Branding your business in the very early stages of a startup should be one of your top priorities. However, branding can seem like an ancillary task that costs money but delivers no immediate value to a new business. In reality, the opposite is true. A business without a brand is like a person without a personality.

A brand represents your promise to consumers, and the visual elements of your brand identity, such as your logo design, help people associate your products, services, and messages with that promise.

Branding your business doesn’t have to cost a fortune or take months and months to develop. There are many tools available online that can help you create and launch a brand in an affordable manner. Here are three things the entrepreneur should do right now to develop a brand that can help your business grow in the long-term.

1. Develop your brand identity

A brand identity includes tangible and intangible elements. Before you can develop your brand identity, you must understand your market, competitors, and target audience. Without this knowledge, you’ll have no way of knowing what your brand should promise to consumers and how to position it so it has a chance to occupy a unique place in consumers’ minds.

Once you gather your research and data, you can define your brand’s promise and position, and then develop a brand identity that effectively communicates that promise and position. Your logo design, your color palette, the typefaces used in marketing materials, your website, ads, and so on, must consistently reflect that brand identity.

2. Create a marketing plan with short- and long-term goals defined

Building brand awareness, recall, trial, and loyalty take time, but there is no doubt that brand value can play a significant role in the success of a business. Think of some of your favorite brands. What do those brands mean to you? Your marketing plan should include initiatives that help consumers develop similar emotional connections to your brand.

Today, the social web offers a perfect place to build brand awareness and recall. By publishing useful and meaningful content and joining relevant conversations online, you can jump start brand development in a way that didn’t exist ten years ago. Social media marketing is extremely affordable and has few barriers to entry. With patience and persistence, you’ll be able to create an online buzz about your brand that leads to purchases and word-of-mouth marketing.

3. Protect your brand.

Visit the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office website (www.uspto.gov) and trademark your brand name and logo to protect it. You don’t want to invest time and money into building your brand and business only to have another company trademark the same name and demand that you stop using it. Similarly, secure your brand name in a website URL, Twitter profile, Facebook Page, LinkedIn Company Page, Pinterest profile, YouTube Channel, and any other social media site where you might publish content in the future. It only takes a few minutes, but the long-term return on those few minutes could amount to so much more.

Ongoing Brand Development

All of these tips can realistically be accomplished within a couple of months and for well under $1,000 (for marketing- and web-savvy entrepreneurs, it can be done in a couple of weeks for less than $500).

Of course, brand-building is an ongoing process that doesn’t end after you trademark your brand name and create a logo. Consumers are fickle, which means your brand needs to stay top-of-mind and continually meet or exceed their expectations or they’ll turn away from it in search of another brand.

As you learned in #2 above, the social web offers a great place to set consumer expectations for your brand and persistently engage with consumers and sustain relationships with them. That’s what leads to brand advocacy, and that’s where the value of branding moves from an intangible business asset to a powerful form of brand equity.

LogoGarden.com founder and President John Williams, a leading logo design expert, literally wrote the book on brand standards for companies like Hewlett-Packard and Mitsubishi. His blogs have been published on sites including MSMBC, Microsoft.com, Yahoo Small Business and Kauffman Foundation’s entrepreneurship.org.

In 2005 John launched the first ever do-it-yourself logo creation website and developed the “Branding Equation”, laying out simple rules for making logos memorable. Over 100,000 entrepreneurs have used John’s unique, automated processes and tools to create their own professional-looking logos at minimal cost.

15 years prior, John ran Logic Design, his own graphic design and branding firm serving Fortune 500 companies such as Caterpillar, Toshiba and AT&T.

Geoff Whitmore is lead traveler/writer at NoobTraveler.com, a blog dedicated to educating its readers on reward travel, travel tips, and cost-saving travel techniques.

Having your own business can be a pain, but we all know there are a ton of positives such as: freedom, being your own boss, creative control, tax write-offs, and a big one for me…business rewards credit cards.

Business Perks

If you have your own business, you have expenses. Some businesses have more bills than others, but there are always costs or purchases being run through a business. Some businesses will have shipping, gas, and production costs, while others may spend their money on ads and Internet marketing. My business expenses include travel, ads, meals and entertainment. Yep, a lot of business lunches.

OK, you get that businesses spend money. So, here’s the deal: If you aren’t using a business rewards or cash back credit card, you are losing money. Maybe it’s money that you didn’t know existed, but there is true opportunity lost. My motto is “If I’m spending a dollar and I’m not earning a point, I’m not getting the full value out of my dollar.”

Extra bonuses are even built into these cards for specific purposes. For example, the The Business Gold Rewards Card(R) from American Express OPEN will get you 3x points per $1 on airfare and 2x points on advertising, gas, and shipping. On anything else, you will get 1 point per $1. The Chase Ink BoldSM with Ultimate Rewards will net 5x points per $1 on all office supplies, Internet/cable, and wireless communications–plus 2x points per $1 on gas. These extra bonus categories can really help to grow your rewards balances.

The Bounty

The points or miles you are earning aren’t just throw-away points. They are as good as currency, and the value is insane. I have used my miles and points to travel across the world for pennies. I have taken trips that I never would have been able to take without the help of miles and points. I have even been able to travel all classy in the front of the plane–and there isn’t anything special about me. I just use my rewards cards for all of my spending and watch the miles stack up.

Another great perk is that when you sign up for a rewards card, there is often a large bonus that comes along with the card. Signup bonuses can range from 25,000 to 100,000 miles. We are talking about hundreds, and in some cases thousands of dollars, just for signing up for the card. It’s up to us to take advantage of the sweet offers while they’re out there.

I have consulted many businesses and I’m always shocked when they have no rewards cards. Business owners are similarly shocked when they find out how much value they are losing. I consulted one business owner who was spending $20,000 per month on ads and wasn’t earning anything back besides what he paid. He is now raking in the miles and traveling like an Egyptian Princess.

The point is that no matter your business (S-corp, LLC, or even a Sole Proprietor), there is a rewards card out there that can meet your needs and maximize your hard-earned dollars. Whether you want a card that earns miles for travel, points for various gift cards or gadgets, or just a card that gives you cash back, the options are out there. So, why not take advantage? It just makes sense.

Geoff Whitmore curates the best rewards travel deals in his daily blog posts and articles on NoobTraveler.com. The site particularly focuses on new travelers (or as they like to call them, “Noobs”), and it teaches its readers how to save BIG. All the while, the site maintains a humorous writing style that is both fun and informative.

Eight out of ten people make buying decisions on a business website; so driving visitors to yours is essential in gaining new customers and building your brand.

Here are eight easy steps you can take to promote your website and increase your visitors. Some of them may take very little time to accomplish, but they will make a world of difference to your bottom line.

Boost Your Visibility on Search Engines

Nothing is more important to the success of a website than search engines. Optimizing your website for search is a critical step. Although there are many search engine optimization (SEO) tools you can use to get people to your page, the following methods will help you promote your site quickly so that you are immediately visible to customers.

1.  Submit Your Site to Search Engines

Submitting your website is free and helps notify the search engine that it should consider adding you to its index. To do so, follow these links:

• Google Submit Your Content
• Bing Submit Your Site (also shows up in Yahoo)

2.    Submit Your Site to Local Search Listings

On top of submitting your site to the three main search engines, you can also submit it to the search engines’ local listings. Local listings show up in the results for people who are close to your business. Even if you’re targeting a broader market, you should go ahead and take advantage of local listings since they’re free. Follow the links below to submit:

• Google Places for Business
• Bing Business Listing
• Yahoo Business Listing

For detailed information about optimizing your website for local search, see How to Use ‘Local SEO’ to Attract More Customers in Your Area.

3.    Pay for Search Engine Advertising (“Paid Search”)

If you want to get traffic to your site immediately, you can pay Google, Yahoo, and Bing to display your ad when people search for specific keywords. For example, if you wanted your site to show up when a person types in “tapas Austin” in Google, you could bid on Google for the keyword “tapas Austin”. If your bid was high enough, your site would show up on the right side of the Google search results and you would only pay Google if someone clicked on your ad.

Below are the paid search interfaces for the top three search engines: Google, Yahoo and Bing.

• Google AdWords
• Microsoft AdCenter (ads show up on both Yahoo and Bing)

You can find keywords to bid on for your website by using:

• Google AdWords Keyword Tool

Promote on Blogs, Forums, and Social Media

After letting the search engines know you exist, it’s time to make actual people aware of you. Referrals to your website from authoritative and trustworthy sources can give you a boost in traffic and help you establish a credible online presence.

4.    Comment on Blogs, Forums, and Social Media Posts

Comment on other people’s blogs or forum posts (that are of course related to your business) and post a link back to your website. (Where possible, return the favor on your site if asked.) Also, use social media to respond to people who are talking about issues related to your business and link them to your website.

5.    Reach Out and Spread the Word

Ask anyone you personally know who runs a website—friends, family, colleagues and business contacts—to post a link to your website. Also, reach out to bloggers or journalists who could write about your business and link back to your website. Make sure you’re reaching out to blogs or publications that are “influencers” (i.e. have a lot of social followers or industry clout) in your target market. Also, work on your pitch and make sure you’re offering something their respective audiences want to read about.

6.    Utilize Social Media

Create Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ pages and link to your website on those pages. If you’ve got a blog on your website, remember to link to your blog posts regularly on social media. For a detailed guide on how to effectively market your business with social media, see How To: Promote with Social Media.

Offline Marketing / Branding

In addition to promoting your website online, you can also use the following traditional marketing tools to increase traffic to your site.

7.    List Your Website on Your Business Cards

Promoting your website on your business cards is a great way to drive more traffic to your site. You can also add a QR code that will take people directly to you website when they scan the code with their smartphones. For help with creating and ordering your business cards, see How To: Order Business Cards.

8.    Create and Distribute Basic Marketing Materials

Other printed marketing materials are great for branding and advertising your business. List your website as well as your social media pages on everything from flyers and menus to magnets and key chains you can distribute for free. For more information on creating marketing materials for your business, see How To: Create Basic Marketing Materials.

Suzanne Kearns is a small business owner and contributor for Money Crashers Personal Finance, an online resource with tips for managing money, starting a small business, and building wealth.

There are many reasons to use a small business credit card, including the ability to establish credit in the business’ name, have an instant line of credit, simplify your record keeping, and keep your personal and business finances separate – a critical component if you want to claim the tax benefits of a corporation or LLC. But when it comes time to pick a card, there are many options from which to choose.

Credit card companies have been courting small business owners for years, and today’s offers are much more appealing than those of the past. However, there are still a number of questions to ask yourself when choosing a business credit card:

1. What Are Your Spending Habits?
Not everyone handles their cash flow the same way, and luckily there is a credit card designed for virtually every type of “financial personality.” For instance, if you plan to pay off the balance every month, you might prefer a card that offers cash back, travel rewards, or a longer grace period instead of a lower interest rate.

On the other hand, if you intend to carry a balance or want to use a card as a line of credit, the interest rate should be your paramount concern. Be sure to understand the APR and what it adjusts to after the introductory term, as well as any extra fees and late penalties. Of course, you never want to miss a credit card payment, as it can cause significant damage to your credit score.

2. Which Types of Rewards Work for You?
If you travel frequently for business, a travel rewards card like the American Express Starwood Preferred Guest business credit card is a good option as it can save you money on flights and hotel stays. However, for those who do not travel frequently, a cash back rewards card may be an excellent option.

The cash back you receive can be as much as 5% of select purchases, which will add up quickly when you use the credit card as your primary payment method and pay off the balance every month. Other cards offer points toward items such as office supplies, gift cards, car rentals, or discounts to stores and restaurants. Take a good look at your spending habits and determine which type of rewards program will benefit you the most, then compare cards to find the best offer. The Chase Ink Cash business credit card is a good option for cash back rewards.

3. Is There an Annual Fee?
The presence of an annual fee may cause you to reject a card outright. However, annual fees can actually make sense depending on your situation and the benefits the card offers. For example, if you choose a cash back card and use it for all your monthly expenses, the cash you earn may more than make up for the annual fee. Just be sure to run the numbers before you make a decision.

4. Are the Offers Temporary or Permanent?
Sure, 0% interest sounds great, but if it rises to 25% in the second year, it may not be a very good deal. Often, credit card providers offer a great promotional deal to reel you in, only to increase it substantially after a year or so. If you’re trying to build your business credit, switching credit card providers every year to a lower interest card can hurt your credit. Your score is made up of a number of factors, one of which is the length of time your accounts stay open. If you perpetually close accounts and open new ones, your score will take a hit.

A better solution is to look for a card provider that is willing to offer you a low APR on a permanent basis. You may not get 0% interest, but you won’t likely be paying astronomical rates in the future either.

5. Does It Offer Online Banking?
If you’re like most business owners, you don’t want to spend a lot of time each month paying your bills. Surprisingly, not all business credit cards offer online banking, so if saving time is important to you, you’ll need to find one that does. In addition, look for a card provider that will allow you to run quarterly and annual reports during tax time, which will also save you loads of time. Another benefit to banking online is the ability to transfer funds between accounts with the stroke of a key.

Final Thoughts
Having a small business credit card can be beneficial to just about any business owner, but only if you do your homework and find the card that works for you. The best way to get the credit card most suited to your needs is to visit a credit card comparison site, such as the one offered by ChooseWhat.com, to study the offerings and benefits of each card.

What are some of the other factors you take into consideration when choosing a credit card for your small business?

However, we know that there are many different email marketers out there in many different types of situations. Perhaps you’re a little further down the road with your business and want a service that you can customize more, or maybe you’re a graphic designer with a ton of experience designing for email.

While our basic email marketing reviews can still help you make a decision, you might need more advanced tools. Read more about these types of services below.

B2B Email Marketing

Business-to-business (B2B) email marketing services are geared towards business who need to market to business customers. Because there’s a longer sales cycle associated with B2B than B2C, B2B marketers need a tool that can help them communicate more often with business customers throughout the buying cycle. You’ll find that B2B email marketing services offer higher volume plans (for example, starting at 5,000 subscribers) than regular email marketing services.  Additionally, these services may offer some or all of the following features:

• “Drip marketing” campaigns — Lets you create and automatically send create multiple sequences of email campaigns based on “triggers,” or actions your subscribers take.
• Behavioral targeting – You can target prospects based on their previous activity.
• Advanced segmenting – Set up segmentation criteria and create targeted campaigns by segment
• Managed email marketing services – Some vendors will offer extra services, such as designing your email template, completely running and managing your email campaigns, and monitoring your email lists

Pinpointe is a great B2B email marketing service that provides unlimited image hosting space, an easy-to-use WYSIWYG editor, and other cool features geared towards B2B email marketers, such as survey creating, dynamic content insertion, and trigger campaigns. You can sign up for a 15-day trial for $5 before committing to Pinpointe’s B2B email marketing service.

Agencies, Resellers and Web Developers

Some email marketing services are extremely flexible and allow maximum customization. They are geared towards agencies or email marketing resellers—anyone who has multiple clients they need to develop customized campaigns for and manage all in one place.

Campaign Monitor is an email marketing service that was originally created with designers, developers and resellers in mind.  The service allows you to create your own templates with HTML code and upload them into the service. Recently, Campaign Monitor added a sleek WYSIWYG editor to their interface that gives even the average user the ability to make professional quality email marketing campaigns using the service’s premade templates.

Campaign Monitor is also designed for those who create and manage multiple email campaigns for multiple clients, since their interface allows you to easily toggle between between clients. Learn more about Campaign Monitor.

Full-Service Email Marketing

Full-service email marketing is great for those who want to completely outsource their email marketing efforts. A full-service email marketing service will take care of every aspect of email marketing for you, from creating your emails to sending and monitoring your campaigns.Some services will even write your email content for you, provided you send them some minimal information. This service meant for any company with a bigger-than-average marketing budget or anyone who wants to save time on doing in-house marketing.

Benchmark Email is a reliable email marketing brand that offers full-service email marketing (in addition to their basic email marketing plan). For $149.95 a month, Benchmark Email will “do it for you.” All you have to do is send Benchmark a document with what you want to say in your email, along with your subscriber list. They’ll create your campaign, upload your list, schedule it to send, and even post it to your social networking sites. Learn more about Benchmark Email’s full service plan.

If you’re in need of a basic email marketing service, check out our reviews of popular email marketing services.

Why South Dakota? It’s ranked as the #1 state to start a business in 2012, according to the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, who just released their Business Tax Index 2012.

The SBEC maintains that taxes, whether imposed on the federal, state or local levels, are the biggest factor in economic growth and job creation.

The Business Tax Index takes into account 18 different tax measures when ranking favorable locations for entrepreneurship and small business, chief of which are the state’s top personal income tax rate and its top individual capital gains tax rate.

According to the data, the 15 best state tax systems for small businesses in 2012 are:

1.  South Dakota
2.  Texas
3.  Nevada
4.  Wyoming
5.  Washington
6.  Florida
7.  Alaska
8.  Alabama
9.  Ohio
10.  Colorado
11.  Mississippi
12.  Michigan
13.  South Carolina
14.  Tennessee
15.  Missouri

According to the report, the 15 states with the worst tax systems for small businesses are:

37.  Nebraska
38.  North Carolina
39.  Illinois
40.  Oregon
41.  Rhode Island
42.  Connecticut
43.  Hawaii
44.  Vermont
45.  California
46.  Maine
47.  Iowa
48.  New York
49.  New Jersey
50.  Minnesota
51.  District of Columbia

If you aren’t lucky enough to live in one of the top 15 states, all is not lost. The SBEC noted that states like Indiana, Arizona, Maine, Michigan, North Dakota, Delaware, and Oklahoma made positives efforts to provide tax relief in the last year.

Also, while the rankings above should give you some idea of the financial challenges and legal obligations your business may face, you shouldn’t let them deter you from starting a business in your home state. A business outside the top 15 can very well be successful, provided you have a solid business plan and anticipate state taxes when creating your business budget.

Additionally, to cut down on your operating costs, you could take advantage of cloud services or low-cost alternatives to business infrastructure tools. Services like online fax services, hosted PBX services, and others will allow you to work virtually and reduce the need for costly hardware.

Being aware of the tax rates and laws in your state (or states) of business is imperative for the fledgling entrepreneur. We highly recommend you consult with your attorney as your move forward in the startup process. To get started on your research, check out the full SBEC Business Tax Index report for 2012, which offers additional state rankings on relevant business factors like state property taxes, state and local sales taxes, gas and diesel taxes, and wireless taxes.

Since its inception, PPC advertising has really leveled the playing field in online marketing. With it, smaller businesses without giant advertising budgets have been able to successfully compete against more well-known brands. AdWords for video is no less useful to startups, to whom one creative video can mean a world of new customers.

To encourage business owners to sign up for AdWords for video, YouTube is giving away a total of $50 million in free advertising credits. Businesses who sign up early for AdWords for video can get a $75 credit, which YouTube estimates will help you reach “1,500 of your most valuable customers on YouTube for one month.” You can sign up for your free $75 credit here.

According to YouTube, here’s what AdWords for video does:

• Find the right audience: AdWords for video provides a range of options to reach the right audience. For example, you can promote your video by keyword to appear in YouTube search results, or you can choose to show your ad against content your customers are most interested in – such as sports or music. Connect with your audience on YouTube and the Google Display Network, which includes millions of websites. AdWords for video links to your YouTube account so you can easily start a video campaign with your existing videos.
• Measure the effectiveness of your spend: On average, we’ve found that YouTube video ads drive a 20 percent increase in traffic to your website and a 5 percent increase in searches for your business (Google Campaign Insights, 2011). With AdWords for video you can find out how viewers are engaging with your brand during and after they watch your ad. You can see how many viewers watched your entire video, visited your website, stayed on your channel to watch another video, or subscribed to your channel, after viewing your ad.
• Only pay for engaged views: With TrueView video ads, you only pay when viewers choose to watch your ad, so you aren’t charged when viewers skip your ad if they aren’t interested or have already seen your video. This means your ad budget is focused on viewers interested in your video. By displaying a call-to-action overlay on your video you can talk about a sale or specific offer to your viewers, share more information about your business, or drive traffic to your website.

If you want to learn more about Google Adwords for video (or, like me, you’re a fan of super-fit shirtless guys), check out Google’s very own YouTube vid below. (The super-fit shirtless guy is at 1:55.)

Even if you decide to go with QuickBooks, we encourage you to be aware of the its competitors, in case you later find yourself needing a specific feature provided by one of these services.

Peachtree

Peachtree (by Sage) is a robust bookkeeping software program and is second in popularity to QuickBooks because of its many useful features, such as customer management, invoicing, and time tracking. Peachtree has four subscription tiers, each with a different number of user licenses and features, and they all come with a free trial. You can create and view professional-looking reports and see an overview of how your company is doing.

The one feature Peachtree offers that QuickBooks doesn’t is the ability to manage fixed assets. Also, if you need to keep track of depreciation of accounts, offices, and other machinery, then Peachtree could be a better option than most QuickBooks plans. However, QuickBooks does offer these features in its Accountant and Enterprise Desktop software.

Since Peachtree is the second most popular bookkeeping software on the market, you can probably find an accountant who is licensed in Peachtree without much difficulty. But, compared to the number of accountants who are certified in QuickBooks, there are much fewer Peachtreee licensed professionals.

AccountEdge

AccountEdge is a bookkeeping software option that bills itself as “premium small business accounting software.” This software has been around since the early ’90s when it was introduced for the Mac, but now a Windows version is also available. AccountEdge has some helpful features, such as a to-do list and the ability to track transactions in multiple currencies, which is nice if you do business abroad.

Like Peachtree, AccountEdge offers the ability to manage fixed assets, which isn’t offered by QuickBooks. The program also has a very user-friendly interface, but it lacks some features offered by QuickBooks such as online-banking and a company dashboard that allows you to view all of your company’s activity at once. If you need to project depreciation of accounts, offices, and other machinery, then AccountEdge could be a better option than most QuickBooks plans.

AccountEdge is comparable to QuickBooks except for the number of accountants familiar with the software. It may be more difficult for you to find an accountant who is familiar with AccountEdge over QuickBooks.

FreshBooks

FreshBooks is software that allows you to track time, organize your expenses and invoice your clients. It’s meant for those who want to track billable hours and send invoices based on those hours. There is a free entry level plan, but it’s limited to one user and three clients or customers you can manage. You can upgrade to the $20 plan that supports 25 clients/customers, but after that the plans get pricey when compared to similar offerings from QuickBooks.

Although not technically a bookkeeping solution, FreshBooks offers some of the same features of bookkeeping software, such as invoicing, exporting and importing data, client management, automated invoice creation, and reporting. The software ties into a number of different online payment avenues and has a 256-bit, federal government grade encryption for all plans to insure the safety of your financial information.

However, Freshbooks’ reporting, project management, and invoicing features are sub-par, and its homepage dashboard is not useful at all, according to Consumer Reports. This software is also pretty basic and not widely used, which may cause problems for you in the future when you need more functionality and support.

Harvest

Harvest is a time-tracking solution that has invoicing built into the system. It’s an ideal solution for people who want to track billable hours and send invoices based on those hours.

Harvest is not quite as popular as QuickBooks, but it offers some noteworthy features. You can send professional-looking project estimates to clients, and they offer an iPhone app that lets you log expenses on the go from any location. Harvest offers common features of bookkeeping software, such as importing and exporting reports and multi-currency invoicing. It also has unique features like desktop time-tracking widgets and Google Apps integration.

However, Harvest lacks some important features. There is no way to sort or filter invoices, and the system won’t integrate invoice payments from any source other than PayPal. Also, Harvest does not give you the ability to define when your fiscal year begins and ends. Since most businesses don’t have their fiscal year aligned with the calendar year, the yearly reports given may not be much help. In addition to these drawbacks, this software is not widely used, and it may be difficult to find an accountant familiar with the software.

For  information on how to set up your company books, see How To: Set Up the Books.

If you’re running an e-commerce business (i.e. you sell products and/or services mainly online) you will need the following key features:

1. Product Catalog:  displays your products or services in an organized and attractive way
2. Shopping Cart: lets customers select items and place them into a virtual shopping cart for easy ordering
3. Payment Processing: lets you accept payment online from credit cards, PayPal, eCheck, etc.

Most basic business website builders do not include these tools and require an upgrade to an e-commerce plan to get them. Basic website builder services are generally focused on informational websites or websites that sell only a handful of products or services. Most of these services do offer e-commerce plans that range in price and functionality, but comparing these upgrades and selecting a plan that fits your needs can be cumbersome.

We’ve come across a solution that aims to simplify the process of building and marketing an online store–Volusion–and highly recommend it to e-commerce businesses.

Volusion Online Store Builder

Unlike other website builder services, Volusion focuses specifically on e-commerce sites. Hence, they offer the following services: domain names, web design, credit card processing, SSL certificates (lets you encrypt data for secure online transactions) and online marketing services.

Visiting Volusion.com gives you a glimpse of the service’s robust offerings. I was immediately impressed by the variety of high quality e-commerce website templates, which range in price from free to around $1000. Volusion currently offers 300+ e-commerce site templates, giving you a number of stylish, affordable options for your website.

Other nifty features include:

• “Soft Add to Cart”: customers can place items in their carts through a popup screen rather than leaving the page
• Wish Lists: lets customers mark their favorite items and add them to a list
• One-page Checkout: helps reduce your customer abandon rate
• Integrated Payment Processing: accepts credit cards and other payment methods
• Deal of the Day: you can easily post a daily deal, as well as coupon codes and other discounts
• Customer Reviews: your customers can post product reviews that give you insight into the popularity of your products and overall buying trends
• Social Store: you can easily sell products and run promotions on a customizable Facebook page
• Mobile-Optimized Site: customers can easily view your site on their mobile devices and make purchases

Volusion vs. Basic Website Builder Services

Volusion starts at $19/month for an e-commerce site that supports up to 100 products and goes all the way up to $149/month for an unlimited number of products. You can also call them to request information and a quote on an enterprise-level plan. Compared to basic website builder services that offer e-commerce upgrades, Volusion offers a wider range of plan options and services.

To give you a point of comparison, 1&1 (a popular basic website builder) offers a starter e-commerce site with 50 products for $12/month. Their second plan level costs $30/month for 300 products. And their third (and highest) plan level costs $50/month and limits you to 20,000 products. While 1&1 gives you a good deal in terms of price, it doesn’t give you nearly as many of the tools and functions that Volusion provides.

Our Recommendations

If you need to create a basic business website (i.e. one that conveys basic information about your business, such as what you offer, where you’re located, etc.), then a website builder service that costs about $10/month will work for you.

If you need to sell products or services online for a low cost, and you don’t need all the bells and whistles of an all-in-one e-commerce service, then upgrading to an e-commerce plan from a website builder like 1&1 may be a good option for you.

If you want a variety of compatible e-commerce tools and robust features, an integrated e-commerce solution like Volusion will be your best bet.

Software that runs on Windows often won’t work on Mac, and vice versa. Thus, the first step in selecting a computer is to take a look at the software you need for your business and choose an operating system that will run it.

At ChooseWhat.com, our development team uses iMacs for work. While the decision was based mostly around what the team was already familiar with, software was a major consideration. The development department found that their familiarity with Mac saved them from having to learn how to do their daily tasks in an unfamiliar environment (Windows-based PC).

Size Matters — A Lot, Actually

One of my biggest mistakes when I buy a computer is that I always overlook size. The size and power of your computer almost always determines your cost. The first thing you should consider is, “How big do I want my computer to be?”

If your computer needs to be taken with you, then you will certainly want a laptop like a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro.  However, if it’s going to stay at the office, you might want to look at something more stationery like an iMac or Mac Pro.

If you decide that you want to purchase a laptop, I highly recommend deciding on a screen size immediately. 13-inch screens are highly portable and easy to travel with, but the small screen can be a pain to read. 15-inch laptops are a very common choice, since they remain portable and readable. 17-inch laptops are mainly focused on high performance–they’re heavy and big, but powerful.

MHz, GB, Dual-Core, and RPM Explained

When selecting a computer, you will certainly be confronted with a lot of numbers and random letters. Usually, higher numbers are better, right? Well, yeah–usually–but that’s no excuse for not knowing what they mean.  There are three big components to a working computer:  processor, RAM, and hard drive.

• Processors generally use MHz or GHz and dual-core, quad-core, etc. The MHz number corresponds to the speed of the processors. The dual-core/quad-core information refers to the number of processors in the computer.
• RAM is like short-term memory for your computer. The amount of memory is measured in Bytes. MB stands for Megabytes, GB stands for Gigabytes, and TB stands for Terabytes.
• Hard drives are like long-term memory for the computer. Again, the amount of memory is measured in Bytes. Hard drives will also have an RPM number associated with them. A traditional hard drive actually has a spinning metal disc that stores the data, so the faster that disc can spin, the faster you can find your information.

The trick is to find the right balance of these three major components that will both meet your budget and scale with your business. Processing power is the most valuable part of the equation, so this is where you will want to spend a little extra. Processors are also very difficult to upgrade, so choosing the best you can afford is a good idea.

RAM is usually my second consideration. You may want to consider upgrading your RAM, since it can really speed up your computer. However, RAM is usually very easy to install yourself and won’t void your warranty, so I usually don’t go for the maximum right away.

Finally, you will want to consider the size of your hard drive. Hard drives are pretty inexpensive and only moderately difficult to install. The basic hard drive has almost always been large enough for me, but if you plan on storing a lot of movies, pictures, and music on your computer, you should upgrade.

All the Extras

Great–you’ve found the computer you want and spent the time to make sure that it meets your budget and your needs in the coming years. Now it’s time to wade through the 1,500 accessories and software packages. Most are unnecessary or cheaper somewhere else, but there are a few things I recommend adding to your order.

• Extended Warranties will save you a lot of headache if you plan on keeping your computer around for more than a couple of years. Parts on a computer will break before the computer becomes obsolete and you will want a professional to replace the parts.
• Additional Monitors are great additions. With a laptop, you might want to have a larger monitor for working at your desk. With a desktop computer, you might want to have two monitors. If your computer supports two screens and it fits your budget, consider this upgrade. (If you have an iMac, you can use a PC monitor as a secondary screen.)
• Printers: Usually, there is some kind of deal on printers when you purchase your computer.  If you can get the printer for free, go for it. But before you pay for a printer, check out our How To: Select An All-In-One Printer.

Our Recommendations

Selecting the right computer for your business is not all that difficult. It’s mostly a balancing act of what you need, what you will need, and what you can afford. In the early stages of a business, we recommend you choose an OS that can run your needed programs and one that you are familiar with. After that, find a computer that has the best performance for your budget.

What is Microsoft Office 365?

You might not have heard about Microsoft Office 365, but you’ve most likely heard about a similar cloud service called Google Apps. If you’re familiar with Google Apps (and who isn’t by now) then Office 365 will be easy enough to get into. Like Google Apps, Office 365 offers an array of online business productivity and collaboration tools, chiefly:

• Cloud-based business email accounts using your domain name + shared calendars
• You can purchase this as a standalone service for $4/user/month (with a max user limit of 50,000) or as part of the Small Business plan for $6/user/month (with a max user limit of 50).
• Office web apps (web-based viewing and editing of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote files)
• Instant messaging, PC-to-PC calling, and video conferencing
• File-sharing on a team site
• Business website builder
• Access on mobile devices
• Antivirus and anti-spam filtering

Microsoft Office 365 vs. Google Apps

Features:

The biggest difference between Google Apps and Office 365 is that, well, one is Google and the other is Microsoft. On one hand, Microsoft Office is clearly superior to any of Google’s office apps (although they’re constantly improving) and a cloud version of MS Office offers distinct advantages. On the other hand, many people use Gmail and its conveniently integrated web conferencing tools for business communications. If you only want to set up business email accounts and don’t care about online collaboration tools, Office 365′s Exchange Online plan (at $4/user/month) gives you the better deal over Google Apps (at $5/user/month).

Price:

The biggest draw of Google Apps is that the entry level version of the service is entirely free for up to 10 users. Once your business has grown beyond 10 employees, you’ll be forced to upgrade to Google Apps for Business, which starts at $5/user/month. In contrast, Microsoft Office 365 does not offer a free plan and starts at $6/user/month. Google Apps has the edge in terms of price, but the difference may not mean much to a business with a small number of employees.

Conclusion:

Both Google Apps and Microsoft Office 365 are high quality cloud services, so you can’t go wrong with either one. At ChooseWhat.com, we’ve used both Google Apps and Microsoft Sharepoint (which is their cloud database offering), in addition to the desktop versions of Microsoft Office. Microsoft Office 365 might not be for everyone, but it’s a great alternative to Google Apps—and we like choices!

Microsoft office 365 offers a free 30-day trial of their Small Business plan. Click here to sign up for free.

One such virtual office provider is Regus, which has recently partnered with Austin-based company LifeSize (a division of Logitech) to provide Regus customers with state of the art videoconferencing rooms. LifeSize has been tapped to install HD videoconferencing suites in more than 240 Regus locations around the world.

These suites, known as LifeSize Public Rooms (they are publicly accessible), will feature conferencing systems that are interoperable with existing video platforms and can work with any platform in any country. Regus customers will have the ability to:

• Have seamless video calling with customers and partners, regardless of their video platform
• Remotely interview potential new employees
• Data share and collaborate with colleagues while traveling

Videoconferencing can be important for the startup with remote employees and/or partners who need frequent, clear communication with one another. It can also give the small business a professional image when interviewing candidates through video or pitching to investors online.

