Seeing your business thrive is a wonderful feeling. All your hard work, late-night calls, busy mornings, weekend shifts, and being available round the clock finally pay off, and you start making money.

You are excited, but part of you is also anxious. “What are you going to do with all the surplus cash?” If you keep it in the bank, it will either be taxed or end up being used on personal expenses, family recreation, or other luxuries, making it an unwise decision.

The best solution? Start investing your business profit to hold or grow it. If you are down for that, here are 5 tips on investing money as a business.

1.    Grow your physical assets.

Investing your business profits in physical assets like real estate or gold is a great idea.

Besides adding to your net worth, real estate can also get you rental income. However, if you don’t have a large sum of money, you can always go for an investment property loan.

Being an intelligent businessman, you do not always have to use a finance or mortgage broker. Instead, you can deal directly with the lender. If you don’t feel confident, an online finance course with Monarch will equip you with the knowledge to do it yourself. Online investing courses are an excellent way to build up your knowledge of the principles, techniques and wisdom needed to make investment decisions.

Alternatively, you can opt to invest in gold and buy bullion – 99.5% pure gold bars or coins – that are very easy to store, and their value hardly depreciates.

2.    Upgrade your staff.

Another smart move would be to invest in your employees. Investing in your people means investing in the future of your business because a well-educated and skilled force is more likely to keep your business on track towards its goals.

This can be done in many ways. For example, you can launch funding programs for individuals who wish to get higher education or paid courses that would help them grow. This not only upgrades your staff but also instills gratitude and respect in your staff for what the company is doing for them.

The second way is to get their hands on updated tools that help them do their job more efficiently and in a shorter period. Again, the more efficient the staff, the better it is for your business.

3.    Add to your equipment and inventory.

Being a business owner, you would agree that your work environment can always be improved and upgraded. This could be done by revamping the interior to give it a new look and fresh feel for the staff, or this could be an addition or upgrade in the equipment.

Upgrading a key piece of equipment can help increase productivity and reduce costs, ultimately increasing your profit. The equipment will also become an asset for you to sell and recover the initial investment at any time.

Also, if there is enough space, you can add additional raw material to your inventory. Bulk buying will always give you a good purchase price, and you are likely to save money in the longer run.

4.    Diversify your portfolio.

They say, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. This might be the right time to use this idea and diversify your portfolio.

With money on hand, you may find yourself in a position to invest in another business, where you don’t need to show up every day and spend hours. So instead, you let your money work for you.

You can do it in two ways: either loan your money to another company in exchange for equity, or you can buy that company’s stocks. By purchasing equity, you’ll become a share-holder in profit, and by investing in stocks, you’d get monthly dividends. Either way, you’ll be making money without spending time, which is your greatest asset.

5.    Build up an emergency account.

A seasoned businessman knows that it’s not always sunshine and happiness. Every business has its good and bad days, and just like in your personal life, you want to put money away for unplanned business expenses or emergencies.

For example, you could have a major fault in your assembly line or might have to pay a hefty licensing fee under some new regulation. Of course, you will never know what’s coming, but you have to be prepared for the worst.

So, it’s wise to have a kind of emergency fund at hand that you only access when it’s most needed.

This is critically important for businesses based on a seasonal product or service because you will have slow days. An emergency saving account can be handy in such cases.

It’s up to you what you take away from these tips, but always try to spend your surplus money wisely; either let it grow or hold it somewhere it doesn’t lose its value!