Did you ever do something that everyone else thought was crazy that turned out to be smart?  I bet when Truett Cathy began selling his chicken sandwich, they were not thinking that he was the smartest small business owner around; maybe they even thought he was a little crazy.  Strangely though, thanks to Mr. Cathy, I seem to keep eating Mor Chikin.  Speaking of crazy ideas, can you imagine telling your investors that you’re a fast food restaurant that’s not going to be open on Sundays?  They would say you were crazy.  But Truett Cathy is not crazy; he’s crazy smart.

If you’re a small to medium sized business and let your customers pay you on terms, is that crazy?  No.  Although, don’t you wish they would pay you much more quickly?  Most business owners have a list of several pressing, growth-oriented ways to deploy cash, payroll included, and need it as soon as possible.    What if you gave your customers a 2% discount to pay you in 5 days and they did it every time?  Most small businesses would be all over that.  In fact, a small business can set up an accounts receivable line of credit that allows them to get their cash in a few days for a fee.  The conventional wisdom is that financing your business by setting up a line of credit based on your receivables, or factoring, is crazy.   It’s not; it’s crazy smart.  Every time a business accepts a credit card for payment, they are getting paid faster for a fee.  Risk bucking the conventional wisdom to something cash-wise.

It’s the businesses who take a risk and do something different from their competitors that give themselves the opportunity to stand out.   Have you done something crazy that turned out to be crazy smart?