Using a virtual officer provider like Regus will give you maximum flexibility, as its services can scale right along with your business. At ChooseWhat.com, we have used a virtual office provider since the company started and highly recommend it to any business that needs a flexible mailing address and wants to take advantage of time-share work spaces (you can schedule the space and rent it out to other companies) and high quality videoconferencing tools.

For more about virtual offices and other mailing address options, see How To: Set Up a Business Mailing Address.

While some might find Intuit’s foray into employee benefits odd, it isn’t much of a stretch considering the array of small business services the company already provides, from accounting and payroll services to its business website builder. The addition of 401(k) and health care services potentially makes Intuit a one-stop shop for many small businesses.

Of course, QuickBooks is an entirely different animal from your health and retirement savings plans, and you may not be ready to sign up for benefits just yet. (We encourage you to read our guide, How To: Get Group Health Insurance before you make a decision.) Regardless of your needs, Intuit’s new services deserve a look.

Intuit 401(k)

Intuit claims that its 401(k) costs less overall than plans from competitors. The plans start at $75 per month for a company with 2-10 employees and go up to $150 per month for companies with 150+ employees. They require a one-time setup fee of $495, but you can receive a $500 tax credit for each of the first three years after signing up for a new retirement plan.

For plan participants, it offers flat-rate annual asset fees of less than 1%. Competitors typically charge 3-4% and increase the percentage as your investment portfolio grows bigger.

Intuit’s 401(k) plans are managed by Morningstar Investment Services. You and your employees will get access to an online account interface that lets you view and make changes to your plan. Read more about Intuit’s 401(k) plan.

See screenshots of the online interface below. Click to view a larger image:

Intuit Health Debit Card

Intuit offers a Health Debit Card, which is an alternative to health insurance that works much like a Health Savings Account (HSA). You can set aside tax-free funds via a debit card account for your employees to use on health care expenses, including medical visits and prescriptions. The employer chooses how much to contribute to the account, from as little as $1 per employee per month, giving the small business owner maximum flexibility. Like with an HSA, the funds roll over annually. The plan costs $5 per employee per month with no setup fees and no minimum requirements.

The Intuit Health Debit Card differs from an HSA in a couple of ways. Unlike a regular HSA, which allows employers and employees to contribute funds, the Intuit Health Debit Card is funded by the employer only, meaning that any funds remaining in the account when an employee leaves stays with the company.  Also the Health Debit Card does not require an employee to be enrolled in a qualifying insurance plan and can be offered to employees regardless of whether or not they have insurance.

A benefit to your employees is that, unlike with health insurance, they do not have to meet any health requirements to qualify for the Health Debit Card. However, employers must be owners of a C-Corporation or Non-Profit (or owners of an LLC that files taxes as a C-Corp) to qualify for the card.

Intuit currently offers a free 30-day trial of their service through their website. Read more about Intuit’s Health Debit Card.

For more information on getting a company health insurance plan, see How To: Get Group Health Insurance.

Most established staffing companies offer three levels of services:

1. Temporary Staffing
2. Temporary-to-Permanent Staffing
3. Permanent Staffing

Temporary (or Contract) Staffing

Temporary or contract staffing enables you to fill short-term positions for a variety of purposes, such as supporting an upcoming project or meeting seasonal demands.

The main advantages of hiring temps include:

• It’s usually pretty easy to get someone in the door quickly
• Temps receive hourly wages and do not get benefits, reducing your costs

The costs of hiring temps vary significantly depending on the role of the temporary employee, but you should expect to pay at least a 30% premium per hour over what you would pay a full-time person working for you. The worker will technically be employed by the temp agency, which bills you for the time.

Temporary-to-Permanent (or Contract-to-Hire) Staffing

Temporary-to-Permanent (also called Contract-to-Hire) staffing is the same as temporary staffing, except that you also have the option to hire the temp permanently after their contract period is over.  The main advantage of going with this option is that you can try someone out before you decide to offer them a full-time position.

The costs of this option will be similar to those of hiring for a contract position. However, once you decide to hire a person full-time, you may have to pay an upfront fee equal to a percentage of the employee’s proposed salary. See below for more details.

Permanent (or Direct Placement) Staffing

Often it’s best to use staffing companies/recruiters to find highly skilled people who are already employed and well compensated.

The main advantages of using staffing companies to fill full-time positions are:

• It saves you time. (Recruiters will digest the resumes and only give you the ones they think are worth your time.)
• You have an opportunity to get high quality candidates. (These candidates may already be currently employed and not necessarily looking for a job.)

You will typically pay an upfront fee equal of about 20% of a placed employee’s annual salary. For example, if you hire an employee through a agency and that employee will be making $50,000 per year, you will have to pay $10,000 to the agency when the employee starts.

Recommended Staffing Companies

Aerotek

Aerotek has been a leading staffing agency for over 25 years. They offer Contract Staffing, Contract-to-Hire Staffing and Direct Placement Staffing. They offer staffing solutions for businesses in a variety of industries:

• Aerotek Professional Services:  Provides staffing support such as operations, professional & administrative, accounting, and contact centers.
• Aerotek CE: Provides engineering and engineering support professionals to industries including architecture & engineering, aerospace & defense, manufacturing, medical device, automotive, and electronics.
• Aerotek Scientific: Provides professional level and support personnel to the scientific, healthcare, clinical research, food and beverage and consumer products industries.
• Aerotek Energy Services: Provides personnel and management services to major field services, oil and gas, power generation and delivery and DOE sites.

Aerotek’s provides their Perfect Fit Program to business clients needing staffing services.  The Perfect Fit Program includes five phases: Customer Analysis, Sourcing, Screening, Selection and Performance Monitoring. Throughout these phases, Aerotek’s support team consistently communicates with you to ensure that you are satisfied with your placed employees.

For those looking for highly qualified candidates, Aerotek employs industry-focused Professional Recruiters who are knowledgeable about the logistics of an industry’s work environment, skill sets, and overall expectations.  They also employee dedicated account managers as well as customer support associates who are solely responsible for payroll, human resources, and other administrative tasks.

Manpower.com

Manpower.com is a well-known staffing agency that offers Temporary Staffing, Temporary-to-Permanent Staffing and Permanent Staffing options. You can easily search their website for staffing solutions based on your business needs, such as:

• Control costs
• Control turnover
• Find the right people
• Hire large volumes
• Hire specialized skills
• Hire a diverse workforce
• Work with a socially responsible vendor

Their specialty areas include Administrative and Office Staffing, Call Center Solutions and Healthcare Staffing, among others. They also offer a recruitment service for high quality candidates called Recruitment Process Outsourcing that drives measurable improvements in candidate quality, hiring timelinesss and recruitment costs.

In addition to staffing services, Manpower.com offers a variety of other services, including: Managed Service Programs (to help you manage a global workforce), Manpower Public Sector (which focuses on governmental needs), Client Site Management (which provides you with a dedicated staff manager), Project Solutions (project management and outsourcing), and Risk Assessment Services.

To make sure you’re not missing any important factors, follow this handy checklist when preparing for the arrival of new employees.

Workspace:

• Decide where your new employee will be sitting and arrange the office accordingly.
• You may need to consider placement of other employees that person or persons will be working with.
• Order a desk, chair and office supplies (if you don’t already have a workstation set up).
• Give your new employee(s) the passcode or key to get in to office/ building (if applicable).

Phone:

• Order a phone or add their number to your company plan.
• Set up phone line & extension.
• You may need to consider how adding lines/extensions will affect your phone plan. For more information, see How To: Set Up a Business Phone System.

Computer:

• Order a computer.
• You’ll need to consider how many computers and which type you need. For help with this step, see How To: Select the Best Small Business Computer.
• Set up computer so that it is ready to use when employee starts (both hardware and software).
• You can usually have an IT person handle this.
• Set up the employee’s email address.
• If your company consisted of just you before you made the new hire, you may have been using a personal email address for business correspondence. It may now be time for you to Set Up Business Email Accounts.

Employment Documents:

Have your new employee(s) fill out the necessary documents for employment, payroll, and tax withholding before or on their start date.

• Employee Agreement Form
• Your new employee should have already signed an Employment Agreement before they started working. Consult with your attorney when drafting your company’s Employment Agreement, or use a service like LegalZoom, which provides online employment forms.
• Tax Forms
• Form W-4 to report how much in taxes to withhold from their checks 
• Form W-9 to provide taxpayer ID number and certification 
• Form I-9 to show that the employee is eligible to work
• You’ll need to make copies of the employee’s driver’s license and Social Security card, or a copy of their passport.  These things are usually kept in the employee’s permanent personnel file and do not need to be sent anywhere.  
• Direct Deposit Form
• You can easily get direct deposit forms from your bank or simply use a template like this: Direct Deposit Authorization.

Benefits Documents:

You may or may not need these, depending on whether you offer benefits or not.

• Health Insurance Forms
• Get these from your health insurance provider or insurance broker. Talk to your health insurance provider or insurance broker about how adding an employee will affect your plan. See How To: Get Group Health Insurance.
• 401(k) Forms
• Get these from your financial services provider.

Introduction to the Company:

Introduce your new employee to your company policies as well as to your other employees.

• Give your employee a company policies manual and/or operations manual (if you have them).
• Write or update company titles, roles, responsibilities and distribute to all employees.
• Usually your existing employees will want to know how adding a new person will affect their own responsibilities.
• Introduce the new employee(s) to the rest of the team (if applicable).
• Celebrate your new hire with a company lunch or happy hour!

Many small businesses rely on merchant processing systems and Point-of-Sale (POS) machines to process their customers’ credit card payments.

However, a new report by Verizon, the U.S. Secret Service, and other international investigative organizations shows that POS systems utilized by small business are often unsecured and in danger of being hacked.

The 2012 Data Breach Investigations Report provides the following statistics about overall data breaches in the past year:

Who is Behind Data Breaches?

• 98% stemmed from external agents (+6% from the previous year)
• 58% of all data theft tied to activist groups
• 4% implicated internal employees (-13%)
• <1% committed by business partners

How Do Breaches Occur?

• 81% utilized some form of hacking (+31%)
• 69% incorporated malware (+20%)
• 10% involved physical attacks (-19%)
• 7% employed social tactics (-4%)
• 5% resulted from privilege misuse (-12%)

What Commonalities Exist?

• 97% of breaches were avoidable through simple or intermediate controls (+1%)
• 96% of attacks were not highly difficult
• 96% of victims subject to security protocols implemented by the four major credit card companies had not achieved compliance (+7%)
• 94% of all compromised data involved servers (+18%)
• 92% of incidents were discovered by a third party (+6%)
• 85% of breaches took weeks or more to discover (+6%)
• 79% of victims were targets of opportunity (-4%)

Small Businesses Frequently Targeted

According to the data, food and beverage, retail, and hospitality services combined to account for the vast majority of reported attacks.

• Accommodation and Food Services:  54%
• Retail Trade:  20%
• Finance and Insurance:  10%
• Health Care and Social Assistance:  7%
• Information:  3%
• Other:  6%

Small businesses were targeted mainly because they often neglect to take simple preventative measures for data security, such as changing their default POS passwords, which would prevent hackers from successfully using programs that automatically try lists of common passwords.

Point-of-Sale Security Tips

For small businesses that use POS machines, Verizon has provided tips for avoiding security breaches and data theft.

Taken from page 62 of Verizon’s 2012 Data Breach Investigations Report:

Below you’ll find a few tips based on Verizon’s research into thousands of security breaches affecting companies like yours that use point-of-sale (POS) systems to process customer payments. If none of it makes sense to you, please pass it on to management.

1.  Change administrative passwords on all POS systems. Hackers are scanning the Internet for easily guessable passwords.

2.  Implement a firewall or access control list on remote access/administration services. If hackers can’t reach your systems, they can’t easily steal from it.

After that, you may also wish to consider these:

3.  Avoid using POS systems to browse the web (or anything else on the Internet for that matter).

4.  Make sure your POS is a PCI DSS compliant application (ask your vendor).

If a third-party vendor looks after your POS systems, we recommend asking them to confirm that these things have been done. If possible, obtain documentation. Following these simple practices will save a lot of wasted money, time, and other troubles for your business and your customers.

For more information, visit www.verizon.com/enterprise/databreach (but not from your POS).

More Data Security Tips

In addition to the POS tips above, we also want to suggest the following for every small business that processes credit card payments:

5.  Use password management software like LastPass to generate secure passwords.

• If you’re not already, we recommend using services like LastPass to manage your passwords. These services are great because they store all of your online passwords in one secure place that is only accessible by you (or anyone with your master password). This method allows you to avoid storing passwords in your browsers. If you’re having trouble coming up with a password that you think would be secure enough to use, LastPass can generate ready-to-use secure passwords for you.

6.  Investigate and mitigate.

• It’s always a good idea to monitor your POS system constantly for any abnormal activity that indicates you are being hacked, such as the presence of malware or records of unidentified logins. Taking preventative measures will only help you in the long run.
• Most small businesses don’t find out they’ve been hacked until at least weeks after the attack has occurred. When you discover you’ve been hacked, make sure to notify your customers of the breach and the steps you’re taking to fix the problem as soon as possible to avoid any negative publicity or loss of business. A small business’ reputation is everything, so make sure your customers believe you’re looking out for their interests and are not part of the problem yourself.

For help with setting up your merchant processing system read our guide on How To: Accept Credit Card Payments.

What is a DBA?

DBA stands for “doing business as.” It is the name under which a business operates and is presented to the general public, but it is NOT the official legal name of the entity or person(s) who own it. In some states and jurisdictions it might be referred to as a “trade name,” “assumed name,” or “fictitious business name.”

Do I need a DBA?

That depends on the type of business you have and how you present yourself. The sole proprietorship is probably the most in need of a DBA. It’s always a good idea to keep your personal and business monies separate. As a sole proprietorship, it’s tempting to simply operate your business under your personal name, but such an action ends up mixing business with pleasure and robs you of the benefit of letting potential customers know what it is you actually do. You should operate your sole proprietorship under a name other than your personal one, and once you choose to present your business that way, you can’t open a bank account or get paid for your services or products until you register as a DBA.

Business entities, such as corporations and LLCs, must register a DBA if they wish to operate under a different name. More often than not this is an issue of name recognition and branding. When you first started your business, you might have chosen a broad and somewhat generic company name. It’s a common and recommended practice because your first efforts typically involve simply getting your company off the ground quickly and painlessly. Once you’re more established and have created a brand for whatever product or service you sell, chances are you will want customers to recognize your brand and not your corporate name.

For instance, if you start out as “YYZ Ventures” and then begin selling a line of cleaning products called “Grime Blasters,” you want the general public to know you for your great product name, not the corporate name that tells them very little about what you actually do. In such a case, you wouldn’t have to change your corporate name, just file a DBA registration for Grime Blasters and you’re good to go.

When is a DBA not a good idea?

There’s always a con to almost every course of action, and if you are a sole proprietorship and not incorporated, you won’t get the liability protection that comes with being some type of corporate entity.

Where do I get a DBA?

Registering a DBA is a quick and cheap task that you can probably do yourself. Simply Google “DBA” and your state’s name and you will find information on how to register. If you would like additional help, you can use an online legal service like LegalZoom. It serves all 50 states and can help you navigate the DBA rules that tend to vary depending on your location.

To get rolling on your business idea you are going to need funding. For the startup, traditionally bank loans and wealthy friends or family (if you’re lucky enough to have any) are your main avenues for cash. These days venture capitalists have drifted towards funding more established companies, which often leaves startups flailing to find “seed” capital. That all could change with the rise of “crowdfunding” and business legislation recently passed by the U.S. Congress that would ease barriers for startups to raise money.

What is crowdfunding?

Crowdfunding is a means of raising money by submitting an idea on the Internet to a vast pool of investors who are just regular Joes. You toss an idea into the pool, ask for money to make it happen, and people can decide to help fund your project in exchange for a piece of the potential profits.

Currently, the SEC forbids companies from publicly advertising for investors and will only allow private equity investment from accredited investors with $1 million or more in assets. This leaves many startups without many avenues to find investors. Under the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act (so far passed by both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate and on its way to President Obama’s desk for his signature), crowdfunding would become a legal way for a startup to raise a significant amount of money from lots more people.

One element of The JOBS Act will allow companies to raise up to $1 million from crowdfunding without having to report it to the SEC, or up to $2 million if the company provides the investors with audited financial statements. Individual investors may only invest $10,000 or 10% of their annual income, whichever is less.

Is crowdfunding right for your business idea?

You’ll find many experts who argue both for and against the practice, so entrepreneurs should approach the idea with caution. You probably don’t want to put your great business idea out there to just anybody without consulting an attorney and protecting your intellectual property. Also, funding your company in this manner takes away the benefits you get from more established investors — namely seasoned and experienced business advice and guidance.

Crowdfunding Websites

To learn more, you can visit several existing “crowdfunding” sites such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter, which are already funding projects on a smaller scale (such as making films or building a specialized bicycle). Now that the JOBS Act is on its way to becoming law, and if significant protections put in place to guard against fraud are effective, these sites and others like them will likely be bombarded with entrepreneurial investment opportunities.

The startup world might soon get a whole lot bigger.

(*Please note, we at ChooseWhat.com are not legal or investment experts. We strongly advise you consult an attorney or financial expert before taking any action based on this article.)

For our own business, we use an online fax service because it makes sense in terms of cost savings and convenience. Without knowing anything about your business I would recommend getting an online fax service, but you should do what makes sense for your particular business needs.

Initial Costs

Equipment Costs

• Online Fax Service: $0
• Traditional Fax Machine: $89.95

The initial costs of a traditional fax machine are much more than that of an online fax service. With a traditional fax machine, you pay for the equipment (i.e. fax machine) up front. With an online fax service, you don’t need to purchase any equipment or install new hardware other than your computer, meaning you’ll spend a lot less from the start.

Ongoing Costs

Monthly Faxing Costs

• Online Fax Service: $10
• Traditional Fax Machine: $40

There are ongoing costs with both an online fax service and a traditional fax machine. On one hand, online fax services charge you a monthly cost relative to a monthly number of allotted pages you can fax. The monthly price for an online fax service varies on a provider basis but is typically around $10-$15 per month and includes anywhere from 300-700 fax pages.

On the other hand, a traditional fax machine will run you about $40 per month because a fax machine requires you to purchase a dedicated phone line for your fax number. This cost alone makes the ongoing costs for a traditional fax machine greater than that of an online fax service.

Advantages of Fax Machines and Online Fax Services

As you can see above, the costs of an online fax service are much lower than those of a traditional fax machine.

The main advantages of a traditional fax machine are that, unlike an online fax service, a fax machine doesn’t require an Internet connection to send and receive faxes, and your fax number won’t change if you decide to switch service providers.

However, you can use an online fax service and make sure your fax number won’t change by transferring (i.e. “porting”) your number into the online fax service you want to use. Read our STARTicle that gives you detailed instructions on how to port your existing fax number to an online fax service.

I’m a firm believer that an online fax service is the best option for most businesses. We use online fax ourselves and will continue to use it.

For information on how to set up your fax number with an online fax service, read our guide, How To: Set Up a Fax Number.

Credit card processing fees aren’t as confusing as many would have you believe. These three easy steps will show you how to lower your credit card processing fees in no time.

1) Interchange is More than a Highway Overpass

Imagine how easy it would be to negotiate low credit card processing rates if you knew what your processor paid for each transaction. Knowing that would allow you to negotiate your own rate at slightly higher than cost. Well, it turns out that your processor’s wholesale price list is just a click away.

Interchange is a fancy word for what are essentially wholesale credit card processing rates. Interchange is charged by the banks that issue credit cards, and interchange rates are the same for every credit card processor.

Take a moment to check out the interchange fee schedules for Visa and MasterCard by following these links: Visa Interchange, MasterCard Interchange.

Now that you know interchange is credit card processing’s version of wholesale, your goal is to get the rate that your business pays for processing as close to interchange as possible. The way to do that is by making sure your business has the correct pricing model.

2) Pricing Model Trumps Rates & Fees

Lowering your business’ processing costs means forgetting about rates for a moment. It certainly sounds counter intuitive, but when it comes to securing the absolute lowest processing costs, rates are not the most important factor. The pricing model on which rates are based has the greatest impact on cost.

Credit card processors assess fees using two basic forms of pricing called interchange pass through or bundled. Bundled pricing is opaque and produces hefty profit margins through expensive mid-qualified and non-qualified surcharges. Interchange pass through pricing is transparent and relatively inexpensive because it completely eliminates surcharges.

Businesses that switch from bundled pricing to interchange pass through can expect to instantly see savings of 20% or more. So stop hacking at branches by haggling with credit card processors over discount rates and attack the root of the problem by demanding interchange pass through pricing.

3) Only One Rate Matters

Whether you are dealing with your business’ current credit card processor or you’re gathering new quotes, attempting to negotiate credit card processing fees on an individual basis is like herding cats. If you concentrate solely on the discount rate, the sales person will simply apply an annual fee. If you beat a sales person down on the statement fee, he will simply add a monthly minimum.

The only way to ensure your rates and fees are competitive is to look at the big picture by considering all costs in aggregate. When comparing processors, add up all of the fees that your business would be charged in an average month and divide that number by gross sales. What you’re left with is something called the effective rate.

For example, if your business processes $10,000 in credit card sales volume in an average month and processing fees are calculated at $250, the effective rate is 2.50% (250 / 10,000 = .0250).

The effective rate is the only accurate singular measure of the competitiveness of credit card processing fees. By taking into account each rate and fee, you take away a processor’s ability to manipulate pricing.

Putting It All Together

You don’t have to be an expert on credit card processing fees to substantially lower your costs. Simply follow these three steps by learning a little about interchange, demand interchange pass through pricing, and measure the effectiveness of your fees using the effective rate.

Once the dust settles, a lot less of your hard-earned revenue will be going into your credit card processor’s pocket.

About the Author

Ben Dwyer is the founder and CEO of CardFellow.com. Compare credit card processing services in minutes and save 40% on credit card processing fees at CardFellow.com.

They work with your existing phone lines; they have cool apps that make them easy to manage; they make it possible for your whole team to be contacted through one number; and they are easy to scale.  There is one catch that you should be aware of: the number you are assigned through a virtual PBX service may not be “portable.”

What does it mean for a number to not be portable? It means that you can’t take the number with you if you decide to change services. Unlike cell phone services, VoIP phone services, and traditional landline companies, virtual PBX services are not required by the FTC to let you take your number with you to another service.

There are two solutions to this problem:

1. Sign up with a virtual PBX provider that allows you to port your number out. (RingCentral Mobile is a high quality service that we have verified does allow this.)
2. Sign up with whichever virtual PBX provider you prefer that doesn’t charge for porting a number into the service and verify that you like the service. (Most don’t, but you can double check that the one you like doesn’t by looking at the “Numbers” section of our Detailed Reviews grid, such as this one for Phone.com.) Then, sign up with a low cost phone service provider that doesn’t require a long term contract (like a residential  VoIP provider).  Port your number from the low cost phone service provider to the virtual PBX service and then cancel the phone service.

The first method is the easiest and the cheapest. The second method is significantly more complicated, but it will ensure that the number is legally yours according to the FTC.

For more help with setting up your business phone number, read our guide on How To: Set Up a Phone Number.

Chase iPhone App

Chase bank offers a free mobile app to their account holders. You must first be enrolled in Chase Online in order to access your account information from your mobile device. The Chase credit card mobile iPhone app provides users with many great features such as:

• Making a deposit is easy with Chase QuickDeposit by giving you the ability to deposit a check using your iPhone or iPad camera.
• Chase Person-To-Person QuickPay allows you to send money to nearly anyone in the U.S. with a bank account simply by using their email address or mobile phone number.
• Push Notifications provide you with free account alerts that you can customize to help you monitor your account activity
• View Rewards Information for your credit and debit cards
• Blueprint credit card owners can now make payments from their iPhone

Other advantages to the Chase Credit Card mobile app is that you can pay bills and credit cards through the mobile interface and view your account balances. The app also helps you locate a Chase branch or ATM and quickly transfer money or make a deposit.

One big disadvantage to the Chase Credit Card mobile app is that you are only allowed to deposit $1,000 a day and $3,000 a week. For the small business owner that means your trips to the bank are not totally eliminated.

The Chase app is free to download for iPhone and Android.

Click here to read the Chase Credit Card full review.

AMEX iPhone App

iPhone users are able to download the free American Express credit card mobile app. Features included with this are:

• Bill Pay allows you to pay your bills online
• Manage accounts lets you manage multiple card accounts
• View transactions that are recent or pending
• Search transactions
• Secure log on
• Access card benefits on the go
• Reset your Password or User ID from your mobile device

One advantage to the American Express mobile app is that you don’t have to first set up your online banking from a desktop computer. You can log on with your banking credentials and get started right away from your iPhone or other mobile device (it is also available for Android and Blackberry). Disadvantages to the American Express mobile app is that not all versions of the Android operating systems are supported nor is the Apple iPad.

Click here to read the American Express Business Credit Card Review.

For more information on business credit cards, visit our Business Credit Card Comparison Chart.

MetroFax iPhone App

MetroFax offers a free app for iPhone users to go along with its MetroFax account. The Essential plan comes with 500 combined pages and costs $7.95 per month. With the MetroFax app, you can address faxes by using the contact information from your phone. When sending a fax, you can easily add a cover page or attach documents, as well as preview your fax before sending it out.

You have the option of sending faxes from your device or you can access your files from services such as Dropbox, Google Docs, SugarSync and Box.net. You can also send a fax-optimized image from your phone’s camera. The app helps you keep track of your fax page balance for the month. In addition to the iPhone, the MetroFax app is available on Android.

Read our review of MetroFax’s desktop online fax service.

eFax iPhone App

The eFax iPhone app is free for users with an eFax account. The eFax Plus plan costs $16.95 per month and comes with 150 incoming and 150 outgoing pages. This app allows you to create and send faxes by taking photos of the documents you want to send, enhancing the images, and then faxing them. You can also search for and view all of your received faxes. With this app, you can create customized cover sheets and use your iPhone contact list to address faxes.

This app had some functionality problems in the past, but these issues have been resolved with the new version. Faxes can be marked with search tags to make them easily accessible at a later date. You have the option of forwarding your messages as a fax or an email. This app is also available for the Android.

Read our review of eFax’s desktop online fax service.

Other online fax services that offer an iPhone app include MyFax and RingCentral.

To find out more about online fax services, visit our Online Fax Comparison Chart.

GetResponse iPhone App

GetResponse’s free iPhone app makes managing an email marketing campaign even easier than before. An account with GetResponse is required to access the app. Its plan starts as low as $14.00 for 500 contacts. With the app, you can schedule emails to be sent out, create plain-text emails on the go, and preview versions of your newsletter before sending it out to your contacts.  You can also import contacts from your iPhone address book into your email campaigns or add contacts manually to your contact list.

Additionally, this app allows you to search through your contacts and view their details in real-time. The app also provides easy-to-read charts showing open rates, clicks, bounces, and other reporting statistics.

Click here to read our review of GetResponse’s desktop email marketing software.

Constant Contact iPhone App

Constant Contact offers a free app for iPhone users to go along with its Constant Contact account. It offers a plan for $15.00 that comes with 500 contacts. This app has many great features, including being able to create, edit, and preview your newsletters.  You can also schedule draft emails, resend campaigns, and view archived emails. The app comes with 10 mobile templates to choose from to help you create your email campaign.

The app also comes with valuable reporting features, such as being able to view which of your contacts clicks, opens, shares, forwards, and unsubscribes from your newsletter. Like with the GetResponse iPhone app, you can import contacts from your iPhone address book. It also makes it easy to search through your contact database and make changes to your contacts’ individual records.

Click here to read our review of Constant Contact’s desktop email marketing software.

Included below are additional email marketing services which also offer an iPhone app:

• MailChimp
• Mad Mimi
• GraphicMail
• Campaigner
• iContact

To find out more about email marketing services, visit our Email Marketing Comparison Chart.

The main difference between these two types of cards is that the recently passed consumer credit card protection laws do not pertain to business credit cards. These laws, contained in the Credit CARD Act of 2009, make sure the credit card issuers are more transparent about changes to personal credit cards’ interest rates, fees, and payment schedules. Because these laws do not apply to business credit cards, there are several stipulations to be aware of:

• Card issuers can raise interest rates without preliminary notice.

Credit card issuers must give a 45-day notice of an increase in the interest rate of personal credit cards, but issuers can change the interest rate of business credit cards without notice and apply it to your previous charges yet to be paid off. However, some issuers will voluntarily comply with the consumer-based CARD Act for business credit cards, like American Express, who at the present time will give you a 45-day notice of any rate increase.

• Introductory rates can end at any time.

With a personal credit card, the introductory rate has to be offered for at least six months. With a business credit card, your introductory rate can be discontinued whenever the issuer wants. Most trustworthy card issuers (like American Express, Chase, etc.) will likely give notice before raising their introductory interest rates, but there is also no legal obligation that forces them to maintain these rates.

• You may have less time to pay your bill.

Card issuers are now required to mail your statement 21 days in advance of the bill’s due date for personal credit cards, but there is no such rule for business credit cards. While this seems fairly hazardous, as long as you keep track of your bill’s due date there should be no surprises. And just like with the other stipulations, many of the top credit card providers will abide by the same rules for personal credit cards as well as small business credit cards.

• You could be subject to unrestricted late fees or over-limit fees.

While the CARD Act limited late fees on personal cards to $25 or the cost of the minimum monthly payment (if that happens to be less), late fees for business credit cards are unrestricted. To cover yourself from obscene charges, be sure to find out the late fees beforehand, so you won’t be caught off-guard.

• Payments are usually applied to the lower interest charges first.

The Credit CARD Act required that all payments toward a personal credit card debt be made on the higher interest charges before lower ones. Again, this does not apply to business credit cards. And, in actuality, most business credit card issuers apply payments to the lowest interest charges before anything else gets paid off.

Despite the above caveats, there are still a number of benefits to using a credit card designed for business use. The most useful feature is the ability to keep your business expenses separate from your personal ones, which will be especially valuable during tax time.

And in general, as long as you’re aware of the rules associated with your business credit card before you choose one and keep an eye out for any changes while you use it, you shouldn’t have any problems.

To get help with choosing a business credit card that fits your needs, read How to Select a Business Credit Card.

Know What’s Working and What’s Not

1. Conduct Employee Motivation Surveys

Conduct biannual anonymous surveys. Ask candid questions about organizational policies, employee pride, daily practices, salary, perks, benefits, work culture, and so on. Build a response database and analyze where you might be going wrong.

2. Understand What Your Employees Need

Employees seek respect, fair treatment, job security, good benefits, and industry-comparable pay. They also seek acknowledgement, camaraderie, and pride in themselves and in the organization. As an employer, you must understand these goals and strive to satisfy them in order to maintain an enthusiastic workforce.

3. Look For The Factors That Upset The Balance

If all else is fine and employees are still not motivated, something’s upsetting the balance. It could be a bad manager, too much emphasis on work and less on personal development, or a disparity in workload management.

Solve Problems With Empathy

4. Don’t Offer Substitutes

A pat on the shoulder won’t pay the bills. A pay raise without recognition won’t provide overall satisfaction. Understand how all these needs flow into each other and provide for them all.

5. Provide Empathetic Benefits

Some organizations withdraw their support the moment employees fall sick or experience difficult family issues. You cannot offer indefinite leave, but do whatever you can to help your employee in their time of need.

6. Hire, Train, And Mentor The Right Managers

Individual managers are not in charge of company leadership, but they can do a lot to either rock the boat or help it float. Hire the right people and train them based on your employee-motivation policies. Mentor them based on feedback from previous team members.

Train Your Managers

7. Train Managers In Motivational People Skills

Each team member must feel that they belong and have a reason for being on the team. This goes beyond mere job description or money. It falls to the manager to inspire, motivate, and build a positive relationship with team members. Not all managers are born with this skill, so you have to provide the right training.

8. Train Managers How To Recognize Contribution

Managers can seriously demotivate team members by failing to recognize their contributions. Train your managers to praise all contributions both big and small. Compliments and recognition are necessary, even if people are only doing what they’re expected to do.

9. Train Your Managers To Be Expediters, Not Controllers

A manager must understand team member needs, intercede on their behalf, and represent their needs to management. It’s these activities, and not their title of manager, that sets their role apart from regular team members.

10. Train Managers On How To Provide Feedback

Ensure that managers both praise exceptional performance and provide any feedback for improvement as soon as a project is complete. Employees are more likely to accept feedback for improvement when they know management is satisfied overall. Managers must not wait for the annual performance review to provide feedback.

11. Train Managers To Be Objective

Feedback for improvement must be objective, unemotional, impersonal, factual, and clear. It should be directed at the performance and not at the employee. The manager’s personal opinion of the employee must not influence his comments.  Keep the feedback relevant to the employee’s role. Don’t let your comments wander to anything not directly tied to the task at hand.

12. Train Managers To Really Listen

Managers must listen to employees and understand their perspectives. By doing this, they can understand how best to deal with performance issues and effectively encourage improvement. At the same time, managers must know how to distinguish between employee manipulation and the real issues.

