Case Studies

DATA STRATEGY

Your data strategy should address technology, process, people, organizational, and adoption considerations that will ultimately help you make better decisions based on your data.

Data Management Solutions

We can guide your organization through the best practices of Master Data Management (MDM), data governance, and building a data-literate organization.

Data Warehouse and Data Engineering

Our data engineers can help your organization select and implement the right solutions for data warehouse migrations, modernization, and automation at any scale.

1500
+
Satisfied clients

2070
+
Order Served

6080
+
5 Star Received

Data and App Integration

From customer portals, to intranets, to systems integrations, we’ve got an excellent track record helping organizations fill in technology gaps and designing solutions focused on business outcomes.

Advanced Analytics

AI READINESS & ENABLEMENT

With the rise of artificial intelligence as a transformative force across industries, our mission is to ensure your organization is not just prepared but primed to harness the full potential of AI technologies.

BI Dashboards and Visualizations

DASHBOARDS & VISUALIZATIONS

Our team is committed to developing best practices for presenting data in a way that is accessible and understandable. This includes dashboards, data marts, and self-service analytics.

Strategic Consulting Services That Fuel Firm Growth

Firms across North America turn to us to guide and inform business decisions. We help firm leaders rethink norms, develop new solutions, and execute with confidence. Each solution is tailored to the client, taking into consideration culture, strategy, economics, and untapped potential.

Executive Coaching

Elevate your high performers to the next level

For over 20 years, the coaches at PipelinePlus have helped high-achieving professionals across North America advance their careers to the next level. Our comprehensive coaching programs unleash your full potential, driving both personal and organizational success.

Step 1: We begin by conducting assessments that reveal insights into your strengths, areas for improvement, and untapped potential. By gaining a comprehensive understanding of your challenges and opportunities, we can tailor a coaching experience that truly resonates with your unique needs.

Step 2: Next, we co-create a personalized development plan that aligns with your aspirations and the goals of your organization. We identify key areas for growth and design a roadmap that addresses the strategic, political, and behavioral obstacles that might hinder your progress.

Step 3: Finally, we have in-depth conversations focused on implementing your plan. We equip you with practical strategies and tools to overcome barriers, enhance your leadership presence, and cultivate influential relationships. With our guidance, you will develop the skills necessary to seize opportunities, drive positive change, and lead with confidence.

1500
+
Satisfied clients

2070
+
Order Served

6080
+
5 Star Received

Business Development Strategy Assessments

Optimize the revenue potential of your firm

Optimizing the revenue potential of your firm requires alignment between the business development function and your partners. Our Health Assessment draws from the practices of the most successful firms, ensuring that your strategy is competitive in today’s business environment. 

Our program is composed of three steps:

First, we evaluate your current BD strategy and the projects and skillsets that support it.

Then, we align your BD function with your goals and identify the gaps that may be holding your firm back.

Finally, we provide the insights and training required to close those gaps, so your BD function can maximize your partners’ rainmaking potential. 

The outcomes of our program are twofold: a BD strategy precisely tailored to your firm’s revenue goals, and greater

Business Credit Repair

Many of our business credit clients have shown concern and discouragement in regard to repairing and building their credit profiles.

Some business owners will make an effort to cut corners on costs wherever they can. We have come across clients who spent countless hours/days/months digging through the overwhelming content on Google, in an effort to repair and build credit on their own. Most of these clients have come to us after exhausting all their options with only a lot of wasted time and resources to show for it. Time that could have been spent creating more success for their company.

So unfortunately, there is no “how-to guide” for repairing business credit, similarly to personal credit, it will depend on the information on each individual report, the judgments, liens, bankruptcies, and/or delinquencies weighing down the scores and the stability of the overall business. There are major differences between repairing business credit and repairing personal credit. Minimal laws and regulations govern the business credit reporting agencies. They are not required by law to give businesses information or address requests in a timely manner where personal credit bureaus are held to the laws of FCRA & its amendments.

We have also come across clients who have submitted numerous requests to D&B, Experian, and Equifax asking for information to be removed. Many of them have gone months without any results or even a response from the bureaus.

1500
+
Satisfied clients

2070
+
Order Served

6080
+
5 Star Received

How Business Credit Scores Are Tabulated

Similarly, to personal credit repair, when a business is looking to improve scores there is frequently credit repair needed to remove delinquent information on reports. But, due to the highly unregulated nature of business credit it is close too impossible to know how to fix incorrect or delinquent information without first reviewing reports with a business credit specialist. There are also counter intuitive rules that apply that cannot be guessed or found by the lay person.

Key Takeaways

Building a strong credit history takes time. That’s why it makes sense to adopt good credit habits even if you aren’t planning to apply for new loans in the near future.
To help improve your credit, make sure to pay your bills on time and try to only use a portion of the total credit available to you.

Following a budget, keeping an emergency fund, and avoiding taking on too much debt in the first place can make it easier to care for your credit. Keeping up a solid credit history and good credit score is a bit like staying in shape—you have to work at it regularly to stay at the top of your game. If you wanted to run a marathon, you wouldn’t wait to start training until it was a month away. Similarly, you don’t want to neglect your credit until you’re about to apply for a major loan.

Instead, try to incorporate good credit habits into your regular financial routines. That way, if or when you need to apply for new credit, you should already be in a strong position. Read on for 8 habits to consider adopting to help raise your credit score.

