It’s not an exaggeration to say that the fate of your company could be decided by your ability to negotiate shrewd and safe deals with customers.

More companies are suddenly floating belly up in the corporate fish tank.

This can hurt you two ways:

• The dead-in-the-water customer owes you money, and/or
• You rely — make that relied — on that company as a primary supplier.

But there are strategic steps you can take, in addition to what you’ve already done, to help minimize the impact of today’s shifting economy.

1. Identify your key suppliers and set up a monitoring system. If a primary supplier shut its doors today, would you have anticipated it? Do you already have a back-up plan in place? Or would you be left scrambling and grasping for new suppliers, who could take advantage of your desperation?

Three suggestions, other than your usual sleuthing:

• Subscribe to Dun & Bradstreet financial alerts
• If it’s a publicly traded company, seek copies of annual and quarterly reports, and
• If your company has an online brokerage account, you probably can access expert stock analyst reports on the account.

Spread yourself thinner. If you haven’t done it already, begin splitting up the suppliers for your most-vital products and services. There’s always been pressure to economize, which usually means consolidating with one supplier. Now, whatever you might be saving will quickly be lost — and more — if you continue to keep all of your eggs in one basket.

Expect an ebb and flow. Finally, in negotiating contracts for your company, make sure you include clauses that’ll protect from future increases — and reward you for future decreases. Many companies treat this as a one-way street. With the yo-yo nature of some resources, like oil, you’ll want the flexibility to roll with price swings in either direction.

Tags: contract, customer, decreases, increases, price, supplier