13. Train Managers To Be Subject Matter Experts

If the manager doesn’t know or understand the project or technology, how can he or she provide feedback or assess someone’s performance? Make sure your managers know each aspect of the work that their team does.

14. Train Managers To Be Humble

Some managers exploit their positions to show their superiority. It’s your job to train them to remember the real reason they’re there. Their job is to manage their team, improve team performance, and positively impact your business, not to upset the balance.

15. Train Managers To Work With Personality Types, Build Relationships, And Ensure Positive Team Dynamics

Your managers must treat each team member the same way and not show individual preference. Your manager should know who works best with whom and use this knowledge to form task-based groups. He or she must also be able to notice and leverage cross-learning opportunities for the betterment of the whole team.

This article was written by Dean of Invesp – a conversion rate optimization company that helps business in optimizing their landing pages and improving the experience of their website visitors.

IDrive iPhone App

IDrive online backup offers a mobile app for iPhone, Android, and Blackberry users who also have an IDrive account. The IDrive online backup mobile app allows you to:

• Share files and folders with anyone anywhere
• Search through files and documents in your IDrive account
• Read documents, watch movies, and listen to music stored on your home or office computer
• Back up contacts and items on your iPhone or iPad such as contacts and photos in your camera roll

A big advantage to the iDrive online backup app is the ability to back up your iPhone or iPad contacts, photos, and videos.

Click here to read the full IDrive Online Backup Review

Mozy iPhone App

Mozy online backup provides a free file syncing mobile app that you can download from the iPhone App Store. A few of the features offered through Mozy File Sync are:

• The ability to synchronize your files across all your computers and mobile devices
• Email a file from anywhere to anyone
• View backed up photos and share those photos right onto Facebook
• Access your audio files from your home computer on your mobile device

The advantage to using online backup mobile apps is that you can access your files from anywhere at any time.  With Mozy, however, you are unable to back up your files on your iPhone or iPad to your Mozy account. The online backup mobile app is available for both  iPhone and Android mobile devices.

Click here to read the full Mozy Online Backup Review

Included below is a list of additional online backup services that offer an iPhone app:

• Carbonite
• SugarSync
• IBackup
• Jungle Disk

For more information on online backup services, visit our Online Backup Comparison Chart.

RingCentral iPhone App

The RingCentral iPhone app is free to download from the iTunes App Store for customers with a RingCentral account. This app comes with many advantages, including the ability to make VoIP calls without using minutes from your wireless plan, and to make and receive calls using your company’s business number. You are also able to show your RingCentral number as your caller ID and keep all of your business voicemails separate from your personal voicemails.

With the RingCentral app, you can receive, view, and forward faxes, as well as receive push notifications for incoming messages. Additionally, you can view your RingCentral call logs and access all your company extensions as a contact group. The app is also available for the Android and the Blackberry.

Click here to read our full review of RingCentral’s business VoIP system.

Phone.com iPhone App

Phone.com offers a free app for iPhone users who have an existing Phone.com account. Phone.com’s iPhone app comes with many great features, including the ability to listen to and manage voicemails, view received faxes, view your extension’s call logs, block calls from unidentified users, and make calls from your virtual office phone number.

With this app, you can also send and receive text messages from your virtual office phone number and quickly connect to your conference bridge. The only downside is that the iPhone version is only available as a Web App. The app is available in native versions for Android and Blackberry.

Click here to read our full review of Phone.com’s business VoIP system.  

Other business VoIP services that offer an iPhone app include Vonage and 8×8. For more information on business VoIP systems, visit our Business VoIP Comparison Chart.

However, if your business consists of just you, you may be wondering whether a sole proprietorship is a viable option for your business. The following information explains why we recommend forming a single-member LLC over a sole proprietorship.

What is a single-member LLC?

It’s just what it sounds like: an LLC formed with only one member. A single-member LLC can be a good alternative to being a sole proprietor, as it can give you the liability protection of an LLC.  However, since you don’t have any partners, your operating agreement is typically a lot less complicated. You don’t have to build in any of the doomsday scenarios you want to think through when dealing with one or more partners because you have complete control.

Furthermore, because you’re the only member, 100% of the income from the LLC is attributable to you. For that reason, it’s considered a disregarded entity by the IRS. Therefore, typically this entity will not file a tax return and will operate under your social security number instead of its own Employer Identification Number.

What if I want to add a partner later?

No problem. You can just amend your Company Operating Agreement and file for an EIN.  You’ll want to consult with an attorney and/or accountant about how to account for any existing assets and liabilities held by the LLC when you make this change.

Why is a single-member LLC better than operating as a sole proprietor?

1. Liability Protection.  A sole proprietor is personally liable for the activities of the business he is operating. Forming an LLC offers some level of protection, which prevents you from losing everything if something goes awry with your business.
2. Capital Gains Tax upon a Sale.  When you sell certain types of assets, like intellectual property (trademarks, websites, patents, etc.), the sales proceeds can be subject to ordinary income tax. When you sell an entity that owns such property, it’s often possible to structure the sale to be capital gains, which are taxed at a much lower rate.
3. Appearances.  You will appear to be more professional if you’re operating as an LLC rather than as a sole proprietor.

Note: Gaines Kilpatrick co-founded ChooseWhat.com and has gone through the entire process to incorporate ChooseWhat. Additionally, Gaines manages HR and has filed numerous legal documents for the company. However, he is not an attorney or an accountant and may not be supremely qualified to give legal or tax advice. We strongly advise you to consult with an accountant or attorney before taking action based on this article.

I’ve since corrected the problem and now have a convenient system in place to monitor my online backup and make sure it runs properly.

I use Jungle Disk for my online backup needs, so my instructions are going to be tailored to their service. However, you can use the main takeaways from this process to configure any online backup service. (If you don’t have an online backup service yet, use our online backup service comparison section to make a quick, informed buying decision.)

Set Up Online Backup Activity Reports

A very efficient and effective way to ensure your online backup is running properly is to set up activity reports to be emailed to you. This is very simple to do.

Jungle Disk Software

1. Go to the ‘Backup Options’ section.
2. Change the ‘Backup Reporting’ drop-down to Report backup summaries.
3. Click ‘OK’ and now you are all set up. The master email on the account is where the activity reports will be sent.

Jungle Disk’s activity reports include the job’s last backup date, number of updated files, and number of errors. By regularly looking at your online backup service’s activity reports, you should easily be able to determine whether your online backup service is running properly. If I had activity reports set up, I would have noticed that my backup wasn’t running because the number of updated files was zero.

Moral of the Story

You’re not going to be able to foresee every single mistake, which is why it’s important to have systems in place, such as setting up activity reports, to catch your mistakes and fix them. The reason my online backup wasn’t working was that I changed the name of the folder I was backing up and hadn’t changed the folder location in the online backup service as well.

Spend the five minutes it takes and set up activity reports to monitor your online backup service. You can thank me later!

Adding keywords related to your topic is critical when setting up your Google+ Business page. Once you optimize your Google+ page for the search engines, you will want to begin taking actions necessary to gain followers so that all your efforts are put to good use.

Optimizing the Google+ Page

1. Tag line
   Your tag line is located under the main title of your page. You can view an example of our tag line on the ChooseWhat.com Google+ Profile page. The purpose of a tag line (which is limited to only 10 words) is to provide a compelling and informative description of your business that also incorporates important keywords. Having a tag line that clearly explains who and what you are, or what you represent, will help your visitors better understand why they are there. This can also lessen any confusion that might deter them from following you, which is your end goal.
2. Introduction Section
   In the about section found under the profile icon (which looks like this:  ) you can fill out your Introduction section and further describe your business in more detail. You can add things such as what you do, what products or services you offer or describe how you are trying to make a difference with your particular business. One important aspect of the introduction section is to optimize for your primary keywords. This needs to be done naturally and not appear as if you are just trying to stuff your paragraph full of keywords that don’t make sense. Such techniques will confuse visitors and deter people from following you. You also have the ability to link to your website in the Introduction section. Refer to ChooseWhat.com’s Google+ profile for an example.
3. Uploading Photos
   Photos are a great way to add additional content and give a personal feel to your Google+ page, making it more appealing and easier to connect with visitors. Don’t be afraid to get creative with this section. The first picture you want to add will of course be your logo. The additional five pictures can be anything you think best represents the style and feel you are trying to portray to the world. Here is a link to some popular Google+ Brand Pages and how they have uploaded their photos to create a branded image for their Google+ page.
4. Recommended Links
   If you look to the right of the Introduction section, you will see the branded links section. The purpose of this section is to provide visitors with additional links to other sites such as your additional social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), a company blog, and any other sites that you may own. At this time, you can have as many recommended links as you like. You can view ChooseWhat.com’s Google+ profile for an example.

Using the Google+ Page

Now that we have discussed the basics of optimizing your Google+ Business page, lets go over five tasks you can implement to add more followers to your Google+ Circles. This may seem like a daunting, time consuming task at first – but fear not! With a little effort, dedication, and creativity, you will surely gain more followers.

1. Make use of your Social Media accounts.
   Don’t be afraid to take advantage of your other social media outlets such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, or personal Google+ page accounts. Promote, promote, and promote your new Google+ Business page through these other media outlets. Start with people you know who will be willing to add your business page to their circles. In the beginning, who better than your friends, family and employees? After that, look to others who you may only be acquainted with. People who have already built a relationship with you through other social media outlets will be more willing and open to following you on  your new Google+ Business page. Simply starting a conversation on your other social media accounts by asking “Have you added us to your Google+ circle?” can help.
2. Add the Google+ badge to your website and any other content that you want to promote.
   The Google+ badge is different than the +1 button, so you should use both within your content and website. The Google+ badge shows Google your relevancy and popularity as well as helps people navigate easily from your website to your Google+ profile page. When users click the +1 button it publicly displays to others that you like a particular website or piece of content.
3. Expand your Circles by adding businesses related to your niche.
   Unfortunately, you can’t add people to your circles to gain more followers. However, you can reach out to other businesses and follow them and interact with their posts. It is up to you to build the relationship. Once other businesses find your content relevant and useful, they will want to follow you. It is a win win situation!
4. Search out engaging topics that are relevant and important to your business.
   You have the ability within Google+ to search out topics relevant to your business and add insightful and meaningful comments to the posts that you find. This helps build your credibility and shows people that you are making an effort in relationship building – a direction in which Internet search is increasingly moving.
5. Share, Share, Share!
   Don’t get so caught up in trying to promote your own Google+ page that you forget to share other people’s great content. This not only shows that you are a contributor to the larger social sphere by helping to promote others, but it also helps improve visibility to you and your brand.
   

If you like what you read and want more STARTicles like this, follow us on Google+ and we will try to return the favor!

What is a branded email address?

A branded email address uses your company’s registered domain in the email address:

@yourcompanyname.com

A non-branded email address is any email address that ends in:

@yahoo.com
@live.com
@msn.com
@gmail.com
@hotmail.com
@aol.com
@mac.com

Why is a branded email address important for my business?

• Establish sense of professionalism: Your business contacts are likely to take you and your business more seriously if you are using a branded email address (@yourcompanyname.com) as opposed to a non-branded email address (@yahoo.com).
• Low cost:  The only required cost is the domain registration, which is roughly $10/year.
• Free advertising:  If you use a non-branded email address, you are essentially advertising that service for free (april@yahoo.com or april@gmail.com).  With a branded email address, you’ll be advertising your own business and reaping the benefits.
• Overall marketing presence: Your email address is another extension of your business and should support other branded marketing materials, such as business cards, website, etc.

Why Free Google Apps?

Free Google Apps is one great option for businesses to use in order to get branded email addresses.

We recommend using Free Google Apps if:

• You have 10 employees or fewer, including yourself (otherwise, you’ll need to upgrade to Business Google Apps, which is $50/user/year);
• Your business frequently collaborates online and/or shares files;
• You want to access your email and other applications anywhere, anytime.

Read How To: Set up Business Email Accounts to see other options that might suit you better.

4 Easy Steps

1.  Register Your Domain Name

The first step is to choose and register the domain name you want to use for your email addresses (e.g. @yourcompanyname.com).  Our preferred registrar of choice is GoDaddy.com.

Ready to register your domain name? Click Here >>

Do you need help with this step? Read How To: Register Your Domain Name.

2.  Create a Free Google Apps Account

The second step is to create a free Google Apps account.  Visit the Google Apps page, and click the “Get Started” button.  The form will prompt you to enter the domain name you registered in the step above, set a username and password for your first user, as well as enter some additional contact information.

Click Here to Create a Free Google Apps Account >>

3.  Verify Domain Ownership

After you have created your free Google Apps account, Google will redirect you to your dashboard to continue the setup.  Choose “Express” setup. 

Google will ask you to verify ownership of the domain name you registered in Step 1.  There are several verification methods, but we recommend adding a DNS record to your domain’s configuration because it is the easiest method and your domain likely will not change.

Click the “Alternate Methods” tab and select the option “Add a DNS record to your domain’s configuration.”  Generate instructions for GoDaddy.com and follow the onscreen instructions.  If you have configured everything properly, Google will show you a message on the next screen that confirms domain ownership.

4.  Update MX Records

The last step is to update the MX records on your domain name. MX Records tell your domain registrar how to route your email (in this case, you’re routing to Gmail).

You can use this tool to automatically create the necessary Google Apps MX records for GoDaddy: https://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/google/gmail_login.asp

Once the MX records have been generated, tell Google that they have been changed. Go to your Google Apps Dashboard, and click “Set Up Your Apps” > Gmail > Set Up Gmail.

You will now be able to start receiving/sending emails from your branded email address.

Optional Step: Create Additional Users

If you have several employees or email addresses you want to set up, then you will need to create additional users.  To create additional users, go to your Google Apps dashboard and click “Organization and Users” in the blue menu at the top of the screen.  Click “Create New User” and fill out the details of the new email address you want to set-up.

Remember, the Free Google Apps comes with 10 email addresses.  If you need more, you can upgrade to Business Google Apps, which is $50/user/year.

Tips for Setting Up Business Email Addresses

• Use a consistent structure for your emails, such as firstname.lastname@companyname.com.  That way, if someone from outside your office has to guess a co-worker’s email address, they will be more likely to get it correct.
• Set up a Google Group if you want to make a mailing list that emails everyone at your office (e.g. office@yourcompanyname.com or team@yourcompanyname.com).
• Inform people of your new email address. Send out an announcement email, update your marketing materials (including business cards) and be sure to spread the word!

If you have any questions or want to share how a branded email address has helped your business, please leave a comment or message me: @CW_AprilA

The following alternatives offer similar functionality to the applications included with Microsoft Office. Each alternative is recommended for a specific purpose or office setup. Although there are many types of freeware and cloud apps on the Web, we’ve detailed the most popular options and explained who should use them.

Apple iWork (desktop software)

Apple iWork is a desktop application suite that works only with Mac OS. The most recent version of the software is Apple iWork 09, which includes Pages (word processing), Numbers (spreadsheets), and Keynote (presentations).

Recommendation:

We recommend Apple iWork for business owners who want to use a Mac computer for business and save significantly on the cost of basic software. If your primary business computers are Macs, or if you’ve got an existing Mac that you’d like to use for business purposes, then you should consider using Apple iWork as an alternative to Microsoft Office.

Cost:

iWork is significantly cheaper than Microsoft Office. You can get Apple iWork 09 for about $80 from Amazon.com or Apple.com, while Microsoft Office Home and Business for Mac OSX goes for about $215 on Amazon.  Unlike Microsoft, which gives you the option to purchase either the entire Office suite or standalone applications like Word or Excel, Apple only offers iWork as a bundled applications suite.

Compatibility:

Unlike Microsoft Office, iWork does not let you open files created in the current software version with an older version, which will limit your ability to share documents with users of the older versions. However, you can open files created in older versions with the current software without any issues. Pages 09 can open Microsoft Word files, and Numbers 09 can open Microsoft Excel files, but you might lose formatting.

Functionality:

Apple Pages 09 offers feature-rich word processing, along with intuitive graphics features. Pages now offers even more variety with 40 new templates, including stationery sets and a variety of newsletter designs. However, the software may lack some functionality when compared to Microsoft Word’s formatting and layout options.

Apple Numbers (the spreadsheet tool) is designed for simple calculations and includes templates for common spreadsheet functions, such as a check register and savings calculator. Numbers is not recommended as a replacement for Microsoft Excel, as Numbers is not good with Pivot Tables, which are integral for many types of spreadsheet functions.

How often is a paid upgrade required?

A new version of iWork comes out every year or two. You are not required to buy the new version, but it is recommended if you want the latest features.

Open Office (freeware)

OpenOffice.org, commonly known as Open Office, is a free, open-source application suite whose main applications are Writer (word processing), Calc (spreadsheets), Impress (presentations), Draw (graphics), and Base (databases). Open Office provides a single interface for the whole application suite, unlike Microsoft Office, which requires you to open each application separately.

Recommendation:

If you’re not ready to completely ditch Microsoft, you might consider purchasing Microsoft Office for some computers and downloading Open Office on other computers to cut down on costs. We recommend OpenOffice for any of the following user types/office setups:

• A business with a small, technically comfortable staff that might be inclined to use open-source tools. If your staff prefers open-source software for philosophical reasons, and can handle a continuously updated interface and less formal customer support, Open Office is a completely viable alternative to Microsoft Office.
• A business with older or shared computers that don’t need complex functionality. If you are using older computers or shared computers (for interns or receptionists, for example) and need only basic functionality, then Open Office might work for you.
• Business owners who want to save significantly on the costs of basic software. The great thing about Open Office is that it’s completely free, and the included applications are comparable to those provided with Microsoft Office.

Cost:

It’s free to download the latest version of OpenOffice at OpenOffice.org.

Compatibility:

Open Office is great for sharing intra-office documents, but you may encounter difficulties when sharing files with people outside your office who are using Microsoft Office. Open Office Writer (their word processor) can open files saved in Microsoft Word or Apple Pages, but formatting might be lost. Writer gives you the option to save files as Word docs, in addition to Open Office format. Open Office Calc can open most spreadsheets saved in Microsoft Excel format and gives you the option to save your spreadsheets in Excel file format (XLS) or in the international standard OpenDocument Format (ODF). Open Office’s native file format generally creates much smaller files than similar files created in Microsoft Office.

Functionality:

Open Office Writer offers nearly as much functionality as Microsoft Word, but users who are already familiar with Word may be bothered by the unfamiliar Writer interface. Similarly, Open Office Calc does not offer Microsoft Excel 2010/2011′s tabbed toolbars and users familiar with recent versions of Excel may encounter difficulties.

Both Calc and Excel offer conditional formatting (the ability to automatically format cells based on the the data within them), but Excel offers a lot more flexibility and control. Calc fully supports the conditional formatting of Excel 97-2003 but does not support the updates included with Excel 2007, nor data bars. Also, Calc lacks Smart Art, a useful feature that allows you to easily create diagrams in a many common formats (like pyramids, cyclical diagrams, org charts, and more).

Calc offers Data Pilot, which is a feature similar to Excel’s Pivot Tables (a function widely used by power users), but Calc doesn’t have an equivalent for Pivot Charts, which somewhat limits your ability to view and analyze data.

Google Apps for Business (online/”cloud”)

Google Apps for Business is an applications suite that is hosted online and includes Business Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs (word processing and spreadsheets), Google Sites (project management) and more, depending on your service plan. Google Docs lets you create and view online documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and forms. You also get online storage for any type of file.

Recommendation:

Because Google Docs isn’t as sophisticated as Microsoft Office or Apple iWork, we don’t recommend that you completely replace your desktop office suite with Google Docs. Instead, we recommend using it in tandem with desktop software.  We recommend Google Apps for any of the following user types/office setups.

• A business whose employees frequently collaborate online and/or share files. The main benefit of using Google Docs is that multiple people can edit one document at the same time, which makes file-sharing and collaboration a breeze. Also, your document is automatically saved any time a change is made, so you don’t have to worry about losing information.
• Business owners who want to utilize office applications and access documents from any computer. The great thing about Google Apps is that it’s all online, and documents are stored in “the cloud.” This means that all you have to do is log into your Gmail account on any computer with an Internet connection to access all your files.
• Business owners who want to set up unified office email addresses (e.g. name@choosewhat.com). If you want to set up unified email addresses for all of your employees and/or business partners, check out Google Apps for Business.

Cost:

• Google Apps Free Version:  Limited to 10 user accounts
• Google Apps for Business Flexible Plan: $5 / user account / month
• Google Apps for Business Annual Plan: $50 / user account / year

Online Storage:

Each Google Apps for Business account can store up to 1 GB worth of files. If you want to increase this limit you can pay for an account upgrade:

• 20 GB ($5 / year)
• 80 GB ($20 / year)
• 200 GB ($50 / year)
• 400 GB ($100 / year)
• 1 TB ($256 / year)

Compatibility:

Google Docs is growing in popularity because it is easily accessible online from any computer, and there are virtually no compatibility issues.  The downside is that it depends on a fast and reliable Internet connection. However, you can work offline by downloading your Google documents. Word documents can be downloaded as Microsoft Word, PDF, OTF, Text or HTML files. Spreadsheets can be downloaded as Microsoft Excel, Open Office, CSV, PDF, Text or HTML files. Of course, this means that you will need existing software, like Microsoft Office or Open Office, to read and edit these files.

Functionality:

The Documents and Spreadsheets tools in Google Docs are very basic when compared to their more sophisticated counterparts from Microsoft Office, and those familiar with MS Office will likely find Google Docs lacking in formatting options and functionality.  Like Apple Numbers, Google Docs Spreadsheets is not nearly as powerful as Microsoft Excel and should not be considered as a replacement when performing functions used mainly by engineering or accounting types.

When ordering your business cards, you’ve got a lot of options, including paper options, fonts, colors and graphics. Make sure you know the basics of business card printing and design by checking out this handy infographic.

Created by BusinessCards.com

For most entrepreneurs, when you first start out and need an address for your business, chances are it’s either just you and couple other people working out of a residence. Therefore, the temptation to use your home address or rent a nearby P.O. Box at the United States Postal Service sounds easy and is the path of least resistance.

You should resist this urge. Residential and P.O. Box addresses are not good options. Here’s why:

Residential Business Addresses

Many small businesses and startups, especially if they are sole proprietorships, use the owner’s home as their business address. Certainly there are advantages to the residential address option. For one, it’s free since you already live there. You will also save money on gasoline and other consumables without the need to travel to the post office or some other location to pick up mail. However, the downside is significant. Some of the problems include:

• Your home address will be publicized on marketing materials and online.
• Your residential address must be properly zoned for your business.
• Someone must be at home most of the time during business hours to sign for packages.
• If you move, you will have to change all of your basic business collateral.
• Since you will both work and live at home, you might feel quite isolated.

P.O. Box (United States Postal Service)

Renting a P.O. Box from the United States Postal Service is another popular option, but it’s definitely the one that will give you the most headaches. While it might sound appealing in terms of being able to separate your personal and private mail, as well as the easy 24-hour access, a P.O. Box is probably the worst option for a business. Some reasons:

• A great many of the most basic business transactions, such as registering your business with your Secretary of State, simply will not accept a P.O. Box as an official business address. Obtaining certain types of licenses (real estate, for instance) also require a regular mailing address.

• Unlike UPS or other private mailbox services, the USPS will not sign for packages from its competitors, significantly limiting the type of mail your business can receive.

When you are ready to set up your business mailing address, be sure to read our guide on how to do it.

Google+ Is Directly Tied to Google Search Results

This is huge. Google gets about 1 billion unique monthly visitors and controls 80% of the online search market. The company is naturally incorporating “+1″ activity (the Google+ equivalent of a “Like” on Facebook) into its algorithm and favoring those results. Businesses with a Google+ profile page that have a lot of followers (or users in their “Circles” in Google+ parlance) and +1 activity (either on status posts or from the +1 widget on a website) will be more likely to receive favorable placement in search results.

Dynamic Sharing Capabilities

When users follow your business on Google+ you categorize them into buckets, or Circles. Circles can be organized in all sorts of configurations: team members, customers, affiliates, etc. This allows you greater control of your social messaging. If you want a message to go out only to team members, you can do so. Want to offer a promotion to a specific set of customers? Create a Circle for them and post a status only that group will see. Being able to blast specific updates to specific people has powerful marketing potential.

Familiar Tools, New Business Possibilities

Some of the Google+ tools that are either still in their infancy or geared towards the personal aspect of the service have potential to be powerful business tools. One is Hangouts, a video chat feature that allows for video chats of up to 10 live Google+ members. Taken in the context of the business world, a Hangout has the potential to allow you to conduct free conference calls with remote team members or clients, and to conduct focus groups with a personal touch.

A relatively new tool that Google+ launched, Ripples, provides fascinating insight into the reach of status updates. Ripples essentially takes the sharing activity of your posts and provides you with a visual representation of how it has been distributed throughout the network. It’s a great new way to monitor your analytics and traffic without having to look at the same old boring line and bar graphs. Check out this link to get a demonstration of how Ripples works.

Fully Cover Your Social Media Bases

Most businesses have already firmly established a presence on Facebook and Twitter (and if you haven’t, you need to), so the temptation to ignore Google+ as just another piece of social network clutter is strong. Honestly, up until the recent release of business pages, ignoring it was easy. Now, though, the service is starting to make noise and will continue to do so as it upgrades its service and provides new offerings.

Social media (if done right) has provided an unparalleled marketing reach to the small business without much money to spend on promotional activities. Potential customers all have their preferred social media networks, and you need to get in front of them wherever you can. Like it or not, Google+ is now a force in social media marketing and needs to be reckoned with.

For more information, see our detailed piece on How To: Use Social Media to Promote Your Business.

With all the fanboys, power users, and geeks out there telling you which OS is best, it can be difficult to make a decision on what computer will best suit your business needs.

What exactly is an “OS,” and what does it have to do with the computer you’re trying to purchase?  The answer lies in that magical space between the physical world and the software world.

Mac vs. PC – Those are the OSes, right?

First, I want to explain that OS stands for “Operating System.” An OS is a piece of software that manages the resources in your computer. I generally find it helpful to think of the OS as the middleman between the physical world and the software world.

Let’s take a look at the differences between a Mac and a PC. In the physical world, the two aren’t very different anymore. They use the same kind of processors, the same kind of hard drives, and the same kind of memory. The big difference in the two is that Macs are vertically integrated. This means that Mac is very particular about the hardware that they use, and they write their OS to take full advantage of the hardware’s abilities. Conversely, PCs have highly interchangeable and customizable parts. The additional flexibility means that there is a natural loss in the stability and optimization of the hardware.

The bottom line is: Macs are very stable, but your options are limited and generally expensive. PCs are highly customizable and cheaper to build, but can be less stable and have a shorter shelf life.

History Lesson

Back in the day (like 5 years ago), Macs and PCs used to be very different. Macs used an entirely different processor architecture called RISC, or Reduced Instruction Set Computer.  PCs (“Personal Computers”) used CISC or Complex Instruction Set Computer. This is where the “Mac vs. PC” distinction really shined. RISC computers can go through many more instructions than a CISC processor can in the same amount of time, which was really great for big number-crunching applications. This made Macs a favorite for graphic designers and people who make movies because these applications require a lot of math.

CISC processors, however, continued to evolve and actually became faster. Eventually Mac decided to switch over to the CISC processors and leave RISC behind. In the end, Macs became PCs. However, Mac took with it the “Macs are better for designers” reputation and rebranded the term “PC” to mean “Not a Mac” through their famous “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” commercials.

Windows, OSX, and Linux

Let’s take a look at the popular OS choices for a computer and explore the real-world benefits and disadvantages of each.

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is the most widely used Operating System in the world. Most software is available for Windows, and there are many programs that run only in Windows. This reason alone makes Windows a solid choice for business applications. Because of the vast selection of software available to Windows, a Windows-powered computer can be very flexible for your business needs. The problem with Windows is that the OS is expensive.  This cost is usually offset when you purchase your computer because it will come with Windows installed, but be aware that you can’t take the Windows disc from one computer and just install it on another. Operating system upgrades are also expensive because you’ll either need to buy a new computer or shell out the hundreds of dollars for an upgrade disc.

Mac OSX

Mac OSX is very quickly growing in popularity, but it is not yet as widely used as Windows. In my experience, Mac OSX crashes less often and is much more stable, prettier, and easier to use than Windows. The problem with Macs is the availability of software. Again, this industry is growing rapidly, and developers are generating Mac software more and more often. However, you’ll probably find that when you need software to fulfill a need in your business, you’ll have 10 options with Windows and only two or three options for a Mac. One of my favorite things about using a Mac is that when it’s time to upgrade my Operating System, it doesn’t cost hundreds of dollars. I can keep my Mac up to date with the latest and greatest for about $30.

Linux

If you have a hardcore techie in your life, you’ll probably hear about Linux. Linux has been around for a couple of decades now, but has always been something that only serious computer lovers used. Linux is a totally free Operating System that is open to any and all developers to work on. The great thing about Linux is that it’s free. You also have a lot of options, probably too many. Linux is just the start; there’s also Ubuntu, Debian, CentOS, Fedora, Mint, and countless other Operating Systems that are based on Linux. Most of the software for Linux is also free, and that’s very cool. Here’s the problem though: free software is usually not as pretty or refined as software that you pay for.

Great – so what are the best options for my business?

In my opinion, the best option is to run Windows on a PC. This is the most common setup and will offer you the flexibility you will need when starting your business. Finding hardware options, software options, and support when you need it will be much easier with a Windows machine.

Using OSX on a Mac is what I use for my personal computing. Let’s face it, Macs are pretty and the cool thing to have these days. The secret weapon for Mac is not the prettiness; it’s the durability and maintainability of both the hardware and the software.

Linux on a PC is a fantastic option for servers and is actually the standard choice for servers. However, I can’t recommend Linux as a good choice for workstations. I want to, and one day I will be very happy to write an article on why Linux is the right choice for business workstations, but that day is not today.

Sole Proprietorship:

As the name suggests, a sole proprietorship is a type of business entity that is owned and run by one individual and in which there is no legal distinction between the owner and the business. Many small businesses start off this way when a person decides to, “be his own boss.” Sole proprietorships are often run out of one’s home: a furniture maker, a freelance writer or graphic designer, and an operator of a small home-based day care center are all examples of this type of business.

The risk and reward are equal. The owner receives all profits (subject to taxation) but also has unlimited liability for all losses, debts, and legal action. This means that the owner has no less liability than if they were acting as an individual instead of as a business.

Although it is cheaper and easier to do business as a sole proprietor, if you want to eventually raise capital the structure can work against you. A sole proprietorship is difficult to formalize and the investor has less peace of mind concerning the use and security of his or her investment.

General Partnerships:

A general partnership, or simply a partnership, refers to an association of persons who work together as an unincorporated company. Partnerships are created by agreement, proof of existence, or estoppel (an equitable legal remedy in which a court will “estop” parties from claiming a partnership does not exist based on the previous actions or words of the people involved). It also offers pass-through taxation just like an LLC, meaning that money made by the partnership is deemed the personal income of the partners, not the business, and is only taxed once.

Other characteristics of partnerships include formation by two or more persons, all of whom are personally liable for any legal actions and debts the entire company may face. Each partner is personally liable – jointly and severally – for all business debts, taxes, or any torts. (Jointly liable means partners are equally responsible, while severally means partners are only liable for their proportionate responsibility in the business or the action causing a dispute.)

For example, if a partnership defaults on a payment to a creditor, the partners’ personal assets are subject to attachment and liquidation to pay the creditor. By default, profits are shared equally amongst the partners. However, a partnership agreement will usually detail the manner in which profits and losses are to be shared. Each general partner is also deemed the agent of the partnership. Therefore, if that partner is apparently carrying on partnership business in the eyes of a third party, all general partners can be held liable for his dealings.

Limited Partnerships:

A limited partnership is a form of partnership similar to a general partnership, except that one general partner (GP) has more liability and authority than the other limited partners (LPs). Like shareholders in a corporation, an LP’s liability to the business is limited only to how much he or she invested. An LP also has no management authority. The GPs pay the LPs a return on their investment (similar to a dividend), the nature and extent of which is usually defined in the partnership agreement. GPs thus carry full personal liability, and in cases of financial misfortune, the GP becomes “the generous partner.” Profits in a limited partnership are also pass-through for taxation.

Limited Liability Partnerships:

An LLP works primarily like other partnerships except each partner is not liable for the conduct or misdeeds of the other parties. Each state has specific rules around the creation of an LLP. Taxation is also pass-through.

Typically, partnerships in all their various forms consist of businesses such as law firms, medical practices, and other similar groups of skilled professionals working together.

Corporations:

There are four characteristics of a business corporation: legal personality (or legal entity), limited liability, transferable shares, and centralized management under a board structure. A corporation is a formal business association with a publicly registered charter, recognizing it as a separate legal entity having its own privileges and liabilities distinct from those of its members. There are many different forms of corporations.

Corporations exist as a product of corporate law, and their rules balance the interests of the management operating the corporation with its creditors, shareholders, and employees. An important (but not universal) feature of a corporation is limited liability. If a corporation fails, shareholders normally only stand to lose their investment, and employees will lose their jobs, but neither will be further liable for debts that remain owing to the corporation’s creditors. There are, of course, exceptions to this but it is rare. Virtually any type of business, provided it is legal, can take on corporate status.