1. Never miss a bill due date

Paying your bills on time is the cardinal rule of maintaining a good credit score. That’s because your payment history—meaning whether you’ve paid your past credit card and other loan bills on time or not—is typically one of the most important contributing factors to your credit score.1

If you have trouble staying on top of bill dates you can consider:

Enrolling in autopay. That way you can make your payments on time automatically.
Registering for billing alerts. These can give you an extra reminder before your payment is due.
Creating a DIY reminder system. Set up recurring alerts on your calendar, or make sure bill emails stay at the top of your inbox until you’ve paid them.
Which strategies you use may depend on what your credit card, lender, or other service provider offers (i.e., not all bills may be eligible for autopay or alerts). But make sure to find a system that works for you.

2. Keep your balances low

If you have revolving lines of credit, such as credit cards or a home equity line of credit, try to make sure you only use a portion of the total credit available to you. One rule is to make sure your outstanding balance is never more than 30% of your credit limit, like staying at or below a $3,000 balance on a credit card with a $10,000 limit.

That ratio is called your credit utilization, and it’s typically another important contributing factor to your credit score. All else equal, using less of the total credit available to you should help your credit score.

3. Think twice before closing old cards

Another contributor to your credit score is the average age of your credit accounts. The longer the average age, the better for your credit (because it shows you have more experience managing debt and means lenders have a longer track record for you to evaluate).

That’s why it may make sense to keep old credit cards open, even if you don’t actively use them anymore. (However, closing a card could still be the right move if it charges an annual fee or if keeping it open creates a temptation to overspend.)

4. Be cautious about new loan applications

When you apply for a new credit card or loan, the issuer or lender will generally make a so-called “hard inquiry” into your credit. These inquiries hurt your credit, though they typically only affect your credit score for a year (and stay on your credit report for only 2 years).2

You can help reduce the negative impact of hard inquiries on your credit by:

Thinking twice about opening new credit cards. Make sure a new card is the right move for you long-term before you apply.
Avoiding hard inquiries if you’ll be applying for a major loan soon. If you’re planning to buy a house in the next year, it might make sense to avoid new cards altogether.
Being efficient when rate shopping. If you’re shopping around for the best interest rate on a new loan (like a mortgage), try to submit all your loan applications around the same time, like within a 1- to 2-week period. Credit scoring models will generally only ding you once—even if you submitted multiple loan applications—if it’s clear that you were rate shopping.3
Finally, know that checking your own credit is not considered a hard inquiry and so won’t hurt your credit score.

5. Consider a well-rounded credit history

To reach a top-tier credit score, it can help to show that you have experience with a variety of types of credit—such as credit cards, auto loans, mortgages, and home equity loans—instead of only one type (such as only credit cards).

This doesn’t mean you should borrow money that you don’t need. But if taking on a new type of loan makes sense within your broader financial plan, know that it might also benefit your credit over the long term.

6. Check your credit report regularly

You’re entitled by federal law to a free annual credit reportOpens in a new window from each of the 3 major credit reporting agencies: Equifax®, Experian®, and TransUnion®. When you check your report, keep an eye out for anything amiss, such as:

Incorrect account details—like a payment reported as late that you’re sure you made on time
Overlooked past-due accounts—such as a forgotten old balance that you need to resolve
Evidence of fraud or identity theft—like a credit inquiry that you don’t recognize
Consider checking one report every 4 months to keep regular tabs on your credit.

7. Dispute any errors you find

If you do ever find incorrect information on your credit report, try to get the information corrected. That typically means both filing a formal dispute with the credit reporting agency and pursuing the issue with the relevant creditor.

Although the process might take some legwork, it can be worth it to make sure your credit history provides a fair and accurate picture of you as a borrower.

8. Keep your broader finances in shape

It can be easier to stay fit when you lead a healthy lifestyle. Similarly, it can be easier to maintain a good credit score when you keep other areas of your finances on track. To adopt a healthy financial lifestyle, consider:

Following a budget. We recommend the 50/15/5 budget, which limits essential expenses to 50% of your take-home pay.
Avoiding getting over-stretched by debt. One guideline is to make sure your total debt payments don’t exceed 36% of your income.
Making sure you have an adequate emergency fund. Try to keep 3 to 6 months’ worth of living expenses in emergency savings, so that you don’t need to rely on credit cards if something unexpected comes up.
Stick to these habits and pretty soon, minding your credit may become second nature.

Want to see how your financial fitness stacks up? Consider getting a financial checkup or trying one of our budgeting and debt management calculators and tools. You can also learn more about strategies for paying down debt, and best practices for managing your credit cards.

How To Build Good Credit

Luckily, there are several steps that you can take to improve your credit score. Some of them may be things you work on over the course of weeks or months. Others are doable in a single day and will help your credit improve quickly:

1. Review your credit reports.
2. Get a handle on bill payments.
3. Use 30% or less of your available credit.
4. Limit requests for new credit.
5. Pad out a thin credit file.
6. Keep your old accounts open and deal with delinquencies.
7. Consider consolidating your debt.
8. Track your progress with credit monitoring.

Each of these steps, whether short-term or long-term, will help you improve your credit score and build good credit. Here’s a closer look at what’s involved in each step of the process to build good credit and how long you can expect each step to take.

1500
+
Satisfied clients

2070
+
Order Served

6080
+
5 Star Received