounts and I said, OK, problem solving.

There's $8 million in outstanding invoices. So some of that is 30 days past due, 60 days past due, 90 days past due, and a couple of accounts that were 120 days past due, which is basically 4 months.

I imagine as a small business owner, you could not last if you had an invoice that was old, that was 90 days past due, which means your cash flow, your payroll, all the things you got to do, that's money that you can't run your business with.

So, back to the story. My 4 keys to collecting cash are problem solving, customer service, gratitude, and relationship building.

So the first thing I did was problem solving. I actually, literally old school, I started calling the customers. I'm like, hi, my name is Dee. I speak to the person from in the accounts and they're like, we have the pleasantries.

And I ask them, could you please tell me what's the issue that this invoice hasn't been paid?

So Gresham, get this. So one company, when I took my call and they said, Dee, we changed our billing system.

So for your business owners, if you all use Microsoft Excel or QuickBooks or whatever, so old school, they had, I think whatever the system was back in the day, they had that system and they said, we've changed our billing system and we notified all our vendors.

I said, you did what? They're like, yeah, we notified everybody. I said, well, when did you send the email?

They said, oh, we sent it out 2 months ago I said well I promise you we never got it my former employer we never got it so I said can you do me a favor please and resend me the email and I also want to confirm that if we basically if I get this email that's 1.

Number 2 you're telling me of the 8,000,000 I can collect 2,000,000 dollars if we reformat these invoices from the old system to the new system. They're like, yep.  And I said, can you put that in writing?

So I get the email and I go talk to my comptroller, my former boss, and she was like, you're telling me we can get $2 million back if we just reformat these invoices.

I'm like, here's the email. She goes, how did you figure that out? I said, one of the keys to collecting the cash is problem solving.

People have to, if you are a business owner, you have to be really good at problem solving, which also involves critical thinking.

You got to answer the question, though. What had I say it this way, you know, it's the why behind the what the what had happened was in collections.

It's the what happened was because basically, when a customer doesn't pay you, there's a story.

There's always a story. There's where if the for example, if you're if you're a small or medium size business owner, and you deal with say, a prime contractor, if the prime contractor doesn't get paid, then obviously you're the subcontractor. You're not getting paid.

But beyond that, as a business owner, you're in the business to solve problems. And if you're not getting paid for why you solve this problem, you have to ask the question, what happened was. And so I asked the question. So in 60 days, I've recovered $6 million.

Gresham Harkless 07:13

Wow, wow. That's that's $6 million. That's crazy. Just to think about that.

Dee Bowden 07:15

So sale, contract, order entry, order fulfillment, accounts payable, accounts receivable, me, there's somebody in every phone company that's collecting the cash every single day because they know how many accounts are due on that day.

So they know how much money is coming in by the day, by the week, by the month. Here's the next thing, before you get to leave the store with your new phone, you actually have to sign a new contract, because you're doing 1 or 2 things.

One, you've just bought a new phone. Two, you're either buying the phone outright, or Three, old school, you're doing the payment plan, aka layaway, but there's a payment plan for your phone, but that's happening every single, every single month.

And then before you get to leave, you have to actually go over to the, to the cashier, and he or she will say, hey, Gresham, Dee, how would you like to pay for this? Debit, credit, cash.

You don't get to leave the store until everything I just described happens and then basically these 2 magical words appear, transaction approved.

And so what I that what I just described how you buy your cell phone is a tracking system that you as a business owner need to have for every client.

You need to know the name of your customer, the contract number if you have one, or order number, the item that you sold to them.

How much did it cost? Or how much are you billing them for? And then what are you supposed to invoice them? That date, and then 30 days later, when are you supposed to get paid?

And a section called notes. Because listen, as brilliant as we all are, none of us can remember all the details for all our e just can't we also we can't solve everything 144 characters I mean, I know we want to text it real quick and we like listen.

But we can't do that y'all gotta have a tracking system to know what's going on. Because here's the thing. What doesn't get tracked doesn't get measured.

And if you don't track it, you end up losing track of your customers, your sales, your invoices and your payments.

And then you don't, then you're like, Oh man, I don't know how to plan for the last quarter of the year.

But if you have been tracking your customers, you'd know this amount of money's coming in, the first of the month, the 15th, the last day of the month.

And now you know how much cash flow you have, so you can plan, okay, I've got a payroll to me, I'm planning on doing upgrades, I'm doing bonuses, I'm doing whatever.

But if you don't have a tracking system in place, you have no idea where you stand. And if a payment is late, what's your process to go collect the cash? Which is why the tracking system is important.

And I use a cell phone because everybody has one. And what I just described, how I said, you got your cell phone, that's the process.

There is a sale, there is a contract, there is order entry, there is order fulfillment, there is invoicing.

They're going to ask you, when do you want your bill? You tell them, and then you're going to pay them.

And I jokingly say, if you don't pay them, they got this magical button called services temporarily disconnected.

Gresham Harkless 09:48

Yeah, absolutely. And I'm sure all of us wish we had that same button within the business.

And to some degree, we might be able to do that. We just have to make sure that we're paying attention to that.

But I almost wonder if part of what I like to call your secret sauce could be for yourself, the business, our combination of both.

Is it, of course, part of that, the 4 C's and being able to understand that, but is it your ability, I feel like to, I don't know, I don't want to say simplify because I feel like a good sign of someone being an expert.

And being really great at what they do is they're able to literally explain it to a four-year-old, so to speak.