When you are ready to take action on incorporating your business, visit Rocket Lawyer or LegalZoom to easily get the ball rolling.

What is “Break Up with Your Bank” all about?

On September 29, Bank of America (the second largest bank in the country) announced that they would begin charging consumers a monthly fee for use of debit cards.  This hit a nerve with consumers, and even though Bank of America has since backed down, hundreds of thousands of people have left big banks for credit unions and other smaller institutions.  This movement has been affectionately referred to as “Break up with Your Bank.”

How does this affect small businesses and startups?

As a practical matter, the $5 per month fee is pretty insignificant.  However, the fact that your bank is willing to risk adversely affecting its relationship with you for $5 per month speaks volumes.  In our section about how to Open a Business Bank Account, we recommend that you develop a relationship with a smaller bank.  In order for someone to care about you, they have to know who you are.  I’ve had an account with Compass Bank for over ten years and they have no idea who I am.  However, every time I walk into ChooseWhat.com’s regional bank, Plains Capital Bank, I’m greeted by name.

What are the advantages of switching to a smaller bank?

I’m going to repeat my above statement because it’s really important:  In order for someone to care about you, they have to know who you are.  Here are a few examples of how our banking relationship has benefited our business and me personally.

Phone Calls, Not Overdraft Fees

If our account is overdrawn, our banker calls us to let us know so that we can put more money in the account. A big national bank will just send you a fine.

Flexibility

I bought my house in 2010, two years after my business partner, Leo Welder, and I started our business. To qualify for a mortgage you have to submit two years of tax returns, and at the time I hadn’t filed my 2009 return yet. My 2008 return was fine, but my 2007 return showed earnings of only $19,000; so I didn’t qualify. However, my banker knew my financial situation, and Plains Capital Bank gave me a short term loan so that I could close on my house with the understanding that I would refinance with a traditional mortgage as soon as I filed my 2009 tax return. Try getting service like that from Bank of America.

Protection

We previously had a landlord that was having some financial trouble. One time he took our rent check to the bank lobby to cash it. The bank thought this was strange, so our banker called and asked me if they should cash the check before they gave our landlord the money.

Convenience

If I need something from our bank, I have several people I can call who know me by name. I don’t have to enter my account number on a touchtone keypad, I just call our banker on his cell phone and tell him what I need.

Quality Customer Service

You might be saying, “It sounds too good to be true.  ChooseWhat.com must be a major account to receive the level of service they’ve experienced.” That is simply not true. Today, we are doing pretty well. However, when we opened our account, Zilker Ventures, the parent company of ChooseWhat.com, consisted of me, my partner Leo and a few part-time interns. Our bank has always treated us the same way we’re treated now. We have a good relationship with our bank because they have been with us from the very beginning. They understand things about our business that you can’t see on a financial statement. Developing this type of relationship can be very valuable for your business.

What are the disadvantages of switching to a smaller bank?

Inconveniences

The main reason not to change to a smaller bank would be to avoid the logistical complications with changing banks.  You’ll have to get new checks, new check card numbers, update your payroll, etc.  Things rarely go exactly according to plan when making major changes like this.

Credit

Another reason might be that your credit isn’t as good as it was when you opened your account at your current bank.  If this is true, you might not be able to open a new account somewhere else.

If you do plan to switch banks, make sure to open the new account first.  Keep the old account open for a few months even after you’ve switched all your activity to the new account just in case you missed something in the switch.

My business partner Gaines and I decided to create a company to provide resources to other entrepreneurs in September of 2007. At that point, like any business idea in its infancy, we still had a lot of details to work out.  The first thing we needed was a name because we knew that right away we were going to have to start acquiring things for the business (like a mailing address, a phone number, a fax number, an LLC, an EIN, and so on).

I remember the exact circumstances of naming the business.  We brainstormed ideas over the phone while I was driving my car and Gaines was at his computer in his home office. After a few minutes, we homed in on the word “Ventures” and decided to work it into the name because at that point we weren’t exactly sure which direction the business would take. The process basically became a crapshoot as we stuck words in front of “Ventures” and put them into GoDaddy to see if the domain was available.  Eventually, we paired it with “Zilker” (the name of a very popular park in Austin near Gaines’ house) and found that ZilkerVentures.com was available.  In addition to the domain availability, we thought the name sounded cool and was easy to say. After about 10 minutes we registered the domain, and Zilker Ventures was born.

Over the course of the next few weeks, we used the name Zilker Venutes to set up the business by doing what is now listed as steps 2 through 17 on the ChooseWhat Startup Guide.  Of course, back then ChooseWhat.com didn’t exist, so we probably missed a few steps and did some others in a less than optimal way (which is the exact problem we help others solve with ChooseWhat.com).  We launched our first website, FaxCompare.com, to test our idea of comparing business services. The need for this type of information was apparent almost immediately, and we even had a bit of financial success.

Gaines and I used that experience to lay out our plan for the future of our business. We hired a trademark specialist to help us find a good name for our long term vision. This process took several weeks of pretty focused efforts, but we eventually settled upon the name ChooseWhat.com, because it:

• was two simple, commonly known words;
• utilized the word “choose,” which is part of our goal – to help people choose the services they need to set up their business;
• the domain was available; and
• our trademark specialist did not see any apparent conflicts with other registered trademarks.

The specialist prepared a formal research report on the viability and availability of the trademark, and we eventually formed a new LLC for ChooseWhat.com.  But, as you can see, we conducted a considerable amount of business under the name Zilker Ventures long before we ever conceived of the name ChooseWhat.com. Today, we still utilize both names.  (If you’d like to know more about how we use the separate entities today, the explanation is more relevant to forming LLC’s and corporate structure; if you post your interest in our Form an LLC forum, I’ll elaborate.)

The lesson here is simple – if the creative inspiration for a great business name seems to be eluding you, just pick a name that has an available domain and revisit the issue later.  Don’t let the fear of picking the wrong name for your business stand in the way of getting started.

Fax number porting is the process of transferring your existing fax number to a new provider. Typically, you can’t port your fax number out unless you ported it in.

You will want to port your fax number if either of the following is true:

• You have an existing fax number that’s printed on your marketing materials (e.g. letterhead, business cards).
• You want to take your fax number with you if you decide to switch to a different provider.

Online Fax Porting Number Costs

Porting number costs vary significantly among online fax services. There is typically a fee to port your fax number into an online fax service as well as a fee to port your fax number out of an online fax service. Included below is a list of services and their porting number costs.

Offer Free Number Porting:

*You can typically only port out a number if you’ve ported it in.

• RingCentral
• Nextiva
• eXtremeFax
• FaxPipe
• InterFax
• SFax

Offer Number Porting for a Charge:

*You can typically only port out a number if you’ve ported it in.

• FaxSer – $15 to port in (only in NY, NJ, and CT)
• FaxAge – $20 to port in and free to port out
• MyFax – $20 to port in and doesn’t allow you to port your number out
• MetroFax – $24.95 to port in and free to port out
• Fax87 – $25 to port in and free to port out
• SRFax – $25 if they have service in the area
• eFax – free to port in and $40 to port out
  
• UnityFax – $15 to port in for local numbers, $50 to port in for toll free numbers, an additional $1/month if you port a number in
• PopFax – must buy their “portability pack” that costs $168 and includes two years of receive service
• MaxEmail – must call to see if your number qualifies

Do Not Offer Number Porting:

• RapidFax
• TrustFax
• SmartFax
• Fax.com
• Send2Fax
• ClickFax
• AirComUSA
• GreenFax
• GotFax
• FaxAway
• FaxItNice
• OneSuite
• SaveOnFaxes

Our Recommendation

I recommend using our online fax comparison chart and picking the two or three services you’re most interested in. Then, use our information for porting number costs to see which service best fits your needs and go sign up.

Compare the top online fax services here.

Steps to Port Your Number to an Online Fax Service

1. Verify with your current provider that your number is able to be ported.
2. Sign up for service with the online fax service you want. Go through the process just like you would if you weren’t porting a number in.
3. Contact the online fax service you signed up for and notify them you want to port your number in. The online fax service will provide you with a transfer request form.
4. Fill out and submit the transfer request form to the online fax service. The transfer process takes about two weeks. Don’t cancel your service with your current provider during this time as it can cancel the transfer request.
5. When the transfer request has gone through, the online fax service will switch the fax number on your account with the number you transferred in.

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Salesforce is a business cloud computing customer relationship management (CRM) provider that currently has 82,400 customers and over 2,100,000 subscribers. In response to this sizeable market, many email marketing services have created tools that let people integrate email marketing with their existing Salesforce CRM accounts.

If you use Salesforce to manage your customer relationships, or you’re thinking about getting it, you’ll save yourself a lot of trouble by signing up for an email marketing service that fully integrates with Salesforce, or at least lets you import your Salesforce contacts easily.

To help Salesforce users make a quick and informed buying decision on an email marketing tool that will work for their needs, we’ve compiled a list of the top services with details below.

Fully Integrated with Salesforce

Many email marketing services like to tout the fact that they’ll integrate with Salesforce. However, this can be misleading. Some services only let you import contacts from Salesforce, while others offer full integration. Full integration means that your email marketing service is built into your Salesforce interface, allowing you to conveniently create email campaigns and manage email contacts from within your Salesforce account. You can also easily sync or transfer contacts between your email marketing service and Salesforce.

The following email marketing apps (from appexchage.salesforce.com) let you integrate your email marketing service with Salesforce.

iContact for Salesforce

App details:

• 2010 Customer Choice Award Winner
• Email campaign reports can be analyzed down to each individual recipient
• No per-user fee—When you buy iContact for Salesforce you get a monthly site-license so all your users can use the application with no additional fees
• “Targeted send” feature—Salesforce users can learn who opened or clicked on your message and send targeted messages based on these and other behaviors
• Add Like and Tweet buttons to your messages
• 99% deliverability guarantee

*For more information about iContact, read our full iContact Review.

VerticalResponse for Group Edition

App details:

• Use your existing opted-in Leads & Contacts in Salesforce to create mailing lists of any size, or upload your own lists from any CSV file
• Use any of their 500+ pre-designed templates, create a design with their simple HTML editor, or upload your own HTML
• Add Like and Tweet buttons to your messages

*For more information about Vertical Response, read our full Vertical Response Review.

Jango Mail for Salesforce

App details:

• Real-time reporting of opens, clicks, bounces, unsubscribes, forwards, and activity through your web site
• Rendering tool—See exactly what your email looks like in Yahoo, Gmail, AOL, and other email clients before sending
• Email campaign reports can be analyzed down to each individual recipient

*For more information about Jango Mail, read our full Jango Mail Review.

Constant Contact for Salesforce v1.0

App details:

• Import contacts from Salesforce into Constant Contact (not automatic)
• Sync opt-out lists between Salesforce and Constant Contact
• Email campaign reports can be analyzed down to each individual recipient

*For more information about Constant Contact, read our full Constant Contact Review.

MailChimp Connector for Salesforce CRM

App details:

• Import contacts from Salesforce into MailChimp (not automatic)
• Sync opt-out lists between Salesforce and MailChimp
• Automatically create Salesforce leads when you get new subscribers

*For more information about MailChimp, read our full MailChimp Review.

Import from Salesforce

The following email marketing services do not fully integrate with Salesforce, but they do let you easily import contacts from Salesforce into your email marketing account and create contact lists for your email campaigns.

GetResponse

Pros:

• Excellent email creation tools
• High quality campaign reports
• High quality customer service
• High quality contact management system
• Can export a clean contact list that automatically removes bounced and unsubscribed email addresses
• Can import contacts from email accounts (e.g. Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail)
• Can create A/B test campaigns (to test subject line, from name, time sent)
• 1 GB of image hosting

*Read instructions on how to import from Salesforce to GetResponse.

*For more information about Get Response, read our full GetResponse Review.

Benchmark Email

Pros:

• Excellent email creation tools
• High quality customer service
• High quality campaign reports
• Can import contacts from email accounts (e.g. Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail)
• Can export a clean contact list that automatically removes bounced and unsubscribed email addresses
• A real person manually reviews your email campaign before it’s sent

*Read instructions on how to import from Salesforce to Benchmark Email.

*For more information about Benchmark Email, read our full Benchmark Email Review.

Emma

Pros:

• High quality customer service (scored 5 out of 5 stars)
• Unlimited image hosting (Market Standard is 5-10 MB)
• Can export a clean contact list that automatically removes bounced and unsubscribed email addresses
• Flexible email templates

*Read instructions on how to import from Salesforce to Emma.

*For more information about Emma, read our full Emma Review.

The Easy Way

Some email marketing services integrate seamlessly with Facebook, offering a link on their signup form page, which makes adding a form to Facebook automatic and painless for the end-user.

The following email marketing services offer a 1-click integration tool for adding your newsletter signup form to Facebook:

• Constant Contact
• iContact
• MailChimp
• GetResponse

The Not-So-Easy Way

Some email marketing services do not have a 1-click integration for adding their signup form to Facebook, and these services require users to manually generate the code themselves and add it to Facebook.

The following email marketing services do not offer a 1-click integration tool for adding your newsletter signup form to Facebook:

• Benchmark Email
• GraphicMail
• VerticalResponse
• Campaign Monitor

We used Benchmark Email to complete this process, but you can use any email marketing service of your choice (provided they supply you with the code for the signup form).

>> COMPARE EMAIL MARKETING PROVIDERS WHO OFFER SIGNUP FORMS

#1: Generate Code with an Email Marketing Service

• Log into Benchmark Email
• Click “Lists” > “Signup Forms”
• Find the subscription form you want to use or Create a New Signup Form
• TIP: Create a separate signup form and list for your Facebook account, so you can track those sign-ups separately and see how that network performs compared to your websites.
• Click “Get Code” and Copy the Code

#2: Install iFrame Tabs on Facebook Page

• Log into your Facebook account
• Use the Search Bar at the top, and do a search for “Static iFrame Tab by Woobox” and select the app
  
• Click “Install Page Tab” to install application
  
• Select the Facebook Pages you want to Add Your Newsletter Form to and click “Add Page Tab” NOTE: You must be an admin of the page
  
• It will redirect you to your company’s page
• Authorize the App

#3: Paste Code

• On your company’s page, find the “Manage” drop-down menu (top-right) and click “Edit Page”
  
• Click “Apps” in the left-nav, and find the Static iFrame Tab you just installed.  Click the “Edit Settings” link
  
• Type the Name of the Custom Tab you want to add, and click “Save”
• Go back to your Company’s Page and Look under your timeline picture. Click the tab you just added
• Click “Settings” and paste the code in the Page Source box (make sure the HTML radio button is clicked
  
• Click “Save Settings”

#4: Test Sign-up

**This process used Static iFrames instead of FBML.  FBML is being deprecated, according to Facebook.  On Jan 1, 2012 FBML will no longer be supported and on June 12, 2012 FBML apps will no longer work.

Quick Response codes, or QR codes, are two-dimensional codes consisting of black and white square modules. These codes can be scanned and read by smartphones to transfer information. They act as a bridge between the real world and the digital world by giving you instant access to information on your smartphone straight from a flyer, magazine ad, or store window, among other places. QR codes can link from anything to a YouTube video promoting a product to a company’s Facebook page.

The key difference between QR codes and standard barcodes is that QR codes can hold significantly more. While most standard barcodes can only hold around 20 to 30 numerical digits, QR codes can hold thousands of alphanumeric characters of information. QR codes work by opening a QR code reader on your smartphone, which works with the phone’s camera to scan the code.  Your phone is then prompted to perform some kind of action, such as directing to a mobile website, giving you directions to a certain location through Google Maps, or activating a phone function such as email or SMS.

Many smartphones come with a QR code reader already installed. Others require you to download a QR code reader app. QR codes have become an increasingly popular way to enhance your company’s marketing campaigns. The increase in the number of smartphone users means more opportunities to take advantage of this emerging technology. Some popular QR code generators include QR Code Generator by Kerem Erkan and BeQRious. As far as QR code readers go, check out i-nigma or NeoReader.

How to Use QR Codes

There are many different ways you can use QR codes to promote your business and connect with potential customers. Here are just a few:

• Business cards- This is a great way to pass along your contact information. You can do this by linking the QR code to your vCard (an electronic business card). This way, when somebody scans the QR code on your business card, all of your contact information will be stored in their phone without them having to manually enter the information. Check out Moo for information on how to create QR Code Cards.

• Marketing materials- QR codes can be placed on flyers, posters, and brochures to advertise your different products and services, or you could promote discounts and giveaways that are exclusive to the QR codes.

• Social media- Use your QR codes to connect users with your Facebook and Twitter pages. This is a great way to get Likes and Follows.

• Phone functions- You can create QR codes that will dial a predetermined number, or generate email and text messages.

If you use QR codes to link to your website, make sure the website is mobile friendly and easy to navigate around. Otherwise, your site may not load properly or at all.

It is also a good idea to have some kind of messaging on your advertisements explaining what QR codes are and providing instructions on how to use them.

Advantages of Using QR Codes

There are many benefits to using QR codes as part of your marketing campaign, including:

• No reprinting of business cards or marketing materials necessary- When your information changes or needs updating, there is no need to reprint all of your materials. All you have to do is update the information that the QR code links to.

• Cost-effective-Not only will you save money by not having to reprint your marketing materials, but there are QR code generators that make QR codes free to create and use such as

• Convenience- QR codes make it easy for users to instantly access business and product information straight from their phone, without having to manually type anything.

• Trackable results-QR codes are a great marketing tool because it is easy to see to see where, when, and how many times they were scanned over a certain time period.

• Competitive advantage- QR codes will give your business a distinct advantage over your competitors who have not yet adopted the technology.

ScanTxt is a service that utilizes both QR codes and SMS mobile marketing. They do this by including text alongside the QR code, such as “text KEYWORD to 467467.” This way if a user cannot scan the QR code, they can simply text the keyword to access the content. ScanTxt offers a 30-day free trial and has plans starting as low as $9.99 per month.

#1: Make Your Subscription Form Easy to Find

Put your newsletter sign-up on every page of your website.  Consider modifying the design so that the sign-up form is repeated in the header, footer or main navigation. The trick is to provide consistency for your users so that when they decide to commit, they know exactly where to find the form.

Tip: Many email marketing services make creating a sign-up form easy by providing pre-generated code that you can simply copy and paste to your website.  Compare email marketing services.

#2: Use a Simple Form

Ask for the bare minimum of information you need to personalize your newsletters.  This is usually just a name and email address.  If you need other information to further customize your campaign, make it optional.

Tip: Many email marketing services provide a sign-up form with various options for you, and you are able to customize which information you want to collect.

#3: Publish Your Archive

Create a page on your website that links to past newsletter issues. 

This allows readers to get a sneak peak of what kind of emails they will be receiving, so they know what they are signing up for.  Be sure to include a description about your newsletter, as well as a sign-up form.

Tip: Many email marketing services provide links to your past newsletters that you can use on your website to create an archive.

#4: Be Clear About Your Intentions

Include a link to your privacy statement in your newsletter signup form.  This helps alleviate users’ fears about what you are going to do with their personal information.

Tip: Link your privacy statement to your “About” page, so readers can also learn more about your company and be sure they trust you before they sign up.

#5: Utilize Social Media

Twitter and Facebook are great tools to share your newsletter campaigns.  Use hashtags (#) on Twitter so your newsletters are indexed for key terms.  You can even embed a sign-up form in your Facebook profile.  You will be surprised at how many new subscribers you will gain.

Tip: Many email marketing services have social network integration. When you send your newsletter, it automatically posts to all of your social networks. 

#6: Follow Best Practices

Do not spam your readers.  Make sure you obtain their email addresses legally and with their permission.  Such unlawful tactics affect the overall perception of your business.

Tip: Many email marketing services offer double opt-in confirmations, so that you can be sure that your list is full of readers who have manually opted in for your content.

#7: Reward Your eNewsletter Subscribers

Your newsletter subscribers are some of your most loyal readers, so give them a reason to sign-up and stay.  Give a coupon for signing up, or have ongoing, exclusive offers for your newsletter readers.  You can even offer rewards for referral sign-ups.

Tip: Many email newsletter services have templates specifically designed for promotions, such as coupon giveaways.  Compare email marketing services.

#8: Blog Frequently

Blogs build a community of readers, which is a great network to solicit newsletter sign-ups.  Make sure to include a newsletter sign-up in your blog signature, so that readers have the opportunity to get similar articles delivered to their inbox.

Tip:  If you allow comments on your blog, add a checkbox to your comment form that allows users to seamlessly opt-in for your newsletter when they post a comment.

#9: Include “Share” Buttons on Your Emails

Word of mouth advertising is one of the most effective forms of advertising.  Make sure to include “Share” and “Forward to Friend” buttons in your newsletter design.  This allows readers to share your newsletter on social media networks or send it directly to a colleague’s email address.

Tip: Most email marketing services include “Share” and “Forward to Friend” buttons as a standard on their email templates.  Compare email marketing services.

#10: Publish Useful Content

The number 1 way to get more newsletter subscribers is to publish useful, relevant content.  Solicit feedback from your readers and give them a chance to tell you what they are interested in reading about.

Tip: Many email marketing services have a “survey” feature that allow you to poll your customers.

If you have any other tips or want to share how these tips have helped you grow your newsletter list, please leave a comment or message me: @CW_AprilA

Related Resources:

• How to Get More People to Open Your Emails
• How to Stop Email Marketing From Becoming a Four-Letter Word

Well, that’s the answer a techie would give you so you’ll realize that the implementation of the idea is much more complex than the idea itself.  So let’s skip how the cloud works and focus on what it actually is.

What is the Internet?

The most important thing to understand about the cloud is that it is only made possible by the Internet.  At a high level, the Internet is a bunch of computers connected together with wires.  One example is loading a webpage: all you’re really doing is having your computer ask another computer for some information (HTML), and then your computer interprets the information and shows it to you in a human-readable way.

So if computers can talk to each other, wouldn’t it be really great if they could coordinate their resources so that a weak computer can ask a strong computer for help? Enter the cloud.

What is ‘The Cloud’?

Cloud computing is basically a way for many different computers (called a cluster) to coordinate their resources (processor and data storage) so that they can all work on the same task at the same time.

All these computers are working on the same problem, and they are nicely coordinated so that you don’t have to know or care about how many computers are working together on a specific task, such as storing your digital photos.  Also, you don’t really need to know which computers have which pictures.  All you need to know is that they’re somewhere in the cloud and you can access them when you need them.

One of the defining features of the cloud is how easily it can be expanded.  Because the cloud is made of a cluster of computers, it should be easy to add a computer if you need more resources.  It’s also pretty easy to remove a computer from the cluster, if you find that you don’t need the extra power.  This elastic property is the key to making the cloud valuable to your business.

How Can I Make ‘The Cloud’ Work for My Business?

Backing Up Your Files

Online backup services often rely on the cloud for saving your data.  Unlike a hard drive, the online backup service is able to keep costs low because it uses only the minimum amount of space needed to store your information.

Using a hard drive can be costly and inefficient. Chances are you’ll never fill up that hard drive with backups (which means you’ve paid for storage space you don’t use), and if you do fill up the hard drive, you’ll need to go out and buy another one.

As a cost-effective solution, an online backup service using the cloud will automatically adjust your available storage so that you are always optimizing your cost/usage ratio and are not overpaying for unused storage space.

Building Your Website

If you want to have a website, you will need a server to host the site.  You can use a computer as your server, but the computer you choose will need to be powerful enough to handle the Internet traffic to your website and also be cost effective (servers can get really expensive).  If your website is really popular, you might have to get more powerful computers to cope with the high traffic.

We recommend using a cloud service, like Amazon EC2 or Rackspace Cloud Hosting, as a flexible solution. Instead of going out and buying your own computer, you can rent some of the resources from the cloud.  The great thing about these services is that you are only charged for the hours that you actually have a server running. And if you do become popular, it’s very easy to make your cloud computer bigger, or add a second one.

Many website builder services already employ the cloud to host your website for you.  These services offer all the benefits of the cloud, but also provide non-technical people with the ability to easily design and manage their own website for a low monthly cost. We highly recommend website builders for business owners who are just starting up or who have a limited marketing budget.

If you are a small, local business, you are probably wondering how you can get your website displayed in the local search results of Google, Yahoo! and Bing. The answer is SEO!

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is the process of optimizing your website so that it can be found on top search engines. There are a lot of components to an SEO strategy, and if you are completely unfamiliar with SEO we recommend reading our article SEO for Beginners as a starting point.

What Is Local SEO and Why Is It Important?

Local SEO is the process of optimizing your website so that it can be found by local customers when they are searching online. For example, if you are searching for a dentist in Austin, Texas, you would probably use the search term “Austin dentist.” The results for the dentists in your area show up at the top of the search results under “Places for dentist near Austin, TX,” which you can see in the image below. These results also show up in the map to the right. How quickly you to move up to the top of the search results will largely depend on how you’ve optimized your website with relevant search terms.

Google provides you with an easy and free way to get your business listed in the results shown above, and I will take you through the process of preparing your website for Google and optimizing your website for the local search engines. First, I’ll cover some of the basics about your website content.

Your Website

First, you will need a website if you don’t already have one. Today, having a website is just as important as having a phone number. Without one, you are virtually nonexistent. Recent reports show that 86% of people use the Internet to locate local products or services, and then follow up with a phone call or in-store visit.  If you do not yet have a website, see our guide on How to Build a Website.

Your SEO Content

Content is the most important element of your website. Without good content, your chances for being found on search engines are limited, and people will not want to stay on your website if they find your content to be boring or irrelevant. Good SEO content includes the right keywords or search terms in these places: written content, title tags, page headings, meta description, meta keywords, etc. For Local SEO, you want to concentrate on “geographic keyword targeting.” This simply means that you should include your location in the search terms you’re using. For example, if you own an accounting business and live in Austin, TX, you’d want to use a term like “Austin accounting services,” instead of simply “accounting services,” in your content.

Keyword Research

To find the right keywords for your website, you’ll need to do some keyword research. Keyword research is a method of finding keywords that are related to your business and that drive traffic to your website. A good tool to use for keyword research is the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. This tool will help you decide which keywords are best to market your business. Always make sure the keywords you use on your website have high search volume, as shown in the Google Adwords Keyword Tool.

Google Places for Business

Google Places for Business: This is the first place to start to get your business found in the local search results. Before setting up your account, you can go to Getlisted.org to see if your business is listed on Google, Yahoo!, and other top local search engines. If your business is already listed, you can claim it.

If you already have a Google account, then all you have to do is log in. Otherwise, you will have to create a Google account. Once your Google account is created, you can set up your Google Places account, which will create a place for your business on Google Maps, so that when someone searches for your business using a search term like “Austin dentist,” you’ll show up in the results.

After you set up your listing in Google Places, it will need to be verified. You will be sent a PIN number to verify that your business is a real business. This is typically sent through snail mail, and you’ll get a postcard at the address you entered in Google. Once you verify that you are a real business, your listing will be posted live on the web. Unfortunately, this can take a few weeks.

Setting up your Google Places account is relatively easy, but there are some details you must pay attention to when entering your information, in order to increase your chances of being found at the top of the search results.

5 Important Elements in Google Places

Below are five elements that you should focus on when creating your Google Places account.

1.    Address and Phone Number:  Make sure your address is consistent every place your business is listed online. You don’t want to have different addresses listed in different places online. Also, make sure that both your address and phone number are consistent across each page of your website. *Note: If you have more than one location, it is best for Local SEO purposes to create a separate page on your website for each location.

2.    Category:  When choosing your category, make sure you choose the category that most closely fits your type of business and the geographical keywords that you used to optimize your website content. This is important because if you choose a category that does not relate to the geographic keywords you used on your website, then your listing may not show up in the search results. To check that your keywords and category match, you can do a quick search in Google for the category name and see if it pulls up the same results as the results you get when searching with you website’s main keywords.

3.    Business Name:  When you enter your Business Name, use only your DBA (“Doing Business As”) name and don’t add any additional keywords. This is against Google Maps’ terms of use.

4.    Business Description:  This is where you’ll enter a description that includes keywords related to your product/service. For example, if you sell beauty products your description would include keywords associated with beauty salons and products. Try to use your keywords in a way that is natural, and make sure you aren’t jamming keywords into your description in a spam-like way.

5.    Content and Media:  Content and Media refers to photos and videos, which make your listing more interesting to your customers. If they are able to visualize your business and your products, your customers will be more likely to remember you and want to learn more.

Other Local SEO Strategies

For some businesses, setting up a Google Places account may be enough to get you ranked in your local search results, but for other businesses more SEO strategies may be necessary. Some other strategies that you can use to optimize your website for local search results are:

1.    Citations:  “Citations” are mentions of your business name and address on other webpages. Citations include mentions in an online yellow pages directory, local chamber of commerce website, or local business association website. There may or may not be a link back to your website from a listed citation. Citations help the search engines confirm that you are who you say you are, and that your contact information is correct. A good resource to locate places where you can get local citations is Whitespark Citation Finder.

2.    Yahoo! and Bing for Business: You will need to sign up for a Windows Live Account and follow their process for entering your business in their directory, which is similar to the process for Google Places. You’ll want to pay attention to the same SEO elements as with Google Places.

3.    Customer Reviews:  Customer reviews help build credibility and trust in your business. There are many ways to go about getting positive customer reviews for your business online so that they will show up when customers search for your business. Yelp is a good place to be reviewed, as well as any other location-specific review websites you use. For more about customer reviews, see our article, Negative Online Reviews: When to Respond and How

Video Tutorial on Local SEO Strategies

If you are feeling overwhelmed about everything you must do to get your business ranked in the local search results, don’t fret. It’s possible to do it all on your own! You don’t necessarily have to spend a lot of money hiring an SEO company to do this for you. There is a lot of good information on the web, as well as low-cost tools that help you through the process of optimizing your website for local search.

‘The Local SEO Formula’ is an excellent resource that I would personally recommend for those of you who want a step-by-step guide on getting your business ranked in the top local search results. The SEO team here at ChooseWhat.com, has reviewed this video and found it to be an excellent resource for guiding you through the Local SEO process.

In 2009 Google launched Google Voice, which provides free PC-to-PC voice and video calling to users worldwide, as well as free PC-to-phone service to users located in the US. Because Google Voice’s interface is very similar to Gmail, many users are instantly comfortable with using the service. Google Voice provides a single forwarding number from Google to all of the user’s phones at no cost. Because Google Voice is so simple and low cost, many small business persons have wondered whether Google Voice could work as a business-level phone system and how it compares to a paid virtual PBX service, such as Phone.com, RingCentral, or eVoice, which connects multiple phone lines under one number. After careful analysis, we found that Google Voice cannot completely replace your small business phone solution.

Where Google Voice Excels

Google has made strides in adding PBX functionality to their free service and can be expected to continue adding additional features. While calls from your PC to other PCs and U.S.-based phones are free, calls to international numbers start at only $0.02 per minute. Their international rates may be significantly lower than those of your current service provider; so, for the user who occasionally needs to make an international call, Google Voice can be an excellent solution.

Google Voice users can take advantage of Google’s expectedly user-friendly interface when checking and storing call logs, text messages and voicemail-to-text transcriptions (which is included as a free service). The ability to check voicemails online, as opposed to sifting through a queue on your phone, has given users much more functionality and flexibility when managing their calls and messages.

Where Google Voice Falls Short for Small Business Functionality

While Google Voice is a fantastic product for organizing a person’s private communications, it does not currently offer many features that can meet the telecommunications demands of a small business. Unlike a virtual PBX service, Google Voice does not currently provide 800 numbers. Many small businesses desire the professional appeal of an 800 number and do not want to be confined to a single local area code. Also, Google Voice does not provide live customer support. Conversely, many virtual PBX providers, such as Phone.com and RingCentral, provide 24/7 phone, email and live chat support so that if you experience difficulty or disruption of service, you will be put in contact with a company representative right away.

Most importantly, Google Voice cannot support multiple users under one account. Different employees in a business must log in to the same account if they want to access call records, logs, voicemails, or texts to your particular phone number. Thus, a user is unable to set permissions for who sees which particular communications. Additionally, Google Voice cannot set up an auto-attendant feature to let a caller decide which extension they would like to be forwarded to. With a virtual PBX service, you can set up an auto-attendant, which directs a caller to the appropriate extension (e.g. Sales, Billing, Customer support, etc.) However, with Google Voice, all selected extensions will ring at once.

Porting Your Number

Whether you choose Google Voice or another solution for your small business phone needs, always look for the ability to take your number with you should you choose to change service providers. FCC law does not currently mandate that Google Voice allow you to port a number that they provide you to another service. Therefore, if you use Google Voice for your business, make sure that you obtain an original number from another provider beforehand.

Click here to learn How To Set Up a Phone Number

Some have predicted that the days of on-premise, desktop software are numbered as buzz about “The Cloud” and web-based applications gets louder throughout the business world. Intuit, a leader in small business software, has responded to this trend in a number of impressive ways.

QuickBooks Online

Intuit’s most obvious move has been creating online versions of their QuickBooks software to compete with other web-based bookkeeping apps. Although not as feature-rich and flexible as the desktop counterparts, these online versions offer a few unique features, such as a “Company Scorecard” that compares your company’s financials to other businesses in your industry, as well as a 30-day free trial. With such a large investment in the desktop software over the past thirteen years, Intuit isn’t going to ditch any of their QuickBooks products in the near future.

