When you run a business, you’ll often have moments when everything seems to be going well. Sales are coming in, customers are responding to your offers, and your operations feel reasonably on track. Yet many Philippine startups discover that, despite these signs, their growth has actually hit a plateau. With time marching on, margins begin to shrink due to inflation and supply cost pressures, which start to exacerbate things.
The fact is, businesses often need to aim past being technically profitable. They must set their sights on a growth rate that, at a minimum, helps them cope with inevitable yearly cost increases, and at best, helps them hit that elusive next stage of growth. Fortunately, big gains do not always have to come from big, disruptive actions. More often, they come from fixing subtle inefficiencies or outdated processes that quietly chip away at your profit potential.
These issues can be easy to miss or ignore, especially when your team is focused on day-to-day operations. But leaving them unaddressed can slow down your business’s ability to scale and make you more vulnerable to being overtaken by competitors that invest in smoother operations. Let’s go through some of the more common yet hidden reasons Philippine businesses are leaving money on the table.
1. Customers Find It Hard to Pay You
A surprisingly common issue is that customers find it hard to settle payments, even when they want to buy from you. This is often the case if you’re reliant on physical cash, but it can also happen if your system only accepts specific digital wallets or bank transfers. If you have an online business that does not yet have an e-commerce site or payment gateway, then this is a particularly common issue. Fortunately, solving this problem is as simple as becoming a Maya Business user and enabling Maya Payment Links.
Maya Payment Links is a simple link payment solution designed for Philippine SMEs and consumers. It works by allowing Maya Business users to offer online customers a secure link for payment that works on any chat or messaging platform that enables live links. All a customer has to do is click or tap on the link, and they will be taken to a secure virtual payment terminal, where they can pay with whatever electronic payment they prefer. Maya Payment Links supports all locally relevant digital wallets, debit and credit cards, as well as QR Ph payments. This makes it the perfect payment acceptance tool for businesses, from startups that primarily operate over social media to larger businesses that need to effectively plug gaps in their payment acceptance processes.
2. Poor Cash Flow Visibility Due to Manual Tracking
Perfect payment acceptance is great, but it means little if you don’t have a clear sense of your financial position. While it’s normal for businesses to juggle multiple wallets, bank accounts, spreadsheets, and chat-based payment notifications, this inevitably creates blind spots that make it difficult to manage expenses.
Digitalizing your financials reduces the risks and guesswork that are necessary evils of manual processes. To make transitioning even easier, choose technology partners that give you full visibility into your cash inflows and outflows. Maya is an especially good choice, thanks to Maya Business Manager, a platform that helps businesses track, manage, and optimize their finances with a comprehensive yet easy-to-use interface.
Cash coming in and out from Maya Payment Links, Maya Checkout, Maya Terminal, and other Maya offerings are logged in Maya Business Manager, giving better visibility into your cash flow. Maya Business also enables you to generate timelier reports and reduces the need for manual data management, simplifying reconciliations. Instead of having to manually double-check bank transfers or chase screenshots, your team gets instant visibility into what was paid, when it was paid, and by whom.
3. Slow or Inconsistent Invoicing Processes
If your business sells services, bespoke products, or B2B packages, you may have experienced delayed payments because of invoicing issues. For example, you may be relying on PDFs and emails, or you might be issuing invoices through a channel that isn’t fully integrated with your payment methods.
Maya Invoice Payments keeps these issues to a minimum by letting you attach payment links directly to invoices so that customers can pay you as soon as they receive the bill. No need for follow-up or complicated instructions that stretch your payment cycle longer than necessary.
4. Operational Inefficiencies
Operational drag is particularly insidious because it is often baked into your business’s way of doing things. When you do recognize it for what it is, you may not even think it’s that big of a deal. Still, these little points of friction can combine to kill your profits. Such things as “turn-based” email coordination between departments, inventory systems that require manual checklists, and time-consuming reconciliation routines all inflate your operating expenses, with these costs going up the larger your team becomes.
Again, digitalization done right serves to lighten the load. Whether it’s with tools like Maya Payment Links or enterprise resource planning software, each manual process you cut down opens up profits you didn’t know you had. Start with your payments first, then start hunting down those bottlenecks that keep eating into your time and money.
Maya Powers Your Business Profits
Left unchecked, small inefficiencies can easily snowball into major losses. Thankfully, the right tools and a digital-first approach can help your business overcome these hidden issues and set you on a path to sustainable profitability. Sign up for Maya Business to order Maya Payment Links and start removing the friction points that have been slowing down your business.
Maya Business users are entitled to a high-performance Maya Business Deposit account for receiving payments. You’ll enjoy an industry-leading 2.5% per annum interest rate on your account and earn PHP 25,000 in interest per year on every PHP 1 million deposit. Your Maya Business Deposit account can also transfer funds for free via InstaPay and PESONet, saving you on payments to investors, partners, and suppliers.
As a Maya Business user, you’re also entitled to a Maya Flexi Loan offer of up to PHP 2 million, which you’ll receive within just 3 months. Use the funds you borrow to fix your business’s hidden profitability issues or give your business a lifeline in small emergencies. Don’t forget to use Maya as your primary processor for all wallet and card payments to receive better Maya Flexi Loan offers in the future.
Sign up for Maya Business today and order Payment Links to start offering each customer a secure and convenient free payment link on their preferred messaging platform. Be sure to explore the other payment solutions in the Maya ecosystem to expand your business’s profit-generation potential.