Do you feel like your ability to kind of understand that, but also give people the keys, for lack of a better term, in terms of executing that, do you feel like that's what sets you apart and makes you unique?

Dee Bowden 10:29

Absolutely. Absolutely. And thank you for the compliment, number one. Number 2, that's when the cell phone story came in. Because I'm in the government space.

So I deal with contracts and vendors and agencies all the time. So I'm collecting the cash on a regular basis, supporting a government agency.

And I always have to deal with vendors who they, especially if I'm reconciling and I say, we awarded you this contract was worth this much, we, you build this much and that we have this much money left over.

And then they'll say, well, no, Dee we disagree with you. And so I always have to find a way to build the relationships.

And so when I was sitting down thinking about like, what's the best way for me to explain collected cash?

I was gifted the idea about telling the cell phone story because I told it on another podcast and the guy goes, oh my gosh, that's so brilliant. He goes, I would have never thought about that.

But I said, that's what happens in business. All those things I described, how you buy your cell phone.

He was like, Dee, no, and this is the exact word, Dee, no one has ever broken down how we do this.

And I said, well, When you buy your cell phone, you have a contract with the cell phone company.

They bill you. There's a person that looks like me or better. I'm just kidding. But your business is only as successful as the people that support it and the systems that you have in place.

Gresham Harkless 11:47

Nice. I appreciate you so much explaining that too. And I guess being able to track those systems, do you feel like that's one of those CEO hacks that can make you more effective and efficient?

Dee Bowden 11:57

Oh, it absolutely is, Gresham. Here's the thing. I'm so glad that you said that because one of the things is, I think sometimes we let our pride get in the way of saying, I don't know how to do this.

Because of course, if you think about it, if you were a superstar in your corporate career or whatever.

And all of us are guilty of this we all have but you know I was the bubble of love in my career. I did this and this and this and this yada yada yada that's great in the career being in a career versus running a business is very very different.

You have to be able to understand you can't see the outside because you're inside the jar. You're on the inside. You're inside the jar.

So you're like, oh, of course I can do all this. You're like, no sir, no ma'am, no you can't. You need some help, friend. You need some help.

The reason I can sit comfortably and talk about collect the cash today is because I've been I've been at a contract administrator for over 25 years.

But what I was 25 years ago, I'm not I'm not that same person today but I was I learned the systems.

And the processes and I've I had great mentors and I took classes and I've got degrees and all the things.

But the point is that when I first became a contract administrator, what I knew was I knew there were systems, but I had to understand how the systems worked.

I had to understand how the contracts worked. I had to learn how to do problem solving, a customer service, gratitude, and relationship building.

I had to learn how to figure out, okay, when an invoice doesn't hit the right contract, how do you fix that so you can take it off the wrong contract and put the money on the right contract?

I had to learn how finance works and how they collect the money. I had to learn how IT works and all learned all the things.

Gresham Harkless 13:34

Yeah, absolutely. I love that. I love those nuggets. And so you might have already touched on this, but I want to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO.

Our goal is to have different quote unquote CEOs on the show. So Dee, is that dual preneur? Is that what being a CEO means to you?

Dee Bowden 13:49

Well, it does because number one, it allows me, number one, being a CEO is, you're the chief executive officer, but you also, you are the chief executive, chief executive officer of your life.

So number one, I chose not to, not to jump all the way into entrepreneurship full time because there are some things I still don't know.

And so I chose that I'm going to do it this way, which is continue to hone my craft. Because when I finally decide that I'm going to be in this full time, I want to be able to have all the things that I talked about learning.

I will have taken classes in all the things and I will have opportunity to practice and to learn how to do those things better.

Number 2, I think as a CEO, you're responsible for recognizing, where are you on your on your on your journey?

If you are a CEO, let it be you're the CEO of yourself because until you can manage you well you can't manage anybody else.

Well, you got to manage you well and what does that mean that means that you have to invest

in classes, in podcasts, in trainings, in all the things, and you have to understand that becoming a CEO is a journey.

All the companies that we admire, the CEOs that are running these companies, they didn't just become the CEO overnight.

Most of them will tell you, I worked in X department, X department, X department, X department.

I was on an executive training path. So they had us learn all the different departments.

We had to learn how the business works from how do we get a customer? How does the mail come in?

How do we pay an invoice? How do we collect the cash? How does software work? What do you do when the systems don't work?

Most of them will tell you, I spent time learning how the business works and all the things that I also learned.

What's gonna make me a better leader? The better leader I am is when I understand how my people, the people and systems that work for me work and what do I need to do to continue to be better in terms of my personal and professional development.

Gresham Harkless 15:44

Dee, truly appreciate that definition. Of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I want us to do now is pass you the mic, so to speak, to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know.

And of course, where people get a hold of you, get a copy of your book, find out about all the awesome things that you're working.

Dee Bowden 15:58

Please visit www.collectthecash.biz/book. That's www.collectthecash.biz/book. When you buy the book for me personally, I personally signed the book, send you a note, and I actually send it to you.

Gresham Harkless 16:11

Awesome, awesome, awesome. Well, thank you so much, Dee. Of course, we're gonna have the links and information the show notes as well too so that everybody can follow up with you, get a copy of the book, and I hope you have a phenomenal day.

Dee Bowden 16:20

You too. Thanks.

Outro 16:21

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by CBNation and Blue16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community.

Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Subscribe and leave us a 5 star rating. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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