A La Carte QuickBooks Apps from ‘Intuit App Center’

One thing Intuit has done to fortify QuickBooks desktop software was to create the Intuit App Center, which allows businesses to expand the feature set of their bookkeeping software by adding specialized applications a la carte. The App Center currently contains 60 apps for QuickBooks Desktop software, 21 for QuickBooks Online, and more to come in the future. You can even send the App Center a wish list of ideas for apps that would make your business run more efficiently.

While researching QuickBooks, I’ve found only a few customers who were disappointed with their QuickBooks software because of the lack of specialized features. After comparing their complaints to the software in the Intuit App Center, it seems like all of the problems can be solved by at least one, if not several, of these applications. There are all sorts of QuickBooks add-ons, from advanced inventory management and job costing to postcard services for direct mailing campaigns.

Interconnectivity from ‘Intuit Anywhere’

The third, and most recent, addition to the Intuit universe is the ground-breaking Intuit Anywhere platform. In the press release, Intuit describes this new program as “a set of widgets and data services that make it easier than ever for developers to offer their customers a seamless, secure and personalized experience between QuickBooks and the apps they use to run their small businesses.” With Intuit Anywhere, application developers now have the ability to add a widget that allows users to log in with their Intuit ID, instead of creating a unique log-in for every app. This not only makes individual apps more attractive to those who already have an Intuit ID, it simplifies the way developers create apps since they can just use the Intuit Anywhere log-in widget to replace the development of an account creation system.

By adding Intuit Anywhere, it seems like Intuit is really trying to become the Facebook of small business. Just like some websites and applications that let you connect through your Facebook account, Intuit Anywhere makes this a reality for business websites and apps with the Intuit ID. Even though this platform is still in the Beta phase of testing, there are already several companies using the Intuit Anywhere technology to improve their performance including eBay, Bill.com, FreshBooks, and others.

Although it is true that the world will see a lot more web-based applications and less on-premise software in the months and years to come, there are some features like the safety and permanence of desktop software that users will not give up anytime soon. For this reason, I believe the future of business software is more of a hybrid model of the two, like what Intuit has established with the App Center and Intuit Anywhere.

You might not have heard the news. This past March, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names (ICANN) approved the formation of the .xxx domain, a new top-level domain that will be available for registration, along with .com, .net, .org, .edu and others. That’s right: “adult entertainment” is so mainstream that it warrants its own top-level domain extension.

How .xxx Affects You

What does this mean for you, a businessperson and/or website owner? It means that there’s a whole new way for people to misappropriate your brand name, infringe upon your trademark or simply divert your traffic.

The good news is that the ICM Registry is giving trademark owners a chance to proactively protect their trademarks by establishing a “Sunrise B” period (the month of September 2011), during which anyone can apply to have their brands permanently blocked from appearing as available .xxx domains.  This defensive trademark registration is estimated to cost a one-time fee of $200-$300, according to AdAge.com.

But what if your brand doesn’t carry a registered trademark? You could buy the .xxx domain related to your existing domain, which costs about $100 per year from GoDaddy, but according to TheRegister.co.uk:

In the event that a porn site and a non-porn site both apply for the same domain name, the porn site will be given priority, although they will be given a warning that a trademark owner is also interested in the domain, and may find themselves on the receiving end of a complaint.

Be prepared to defend your trademark. If you don’t have an existing trademark, you might consider applying for one as soon as possible. If you’ve just started your business, you may want to simply rethink your business name to avoid future disputes. Whatever action you take, make sure you’ve got the proof to back up your brand.

The Coming .com-pocalypse

Ominously, BrandChannel.com proclaimed today that “a new era in Internet policy begins June 20th.” On June 20th, ICANN will open the application process for 400-2,000 new top-level domain name extensions, including .sport, .law, .mtv, .nyc, .arab and many other industry-, brand- and location-focused extensions.  The .xxx domain extension is anticipated to be the most popular new extension, as approximately 60 registrars have been approved to sell over 1,000 new .xxx domain names.

These new extensions are meant to counteract phishers, scammers and cybersquatters from thwarting actual brand names and diverting Internet users from finding relevant and authentic information. Consequently, .com is expected to not have as much importance or sway as it has had previously, and .com domains that seem to be inactive will be replaced with domains that display actual content and relevant information.

I can see this change being both useful and annoying for brand managers, business owners and website developers everywhere.  Perhaps very soon .com will be going the way of floppy disks and VHS, and high schoolers will be debating whether we meant .computer or .commerce.  But only time—and cyberspace—will tell.

QuickBooks has given tons of entrepreneurs and business owners the ability to manage invoicing, account receivables, printing checks, payroll, inventory, bills, budgets and a lot more. But is QuickBooks right for you?

The Case For QuickBooks

We asked ChooseWhat.com’s accountant, Jim Greer, what he had to say about how QuickBooks stacks up against other low-priced software competitors like Peachtree. Here is his response:

As far as price, it can be worth it [to use software other than QuickBooks] because software like Peachtree is less expensive than QuickBooks, and while I’m unfamiliar with recent versions of these other programs, assume them to be comparable to QuickBooks.  But as far as the trouble, it’s probably not worth it.  QuickBooks is now the standard for small business accounting and it’s far easier to find employees familiar with QuickBooks than to find or train people to use these other programs; as well as finding online support, local support, or third party software to help you use these programs.

For example, here in Austin, Peachtree’s website lists only one certified expert who can help me with Peachtree, while QuickBooks’ website lists 104.  For third-party apps that integrate expense management into the accounting software, Peachtree’s website only lists five, while QuickBooks has nineteen.  Similarly, for third-party apps integrating inventory management, Peachtree lists nineteen, while QuickBooks has fifty-five.  And that’s because QuickBooks has the critical mass required to attract accountants and developers to work with their program, while Peachtree does not.

I myself have been helping small business clients for over eight years, and have yet to find one who didn’t use QuickBooks.  While I’m sure they exist, QuickBooks is definitely the standard, while employers pay a small premium for people who can use other software.  If you like the cheaper price and plan on doing your own bookkeeping without need for help or third party add-ons, going with Peachtree or other programs might be a good idea.  But if you think you’ll someday need to find a new bookkeeper to use your system or want to add on extra apps, QuickBooks is the way to go.

The Case Against QuickBooks

We also spoke to Adam Nyer, who started full-service real estate development and construction company, Skybeck Development, LLC, about his experience with QuickBooks.

“For the construction industry, QuickBooks is lacking,” Nyer says. Like most entrepreneurs, Nyer started out using QuickBooks. He tried to make it work until he realized that he should give up and look for software that would better accommodate his needs.

After doing research online and demoing several software programs (including MasterBuilder by Sage, ProCore and ProContractorMX), he finally settled on AccuBuild, which offers a variety of construction management software products that handle accounting, job costs, document management and project management for any construction job.  But, Nyer says that, compared to QuickBooks, which costs $319.96 per license for QuickBooks Premier Contractor, AccuBuild cost Skybeck approximately $8,000 for 5 user licenses.

Was it worth the hefty sum? “For me, AccuBuild was worth the cost because it gave us a lot of functionality, accounting and project management tools. But it was definitely hard and took time to transition from QuickBooks to a new system.”He advises others in construction, as well as anyone who finds QuickBooks doesn’t fit their needs, to start with the right system up front before it’s too late:

“If QuickBooks isn’t working for you, you should find accounting software that does instead of trying really hard to make it fit.”

Our Conclusion

Statistics show QuickBooks accounts for 94 percent of all small business accounting software sales, which, like Greer says, is probably the biggest reason to use it.  Although, if you’re in an industry that demands a more robust accounting service, there are definitely quite a few industry-specific account management tools on the market. They cost significantly more than QuickBooks, but you may find that the better option. The smartest thing a cost-conscious entrepreneur could do would be to start with a QuickBooks product with a month-to-month plan that you can cancel at any time. After using it for a pre-determined amount of time, schedule a time to sit down and evaluate whether it’s really working for you or not.

Another tip? Keep a backup of your financial records, invoices, bills, etc., so that if you ever need to migrate your information to a different system, it won’t be as painful and time-consuming as it could be. You could store it on your desktop, on a local server, or use an online backup service. Whatever method you choose, it will be infinitely better than being inactive and waiting for the inevitable time-suck coming your way.

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Make it Easy for Users to Share

This is the No. 1 golden rule of online marketing. You have to make it easy for your users to share your efforts with others. Your email marketing campaigns should be a breeze to pass along, and you can achieve this by simply having a prominent call-to-action (or even a large button) that allows your subscriber to forward your eNewsletter to a friend with one click.

Create Newsletter Archives

A painless way to share your eNewsletter is to create an archive where visitors to your site can see previous email campaigns. Many email marketing services, such as MailChimp, will allow you to create a campaign archives within their system that you can then edit. This helps you to easily share your archive so that potential subscribers can see what your newsletters look like.  With MailChimp’s system, you can also embed these campaign archives on your own site and they’ll be updated when you add a new email campaign.

For those that are moderately tech savvy, you can create your own newsletter archive on your site that you can customize to look exactly how you want it without having to go through an email marketing service.

“Like” It On Facebook

There’s no doubt that Facebook is a huge social networking site that millions of users spend a lot of time on every single day. Don’t you want to take advantage of those numbers by sharing your latest email campaign on it? Not only can you easily share your email marketing campaign on your Facebook Wall, but you can also share it on your company’s Facebook Fan Page through several services, such as GetResponse.

Another great feature some email marketing services like Benchmark Email provide is the ability for your subscribers to “Like” your campaign without having to leave it to do so. They will simply be redirected to the web version of the email and see how many other people have “Liked” your newsletter. Having users “Like” your newsletter on Facebook is a great way for other people to see it without you having to promote it yourself. It helps you create a following of similar users.

Some email marketing providers offer the option to display your Facebook profile in your newsletter and include recent status updates, which can help to drive people to your Facebook page. This also works conversely in that you can add a newsletter signup form to your Facebook page easily with many of these services.

Share Your Newsletter through Social Networking

Most of the email marketing services we’ve reviewed offer some form of social networking integration in that you can easily input your Twitter and LinkedIn account information and have your service automatically post the link to your recent email newsletter on your different profiles once you’ve sent your campaign to your subscribers. Make sure you sign up for a service that offers this automatic feature.

MailChimp even allows you to see who else has retweeted your newsletter in your user dashboard through their service so you can see the full scope and reach of all of your campaigns.

Of course, the best way to make sure your email marketing efforts are reaching the most number of users is to have unique, relevant, and interesting content that readers find useful.

While we’re on the topic of eNewsletters, go ahead and sign up for ChooseWhat’s newsletter, where we give you great tools and tips regarding small business topics!

OpenOffice.org

Last time I checked, Microsoft Office was available for about $150.  That’s a lot of money if all you really need is a spreadsheet and a word processor – especially when there are excellent alternatives.

OpenOffice.org is a free suite of office software that offers most of the features available in MS Office.  OpenOffice comes with “Writer”, “Calc”, “Impress”,  “Draw”, and “Base”.  These programs can be compared to “Word”, “Excel”, “Powerpoint”,  “Paint”, and “Access”, respectively. I use OpenOffice personally, and I rarely have any problems using it to open, edit, or save Microsoft Word documents.

LibreOffice is a spin-off from OpenOffice.  It also offers a suite of tools that are similar to Office.  One of the major differences between OpenOffice and LibreOffice is that OpenOffice is now run by Oracle.  Oracle is a large company who recently acquired Sun, and, in doing so, also acquired the open source projects that Sun has been maintaining.  LibreOffice is run by The Document Foundation, a community-based foundation with no corporate origins.

Microsoft Office is a time-tested, feature-rich suite of applications that is pervasive and widely accepted.  However, spending $150 for each computer in your business could very well be overkill if you’re not using all of those extra features.  I suggest downloading one of the free alternatives and giving it a try.  It’s FREE, you actually have nothing to lose this time.

Jason Huie

Calls-To-Action

If you want your website to help you generate leads for your business, I would say the most important thing to do is to make it obvious to people on your website how to become a customer.  Seems fairly basic, but it’s shocking how many people forget this.  It’s the equivalent of forgetting to ask for the order in the sales process.  It’s important for your website to educate your prospect about your product and to make them feel confident in what you have to offer, but if you don’t make it clear how to buy, odds are, they won’t.

Clear “Calls-To-Action” on your website are the online way to ask for the order.  A very simple call to action would be, “Call this number to get a free consultation:  555-555-5555.”  Another, might be, “Fill out this form to get a free quote” followed by a short form asking for the prospect’s contact information.  When a person on your site takes one of these calls to action, they transform from a visitor on your website to an actual sales prospect.

Your Calls-To-Action should be prominently displayed, so they are easy to find and you should have at least one on every page of your website.  A common way to ensure this is to put one in the header of your website- you’ll regularly see a “Call Us for A Quote:  555-555-5555″ in the header of a website.  Good Calls-To-Action also make it clear that if the visitor takes this action, they’ll get something that they want: a quote, a consultation, a white paper with good information, etc.  You need to give them a reason to take this step, because you are asking them to become a prospect.

Leo Welder
ChooseWhat.com

We spoke to Birds Barbershop co-founder, Michael Portman, to talk about how Birds became a local favorite and national smash in just five years.

Honestly, I was hesitant to step into Birds Barbershop. I thought it was gimmicky.  Free Lonestars while I’m getting my hair cut? Suspiciously low prices? Hipsters? But I went in, and over a year later I’m still getting my hair cut there by the same talented woman who cut it the first time. I now fully understand why Birds has been named the Austin Chronicle‘s “Best Barbershop” every year since 2006 and one of the top 100 salons in America by Elle magazine.

When I finally spoke to Birds co-founder, Michael Portman, to talk about his success, I found his attitude about the business to be delightfully familiar. It’s palpable during every part of the Birds hair cut experience.

The most surprising thing to learn about Birds might be that they “do it all in-house and don’t outsource anything,” according to Portman, who has served as writer/advisor to Vicente Fox, editor in chief of a multi-million dollar PR agency, and communications director for Disneyland. “We’re like a little ad agency at Birds, and there are surprisingly few people doing what we do.”

What catapulted Birds from local startup to major success? Read Portman’s tips below to find out.

6 Tips for Business Success from Michael Portman:

1.    “Co- everything”: No one person knows everything. Side with people who complement your strengths.

We don’t have any “know-it-alls” here. I co-own the business with my business partner, Jayson Rapaport. We complement each other in a lot of ways. Hair is usually a drama-prone business. It doesn’t have to be. We have a great team working for us.

2.    Ideas are free. The trick is finding that great idea that is so obviously, simply, correctly the answer that there is no alternative.

We started Birds Barbershop because it needed to exist and didn’t. Birds is in the “needs” business, not the “wants” business. We cut out all the fluff. There’s a lot of largess and mystery in the hair business. We take the Jet Blue approach. Make your customers comfortable, not like they’re in a strange place they don’t understand—which is what most hair salons feel like.

3.    If it doesn’t sell itself, don’t do it.

Birds $19 shortcut comes with a free beer and a super pro cut. Verb is Birds $11 version of American Crew, which sells for $17. In the industry, getting 5% of your customers to buy hair product is standard. Why settle for that? Make everyone want to buy your product. Offer maximum quality at minimum cost.

Lonestar: We stocked it in the store because we liked it. That eventually led to a partnership with the brand and direct supply of the product.

Our niche: The person who thinks, “I don’t have time for an appointment. I don’t want extras. I don’t want sprinkles, just the brownie. I don’t want to look like I’m trying too hard. I just want a decent haircut at a decent price.”

4.    Everyone tries local once, but they only return if you can deliver on the big guy’s level.

If you’re local, you have an advantage over a large chain. You’re part of your community and know what it wants. You have to be living the community experience to know and sell to your customer.

The biggest thing to remember is that “being local” is part of what makes you exceptional. It’s not everything. Once you’ve got people’s attention and trust, you’ve got to deliver. Your customer demands value, so give it to them.

5.    Authenticity counts now more than ever.

Nowadays, people don’t walk in the door unless their friend has recommended it. Be conscious about your customer, and be authentic.  My customers appreciate me climbing a pole at a rock club and putting a sticker on it more than paying for an ad in the newspaper.

6.    Force yourself to sit down and listen to people.

Coming from a creative background, I respect creativity in colleagues and employees. We have a small group that sits down to brainstorm ideas regularly. We take the best ideas, the ones that feel right, and do them. (An example is this year to celebrate Cinco de Mayo—and our five-year anniversary on May 16—we came up with “Birds Barbershots” and got a tequila vendor on board.)

Don’t do a zillion ideas just to be able to post on Twitter about it. If you’ve hit on an idea and everyone in the room has a happy face and is high-fiving each other, go with that idea!

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When brainstorming your domain name, there are a few ideas you want to keep in mind:

Firstly, you want to brainstorm a few domain names that are keyword-rich, meaning those key phrases that someone might search in order to find your site. Write down all the words related to your niche. This will help you when optimizing your website for search engines down the road.

Secondly, you want a domain name that is easy to remember and spell. For example, a good domain name would include words that are short and easy to remember without any hyphens or numbers.

It is also a good idea to keep in mind to use a domain name that is related to your product or service. This not only makes you and your website easy to remember, but it can help with your branding.

The last suggestion for choosing a domain name is choosing a dotcom domain name. A dotcom name is the most well-known type of domain name and will help people remember your URL and boost your credibility.

Lindsey Marino
ChooseWhat.com

As most people are loss averse, they will often continue down a path of action that produces a less valuable outcome solely because they want to justify the work they have already performed.  Learning to let go, discard your previous attempts and use a new method often can allow you to deliver a better outcome more quickly.

Casey Jones
ChooseWhat.com

As co-founder and CEO of Yorktown Technologies, L.P., the first company in the world to widely market a biotech animal, Blake has been a driving force behind GloFish‘s unprecedented success, responsible for everything from raising seed money and filing patents to wading through the murky waters of FDA regulations. Conquering many of the same challenges that vex the average entrepreneur, he has emerged from his aquatic undertaking, Michael Phelps-style, to claim the equivalent of a gold medal at the 2011 Austin Under 40 Awards for his contribution in the field of Science and Technology.

Blake attributes his success largely to “a strong understanding of how to ensure that the actions which are taken each day align with the company’s long-term vision and effectively move us toward that goal.” Lack of a coherent vision, he says, is one of the biggest and consistently re-emerging challenges faced by many of the dozens of entrepreneurs he has worked with. We sat down with Blake to talk about how to achieve long-term success and avoid the distractions that can take you off the path to success.

Blake says that when talking to other entrepreneurs he often fields questions such as “Should I hire another employee?” or “Should I raise additional capital?” He answers with “Well, where do you want to be in 10 years?”  Frequently, the person he’s talking to is unable to come up with a clear answer. At the point, he advises the entrepreneur to use the following process to help crystallize a long-term vision that will not only help to answer the immediate growth-related question, but also lead to ultimate success.

Identify your hedgehog concept.

It is critical to identify your “hedgehog,” which is a concept from Good to Great:Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t by Jim Collins. The hedgehog consists of three components: what you are deeply passionate about, what you can be the best in the world at, and what drives your economic engine. While it could take a few years for a typical large company to refine their hedgehog concept, it’s possible for smaller businesses to identify their hedgehog dramatically faster, even within a matter of days, says Blake.

Identify a long-term vision or rethink your hedgehog concept.

The confluence of the three areas of your hedgehog concept is likely the best opportunity for long-term success. What you would expect as the outcome of a relentless focus on your hedgehog over 10 or 20 years will often help you identify the ideal long-term vision for the company. If your long-term vision is not appealing, you should rethink the hedgehog.

Identify necessary milestones for each area of the business over the next 3-5 years.

Once the hedgehog and long-term vision are clear, you can fairly easily identify the necessary milestones for each area of the business over the next three to five years. Similarly, these milestones can then be broken down into annual, quarterly, monthly and even weekly goals. Create a schedule for regularly checking the progress of and updating your goals to help you visualize the path ahead.

Communicate your hedgehog concept and long-term vision to motivate stakeholders.

Communicating your hedgehog concept, long-term vision and related milestones and goals will help each stakeholder in the business better understand how day-to-day work is all part of the path to something much bigger—and how one individual can make a significant impact on achieving the company’s vision. Fueled by passion and not just money, your people will be much more motivated to contribute to the company’s success than they otherwise would be.

Identify which opportunities to embrace and which will distract you from your core path.

A clear hedgehog concept and long-term vision are critical not only because they help the business to identify which opportunities it should embrace, but also which activities the business should not pursue. This distinction is particularly powerful in that it can empower employees to make appropriate decisions without undue micromanagement.

When deciding whether to pursue opportunities that arise, constantly refer to your hedgehog and be wary of engaging in activities that will take them off the path to long-term success. “Think of your long-term goal as a destination,” says Blake. “If you need to get to San Diego by Sunday and a friend asks you to stop by San Francisco on Friday, can you still make it to San Diego on time?”  If your answer isn’t entirely affirmative, then you must at least make sure the detour is worth it.

Recommended Reading:

In addition to Good to Great, Blake recommends the following resources to help you conceptualize your vision and get you started on the path to long-term success:

• “Good to Great: What’s Your Hedgehog?” by Wendy Green
• Start with Why by Simon Sinek
• Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish
• Focus: The Future of Your Company Depends on It by Al Ries

“I had three internships in college and switched my major after each one,” he discloses.  Now, years later, Green and his business partner Jay Whitchurch have started campus2careers, a company that aims to match up current college students and recent graduates with internship and entry-level positions at small and medium-sized businesses.

Green believes that small businesses could better leverage student talent by building more effective, annual internship programs that offer many benefits, including building capacity, accessing new skills, identifying future employees and offsetting labor costs.

Read on for key advantages and tips he’s identified to help you build a better internship program.

Advantages of Hiring Interns

• Access to talent and skills that wouldn’t otherwise be available. Most of the top students get scooped up early in their senior year by big companies, so an internship sophomore or junior year gives you first dibs.
• Access to lower-cost labor. The Kaufmann Foundation suggests small business owners value their time at$100 per hour.  So even a paid intern frees up your time and gives you a huge cost advantage.
• Opportunity to mentor young people, help develop skills and give back to the next generation.
• Ability to try out different people and positions. Since hiring interns is cyclical, you can try different interns as well as create or modify positions until you find out what works best.

Tips for Hiring Interns

1.  Think of your internships as an annual program, not a one-off need.

Green says that the first step in getting the most out of your interns is to change the way you think about them, or, in his words, “to shift your paradigm,” so that you’re thinking of interns as “a recurring resource you need in your budget,” rather than as short-term laborers hired to complete a one-off task or project. Instead of hiring in terms of deliverables, “hire someone to build and maintain your website or to run your social media initiatives,” he advises, “to build a job they want and you need.”

It may be counter-intuitive to give larger responsibilities to short-term employees, but doing so actually provides more benefits to the business owner.  Defining clear responsibilities and setting goals will foster a self-sustaining hiring system, Green argues:

You know [your interns] are gonna leave eventually, so you can prepare for it. It’s actually a more predictable situation than with employees. After your first interns have defined their own roles, ask them to find their replacements by referring friends or classmates.  The first intern builds the job, the second intern improves it, the third one refines  it, and so on.  Either way, you can count on an intern all year if you plan and budget for it.

[Some people] might say it’s not worth the time it takes to train your interns and that you’re only getting a three-month value for a two-month investment. But, if you do it right and create a system where interns are finding their own replacements, educating and training them for you, you can get at least one full year of labor out of it. It’s completely scalable hiring and training!

2.  Build the experience you would’ve wanted in college.

“Would you have done the job you’re offering when you were that age?” Green asks.  Every small business owner—whether they went to college or not—ought to know what a compelling job looks and feels like.  Create a job that is interesting and gives an intern the opportunity to learn. If you offer a position that’s valuable to someone, whether due to money or increased skill level, then he or she will provide value to your business, and you’ll be reaping the benefits described above. Green concedes that sometimes interns are given the most mundane tasks out of necessity, such as data entry, but he argues that it shouldn’t be an excuse for you not to elevate their roles: “It’s OK to let [interns] do data entry, but maybe also pay for them to take a class to increase their skills.”

3.  Set expectations and define incentives clearly and up front.

Green says that, even though this point is the most obvious, it is also the least followed in his experience.  He advises business owners to be clear about in the job posting as well as during the interview. “Go ahead and ask a student during the interview what they want out of the job,” he says. “Sometimes the answer is to build up their resume or simply to make money, but more often than not students will be satisfied with compensation in the form on training or unique experiences that will give them an edge in the job market.”  Being flexible with incentives can create a mutually beneficial agreement between you and your interns.

4.  Treat the student like a full-time employee; get rid of “just an intern” mentality.

Green says that as long as you’re paying your interns (as you should be, assuming you’ve “built them into your budget” like he recommends), there is no definitive legal definition between an internship and a part-time job. Legalities are related to the hours your interns are working—which shouldn’t exceed 30 hours or else they’ll be considered full-time—not the tasks they’re being given.  He advocates treating interns no differently than if they were full-time employees, which means that every opportunity available to your employees should also be available to your interns.  “Assume that your interns will become future employees,” he says. “Keeping them will give you the best return on your investment.”

5.  Formalize the internship with forms, core hours and clear lines of accountability.

In order to get your interns to show up every day, to be accountable and act like employees, requires you to add structure to their daily work lives. Green proposes using a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that will lay out the goals of the intern and expectations they have about the job. (You can find this and other internship forms on the campus2careers Business Resources page).

“The last 16-18 years of their lives, these students haven’t been asked to be personally accountable—schools and their parents keep them in check,” says Green, “but when you make them accountable and autonomous, you’re teaching them career skills, which is what internships are all about.”

If you are looking for an intern this summer, go to www.campus2careers.com to get matched with your top college candidates from all Texas schools and beyond.

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Rowse was speaking about how your site or blog should aim to build a community. Whether this is through social media, blog comments, or forums, it is important to have your users engaged with you and your site. At ChooseWhat, we invite our users to interact with us in a plethora of ways, especially through our forums, which are lovingly maintained by ChooseWhat’s User Liaison and Assistant Research Analyst Reece Freeman.

“If you have a community, users will develop a personal connection and stay on your site longer,” he explains. Read on to learn why building a community is important and what you can do to help foster one on your site.

Why are online communities important?

Basically, an online community is a group of people with mutual interests who use the Internet to communicate, collaborate, and pursue their interests over time. The tools used in a community, such as forums, blogs, message boards, etc., are actually not the community; they are the tools used to interact within the community.

So why is it important to build a community?

“If users have something to say about your website, then they are already having that conversation with friends, social media websites, or other online communities where you have no control over that dialogue,” Freeman says.

With your own online community, you’ll have better control over what people are saying and how they’re using your site. Not only do community members tend to stay on your site longer, but according to an eBay study in 2006, community users spend 54% more than non-community users, so that online community could eventually lead to a higher conversion rate.

Implement simple conversation tools

To start a community, use features like comments on blogs, forums, and other types of threads to get a dialogue initiated on your website. “One of the hardest things to do in developing a community is getting the first person to talk,” Freeman says.

During his lecture, Rowse recommended that you “be the community that you want to have.” In other words, you need to start the interaction for others to follow. He suggested that you start with your comments section by allowing others to respond. You can garner more responses if you ask for advice or tips and post polls in your blogs or forums. Rowse also advised using social media wisely; don’t just post links to your site and make sure you interact with people.

Freeman’s tip regarding forums is to create general forums so that new users can find out where to post without having any prior knowledge of your site or products. “Also make sure no one is hung out to dry with a question,” he says. “Keep the conversations going even after you’ve answered their question by asking follow-up questions.”

Turn your website users into community members

“If implemented correctly, an online community can create a dedicated user-base that has a personal attachment to your website,” Freeman says.

You can reinforce the value gained through interactions with the community members. Because of the personal attachment created by an online community, time spent on community-related has been shown to be exponentially greater than websites that don’t have these tools.

Keep the conversation focused and useful

One of the biggest issues you might run into with building a community is what Rowse referred to as “trolls,” which are mean-spirited users. Trolls, along with spammers, can create unwanted posts that deter the conversation you’re trying to have with your members.  Rowse recommends that you think about your policies and standards before you need them, and, above all else, be firm, calm, and polite with troublemakers.

Freeman agrees that you need to have policies in place when trying to create a community that all users must abide by. He suggests implementing anti-spam filters, such as CAPTCHAS and double opt-in forms, to help keep your community free of unwanted members.

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What is a Process?

A business process is simply a set of instructions or guidelines that orient you towards achieving a goal, whether it’s as broad as running a successful business or as specific as transferring a phone call. A business process can be decomposed into several sub-processes, which have their own attributes, but also contribute to achieving the goal of the super-process.

Businesspeople typically recognize three types of business processes: Management processes, Operational processes and Supporting processes (which support the operational processes). April Coburn identifies particular processes within these three main types that are especially important for small business owners to write and implement:

1. Policies (“Management”). You should create a policy manual for current and future employees that lays out the rules, expectations, roles, responsibilities and benefits of being employed by your company.
2. Repetitive and/or overly complicated tasks (“Operational”). Daily repetitive tasks include: answering the phone (including how to transfer and forward calls, etc.) or emails, sending a fax or an invoice, etc. Complicated tasks, like how to launch an email marketing campaign or how create a website, are usually broader and include several sub-processes.
3. Specialized processes (“Supporting”). These types of processes draw on specialized knowledge that you or your employees possess. You may not be able to write these processes until you actually hire employees and/or define roles within your company.

Why Do Small Businesses Need Processes?

“I can’t think of a single successful business that doesn’t write and use processes,” says April. “If you aren’t implementing processes, there’s no way that your business can grow and evolve.” According to April, business processes form the backbone of how you operate and become a valuable source of knowledge that can be passed down to future employees or even sold to future buyers.

Here are some of the main benefits for small businesses of writing processes:

• Processes keep knowledge de-centralized, so that if an employee leaves, you aren’t left with a sudden void that no one else can fill.
• Processes give business owners a way to measure employee performance. Without processes, it is difficult for you, as a business owner, to estimate how long a task or project will take to complete. Processes will help you to make repeatable tasks more effective, cutting down the time it takes to complete a task or reach a goal.
• Processes help eliminate mistakes and errors. Writing down a standardized way of doing something will give your team members a definitive reference and leave less room for guessing and errors on their part.
• Processes let you focus on the bigger picture. “You might think that something as simple as answering the phone doesn’t need to be written down and outlined, but you’d be surprised at how many little details you have to remember on a daily basis,” April warrns. Instead of memorizing how to do something, write every little detail down. As your company grows, you’ll be able to hand off processes and repeatable tasks to employees while you concentrate on building your business.

How to Identify Areas Where You Could Use a Process

Use the following questions to help you identify whether you need to write a process for any given task:

• Is there only one person in the office that knows how to do a task/tasks?
• Is this common knowledge that every employee (and/or employer) should know?
• Do you find yourself doing a task multiple times?
• Is the task overly complicated or does it have lots of little details?
• Do you need a task completed in a specific way?
• Do you plan to hand off a task to another person in the near future?

Tips for Process Writing from ChooseWhat

Here is a list of things we’ve done at ChooseWhat to encourage process writing. Feel free to find the ones that are most applicable to your business and starting implementing them today.

• Make trainees write processes for you. April says that when she first started writing processes, she would write every step and sub-step herself. However, she quickly realized that because she had a better understanding of the task or project she was writing about than anyone else, her processes frequently came off as esoteric. She advises trainers to sit with trainees and walk them through a task, as the trainee takes notes that will form the process. The person who will be using the process should contribute to the process just as much as the person imparting the knowledge.
• Create a shared repository for processes. It’s important to make processes accessible to everyone in your business. Create a repository that shows a list of your current processes. You can simply create a new file folder on your shared server or you can use an online system, such as EditGrid or GoogleDocs to keep track of processes.
• Audit your processes frequently. Processes will become outdated the minute you find a better way to do a task. It’s important to read over your current processes to make sure they are all up to date. Set aside some time to audit processes each week or each month.
• Schedule time for writing processes. If you don’t create a schedule for writing processes, they probably won’t get written. Setting aside time for your employees to evaluate what they do and how they do it will help everyone become more effective in the long run.
• Read The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It. April highly recommends this book that will help you become more process-oriented. She shares an inspiring quote from the book below:

“You must analyze your business as it is today, decide what it must be like when you’ve finally got it just like you want it, and then determine the gap between where you are and where you need to be in order to make your dream a reality. That gap will tell you exactly what needs to be done to create the business of your dreams. And what you’ll discover when you look at your business through your E-Myth eyes is that the gap is always created by the absence of systems, the absence of a proprietary way of doing  business that successfully differentiates your business from everyone else’s.”
– Michael Gerber

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“Logging your time accurately helps you to determine where you’re spending your time,” Wong says. “As a company it makes your processes tighter or makes it easy to see where you would need to bring additional people on. Using the Refresh Timer enables you to log your hours efficiently and precisely.“

Why Use Refresh Timer?

Before using the Refresh Timer to help log his hours, Wong realized he was only tracking about 60 percent of his time. He realized that he wasn’t getting an accurate depiction of where he was spending most of his work hours and, therefore, wasn’t able to determine where he needed to make improvements.

