Acquisition creates a customer. Billing creates oxygen.
The cash conversion cycle is the operating distance between paying for demand and collecting from the customer. Shorten that distance with terms, deposits, milestone triggers, and invoice discipline.
Four checkpoints from cash out to cash in.
Select a checkpoint to inspect the operating intervention. Days are illustrative and should be tuned to the contract, customer, and delivery model.
Stop funding the gap
Map the lead cost, delivery cost, contract trigger, and expected collection date before the sale is accepted.
cash_out → collection_dateMove cash without creating new failure modes.
Due date, payment method, deposit, and late-payment treatment are visible before work begins.
Advance payment matches discovery, setup, capacity, or materials the business must fund.
Deliverable and approval criteria are concrete enough to generate the next invoice.
Every receivable has a next action, not just a colored status in a dashboard.
Shorter payment terms do not guarantee faster collections. Invoice accuracy, approval workflow, customer risk, and payment access determine whether a due date becomes cash.
What usually breaks the cash path.
Milestone completes, but the invoice waits for a weekly admin batch. Fix: trigger billing from the approved event.
Customer cannot tell what the upfront payment funds. Fix: tie it to named setup, discovery, or reserved-capacity work.
Everyone can see a late invoice, but no one owns the next action. Fix: assign account-level collection responsibility.
Measure the distance. Then shorten it.
Track invoice lag, DSO, deposit coverage, approval delay, and actual collection date before scaling acquisition.
OPEN CASH TRACE