“I reviewed many different desktop time tracking programs for activeCollab, which we use, and I found that the Refresh Timer was the most efficient and easy to use,” Wong explains.

Wong settled on the Refresh Timer because you can easily log your time directly to a ticket, log straight time if there is no ticket, mark tickets as complete, and set when your timer stops tracking time for those times when you accidentally leave your computer without pausing the timer. With the Refresh Timer directly on your desktop, it means you won’t have to remember to log into activeCollab or Basecamp to track your time. Plus, it doesn’t take up a lot of space on your desktop, and, better yet, it’s currently free! Before you can use the Refresh Timer, you’ll need to download Adobe AIR, which is also free.

The only drawback to using the Refresh Timer is that you cannot directly comment on a ticket from its interface. For that, you’ll have to log into activeCollab.

“Because of the Refresh Timer I’m now tracking up to 90 percent of my hours,” Wong comments. “And, I think it helps me focus more. Maybe it’s an inherent ‘race against the clock’ mentality, but I notice myself completing tasks faster.”

Evaluate Your Team’s Time

It’s one thing to just log your hours correctly, and it’s another thing to use those logged hours to get a better picture on how your employees spend their time. Once everyone is tracking their time effectively, you can easily evaluate your team’s tracked time. Wong recommends using a template to create a pie chart to get a quick, visual representation.

“As a business, you can see an overall picture of where everyone is actually spending their time, not just where you think they are. It’s a great way to see how projects are being managed and lock down processes,” he says.

To create this pie chart, Wong suggests exporting your employees’ time from activeCollab, which is not organized, creating a pivot chart to evaluate the data, and then converting into a pie chart. Luckily for you, Wong is an Excel macro guru (and an overall nice guy), and he created an awesome template for you to easily download and use.

On this document, you can see a pie chart of time logged by project, and you can also filter the chart by person.

How to use the template:

1. Open the template
2. Enable your macros
3. Copy and paste the exported time report from activeCollab into columns A through J of the “Time Report” tab
4. Click the “View a pie chart of the time logged by project” button

Now you too can have an accurate picture of your (or your employee’s time) in order to manage your projects more better.

If you have any questions regarding small business products, please visit the ChooseWhat forums!

We were lucky enough to spend some time talking to Jay, who offers his top financing tips to everyone from startups to major corporations.  Avoid these 7 pitfalls of raising capital, according to Jay:

1.    Putting the Cart Before the Horse

It’s easy to have a great idea and race towards raising capital, but without a solid business plan and some research into what investors are looking for, you’ll often fail to get the capital you need. Think of your quest for capital as a horse race: the fastest horse out of the gate doesn’t necessarily win the race. Often, the win rests on the skill of the jockey (or business owner) and the ability of the horse to outlast competitors that tire out quickly.

To beat competitors vying for seed money, you need a surefooted business plan with key investment points, market analysis, financial projections and proposals.  As your business plan is the primary motivator for investors, you’d be wise to spend as much time as possible ironing out the kinks before you ask for the cash.

Check out the SBA’s Business Plan Template.

2.    Fudging the Finances

You can have the most brilliant business idea, but if you don’t understand financials and can’t convey your understanding in detail, then you won’t get what you want out of investors.  “When reviewing a company I want a thorough financial model, industry analysis and economics on a project,” says Jay. “I’ve also reviewed business plans for entrepreneurs who don’t have realistic or accurate numbers and it is an immediate red flag.”

If you aren’t financially savvy or if you simply want a second opinion, Jay suggests finding someone to advise you on the finances. You can consult friends or family members with the right background or choose to hire a professional, but either way it’s time or money well spent.

3.    Running an Army of One

Startups typically begin with one or two bright-eyed entrepreneurs. But, before you can convince investors of potential success, you need to secure a management team that can earn the revenue that will get you off the ground and handle the cash flow responsibly.  “There’s sort of a chicken and egg problem with securing your team and raising capital,” claims Jay. “How do you get a great team without first having the capital to hire them?”

One solution, Jay advises, is to hire the right people as part-timers, contractors or consultants until you have the means to transition them into full-time employees.

Check out our blog post on Where to Find New Employees.

4.    Failing to Match Up Interests

To increase your chances of securing capital, you need to research and identify your target investors and match up interests.  “A person looking to raise early stage venture capital wouldn’t have much success in targeting investors who are risk adverse,” Jay says.  Obviously, you’re going to have vastly different experiences with friends and family members than with venture capitalists or angel investors.  Whichever route you take, make sure you thoroughly understand the needs and interests of investors before making your pitch.  Also, be wary of having too many investors who may have conflicting interests.

5.    Staying in Your Comfort Zone

Tapping friends, family and colleagues in your local area for capital is a good first step, but chances are there is a limit to how much you can raise in your area, especially if you’re in a small town.  Be willing to expand your search and travel to investors in different locations who could substantially increase your capital.

6.    Losing Momentum in the Paperwork

Having the proper subscription documents ready for investors can be very important when you meet with investors.  “Don’t lose momentum by failing to have thought out how you are going to structure your investors’ investment.” Jay warns.  “I’ve seen people spend up to six months trying to finalize valuations and send paperwork over to investors.”  During that time, investors could lose interest and fail to act.  To avoid losing investors, have somebody on your end follow through on getting the paperwork ready and signed in a timely manner.

7.    Writing-Off Your Appearance

You may not like to think so, but dressing the part can be to your benefit.  If you’re meeting fellow Internet guys, you don’t have to show up in a coat and tie, but if you’re going to a big financial institution, then you’ll probably want to dress more professionally.  Again, it’s about conveying that you understand who your investors are and what they require. But, on the flip side, you should stay true to your own company culture and viewpoint. If they aren’t cool with your jeans and T-shirt look—or your coat and tie—perhaps you might not want them engaging in a business relationship with you after all.

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What is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing is simply a practice which rewards “affiliates” based on each customer acquired by the affiliate’s marketing efforts. In other words, brands will pay commission to their affiliates for referred business (typically through advertisements on your website, email newsletter or social media pages).

As an alternative to Google Adsense or banner ads, affiliate ads on your website or email newsletters could be a great way to generate extra income for your business. It is relatively easy to get started with affiliate marketing, since, depending on the type of business you operate, many of the companies you wish to work with already have programs in place. Signing up for an affiliate program sometimes can be as easy as visiting a company’s website and filling out a form.

Types of Affiliate Models

Cost per Lead

Cost per Lead means that a company pays you each time someone clicks on an advertisement on your site and does one of the following: creates a profile, fills out a form containing their contact information, or signs up for a free trial. The payout for each lead is typically lower than the payout for each sale in the Cost per Sale model, but, since the visitor does not actually have to purchase anything, visitors will typically convert into leads at a higher rate than they would convert into sales. Not all companies offer the Cost per Lead model.

Cost per Sale

Cost per Sale is a great way to keep your marketing costs low while building a relationship with any company you are advertising. Before going in to a cost per sale relationship you should consider a few things: the amount of traffic you plan on receiving, the amount of traffic you believe you will be able to send through the advertisement, and how much the company is willing to pay you per sale. A cost per sale payout should be significantly higher than Cost per Lead or Cost per Click contracts, since the company will only write you a check when someone goes to your site, clicks on the advertisement and then buys a product. Keep in mind that this type of affiliate model depends on two questions:

1.    From the number of people clicking on this advertisement, how many people are buying the product?
2.    How many visitors to my website does it take to produce one sale from the advertisement(s)?

Cost per Click

Cost per Click simply means that each time someone clicks on your advertisement, the company you are advertising for pays you a fee. The payout per click is usually very low, and you will typically only see it practiced on sites with extremely high traffic volume or on sites that advertise products which aren’t very relevant to the content of the website (example: a car advertisement on an extremely high traffic sports website).

Where to Find Affiliate Programs

Here are some well-known affiliate networks that offer a large number of advertisers to work with:

• Commission Junction
• Linkshare
• Buy.at
• Shareasale

If you don’t find a specific company you want to work with on any of these networks, you could also try contacting the company directly to inquire about affiliate programs. Some companies will already have affiliate programs set up, while others may not.

If a company you want to work with doesn’t currently have an affiliate program, inquire about setting one up to work with you. If you’re approaching a company that is selling a product or service that goes in tandem with or compliments your own, you’ll probably have a relatively easy time trying to set up an affiliate relationship.

Should I get into affiliate marketing?

There are no hard rules when it comes to affiliate marketing. Simply do what makes the most sense for your business. You may decide that putting ads on your website that take visitors off your own page doesn’t work for you. Affiliate marketing isn’t for everyone, but if you decide to get into it you’ll find it’s a lot easier than you might expect.

*If you own a small business and want to learn how to utilize affiliate marketing to spread the word about your business, keep reading our blog for future posts in this series.

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“As a real estate professional, I am constantly looking for new ways to network,” Carvajal says. “I have been studying Facebook and social media for a while now, and I’ve even been approached by many business owners about consulting on their social media strategy.”

There’s no denying that Facebook is a site where a lot of people are spending a lot of their time. Incorporating Facebook can be a great boost to your marketing strategy. Read Carvajal’s tips below on how to take advantage of Facebook in order to expose more people to your business.

Use Facebook to Meet New People

“Think of Facebook as one big cocktail party,” Carvajal explains. “It’s your job to interact with the most people.”

When Carvajal meets people at events, he immediately friends them on Facebook. But it doesn’t just stop there. He interacts with them; he invites them out for coffee; he follows up with them. It’s not enough just to friend people on Facebook and hope they become a customer eventually. You have to work at it.

“It helps them remember what I look like, know a little bit about me, and become familiar with what I do. It’s a great way to keep in touch.”

Build Relationships—Don’t Plug Your Business

After you’ve friended someone on Facebook, it’s best not to bombard them with a ton of self promotion. Carvajal strongly advises against this strategy.

“It doesn’t work to just plug your business,” he says. “People will defriend you.”

Be Interesting

Instead of just posting about what your business is doing, Carvajal suggests that you simply be interesting.

“What has your attention?” he asks. “Engage people with what you find interesting. People connect with what captivates them.”

While Carvajal does discuss his business on his personal and professional Facebook pages, he doesn’t stop there. He posts things he finds appealing himself.

He suggests posting:

• Photos
• Quotes
• Poll questions
• Jokes
• Links to articles
• Videos
• “Stupid, random” things

What do you click on? Follow that same concept.

Be Interested

But once you’ve posted something, you have to be interested in what people are saying too. You can’t make your interaction one-sided. You are on social networking sites in order to build relationships, and you can’t do that if you’re not making the effort.

If someone comments on your posts, respond to him/her. Better yet, “Like” or comment on someone else’s posts.

“The more you interact, the more times you’ll shop in people’s newsfeeds—it puts you out there,” Carvajal says.

Plus, he adds that you can get introduced to new people by simply posting intelligent things on other users’ walls. It can help build your network by simply being interested in what others have to say.

Use Community and Fan Pages to Build Brand Recognition

Carvajal suggests having a personal and a professional Facebook page. “It’s a big mistake to not be on Facebook personally. People will know and like you and move onto your business page.”

While he says having a business page is important, he says you can also build your network by having similar community pages that inadvertently apply to your company. For instance, one of his realtors created a community page devoted to dwellers of a certain condo complex in Austin and posts deals and events to her fans. She’s able to build a relationship with her followers without directly selling anything to them.

“These pages have nothing to do (officially) with the Carvajal Group, but they have everything to do with the Carvajal Group,” he explains. “You can use these other community pages and channels to narrow down your demographic and direct them to your business.”

Armed with Carvajal’s tips, you can now master your business’ social networking presence! And while you’re out conquering Facebook, don’t forget to visit the ChooseWhat fan page!

Successful criminal defense attorney James Gill had no prior background in construction rental before he started Austin Rent Fence, LLC. What he did have was the determination to create the first locally owned and operated alternative to a national company who had been dominating the fence market in Austin, Texas. He also had business partner Matt Beahm, who had six years of prior experience in a related construction field, on which he could rely for insight into the market.

After months of extensive initial research, James and Matt co-founded Austin Rent Fence, LLC in 2008. The company’s mission? Simply to “outperform the national chains that dominate the local industry, with materials that stand up under Austin pressure and service that runs circles around the ‘big dogs.’” Nearly three years later the company is still going strong with three full-time employees and dozens of part-time employees who’ve helped contribute to the company’s success.

How can one emulate James’ pathway to success and beat the odds against small businesses trying to compete with large, national companies? Use the following strategies that James has used successfully to leverage the power of “local”:

Know Your Market

Three years ago, James knew very little about construction rental, but he knew that only one service provider existed in Austin: a large, national company that had the monopoly on the local market. Before diving headfirst into launching Austin Rent Fence, James was adamant about taking the time to properly research the market. He spent time studying the general industry, his competition’s marketing strategies (and their related failures and successes), weaknesses and possible opportunities to differentiate their brand from a well-known dominant player.

Through his research, he also discovered that he needed to build a website that would generate leads from search engines and help him achieve the following point, which is

Get On Top of Local Search

Getting on top of local search means ensuring that your company is listed at the top of the search results when someone searches for a local company in a specific industry. For instance, searching “rent fence Austin” will return a page with austinrentfence.com at the top and at least three top 10 results linking to the company’s site. If you get to the top of your local search results and your competitor is national, you can easily siphon customers, who prefer to deal with local merchants, from bigger, remote companies.

Succeeding at local search requires you to have a properly optimized website and a strategy for promoting your site online. For more help with these topics, check out our handy guides:

• SEO for Beginners
• Promote Your Website

Network with Local Connections

Networking with local connections is key to expanding your business and becoming well-established in your local market. James not only networked with friends, family and acquaintances in person and on Facebook, but he also became active in local trade organizations, such as the Austin General Contactors Society.

Through friends and family as well as local organizations, James was able to land major deals with local clients like the South by Southwest (SXSW) music festival. Business partner Matt Beahm even networked inadvertently and successfully with a seatmate on a plane back to Austin, which led to Austin Rent Fence servicing another major Austin festival: Fun Fun Fun Fest. Moral: Simply engaging in a friendly conversation—”networking”—pays off.

Expand Your Referral Network by Offering Good Customer Service

Good customer service can be crucial for local businesses, as it is the most important differentiating factor between small companies and large chains. James credits the engagement of Austin Rent Fence with customers on a more personal level as a critical factor in the company’s success. From the moment Austin Rent Fence landed its first client until now, James has made following up with customers his main priority. He makes sure he receives feedback from customers and does everything possible to ensure customer satisfaction.

He has also provided discounts and other incentives for first-time customers, in an effort to expand his client base. James believes that Austin Rent Fence’s excellent service coupled with unbeatable incentives was the primary reason people spread the word about his business.

“Everyone wants great customer service, he says.  “People will tell their friends and colleagues when they experience it and refer them to you.”

Cater to Local Culture

Everything that is Austin oozes out of Austin Rent Fence. The company’s branding/promotional material puts Austin institutions and hallmarks on parade. For instance, the Austin Rent Fence logo—a hippish squirrel with obligatory dark shades, musical instrument, facial scruff and burnt orange sandals—appeals to Austin’s love of The University of Texas, outdoor culture and omnipresent music scene. Instantly recognizable and ethos-inducing, the references seem to work. James recommends using similar hallmarks of your local community to appeal to potential customers.

Utilizing the strategies above will help you to not only survive your first year in business, but also help you to become a fixture in your local market, despite all of the “big dogs” threatening to run you out.

For any other criminal defense attorneys (or doctors or office workers or born entrepreneurs) who want to start a local business, James Gill offers one last piece of advice:  “At a certain point you have to stop listening to everyone who tells you you can’t do something and just do what you believe in.”

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With only a couple of weeks left on his project management class, Middleton is brimming with new ideas from the course. “I didn’t think it would actually help that much, but the class has definitely helped develop structure, process, and foundation for everything I do.”

Research and Define Goals

There are many great reasons for taking additional courses and continuing your education. If you are earning a certificate at the end of your class, you may be more marketable to future employers or become eligible for a promotion at your current company. Plus, you will most likely look at an increase in salary down the road. In addition to the benefits of career advancement and higher salary, continuing your education also gives you more tools in order to perform your job more effectively.

Middleton suggests defining your goals before deciding on what course you want to take. Is it to enter a different field? Learn more about the field you’re already in? Improve your skill set? Learn a new tool or technology? Gain a certificate? Sit down and think about what you want to get out of your class.

Once you’ve set out your goals, go forth and research! Do you want to take a course online? Do you want to take a night class at a nearby school? You also want to research the teachers in charge of classes you’re interested in. Make sure you’re finding a class that will fit with your needs.

Ask Your Employer

Once you’ve decided which course to take, talk to your employer. If your company already has a continuing education policy in place—a lot of larger corporations do—this will be pretty easy. If they don’t, you should approach your supervisor or the human resources department.

“It’s less expensive for companies to promote from within than to recruit a new employee with the right education, so it’s in your company’s best interest for you to take the initiative to improve your skill set,” Middleton says.

Plus, a lot of companies will most likely cover some (if not all) of the cost of your class.

Recognize Time Constraints

Before you sign up for your class make sure you really recognize the time constraints you’re going to be putting on yourself.

“Realize that most one semester night classes will require at least eight hours of week of your time,” Middleton says. “This is equivalent to adding on an additional work day to your schedule every week. Do you really have that available?”

Maintain a Balance

Middleton suggests that, after you sign up for your course, you should take a step back and analyze your priorities. You will want to make sure to maintain these priorities throughout the duration of your class. “No matter the additional requirements, it is vital to your overall success that you keep your priorities in line. Make time to spend on your hobbies, interests, and friends,” Middleton says.

For instance, in addition to his work here at ChooseWhat and his project management course, Middleton is currently playing on a rugby team in Austin. He also maintains his relationships with friends and family, as well as his fitness regime.

“It’s also important to maintain a good diet and exercise routine to keep your energy levels up,” he adds.

Check out Middleton’s previous tips on healthy snacking.

Enjoy Yourself!

Middleton’s best tip for those wanting to further their education while maintaining their fulltime jobs is to simply enjoy yourself.  “Make sure that when you do go back to school that it is in an area where you have a lot of interest,” he says. “The last thing you want to do is work all day and then go to a class you don’t care about or are bored with.”

At the end of the day, going back to school is about you and your own personal development, so “don’t spend all that time without anything changing in your career.”

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According to Subhi, conducting international conference calls is vital to managing overseas operations and ensuring sustainability for international businesses.  It is important to be in constant communication with business counterparts abroad because it creates a personal relationship with overseas employees and ensures management will be updated on every process.

About the Khudairi Group

Daily conference calls to Iraq are necessary for the Khudairi Group, a business focused on rebuilding and developing Iraq, to monitor operations across three different divisions:  Government & Infrastructure, Marketing & Distribution and Oil & Gas.  Each of these main divisions, based in Houston, has daily international conference calls with the staff in Iraq that provides a level of on-the-ground transparency for the Houston headquarters.

Conference Calling Systems

It’s important to choose a conference calling system that works with your business needs.  Some businesses use a simple office phone to conduct conference calls, while other companies opt for web conferencing services, such as GoToMeeting.  The Khudairi Group started out by using Yahoo! Messenger but later converted to Skype, which is great for its chat, video and file and screen-sharing capabilities.

During conference calls, Subhi’s team simultaneously uses chat and video functions to repeat information, as the chat dialogue is helpful for non-native English speakers on the overseas team to follow along with the conversation.  Using Skype, you can also save previous chat conversations, allowing users to go back and review the dialogue from the meeting.

Skype costs as low as 2.3 cents per minute or 1.2 cents per month.  International SMS rates vary by country.  The Business version of Skype allows you to utilize

• IM
• Conference calling
• Video conferencing
• File sharing
• Screen sharing
• Call transfer
• Call forwarding
• Voicemail service
• Caller ID
• Online numbers
• SMS
• Skype Manager (Lets you centrally create and manage Skype accounts for your employees, allocate Skype Credit and assign features for employees to use.)

Key Guidelines for Your Conference Call

Here are some key guidelines to follow when having a conference call:

1.    Develop and distribute an agenda prior to meeting.

Agendas help you organize your discussion points and make your conference calls quicker and more effective.  Emailing your agenda to all conference call participants prior to the call will help participants focus on specific topics at hand.

2.    Follow a predetermined structure and stay on topic.

Structure is important when managing international conference calls. Especially when dealing with management offices in developing nations, “you [should] try to create structure where there isn’t structure,” Subhi advises.  A way to create structure is to set a schedule for conference calls and stick to it.  Subhi’s team sets pre-determined phone call times each week and holds overseas managers accountable for showing up and being prepared for the calls.

When Subhi’s team first started conference calling the team in Iraq, some of the managers in the overseas office wouldn’t show up to the conference calls or would procrastinate and offer excuses.  “[Having scheduled phone calls] was a new concept for the Iraqi management team,” Subhi admits, “but once we imposed a schedule, they were more willing to show up and be accountable.”

3.    Maintain effective communication from top to bottom and vice-versa.

“Lower level managers and employees are quick to imitate [top level] management styles,” says Subhi.  “If you set a good example for effective communication and accountability during meetings, they will follow your lead.”  The following step should also help you to maintain effective communication among overseas team members.

4.    Allow time for questions and concerns.

Setting aside time for questions and concerns allows participants to voice their opinions, if they haven’t had a chance to speak.  It also lets participants bring up any other important issues that weren’t already covered in the agenda.

5.    Send conference minutes, next steps and action items to all parties involved.

Subhi is always copied on emails containing meeting minutes, and he tries to follow up with each manager/meeting leader about the conference call if he isn’t in it.  He recommends including next steps and action items in your email as well as the minutes.

Other Considerations for Making International Calls

Working with employees abroad always requires special considerations due to time differences.  Subhi’s team schedules their conference calls with the Iraqi management office for every Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday because the schedule works best for the overseas team.

“In Iraq—and really all of the Middle East—most people have half days on Thursday, Friday off, and they work on Saturday and Sunday, which is somewhat counter to our work week in America.  Since we’re corporate, our overseas team pretty much has to follow the schedule that we set, but we try to be considerate about the time difference and the culture there.”

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“I wasn’t always so organized, but once I got hired by ChooseWhat I knew I had to adopt a system to manage all the information given to me,” Malden says. “The right organization is paramount to success at your job.”

So what can you do to stay more organized at work? Read Malden’s tips below.

Write It Down

First things first: you HAVE to write it down. A written (or typed) list gives you a tangible record of what you need to do rather than just an imaginary list in your head. “You might think you can remember everything that people ask you to do, but there will always be something that slips by you,” Malden says. “Make sure it’s not something important that slips by.”

Keep It All in One Place

Use only one or two systems to record tasks and events. For example, keep all of your appointments on your calendar and all of your assignments on a notepad or in your phone. That way you can worry about executing these tasks rather than having to remember what they are or where they’re located.

If you start putting some of your appointments on your phone calendar, some on your computer calendar and some on your desk calendar, chances are you might forget something eventually. So, use the fewest number of systems to keep track of tasks.

Always Have Your List with You

You can’t easily jot down tasks and assignments if you don’t have your list with you at all times. If you go into an appointment or a meeting, have your list on you. “If you say, ‘Oh, I’ll write that down when I get back to my desk,’ chances are you will forget it,” Malden says.

This is especially important if someone tells you something in the middle of a conversation because it’s easy to miss or forget details unless you write it down.

Update Your List Consistently

If you keep all of your to-do items in one place and you always have your list with you, you have to be diligent with writing everything down. “My best piece of advice is to always be consistent and maintain your to-do list every day. Make it a habit,” Malden says.

Start and End Your Day with Your List

Start every day by looking at your list from the day before. Chances are that you didn’t finish everything that you needed to yesterday, and, typically, after going home the night before you probably forgot the details of what you needed to do.

And, just as starting your day with your list is incredibly important, it’s also vital to end your day with reviewing your list. Check off things you completed! Doesn’t it feel good? Write down notes of things you need to accomplish the next day. Don’t wait ‘til the next day; get it all down before you walk out the door.

Helpful Tools

• Tadalist.com is an easy to-do list tool that you can even use to share with others.
• iPhone apps, such as ToDo or Remember the Milk

Remember that being organized is essential to performing your job well.  “Being organized is important because the one time you forget to write something down, it’s going to be a huge mistake,” Malden says.

Like the tips you read here? Sign up for the ChooseWhat monthly newsletter!

Clearly Define Your Purpose and Goals

Before you can improve the effectiveness of your site, you need to define its purpose.  Specifically, what are your goals for the website?  Do you want it to:

• Present information about your company?
• Generate business?
  • Through ecommerce (i.e. selling products/services on your site)?
  • Through lead forms (i.e. having users fill out a form to get more information)?
  • Through phone calls to your company?
  • Through subscriptions to your service or your monthly newsletter?

Although the questions above seem obvious, it is very important to commit them to writing.  When determining ways to make your site more effective, you will use these answers as guideposts.  When making a decision about your site, always ask yourself “Will doing this help me achieve the goals of my website.” If the answer is “no,” it’s likely a waste of time.

1) Recreate the User Experience

Remember that people are looking for answers when they get to your website.  If at any point they get confused or frustrated, they will abandon your site, rendering it ineffective.  To avoid losing customers, try to recreate the experience of a person (or persons) arriving at your website.

Pretend you’re searching online. You can start by searching for your site’s target keywords on the top search engines to see if your site comes up for the right keywords.  When you do find your site, look to see which page comes up on that particular search (often times it’s not the home page) and ask yourself if you were the one searching, what you would do if you visited that page.  If it is not one of your stated goals, then you’ve found an opportunity for improvement.

Click links. You should not only click all of the links on your site to see if they navigate to the correct pages and information, but also click the links on your email newsletters, social media sites and other blogs or sites that link to yours.  Again, check to see that the content on your entry pages (an “entry page” is the first page that a person sees when they arrive at your site- often this is not the home page) is relevant to the links clicked.

Pay attention to your messaging on other marketing materials or advertising. Again, make sure that your ad is sending customers to the right place.  Leo asks, “Is the discount that people heard about on the radio easily visible when they get to your website, or do they have to dig for it?”

Identify calls to action. Is the path to the action that you desire from the user (e.g. filling out a lead form, calling you, buying a product) clear?  If any page of your site is lacking a clear call to action, you will lose customers.

2) Eliminate Jargon

Most business owners don’t realize how harmful jargon can be.  Most of your customers probably don’t have the background in your industry that you do and will be put off by industry-specific jargon.  If they don’t understand what you’re selling, they won’t buy. So, eliminate the jargon, and if you must use it, make sure to define it in simple terms that anyone can understand.

Hire a good copywriter to create clear, compelling copy for your site, or pick up The Yahoo Style Guide, which has useful tips on improving copy.

3) Simplify Choices

Don’t give your users too many choices on your website. When you do give them choices, make them easy ones.  The person on your site is there to get answers from you, the expert.  Give them the information they’re looking for up front, without any hassle, and they’ll be more likely to act.  It may be helpful to create user profiles using demographic information you’ve collected about your customers, so that you can tailor your site content to specific user types.

4) Use Tracking

Tracking services can help you view how people are currently using your site.  Most of these services will let you see how your visitors are arriving (e.g. through search, direct, email, etc.)  Some popular tracking services that we’ve used here at ChooseWhat are

Google Analytics:  A free tracking service that lets you view visitors, entry pages, links clicked, average time on site, etc.

Hitslink:  A paid tracking service that shows you more detailed information than Google Analytics, but is less user friendly.

ClickTale:  Lets you watch videos of visitors interacting with your site, view Mouse Move Heatmaps, see Form Analytics, etc.

5) Find a Good Hosting Service

Make sure you have a good hosting service.  If you regularly visit your own site and find the slow load time frustrating, then your customers are probably frustrated as well.  Slow page loads and issues with your site being down will cause users to abandon your site quickly.  There are many hosting services on the market, and it’s up to you to choose one.  But remember that free hosting services will never work as well as hosting you pay for.

6) Test Your Site in Different Browsers

Most Internet users use IE to view websites.  If you use Firefox or Safari, you should also regularly view your site in Internet Explorer to make sure your site looks and functions correctly on all browsers.  Conversely, if you use IE, regularly check your site on Firefox (and Safari if possible).  Roughly 30% – 40% of our visitors use Firefox, which is a significant percentage.

Check out this list of tools for testing Cross-Browser Compatibility.

Using Leo’s tips, you’ll have an effective business website in no time and be ahead of everyone else in the online game.

Cheers!

Belaire got her environmental drive from watching her parents’ business, an environmental consulting business that helps companies reconstruct land on the Texas coast after a build in order to bring the environmental surroundings up to specific standards. “Seeing how they started out making a difference with just two people and watching them grow with their team and make an even bigger difference to their surroundings is inspiring,” Belaire says.

It can be difficult to be green at the office because, as Belaire points out, “it’s harder to do because someone has to take the initiative to set up green practices.”

Learn what you can do to help your office become more environmentally-friendly:

Conduct a Waste Audit

The first thing your company should do is conduct a waste audit. This can be as simple as doing a walkthrough of your office operations and see what and how much is being thrown away. Once you have a better idea of what is being tossed out in your office, you can look for opportunities to reuse these items or even reduce waste. The Environmental Protection Agency even has a worksheet you can download to help you with this process. You will probably be able to easily see where you can implement simple environmentally-friendly practices.

Try Composting

Even though your office doesn’t have a yard, you can still participate in composting. Composting is the decomposition of organic matter to make substance this is beneficial to houseplants or enriching soil. It is an easy way to reduce the volume of garbage sent to landfills. If you’re willing to give up a little bit of space under the sink or on top of the fridge in your office’s kitchen, your company can keep its food scraps out of the landfill too.  And, if you get the proper bin, your compost collection doesn’t have to smell. Look into Bokashi bins, which is full of effective microorganisms. You can donate your compost to a farmer’s market or community garden. Learn more about office composting.

Recycle the Lazy Way

Recycling can be such a hassle sometimes if your office building doesn’t recycle. Someone has to take it upon themselves to initiate a recycling program and take the recyclables to the center. It’s hard to want to be green when it’s a hassle, right? So feel free to lazily recycle by hiring someone to come pick your recycling for you! Companies like Trusty Pickup will haul off your recycling for a small fee.

Buy Sustainable Products

There are also many options to buy products that are sustainable and made by companies using sustainable practices. The Santa Monica Office of Sustainability and the Environment is an excellent site that highlights a lot of green office products, such as printers that meet Energy Star requirements or toner cartridges that can be refilled or recycled.

Implement Easy Green Practices

Like I said before, going green doesn’t have to be difficult. There are always a ton of simple and small ways you can make your office more environmentally-friendly.

• Set your printer margins wide and print double-sided documents to reduce paper waste.
• Provide employee incentives for those who ride their bikes to work.
• Encourage public transportation or carpooling.
• Turn computers and appliances off (not in hibernation mode) when leaving the office.
• Switch to energy-efficient light bulbs.
• Use coffee mugs and Nalgene bottles instead of paper cups or plastic water bottles.
• Take your own Tupperware to restaurants instead of getting to-go boxes.
• Turn off all the lights.
• Unplug the toaster and microwave when not in use.
• Buy organic snacks in sustainable packaging.
• Hand wash dishes instead of using the dishwasher, or at least make sure the dishwasher is full and not set to Heated Dry.

“There are many different reasons to be environmentally-friendly, not just in the office but in your everyday life as well,” Belaire says. “The environment surrounds us; it’s the air we breathe, the food we eat and the ground beneath our feet.  Making more environmentally conscious decisions is an easy thing to incorporate into your daily life.  Our decisions and habits today can help future generations.”

Business Server Options

PC as a Server

If you have fewer than 20 office computers running windows, you can use a Windows 7 machine (i.e. a PC) as your server.  In this scenario, your “server PC” is acting like a shared hard drive so you can’t set different security protocols for different files.  Otherwise, it accomplishes most of what a true enterprise server would accomplish and it’s a lot less expensive and easier to maintain.  In addition, you can sign up for an online backup service like JungleDisk or Mozy to back up your server, which costs less than $10 per month.  Unfortunately, if you need more than 20 connections, this is no longer an option.

Business Server OS

Here at ChooseWhat.com, we used a PC as our server for a long time (which worked well enough), but we outgrew it. If you have 20 ore more computers that need to connect to your server, you will have to purchase a business server with a server operating system (OS), such as Windows Small Business Server 2008 that can support up to 50 employees. The main advantage of having an enterprise-level server is that you’ll be able to set multiple levels of permissions for each file on your server, which means increased security.

Virtual Private Server (or Dedicated Server)

A virtual server means that your server is hosted online and managed by a hosting company.  Gaines says that if you’ve already hired an IT team to manage your server, you may also want to pay them to provide a virtual server (which many IT firms do).  However, Gaines is hesitant to recommend this option to start-ups, as virtual servers for this purpose can cost  $500+ per month.  In this scenario, you’re also depending on a bulletproof internet connection and an extremely reliable IT service firm.  Gaines said this option just didn’t make sense for ChooseWhat.com.

Cost of Buying a Business Server OS

According to Gaines, who was responsible for purchasing our new business server here at ChooseWhat.com, business servers for small businesses start around $2,500.  We spent about $6,000 when it was all said and done.  Here was the cost breakdown:

Server Machine:   ~$3,500

OS:  Windows Server 2008 (~ $1,500)

We got ours for free because we’re a member of Microsoft BizSpark.  If you qualify (i.e. you have 10 or fewer full-time employees), BizSpark is a really great program sponsored by Microsoft that provides free software to certain types of small businesses.

CAL’s:  You are required to purchase licenses for each machine connected to the server ($85 per machine)

Setup and installation:  8 hours for the server and about 1 hour per machine ($75 – $150 per hour in Austin, Texas)

Tips for Configuring Your Server

• Servers should be configured with multiple redundancies. This means that the server has two hard drives that mirror each other, allowing for both on-site and off-site backup and ensuring that your backup is preserved in the event of a localized disaster.
• You should also configure the server to back up every night. This ensures that no more than a day’s worth of data will be lost in the event of a disaster.  To configure your server, check with your server provider for detailed instructions.  If you’re using Windows Server 2008, you can follow this guide on Backup Basics in Windows Server 2008 R2.
• Don’t host your email or calendars on your server. Most business servers allow you to host your email on your server.  However, you may want to avoid hosting your own email for a couple of reasons.  First, you want to protect your server from any viruses you may accidentally download through your email.  Second, if your server ever goes down or you have server issues, you won’t be able to access your email.  Using a cloud (online) email service like Gmail or Yahoo Mail is preferable.

What exactly is PPC? It’s an Internet advertising model used on search engines, typically the Big Three: Google, Bing, and Yahoo, through which you create an ad to show up when Internet users search for specific keywords. You will only pay the site when your ad is clicked on. Typically you make a bid with the search engine to compete for the top spot in the paid search section.

“If you do PPC for your site and bid high enough, you can get traffic to your site quickly. Plus it gives you a better understanding of what keywords drive traffic and conversions.”

Here are Wong’s pointers on how you can make PPC work the best for your company:

See the Larger Trends

We typically run reports on the keyword level to analyze the performance of our PPC accounts, but it’s also important to take a step back to look at your accounts from a higher level. Wong says it’s easy to create these reports with pivot tables in Excel, where you can see how your account is performing from both an ad group level (i.e. the group of similar keywords, such as send fax, sending fax, etc.) and a campaign level, which is the site itself.

Focus on Major Ad Groups

Like with many things in life, the 80/20 rule can also be applied to PPC. Wong says that roughly 80% of your PPC account’s revenue will come from roughly 20% of the keywords. By focusing on the performance of your major ad groups, you can have lager impacts on the performance of your account by tweaking just a few things.

Your major ad groups include:

• The keywords that generate the most clicks
• The keywords that produce the most revenue
• The keywords you spend the most money on

“Always Be Testing”

According to Wong, PPC is a game of always testing and never settling. You should test everything, from ad copy (the content that people see in your ad), to max PPC bid, to your landing page (the page they land on from your ad), and more.  But, when you find something that works, make sure to keep testing to find something that works better. By doing so, you’ll be able to stay ahead of your competitors. Wong warns that PPC is not something you can set and forget.

“Remember, a lot of times you’ll think something will work, but you have to test a lot of things and remind yourself that you don’t know exactly what a buyer will do,” Wong says.

Utilize Negative Keywords

According to Google, “negative keywords” are words that keep your ads from being shown when  a user does a search. A perfect example is the phrase “how to.”

“People who tend to search for ‘how to’ do something aren’t typically buyers, so you want to make sure your PPC is only seen by those who will lead to conversions,” Wong says.

Wong suggests adding negative keywords to your PPC accounts in order to filter them out because it gives you greater control on who sees your advertisement.

Track Conversions on Specific Keywords

Tracking conversion rates on a keyword-level basis is an absolute must in order to have a successful PPC account. Each of your keywords should have a unique tracking ID so that you can see how many people are coming to your website on each keyword and how many of those people are converting into leads. It’s not just enough to see which keywords spike your traffic if they don’t lead to sales. Knowing whether the people coming to your website are converting is the most important piece of PPC, according to Wong.

Everyone has deadlines. Everyone has been told that they need to finish tasks or projects—or to deliver a product—faster than they’d planned. It often seems impossible to meet these deadlines, but there are ways to get the job done. Knowing how to properly crash a project is a vital tool for any project manager. But, for project managers, it is also one of the most difficult things to do. “If something takes Karen six days to accomplish on her own, then Karen and Peter working together should be able to accomplish this task in three days. But, this is rarely, if ever, the case,” says Nick.

Make the Impossible Possible

“Tasks can always be done faster,” says Nick. “It’s just a matter of: How much extra will it cost? How much faster can it get done? Who will be working on it?” Answering these questions and putting plans in place to execute your objectives will help make the impossible possible.

According to Nick, there’s always a risk of decreasing the quality of your product when you crash the project, but you should have a solid plan in place to help you minimize the loss of quality. “I wouldn’t recommend crashing the project unless absolutely necessary—which is often the case for small businesses,” he admits.

Add Additional Resources

Nick says that adding resources costs money and can often cause the project to take longer. Typically, additional resources external to the project will have a bigger learning curve than those already working on the project. And teaching or training additional resources will take time away from those already working on the project. Nick recommends adding additional resources only when there is a small or no learning curve involved (e.g. doing math, plugging in information, fact-checking, etc.) in order to minimize time drains.

Reorganize Tasks

Breaking down tasks from a few big picture accomplishments to several smaller, more tangible pieces can help a project manager better organize and prioritize tasks. Work breakdowns also help to identify which steps can be accomplished at a faster rate than others with minimal cost (i.e. only a few additional resources are necessary, and there is little to no learning curve). Nick also advises PM’s and teams to identify tasks that can be done in parallel. For example, instead of doing Quality Control on all of our vendor reviews before we publish them on ChooseWhat.com, we upload reviews that have already been quality checked while other reviews are being QC’d. This makes the process faster and much more effective.

Create a Networking Diagram to Identify Your Critical Path

A networking diagram will help you determine your “critical path.” The critical path is always the longest path to completion of the project and involves all of the steps that MUST be accomplished to complete the project. Identifying your critical path is imperative to crashing the project. Only the activities aligned on the critical path can affect the overall duration of the project; so, you’ll want to focus on shortening the time it takes to complete critical path activities. However, it’s important to note that as you being cutting down time on critical path activities (such as by throwing additional resources at them), your critical path may change along with your overall strategy for crashing the project.

The following diagram (drawn by Nick) shows the critical path (green) to completion of the project (yellow). The numbers denote hours of work allotted to each activity. Totaling hours on the critical path will give you the longest (read: actual) timeframe for completing the project.

Crying Gets You Nowhere

“Getting told that a project is due sooner than expected is not the end of the world,” Nick admonishes. “Be creative, and come up with a solution because crying gets you nowhere!” Your solution is going to involve plenty of graphs and flow charts that will help you get a firm grasp on realistic goals and work schedules, as well as your own judgment on how to utilize resources.

“Crashing the project—and managing projects in general—is both an art and a science,” says Nick. The “science” part, he says, involves graphs and numbers.

The “Science” of Crashing

For instance, you have 10 workers, and each worker on this project costs the company X number of dollars per hour (we’ll say $20), and the project is due in four days (with eight hours in a day), you are going to spend $6,400 in labor costs. Just before you start working on the project, your superior tells you the project must be done in three days.

As project manager, you decide that if you’ve got 10 workers (working eight hours per day),  and you need to speed up the project by three days, you’re going to also need to increase your workforce by five people. The project manager then can report to their superior that they can in fact speed up the project to be done in three days, but it is going to cost $800 extra (15 workers x 8 hours a day x $20 an hour x 3 days). It is then up to the person who is funding the project (or your superior) to decide whether the $800 extra it would cost to finish the project one day earlier is worth it.

(15w x 8hrs x $20 x 3d) – (10w x 8hrs x $20 x 4d) = $800

The “Art” of Crashing

The “art” part involves your skill at putting all your resources in the right places.

“We wouldn’t want April (our Web Developer here at ChooseWhat) to be working on a research database when Casey (one of our researchers) can do it much more efficiently,” says Nick. “And we wouldn’t want April spending all her time teaching Drupal (our Content Management System) to Casey.”

But, he admits that a little bit of training is often necessary to enable the handing-off of tasks. (In our case, a 30-minute training session on Drupal sufficed.)

This is the end of your crash course in “project crashing.” Just remember that rushing to meet a deadline doesn’t mean you have to feel frazzled. The more you plan for the crash, the softer it’ll be.

Check Out Craigslist

Craigslist is a great resource to find new employees if you use it properly and beware of Spammers. Coburn advises that some positions seem to elicit more Spam than others, so it’s best to come up with a way to weed out the Spammers.

“A method I’ve used to throw out all the Spammers is to ask applicants to answer a specific question in their email or put a particular subject line,” Coburn says. “This not only allows me to see who is clearly a Spambot easily, but if the applicants follow instructions, they are automatically moved to the next round.”

Other tips for looking for applicants on Craigslist include:

• Post positions in several different categories, but don’t go overboard.
• Never list your phone number.
• Use an anonymous email address.
• Repost your job posting weekly so that it doesn’t get buried by new listings.
• Make your job posting clear about what you want.
• Be aware of size issues if you’re requesting work samples. (Craigslist only allows a specific number of files to be received through their system.)
• Take down the job posting once you’ve hit a specific number of applicants. (Coburn suggests 50.)

Look for Interns on University Sites

If you’re searching for interns, the absolute best resource to help you find them is your local university’s job posting site. Since we’re based in Austin, Texas, we take advantage of the University of Texas job board.

Although the school is so huge, Coburn says that she prefers not to narrow her search down to just one department or major.

“We know that they’re not that far along in their careers, so we tend to keep our options open,” she says.

Coburn also says that, since the job board is private, you can feel free to post your real email address because you won’t be getting spammed, but you should still never post your phone number.

ChooseWhat’s Strategies Officer Gaines Kilpatrick also suggests posting on local university job boards if you’re looking for an entry-level position because alumni will also be searching the board. That’s how he found Coburn!

Kilpatrick recommends making sure that your job posting sells the company as well, especially if the job you’re hiring for won’t be the most exciting one.

“If you describe a bunch of menial tasks, no one will apply, so you should advertise the benefits of working for your company and try to attract the right candidate,” he says.

Learn more about getting the most out of your interns.

Use a Headhunter for Senior Positions

While weeding through dozens of resumes might work for most positions you’re hiring for, Coburn suggests using a headhunter for senior-level employees.

“Headhunters usually charge20 to 30 percent of the yearly salary, so for a senior-level position, it’s worth it,” Kilpatrick says.

Tip:  Instead of using a general headhunter service, look for a specialized headhunter who places employees directly into positions you need to fill.

Try Freelance Sites for Contractors

If you’re looking for a contract laborer, check out freelancing sites, such as oDesk or eLance, which Coburn uses to find web development freelancers.

Coburn recommends working with contract laborers on a per project basis rather than an hourly wage. It should save you time and money in the long run.

She also says to be wary of low-cost agencies that make low bids on your postings. Typically the lower end agencies are based abroad, “so you might think that you’re getting a good deal, but communication could be tricky.”

Coburn advises to ask contractors for references and feel free to call them. They might even give you pointers on how to hire people through these sites.

A benefit of using these freelancing sites is that they have built-in communication tools, such as chat, email, and payment options, which are useful if you’re managing several freelancers.

Network, Network, Network

When searching for a new employee, you should also reach out to people within your industry to give you suggestions or advice.

But, according to Kilpatrick, you should beware of hiring friends. “I shy away from hiring friends because there are usually strings attached!” he advises.

When you’ve found a couple of potential candidates, learn more about conducting the perfect interview!

Why You Should Care about QC

According to a recent study published in the Journal of Management and Marketing Research,

Traditionally, small organizations have been less likely to utilize strategic management models and strategic planning concepts than large organizations for many reasons: (1) Small organizations are often family-owned; (2) Small business leaders are often more focused on day-to-day operations as opposed to management models and strategic management systems; (3) Small businesses have less money to spend on training; and (4) Their competitors generally operate the way they do – without using management models and implementing improvement systems. Also, entrepreneurs who develop small businesses usually have little desire to establish routine processes and procedures.

Although not many small businesses have a strategic management model in place, ChooseWhat.com’s Adam Malden believes that even if more work needs to be done initially, small businesses owners can and should implement Quality Control standards and processes.  Why?  “It’s the last line of fact-checking and assurance of quality before a product, service or information about a company goes public.”

Here are Adam’s tips for implementing Quality Control easily and effectively in your small business:

Standardize QC with Processes

The easiest way to handle QC is to standardize everything from start to finish.  One way to create standardization is to write a thorough process that can be distributed to employees who are responsible for QC.

Create Checkpoints

Since QC is a recurring task, employees in charge of this task should check in with a project manager throughout the QC process.  The manager can help improve and correct errors in the process as it’s being implemented, in order to minimize time spent troubleshooting later on.

Maintain Flexibility

Flexibility is key for QC.  Especially for small businesses and entrepreneurs, processes and procedures will require revision and improvement.  The ability to incorporate employee feedback into your QC processes is essential.

Adam says that our QC process here at ChooseWhat for small business product and service reviews follows this particular flow (simplified):

• Review each company, service or product twice.
• Compare discrepancies between reviews and right-size information.
• Check-in with project manager on status and process.
• Information goes live on our website/gets published.
• QC published content.

What about the REALLY small companies, the one-man shops?

“You can definitely implement QC even if you’re a one-man shop,” says Adam.  “Once you’ve got your guidelines, processes and checkpoints in place, all you have to do is follow your own process for ensuring a quality product, service or publication.”

Tips:

• Write up your processes for standardization just as you would for any employees.
• Follow these processes yourself or find someone to help you QC.  You could probably even outsource this task.
• Use tools to help you achieve QC, such as firms or online tools that specialize in market research, focus groups or website usability testing.  Incorporate these into your processes when appropriate.

Models for QC and Strategic Management

For more about models for QC and Strategic Management, check out “What Management and Quality Theories Are Best for Small Businesses?” in the Journal of Management and Marketing Research.

From the abstract:

This paper proposes various management models that small business leaders can use to integrate quality initiatives into the strategic management of their organizations. In so doing, they can increase the probability of their organization’s long-term survival.

Develop a Quiz

Welder suggests crafting a quiz of questions you would ask every candidate in order to break the ice and assess his/her personality. These questions are supplemental to the usual prior employment, skill set, and future responsibilities script.

Welder’s favorite questions include brain teasers that don’t necessarily have an answer, but he says these give him some insight to the interviewee’s reasoning skills and attitude. Future interviewees of ChooseWhat, take note! Here is a taste of Welder’s interview questions:

• Why are manhole covers round?
• How many jelly beans are there in a glass jar that holds one liter?
• If you were stranded on an island with everything you needed to survive but could pick two extra things for yourself, what would you pick and why?
• What does a web hosting company do? (This question lets Welder know if the interviewee is familiar with ChooseWhat’s industry.)

Plan for the Future

Don’t just decide what your new hire will be doing tomorrow; plan their responsibilities for the future as well. Sit down and write out the activities that you see the employee doing over the next six months and then the next two years. What are the skills and personality traits you think would best serve a person in this position?

Check References

Always ask for references. Even though these people have been handpicked by the interviewee, they can still provide you with invaluable information. When contacting references, you should take note of the following:

• Did they call you back, and how quickly? If they avoid you, that’s an indication of their relationship to the candidate.
• Did they volunteer additional information? If they try to sell the candidate to you that means they actually liked him/her.
• Did the candidate only provide you with personal references? Unless you’re interviewing interns, everyone should have at least one professional reference, and, if they don’t, it’s a red flag that might indicate they don’t have a good relationship with any prior employer.

Create a Short Assignment

Between the first and second interview, you should give your candidate a short, timed assignment that’s relevant to the position. “Make sure to keep it simple, specific, and short so you can judge their talent appropriately,” Welder says.

If you’re hiring for a writing position, give candidates a timed writing assignment. If you’re looking for someone to make reports, give them a spreadsheet assignment. For a web developer, ask candidates to craft a proposal. The goal is to create an assignment that’s close to actual assignments your new hire will be completing. This assignment also helps you assess how well they follow directions and meet deadlines as well as utilize their skills.

Gauge Attitude

In addition to skills, Welder explains that an employee’s attitude is a huge deciding factor in who he hires. “Sometimes a good attitude can even outweigh strong skills,” he says. “You can teach skills. You can’t teach attitude.”

Good indicators of a great attitude for Welder include:

• The candidate has researched the company and has a good understand of what the company does. It means they are enthusiastic and interested.
• The candidate asks good questions. It means they have thought through their research and are excited by what they found.
• They are willing to do what it takes, no matter what.  However, someone with a lot of caveats could be trouble down the line.

“You have to work with this employee every day, so make sure you actually like him/her,” Welder points out.

Discuss Salary

While it can be iffy for an interviewee to discuss salaries upfront, Welder says for a boss it’s okay to talk money if you think you might extend an offer to the candidate. You want to know if you’re in the same ballpark moneywise as the candidate because if you can’t provide them with a livable wage, there’s nothing you can really do.

However, Welder strongly advises steering clear of mentioning specific numbers because you can’t retract your original number when you’re hiring someone. He suggests simply asking the candidate what his/her expected salary range is to make sure you’re both on the same page.

Tips for Interviewees

While some bosses might find it difficult to interview new hires, there’s no question that being interviewed is infinitely scarier. Welder also gives a couple of pointers for those walking into an interview.

• “There is no excuse for missing your interview!” Welder says. Never reschedule your interview the day of.
• Understand the business as best as possible. Go the extra mile to learn everything you can about the company.
• Focus on three main things during the interview:  asking questions, showing your interest, and demonstrating your skills.
• It never hurts to overdress.
• Make sure to have excellent professional references.

Interviewing potential employees doesn’t have to be stressful! Using Welder’s tips, you can take pride in knowing you’re hiring great employees who can help grow your business. One last piece of advice for bosses? “Don’t talk too much!” Welder says. “Don’t oversell the company too much, and don’t just quiz them either.”

Two full-time employees are considered a group.

Small business owners typically ask, “When is my company eligible for a group plan?” and “When should I get one?”  You are eligible for a group plan when your company consists of two people, whether it’s two business partners or one business owner and one employee.

“If it’s you and your secretary, you should go ahead and get a group medical plan,” says Gaines.

Group medical plans cost the same or less than individual plans and have much better coverage.

When Gaines and ChooseWhat.com co-creator Leo Welder became business partners, they opted to get a group plan for just the two of them because it ended up being cheaper and providing better coverage than individual health insurance.  Gaines attributes this, in part, to their demographics (i.e. young, single, healthy, male) that affect the premiums for health insurance.

Gaines recommends that start-ups consisting of a few relatively young and healthy people should sign up for a group plan as soon as possible, but he also advises you not to worry about not fitting into specific demographics.

“There are laws protecting groups and mandating coverage of things that most individual health plans aren’t likely to cover, such as pre-existing medical conditions or maternity,” he says.  “Group plans definitely give you distinct advantages.”

Employers have to contribute at least 50% of the cost for group medical.

Before you decide to provide health insurance for your employees or not, consider your industry:

• Do you have or expect to have high or low turnover?
• Do your current/future employees have a high or low skill level?  Are they easily replaceable?
• Do you want to attract and retain the top employees with health benefits? Or is it more about keeping costs low?

Answering these questions will help you get a better sense of whether providing health insurance is something your company is prepared to do.  Also, keep in mind that you’re obligated by law to contribute at least 50% of the cost for group medical. But, you can also set company-specific health insurance policies, such as whether you’ll cover spouses and dependents and up to how much you’re willing to cover.

The forms are easier for group medical plans than for individual plans.

Gaines says that individual health insurance forms are fairly complicated and tend to delve deeper into your background and medical history than group health insurance forms, lengthening the approval time and making it more difficult to get approved.

Gaines also advises business owners to use a broker (all the major health insurance providers work with them) to find the right health plan and provider for their companies.  As you get new employees, you’ll need to re-evaluate your group plan based on your employee demographics and renew or sign up for a new plan.  A broker will handle this process for you and figure out the best plan/provider for your company’s needs.  Brokers also keep up-to-date with new laws and tax credits that relate to your medical plan.

You can have different medical plans for employees and executives.

Deciding on your medical plan can involve more than just deciding whether to go with an HMO or PPO.  You can also opt to get two different plans for employees and executives at your company.

“It’s a way for you to keep costs low while also giving people options based on their needs,” says Gaines.

It’s also a good idea to provide your employees with options (e.g. dental, vision, deductable/ premium level, etc.).  For instance, Gaines and Leo had lots of informal conversations with everyone  here at ChooseWhat.com to get some ideas of what people needed and wanted before they selected a plan that would provide everyone with options.

Deciding whether to get a medical plan for your company is a big step, but, according to Gaines, it’s not one you should be afraid to take.  “This post is for small business owners just starting out who are still on the fence or are lacking enough information to make a decision,” says Gaines.  “I’m here to say go ahead and pull the trigger, because it’s worth it.”

Considering your options and keeping in mind the tips listed above will help guide you and your company towards a happier, healthier work life.

“I majored in international business, so I always wanted to work abroad somewhere and an opportunity in Costa Rica just happened to come up,” Belaire says.

While moving (and working) abroad can seem scary, Belaire has learned a lot from her own experiences. Read below for her tips on how to successfully move to another country.

What to Research Before You Go

While you can’t prepare for everything before you move, you should at least research the country you’re moving to—and visit first if you can. Belaire recommends reading as many books as you can. For her move to Costa Rica she read a book about retiring there that gave her plenty of pointers. Also, she had a friend who already lived there, which made asking someone questions incredibly easy. If you know someone who currently lives abroad, pepper him/her with as many questions as possible. You may not have all the answers before you go, but it’s best to be informed as possible.

“It’s definitely hard to think about all of this stuff before you go,” Belaire says.

During your research there are several key components of living abroad you should consider, such as:

Housing

Think about what type of housing you want to live in. Do you want the comforts of home, such as air conditioning, TV, and a washer and dryer? Or would you rather live as the locals do? Also think about where you want to live. Do you want to be near fellow countrymen or other work abroad types?

Transportation

What is the transportation like in your new country? How will you get around, especially from your home to your new job? Belaire recommends paying attention to the distances between where you will be living and the places you will need to go on a regular basis, such as the grocery store. You should also consider how much plane tickets from your home country to the country you’ll be working in will cost.

Belaire got around Costa Rica by taking the bus, renting cars, and even driving a four wheeler!

Money

It’s important to note the conversion rate from USD to the currency of the country you’re moving to.
Are ATMs available? Will your credit cards work? And, if the company you work for is based in the U.S., for example, you’ll need to still pay taxes come April 15^th.

In Costa Rica, Belaire says that you can exchange dollars at restaurants and other businesses but that they give you a worse rate than through the bank.

Communication

How will you communicate with your friends and family back in the States? Can you get a cell phone and/or the Internet?

Belaire stresses that it is important to get a reliable phone. In Costa Rica, you have to be a citizen to get a cell phone, so she befriended a local who trusted Belaire to get a phone in her name. Otherwise she wouldn’t really have access to a phone.

Visas

Learn what the Visa requirements are. How easy is it to obtain a Worker’s Visa? If you don’t get a Worker’s Visa, how often do you have to be to leave the country? Will the company you work for pay these expenses?

Belaire says that the company she worked for, Surf Divas, was based in the U.S., but they did not offer her a Visa because the process is incredibly long in South America.  Without a Visa, Belaire was required to leave the country every 90 days for at least 72 hours.

Cultural Differences

Every country is different, and so are their citizens. Be aware of how people interact in your new country. What kind of lifestyle are your new coworkers used to living?

According to Belaire, Costa Ricans are known to live on “Tico time” and are very laid back and non confrontational. As the hospitality coordinator for Surf Divas, Belaire was required to inspect the hotel rooms of guests before they arrived to make sure they were up to standard, and often she found it difficult to get hotel workers to get their jobs done correctly.

“I found out that it worked if I helped them do their job so they knew I wasn’t just being mean,” Belaire says. “Plus, being very appreciative afterwards went a long way.”

Medicine

If you’re not going to get insurance through your company, you should look for insurance specific to your country. Some insurance providers have worldwide coverage; however, they may be pricier. Belaire found insurance that was specific for Costa Rica, but she says many people go without because coverage in Latin America is harder to find than in Europe. Do your research before you go.

Just Do it!

Moving abroad is a big step, but Belaire recommends you go for it even if you’re a little scared.  You’ll learn more in your first month in your new home country than you probably would if you read dozens of books.

“Even if you don’t have all the answers, just do it!” Belaire says. “It’s more exciting that way.”

Chances are that you will have the experience of a lifetime and come away with many important lessons. Belaire says that Costa Rica taught her “how nice it is to slow down, enjoy life, and just get away from it all!”

The following add-ons are ones that Koby uses on a daily basis.  “There are lots of add-ons in the Firefox database, as well as on other third-party sites, but these are some of the simplest and easiest to use,” he says.

(The SearchStatus and SEO Doctor add-ons come from Mozilla.org, while SEO for Firefox and SEO Toolbar come from SEObook.com.)

SEO for Firefox

>Function:  Perform keyword research.

1. Download and install SEO for Firefox on your Firefox browser.
2. Enable the add-on by clicking on the SEO for Firefox icon. = off and = on.
3. Type your search query into one of the big three search engines (Google, Yahoo, or Bing).
4. A number of quick links will appear underneath the search box to help with your keyword research.  We most frequently use the AW Sandbox, Sktool, and 100 links.

SearchStatus

>Function:  Highlight no-follow links.

1. Download and install SearchStatus on your Firefox browser.
2. Highlight no-follow links by right-clicking on the SearchStatus icon () and checking the Highlight No-follow Links option.

3. This add-on highlights no-follow links in pink () allowing you to more effectively acquire links that aren’t “no-follow.”

Other uses for SearchStatus:

• Show Whois
• Show robots.txt
• Check PageRank

SEO Doctor

>Function:  Check On-Page SEO.

1. Download and install SEO Doctor on your Firefox browser.
2. Navigate to the page you want to check on-page SEO for.
3. The lower left-hand corner of your browser will show the page’s SEO score out of 100:
4. Click the score and a larger window will appear that gives you more information about your on-page SEO score.

5. You can click any of the items for a more in-depth explanation.

SEO Toolbar

>Function:  Check for proper usage of heading tags.

1. Download and install SEO Toolbar on your Firefox browser.
2. Navigate to the page you want to check heading tags for.
3. Click the SEO X-ray button of the SEO Toolbar: 
4. The tool will darken the page, box the page’s heading tags in orange, and bring up a box that lists the number of external and internal links on the page.

Other uses for SEO Toolbar: Site info, Search Engine Ranking Checker, Compare sites

Koby advocates trying these four tools first and then experimenting with other tools if you’re not satisfied.  “These add-ons work for me, but you might find something else that works for you,” he acknowledges.

For more advice from SEM Analyst Koby Wong that will help you boost your SEO efforts, check out SEO: Play the Hand You’re Dealt.

Why Provide Healthy Snacks?

While it’s not necessarily the boss’s job to provide their workers snacks, it’s fairly painless to promote a healthy lifestyle. And if you’re already providing snacks, it’s incredibly easy to switch to purchasing healthy snacks in order to keep your workers happy, healthy, and productive.

“Healthy eating promotes a high metabolism, and a high metabolism produces higher energy levels, leading to higher productivity,” Middleton explains.

According to a study earlier this year by The British Journal of Psychiatry, eating junk food can lead to depression.  Conversely, if your employees are committed to eating healthier in the office, they will probably transfer this diet to their personal lives.  And if employees are choosing a healthy lifestyle, they will probably be less likely to get sick. Also, as I’ve mentioned in a previous blog, your company could possibly receive grants from the government for having wellness programs.

Additionally, while some people might balk at the expenses incurred by more nutritious foods, buying more expensive, healthy foods, instead of lower cost, unhealthy foods, might save you trips to the doctor later.

Note How You’re Snacking and Why

The average American eats four snacks a day. Although eating smaller portions more frequently is generally healthier for you, too much grazing can really add up the calories. Do you know how much you’re consuming? You may not even realize how many potato chips you eat throughout the day.  A great way to keep track is through websites such as Calorie Count or with an iPhone app.

Another thing to consider is that you may just be snacking out of habit, not because you’re actually hungry.

“You might not even realize you’re snacking that much,” Middleton says. “Sometimes you’re just bored, and you’ll end up snacking. A walk around the block is better than a walk to the kitchen.”

If you think you might be snacking merely to break up the day, try drinking more water or taking a 5-10 minute walk around the block like Middleton suggests. And if you are going to snack, check out healthier options below.

Substitute for Healthy Foods

It may be incredibly easy to grab sodas and chips, but it can also take very little thought to simply substitute for healthier options.

• If you’re craving soda: try iced tea instead. “Sodas are terrible for you!” Middleton says. Plus teas have antioxidants in them and will give you the same boost in caffeine and sweetness you crave.
• If you’re craving coffee: cut back on the sugar and cream! Middleton still suggests you cut back on high-caffeinated drinks in general, as they can ruin your sleep pattern. But, if you really do need your coffee pick-me-up, try cutting out all the sugar. And a cuppa Joe with some low-fat milk at the office is way better for you than any frappe-mocha-latte-chino would be.
• If you’re craving sweets: try yogurt, preferably Greek, with a bit of honey. Middleton also suggests picking sweeter fruits, such as cantaloupe or watermelon, which are also incredibly cheap.
• If you’re craving chips: substitute for apples and peanut butter. Not only will you get the saltiness you crave, you will also get a little protein boost.
• If you’re craving a sports drink: swap for a coconut water instead. These contain more electrolytes than a Gatorade, have less sugar, and are hydrating.
• If you’re craving a little bit fat: go ahead and have a little bit of Ranch dressing or cheese, but at least have that dressing with some carrot sticks or celery.

Middleton acknowledges that it’s impossible to eat healthily all the time. The ChooseWhat team is obsessed with a certain taco stand, and we eat there at least twice a month. But we all take the six block trek there to do so—and in the Texas heat, it’s no small task! So, if you are going to cheat, at least walk or bike there.

Happy snacking!

You’ve decided you need a website, but you’re looking for a lot of flexibility and control over the look, feel and content of your site.  You also don’t want to spend a lot of money.  Whether you need a personal blog, a micro site (or satellite marketing site) or even an ecommerce site, a WordPress site and a cpanel hosting service will help you create a cheap website with a lot of flexibility and options.

The steps listed here should help you set up a professional, functional website using WordPress in one day or less using little to no knowledge of creating websites.

Sign up for hosting space.

1. Pick a monthly service plan.
2. Pick/register a domain name, or use your existing domain name.
3. If you registered your domain name on another service (e.g. you registered with GoDaddy, but you want a hosting plan from HostGator), then you’ll have to point your domain name to your new server/hosting service.)  Contact your hosting provider for more information on how to do this.

Tips:

• Hosting services range from completely free plans to per-month or per-year plans.
• Remember that free options are never going to give you optimal results or consistent service.
• Monthly plans are affordable and typically come with 24/7 access to technical support.  Paying annually often gives you the same quality of service for a discount (typically 10%-15%).
• Look for hosting that provides you with a control panel (“cpanel”).  Some hosting services (usually the free ones) don’t provide a cpanel, which makes it more difficult to create your site.
• See WordPress’ list of hosting services that easily integrate with WordPress.

Install the WordPress Fantastico script.

1. Log into your cpanel:  http://yourdomain.com/cpanel
2. Locate Fantastico De Luxe (should be under Software/Services).
3. Find WordPress script under Blogs.
4. Activate it.
5. Once it is activated, you can log into http://yourdomain.com/wp-admin to modify your site.

Pick a WordPress theme.

1. You can use the ones in WordPress’ searchable Themes library.

• Just log into to your wp-admin page and locate Themes under the Appearances menu in the left-hand navigation.  You can install a theme directly in the interface and begin using it.

2.  You can also use the ones you find on a number of third party sites.

• Do a Google search for “wordpress themes” or “best wordpress themes” and see what comes up. These might be free or paid, depending on the design/functionality built into the theme.

Tips:

• Your WordPress theme is going to depend on the type of site you need.  There are numerous themes that look like blogs, but you’ll be surprised to find themes suited for online magazines, ecommerce sites and informational sites as well.
• In order to fully manipulate/customize a theme, you need some programming knowledge.  If you don’t have this knowledge, it might be best to pay for a customized theme or hire someone to create a custom theme for you.

Install FileZilla (or other FTP program) on your computer.

(Use this program to upload themes from third-party sites and other files to your WordPress site.  You can also upload files directly to the File Manager in your cpanel, but using an FTP program eliminates the need to open and log into your cpanel constantly.)

1. Download the FileZilla Client for all servers.
2. “Quickconnect” to your server by putting in the Host (yourdomain.com), Username and Password (for cpanel).

Upload and install your theme.

(Follow this step if you’re using a theme from a third-party site.)

1. Download the theme to your computer.
2. Unzip the file.
3. Open Filezilla.
4. Quickconnect to your site by using your login.
5. Locate the file on your computer (use the left-hand window to find it).
6. On your server (right-hand window), navigate to public_html > wp-content > themes.
7. Drag and drop theme file from the left window into the Themes folder in your cpanel. (It will copy over.)
8. Log into your wp-admin page.  Now, in your Themes page (under Appearance) in your Dashboard, you can activate your theme and start using it.
9. Learn more about using FileZilla at WordPress.org.

Modify your theme.

(Do this if you have some knowledge of CSS or PHP.)

1. Log into www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin.
2. In your Dashboard, click Appearance > Editor.
3. Edit your theme’s CSS Stylesheet.

Tips:

• Back up your theme by saving the original file for your theme in a folder on your computer you can easily find.
• You might want to modify your theme offline to avoid losing information.  You can either modify the theme in your wp-admin page and transfer/save it into Notepad, or create a copy file of the original theme file and change it on your desktop before uploading it to your Themes folder.

Use key functions in your WordPress Dashboard.

(You’ll definitely be using functions like Posts and Pages in your WP Dashboard, but don’t forget to take advantage of the following functions as well.)

1. Settings:  This is where you can set your site title, tagline, front page displays, default posting and commenting settings, configure media hosted on your site, etc.
2. Widgets:  Locate this under the Appearance menu.  You can add, remove or change the placement of widgets on your WordPress site.  You can also choose which page(s) to display them on.
3. Plugins:  There are a number of plugins that can enhance your WordPress site and help you accomplish what a custom-made website can do.  Here are some helpful plugin categories to search through:

• Comments
• Images
• SEO
• Analytics
• Sidebar
• Twitter
• Facebook
• YouTube
• Social media
• Forms
• eCommerce
• Slideshow
• Widgets

Sign up for Google Analytics.

(This is a free analytics tool that lets you view the traffic to your website and helps improve your marketing efforts.)

1. Sign up for a Google Analytics account.
2. Install a plugin like Google Analytics (there are a lot of plugins that work specifically with Google Analytics) in your WordPress Dashaboard.
3. Get your Web Property ID code from your Google Analytics account and put in the plugin.
4. Track the traffic to your site.

I’ve covered the basics in this blog post.  Look for more WordPress related posts and helpful tips in the future.  Also, if you don’t have the time or patience to set up a WordPress site, check out our How to Build a Website guide for information on all-in-one site hosting and site builder services.

Always Have an Agenda

Don’t walk into a meeting without an outline of topics to discuss and goals to achieve. Creating an agenda helps to spell out the items to be discussed and the expected results. Always pass out your agenda prior to a meeting. This will also help meeting participants know what is expected of them and how to prepare for the meeting. Make sure they have ample time to gather their needed notes and resources.

Set an End Time

Start your meeting on time, and set a specific end time. This will help you to keep a timely approach on your agenda items.

Lay Out the Purpose of the Meeting

You should ask at the beginning of every meeting, “Why are we here, and what goal are we hoping to accomplish?” If you lay out your objective immediately, you set the meeting’s tone and assert yourself as the meeting’s leader.

Schedule Guests Appropriately

Don’t include anyone who’s not absolutely necessary to the topic at hand. If you only need someone for the last 10 minutes or so, schedule them for that time. Plus, be wary of meeting with more than 10 people; they tend to derail easily and are harder to keep on track.

Stick to the Subject

Stay on topic and don’t deter from your agenda. If an issue arises that can be resolved between a couple of people outside of the meeting, make a note to follow up at a later time.

Develop Meeting Guidelines

Every company will have different guidelines for running their meetings, but make sure you stick to your meeting norms. An example of a typical norm is allowing every member uninterrupted time to contribute. Once your norms are established, it’s important to follow them. They will help you be proactive and keep your meetings running smoothly.

Turn off the Phones

You’re either at a meeting or not. Unless you are waiting for an important call, keep the phone at your desk. If you’re planning on having a long meeting, schedule short breaks for employees to check their email.

Leave with Action Items

You should never leave a meeting without action items. At the end of your meeting, go around and review the action steps required of each person.  This will help you make sure you are meeting your intended goals stated at the beginning of the meeting. Create a timeline to go along with your action item list and who’s responsible.

Other Helpful Meeting Tips

• Beware of automatic meetings. Don’t have a meeting just to have one. Typically Friday or Monday morning meetings can turn into “posting” meetings, meaning there is little to no value behind them. If your company is getting together just to update each other without concluding in specific action items, these meetings could easily happen over email.
• Try “standing” meetings. Some swear by making everyone stand during meetings. This supposedly cuts down on the tendency to reiterate points as people tire of standing. These types of meetings are effective at creating quicker meetings.
• Allow for transit time. Be careful of scheduling meetings back-to-back. Building in 10-15 minutes for travel time between meetings can reduce stress.
• Meet on Tuesday at 3 p.m. A LifeHacker study concluded that Tuesday at 3 p.m. is the most “available” spot for business meetings. While this is a good indication of when to meet if you have a busy schedule, you should take into account your team’s work flow.

Now that your meetings are more productive, make your business run more smoothly with popular small business tools, such as online fax, email marketing software, and virtual PBX.

Gaines encourages people to consider the following five areas before they start looking for office space:

1.  How Much It Really Costs

Tip:  Look for a low Add-On Factor.

Leasing an office space is very different from leasing an apartment or place to live.  The cost structure for leasing an office is based on the cost per “rentable” square foot per year.  However, rentable square feet are different from usable square feet. “Usable” square feet are the square feet in your office suite.  (If you took a tape measure and measured your office space, you would get the “usable” square feet.)  However, you pay for “rentable” square feet, which is your “usable” square feet plus your pro rata share of the building’s common areas (e.g. lobby, bathrooms, corridors, etc.).

Building owners determine “rentable” square feet by applying a percentage “add-on factor” to your usable square feet.  For instance, if your building has 10% common areas, and your office suite contains 1,000 square feet, you would pay for 1,111 rentable square feet (1,000 / (100%-10%) = 1,111).

You should always compare office space alternatives on a cost per usable square foot basis.  Add-on factors can range pretty significantly from building to building, sometimes even between different floors within the same building.  As a general rule, a lower add-on factor is more cost effective for tenants.

Tip:  Look for a Full-service Lease.

There are two main ways rent is quoted:

1. Full-service/Gross lease, which is all-inclusive, meaning that all utilities and janitorial services, taxes, insurance and common area maintenance (CAM) are paid for
2. Triple Net (NNN) lease, which means that on top of the rent, you pay your pro rata share of taxes, insurance and “common area maintenance” (CAM) fees

Your first question should always be “NNN or Full Service/Gross?”  Comparing a NNN rate to a Full Service/Gross rate is like comparing apples and oranges. You need to figure out what the total cost to you will be for all the various alternatives and compare those figures.

Triple net charges will vary significantly from region to region but are typically $10+ per square foot.  According to Gaines, triple net charges in Austin, Texas can be as high as $15 per square foot.

Occasionally, you’ll see a rate that includes some NNN charges or utilities.  This type of lease might be called a Net lease or a Modified Gross lease.

2.  How Much Space You Need

First and foremost, you should consider how many people you’re trying to accommodate.  Second, you should think about parking.  Most office buildings have a parking ratio, which is the number of available parking spaces per 1,000 square feet.

For example, if you have a 3 per 1,000 parking ratio, you have to lease 1,000 square feet to get three parking spaces.  So, if you have five employees (1000/3 x 5 = 1,667) you need to rent 1,667 square feet to have enough parking spaces for all your employees.

Some buildings, such as medical or retail, might have a higher parking ratio, or there might be off-site parking available.  Those types of scenarios might allow you lease less space to accommodate your people.  200 square feet per person is a pretty good minimum amount for a high density office with lots of work stations and few private offices.

3.  Using a Broker vs. Making a Direct Deal

Typically, tenants don’t have to pay their brokers, but that doesn’t mean brokers work for free.  The size of their fee is based on two main factors:  rent and time.  A broker will make the same amount of money on a 1,000 square-foot lease with a five-year term as on a 5,000 square-foot lease with a one-year term.

If you can sign a long term lease and/or you need a lot of space, you’re probably a good client for a broker. Since it won’t cost you anything, and will save you a lot of time and provide with you significant market knowledge, you should hire a broker.

On the flip side, if your business is just getting started, you probably want to lease a small space with a short-term lease in order to have maximum flexibility. Requiring flexibility makes you a nightmare client for a broker.  However, building owners and their representatives always have small spaces that they’re trying to lease.  If you can find a space that’s already configured the way you want it and you don’t have a broker, the out-of-pocket costs to the building owner are minimal.  In this situation, it should be pretty easy to get a short-term lease.

Note:  Gaines says it’s also important to note that commercial leases are not promulgated (i.e. the forms are completely negotiable).  So, it’s important to get a real estate attorney to look over your documents before you sign.

Tip:  Never hire a residential broker to negotiate a commercial transaction for you.

Most brokers are specialized, and you can find a number of brokers basedon the type of space you need. For retail, you want to look for a retail broker.  For office, hire an office broker.  Never hire a residential broker to negotiate a commercial transaction for you. Residential real estate has been largely standardized in an effort to protect consumers.  The same is not true for commercial real estate.

“Just like you wouldn’t go to the eye doctor for a heart transplant, you should not trust a residential broker to handle a commercial transaction,” says Gaines.

Hiring a broker who’s not qualified will cost your new landlord money and will not add any value to you.  You’re more likely to get a fair deal if you work directly with a landlord than if you force that landlord to work with an unqualified broker.

4.  Type of Office Space You Need

There are many different types of commercial space: office, industrial, retail, medical, executive suite, etc.  Office space is in an office building.  Retail space will have higher visibility from the street and is better for retail customers.  And space that is specifically built for medical use typically offers more available parking spaces per square foot.  The pricing is different for all these different types of space.

A one-man shop or small office should consider an executive suite, which is often advertised in the classifieds. A typical executive suite includes a small to medium-sized office with a shared reception area, conference facilities and a break room.  In addition, many executive suites provide a receptionist, phone service and other administrative services for an additional fee.   You’ll pay more than you would pay for your individual office, but you typically would not be able to lease that small of a space.

A typical office building has 5′ windows, and there is at least 34′ from the windows to the hallway.  It’s against code to build a wall into the center of a window, so the minimum you could lease would be 10×34′, which is 340 usable square feet.  Throw in a 15% add-on factor, and you have 400 rentable square feet.

A reasonably priced office building in Austin, Texas will cost you $20 per rentable square foot, Full Service/Gross, which equates to $667 per month. A 10′x15′ executive suite will cost a little more, but you’ll get all the other amenities.  It’s also virtually impossible to find a space that small.

5.  When to Look for Office Space

Because commercial leases are typically longer than residential leases, there’s more lead time to look for a new office space.  For commercial spaces other than executive suites, it’s common to start looking six months in advance of your move-in date. Conversely, “if you’re looking for an executive suite, you could probably find one right now and move in immediately,” says Gaines.

Also, keep in mind that there are other factors that will take some time to square away.  It’ll take you several passes to get the lease document in final form, and you need to obtain permits to build out your space.  Planning for these events will help the transition to a new office space go more smoothly.

So, you’ve found a new office and are ready to move in.  Instead of taking your old fax machine and desktop phones when you move, switch to online fax and virtual PBX services.

People think about starting their own businesses all the time, and some people actually do. Some take the plunge and wind up tremendously successful, but other people—the majority, in fact—fail. You’ve heard the statistics and are afraid. Very, very afraid. But you’re not going to let it stop you from turning your dream into a reality. Whether you’ve actually started up or haven’t yet, check out these tips to help you beat the odds and become a major success story.

Start with a solid business model.

You’ve probably talked about starting a business in countless casual conversations with people. One day, you decide you’ve had enough of talking and want to start doing. Where do you begin? Starting a business is easier said than done, and you know that. If it was a cake walk, then you would’ve started up much earlier than you did. Deciding to start your own business is only the first step. After that, you’ve got planning, planning, planning and more planning to do.

Lisa Canning of EntrepreneurtheArts.com believes that every creative startup needs “a minimum of 3 years of financial projections that include not just your perceived costs of your creative start-up but also how you will support yourself.” Although I’m not sure it should take that long to plan how to finance your business, I do believe that creative people don’t pay nearly enough attention to financing their business as they should.

You’ve also got to make sure you have a solid business model. While your initial idea may be a good one, it needs to be tested for viability before you can say with certainty that you want to commit your time, money and energy to it. At the very least, you should do a SWOT Analysis. You could also use this 8-Point Test from Investopedia (a Forbes brand) to test the viability of your business model.

Know who you are and what you want.

You want to start your own business to:

• Satisfy your own ego
• Make money
• Quit your day job
• Solve a problem/fill a need
• Share a great idea
• Change the world
• Because your mom thinks it’s a great idea

Figuring out the source of your motivation will help you figure out whether going in business is right for you or not. It will also give you an idea of how invested you are, both financially and emotionally, in your business. You need to have an endless supply of motivation to keep you going, even when it gets tough, and you also need traits of a successful small business owner to steer you towards success.

Check your ego (the one you’re pretending not to have).

People with business backgrounds and technology backgrounds aren’t the only ones in love with their own ideas. People in creative careers—the people who tend to have the so-called “Type B” personalities—are often just as narcissistic as anyone else. You’d like to believe you’ve stumbled on the next great idea, or that you do something better than anyone else does, but chances are there are intelligent people out there doing the same thing as you.

To be truly successful, you’ve got to get more than just your family and friends on board.  Don’t make the mistake of surrounding yourself with Yes Men. It often pays to get advice from people in your industry that you hardly know or don’t know at all. These people are more likely to give you constructive criticism and help you foster a better, stronger business plan.

Don’t get married to anything.

As I said, don’t fall in love with your own ideas, and definitely don’t get married to them.  Like a good writer, you should accept that your idea is going to have to pass through revision after revision until you get something truly great.  The industry you’re in might require you to change your strategy, modify your product or even force you to change the way you’ve always done things, which can be hard for people who’ve already experienced success using the same strategy they’ve always used.  Stay open to new ideas and to learning from people outside your industry.

Quit your day job. Or don’t quit. But decide now!

Listen up, creative peeps. This is important: Decide if, when and how you will quit your day job, and do it right now. Sure, a lot of businesses start as hobbies that creative people do for fun or to make money on the side. But, the biggest mistake you could make is to avoid thinking about quitting your day job. If you don’t make the decision now, you’ll be forever stuck in a rut. You won’t know how much time to devote to your side business, and you won’t be able to prioritize effectively.

A lot of creative people I’ve known have told themselves, “I’ll just see if this works out. If it doesn’t, I’ll always have my day job.” Granted, it’s smart to have a Plan B, but don’t use it as an excuse not to push yourself. By that same token, don’t go into business with anyone who refuses to push themselves or ask themselves the hard questions. Your business partner needs to be equally invested as you are, and they should make up for what you lack. Ask your business partner(s) if they’re ready and willing to quit their day job. If they’re the least bit hesitant, you should probably find a new business partner.

Check out these stories of people who have quit their day jobs for their creative businesses on Etsy.com: Quit Your Day Job.

Get people to pay you what you’re worth.

Because a lot of creative businesses start as hobbies, many creative business owners start by selling to friends and family members. Sooner or later, a friend will ask you if you can do his friend a favor by giving him something for free or offering a discount based on your relationship with your friend. You know what this is; it’s called the hook-up. In the beginning you oblige because, hey, someone likes your art (or your cupcakes or your music or your writing or your tiny ceramic elephant figurines)! And you’ll take what you can get.  But, it’s best not to set a precedent that you’ll later regret. Get people to pay you what you’re worth in the beginning, and it’ll make all the difference.

Don’t cave to everyone’s requests for your time and resources. Be firm. Act like the business person you want to be. If you let people know that you’re serious about starting your business, they’ll be more willing to support you. Check out 5 Steps for Getting People to Pay What They Owe You.

1. Collaborative

The No. 1 trait of a successful business owner according to the study is a leader who is collaborative. This means a business owner who understands how to delegate tasks effectively to employees as well as foster strong interpersonal relationships with their management team, employees, vendors and customers. Those with the collaborative trait are committed to creating opportunities for others, not just making a profit through their business.

2. Self-Fulfilled

Successful small business owners value the personal fulfillment and gratification their companies provide them and enjoy the respect that comes with being their own boss and being in control of their own long-term net worth. A good business owner doesn’t just have a business to have one; they desire creating something of value and love what they do.

One reason some businesses will succeed over others is they have a great team in place. Your team will be more productive knowing their boss believes in them, the company, and the product. It will be difficult for your business to succeed without you loving it.

3. Future-Focused

As a business owner, you must plan for both the short- and long-term future. You should be focused on cash flow and have a well thought out plan for how to run your business day-to-day and for years down the road.

4. Curious

Good entrepreneurs are always asking questions and are keen to learn more about how others run their businesses. They should also seek out best practices regarding management, business innovation, motivating employees, and more.

Read books, attend seminars, join an entrepreneur’s league—you should constantly be learning more about how to be a better business owner and how to grow your company.

5. Tech-Savvy

In addition to learning more about bettering your business, you should always be on the look-out for technology to make your job easier. Also, a good entrepreneur will invest time in their company’s website and will rely on technology to make his/her business more effective and efficient. (Learn how to automate your business.)

As we’ve said before, your business needs to have a website. A good business owner must embrace the digital world, including social networking, to keep abreast of technological advances and customers that are always on the go. Don’t miss out by being behind on the times. (Learn more about how to build a website.)

6. Action-Oriented

The final trait the study deems important to a successful business is being proactive to build your business. You should always be striving to take your business to the next level.

7. Positive

In addition to the above traits, there are a couple more that I think are important to have in order to be a successful boss and business owner. First of all, you must remain positive. It’s been a tough couple of years for small businesses, and even if you’re sweating it financially, you must put on a brave face for your employees. Now, I’m not advocating lying to your workers, but instead of focusing on just the hardships, you should come up with a proactive plan (see above) to continue growing your business. Not only will this help keep your employees happy and productive but it will also help keep you focused on improving.

8. Competent

There is a difference between being intelligent and being competent. Plenty of smart people aren’t adept at the simplest of tasks, and that makes it difficult to run a business—or rally your employees around you. I once had a boss who got her ATM card stuck inside of a machine and made her assistant go get it out after she left in frustration. This action made all of her employees think twice about following her leadership.  Think about Michael Scott on The Office. You want your employees to respect you.

If you lack knowledge or experience in certain areas, make sure you hire brilliant people who can take over in those departments, such as an incredible accountant or a brilliant SEO analyst.

9. Visionary

ChooseWhat’s Operations Officer, Leo Welder, also put his two cents in regarding traits successful business owners should possess. Welder says that all business owners should be visionary. He says business owners must take charge and lead their companies in order for employees to follow them and thrive. You must be able to communicate your vision to your employees.

“A company is much more likely to succeed if the founders can make their employees believe that they will be successful,” Welder says.

10. Persistent

But Welder’s top trait in order to own a flourishing business is being persistent, which he says was also incredibly important to President Theodore Roosevelt:

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence…Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘Press On’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”

Now that you have the skills to make you a successful business owner, get the tools to help your business become more productive with online fax, virtual PBX, and email marketing software.

What is (10+2)*5?  Simply put, it represents an hour of time in your workday.  As the rule goes, for every 10 minutes of work you do, you should take a two-minute break afterwards.  Repeat the process five times, and you’ll find yourself at the end of the most productive hour you’ve ever spent working (or studying, in Adam’s case).  That’s the theory detailed by Merlin Mann at 43Folders.com, and Adam swears by it.

“This method can apply to any project or task at hand, and anyone, including employees and business owners, can use it effectively,” says Adam.  But, in order for the trick to work and for productivity to increase, he admits that the person using it has to be in the right mindset.  “You have to understand why you’re doing it,” he says.

To make the most out of (10+2)*5, he recommends keeping the following in mind:

Anyone can and should increase their productivity.

Much ado has been made over the years about the steady decline in workplace productivity, due to the advent of the internet, social media sites, plugins, widgets, apps, etc.  It’s a growing problem that larger companies have to face all the time and that forces them to block their employees from accessing certain sites (and even Gmail).

“Fortunately, we don’t have to do that here,” says Adam.  “Small businesses like us have the benefit of having a relatively small number of employees to manage, and the bosses are able to spend more time with employees.”

As a direct result, small business owners are able to separate the wheat from the chaff much more easily and weed out unproductive, uninterested workers.  But a problem arises when a group of eager, autonomous small business employees are left to their own devices and given the space to work on individual projects and tasks.  Everyone has succumbed at one time or another to procrastination, Adam surmises, especially when faced with a long list of to-dos.

“You might consider yourself a responsible, focused worker, but you know that sometimes sitting down for two hours and forcing yourself to plow through a large, complicated project just doesn’t work,” he says.  “That’s when you need to stop and take a break.”

He says that once you realize you’re slipping into procrastination mode, you should be proactive about increasing your personal productivity.  The beauty of (10+2)*5 is that it helps you hold yourself accountable when no one else is there to rebuke you.  “It’s a tool that helps you get where you want to be,” he admits.

“Goofing off” is good for you.

“Goofing off” isn’t just OK; it’s necessary.  The reason why we crave the breaks, he says, is that we’re most likely on the verge of a burnout, which, in turn, becomes the catalyst for procrastination.  It’s a vicious cycle of giving 150% of yourself to the task at hand, followed by a period of procrastination, followed by a race to finish another mountain of work before an impending deadline.

Rather than experience sporadic bursts of productivity, we should instead maintain a steady flow of productivity that results in an overall productivity increase.  As a small reward for accomplishing something, the breaks give you the motivation to forge on with the work—at first.

The mind hack: You actually don’t want to take breaks.

Adam says that when he started applying the Procrastination Hack, he wasn’t immediately able to commit to a full 10 minutes of uninterrupted work.  But the two-minute break at the end made him look forward to finishing.  As time went on, the more work he did during the 10-minute intervals, the more accomplished he felt.  Eventually, stopping every 10 minutes to take a break becomes annoying.  According to Merlin Mann, the breaks are meant to happen less frequently as you become more productive.

You realize that you no longer want to take breaks at the point when the feeling of pride an accomplishment derived from the 10-minute work intervals surpasses your need to goof off.

Set your own rules; follow your own rules.

Adam admits that (10+2)*5 might not be for everybody, but he implores people to at least try it.  He also suggests modifying the numbers to find what works best for you.  For example, ChooseWhat.com SEM Analyst Koby Wong has modified (10+2)*5 to come up with his personal 50+5 method.  He works for 50 minutes, and then takes a five to 10-minute break.

The most important thing to remember is that you’re using the Procrastination Hack to move your brain out of the inert state it’s in, so that you’ll want to become more productive.  You can use whatever method works best to help you achieve that goal.  You may even want to go beyond just the timing aspect and set rules that specify how often you can look at Facebook or Twitter per day or how often you can check Gmail.  Maybe you want to force yourself to spend at least one of your breaks stepping outside the office and getting some fresh air.

One thing you can do that I’ve found helpful is to disable or log out of your plugins and RSS feeds and reduce the number of pop-ups, alerts and other interruptions that hinder productivity.  Attempt to silence the noise and chatter that takes you out of a productive state of mind.  (Merlin Mann wrote the (10+2)*5 Procrastination Hack in 2005, and Facebook was launched in 2004.  I’m not sure if he was aware of the problems it would cause or could predict them at the time.  But I’m sure if he did, he would have advised something similar.)

Tools Designed for (10+2)*5

The following tools were designed to help people apply the Procrastination Hack written by Merlin Mann:

• Instant Boss: a timer application for Windows only
• (10+2)5 widget: a simple timer application for the Mac OS X Dashboard
• (10+2)x5 Procrastination Hack: an iPhone application

Other Productivity Tools:

• RescueTime: robust software for time management and activity tracking ($6 – $15/ month)
• 15 Awesome Time Management Tools and Apps: a list of apps that work with Windows, Mac, Firefox and Gmail.

Wong loves poker so much, in fact, that he constantly plays with a stack of poker chips at his desk while diligently working his SEO magic. It’s no wonder, though, because Wong won his first live poker tournament in San Diego at the tender age of 18, and ever since then Wong has been fascinated by the game.

“I love the competitive factor of it. You’re concentrating on beating people you’ve never met by using your mind,” Wong says.

Learn how poker and SEO have more in common that you might think—and how you can master the cards you’re dealt.

SEO and Poker: Games of Incomplete Information

In poker, you have no idea what cards your opponents are holding or how they’re going to react to your actions. Even though you may be able to read some people, typically you’re playing against people you’ve never met before and you won’t know their next moves.

With SEO, you might not know all the pieces of the search engine’s ranking formulas that rank your website for keywords.  Another ambiguous element of SEO is how your competitors are going to react to their own rankings.

The best way to cope with the incomplete information SEO throws at you is to follow poker professional Tommy Angelo’s advice and “foresee all pertinent paths without attaching to any of them.” This means that because you can’t accurately predict how changes will affect your search engine rankings, the best way to deal with the changes is to openly accept them and not become too emotionally attached.

Learn To Make Quick Decisions Based on Your Competitors

When playing poker, the players constantly change their strategies. One hand, they’re bluffing; the next they’re folding.  And maybe once in a while they’ll have one amazing hand. Based on your opponent’s strategy you must learn to make quick, sound decisions. A great way to become better at adapting to your competitors’ moves is to learn all you can about the game from professionals or at training sites, such as www.DeucesCracked.com.

SEO also requires you to react quickly to your competitors. You want to make sure that you’re doing the best you can to become ranked as high as possible. Competitors can change how aggressive their SEO efforts are at any time. You must learn to base your own efforts on what your opponents are doing. The best way to do this is again to learn more from professionals (check out www.SEOBook.com).

Another great way to see what your competitors are up to is to use Yahoo Site Explorer. With this tool you can check out the backlink profiles of competing sites, which should give you some idea about their strategy. Tip:  Do some research and see if you can acquire the same backlinks as them.

Play for First Place

In a typical 180 person poker tournament, first place gets paid 30% of the prize pool; second place gets paid 20% and the percentage of the pot gets significantly lower the higher you place.  SEO is incredibly similar in this regard because a No. 1 ranked website on Google receives 42.13% of the traffic, whereas the second ranked site gets 11.9% of the traffic, and so forth. Because a No. 1 spot on Google is more top-heavy than a first place finish in a poker tournament, it’s even more important to go for that No. 1 spot by having great SEO tactics.

Diversify

Wong says that poker professionals should never put up more than 5% of their bankrolls at any given time so that no single tournament can break them. He advises that you have to be able to ride through the highs and lows as a poker player without putting all of your earnings on the line.

Because there are so many link building strategies that exist in SEO, you should never rely solely on one strategy to boost your rankings. This is especially true because some strategies are riskier than others and because search engines are always evolving their algorithms. By diversifying your link building strategies you are able to maintain your rankings.

Tip: If you’re building your ranking by submitting articles to directories, make sure to also try writing press releases or using social bookmarking sites. Sources from links should come from a lot of different places.

Analyze and Evaluate Your Results

According to Wong, many poker players don’t spend enough time looking back at their performances to analyze and evaluate their results. By doing so, players can make better decisions in the future. When it comes to SEO, you also want to take some time out every once and a while to evaluate your SEO efforts because not all of your strategies will have the impact you thought they would.

Wong recommends that you keep a good database of keywords and links so that you have a good idea of what’s working and what’s not. Links from three months ago could have a lingering effect on your rankings today, so it’s crucial that you spend time analyzing your tactics.

Wong says, much like poker, the important rule to remember about SEO is that “you always have to keep learning to stay ahead of the curve. You don’t ever want to get left behind.”

You should check out my past blog “SEO for Beginners” if you’re setting out to build a website. Also, learn more about other small business tools including email marketing services and online fax providers.

1.Arguing

The Customer is King—except that quite a few business owners have forgotten that truism in the age of Yelp.  Just the other day a friend of mine posted a negative review of a well-known local restaurant here in Austin on Yelp, and the owner had the brilliant idea to reply to my friend’s comment.  The owner replied that my friend was mistaken in his assessment—and that was all.  Even after my friend described how the undercooked food had made him sick, the owner had the nerve to tell him he was mistaken about the “freshness” of the food served.  Imagine the irritation and resentment caused!

Tip: Never respond to a customer’s comments publicly.  Though it may be your gut reaction to negative feedback, arguing achieves nothing.  If you do decide to respond, don’t simply argue with your customers to preserve your reputation; make the situation better for them.  Give them a reason at the very least to delete the negative review and at most to give your business a second chance.  (Check out Negative Online Reviews: When Should You Respond and How?)

2.Breaking Promises

Customers tend to freak out when the actual customer experience is inconsistent with their expectations of the product or service.  What drove my friend to post the Yelp review was that the waitress at the restaurant had hyped the dessert and created an expectation of high quality in his mind.  The food, however, came nowhere close to meeting the expectation created.

Tip: Don’t make promises you can’t keep, and don’t break promises.  Establish and implement policies, such as giving discounts, refunds or compensations, to ensure customer satisfaction when the promise is broken.  Make sure your employees are aware of the policies and follow through when the situation calls for it.

3.Tuning Out

“You can’t please everyone,” as the saying goes.  True, but you should try your hardest to.  The restaurant owner’s very curt response to a well-articulated review displays a total disregard for not only the customer’s feedback, but also for real problems going on in his kitchen.  I suspect that other Yelp users who view the restaurant owner’s curt response will quickly recognize that he didn’t attempt to solve the problems mentioned or seem to care much about the customer.  Turning a blind eye to customer feedback is just plain foolish and can damage the credibility of your business.

Tip: Do everything possible to get customer feedback before the customer walks out the door.  Don’t underestimate the use of the comment card; it gives customers a chance to vent and voice negative opinions before they go online and do damage.  Offer customers a reward for their feedback, and let them know that their comments help you improve your service.  Sometimes, just knowing that a company is working to improve things is enough to get me to stick around.

4.Product-is-King Thinking

So, your product is so good that you can afford to let customer service slide.  You tell yourself that customers will keep coming back because nobody else offers the product you have…right?  Wrong.  It’s entirely possible for some new and better competitor to come out with a comparable product and better customer service.  When that happens, you’ll definitely lose out.

Here at ChooseWhat.com, we’ve seen the scenario one too many times.  A company that offers a truly great product or service but doesn’t work on improving customer service loses customers, as well as respect.

Tip: Gather feedback while customers are using your product or service.  A prime example of gathering user feedback is Benchmark Email, an email marketing company who has just implemented a Twitter-like forum that allows users to submit feature requests and vote for their own and/or other customers’ submissions.

5.Forgetting Your Friends

“If you make customers unhappy in the physical world, they might each tell 6 friends. If you make customers unhappy on the Internet, they can each tell 6,000 friends.”
–Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.com

Thanks to the rise of social media and social networking, customers can now share their customer service experiences to thousands of people with the click of a button.  This simply means that business owners need to work harder and be smarter about how they approach customer service.  It helps to think of each customer as a personal friend of yours.  Depending on how you act, a friend might either fully endorse you and your brand or gossip and spread rumors about you behind your back.  Worst of all, they might remain silent, having not formed an impression of you one way or another.

Tip: Businesses, like friendships, are built on loyalty and trust.  Spend some time working on how you interact with people.  Everyone in customer service needs to read How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.  If every person in customer service followed everything in that book, businesses would infinitely improve customer retention and nobody would ever be disgruntled.

When I said avoid these customer service mistakes “at all costs,” I literally meant all costs.  No matter how much money, time or effort you have to spend up front to prevent customers from jumping ship, do it.  It just might save your business entirely.

Business Cards are Accessible to Everyone

Yes, while millions of people are scrambling to get their iPhone 4.0 and millions more have other Smartphones, not everyone has welcomed the 21^st century yet. I know plenty of employees who do not have a fancy phone and still rely on passing out business cards to potential clients.

Business cards are incredibly easy to hand out and more convenient than having an expensive phone for many small business owners who are trying to cut down costs. While iPhone apps like Bump are pretty cool (who doesn’t want to bump iPhones with each other?), isn’t it much easier to simply hand your card over to the person you’re speaking with rather than have to both have your cell phone in hand?

Not only are business cards easy for networking and having on hand, but think about meeting a prospective client for the first time. Normally when you give them your business card, it’s while you’re in the middle of a conversation or on the way out of one. The passing of cards does not disrupt the flow of your conversation, but digging for your phone and inputting information definitely does.

Plus, in my case, I have an easier time remembering someone when I have something tangible in my hand, not an impersonal virtual card sent to my phone. This is especially true for common names, such as John Smith, where a quick Google search or Facebook sleuthing will yield nothing useful.

Business Cards Speak Volumes about Your Creativity

If you’re in a creative field, you NEED to have business cards. Hands down. No ifs, ands, or buts. Clients will be more likely to work with you if they can actually see what you can do. Don’t pass up a chance to make a lasting first impression.

Business cards aren’t merely a way to get your information across; they are also great marketing tools. Creating unique business cards is a way to make an impression and be remembered. Until you can create kick ass virtual business cards, nothing will take the place in having creative and visually pleasing cards. Make sure to show your personality and have all of the pertinent information on your card.

Business Cards are Steeped in Ritual

“The card is universal. There’s this ritual that would be a shame to lose because we could push a button and electronically transmit the information,” says Peter Post, the director of the Emily Post Institute, in a Globe and Mail article. Not only are business cards marketing tools, but they are definitely a part of a business tradition. There’s something so personal about passing your card out, and I can’t imagine simply just sending a virtual card through my phone instead.

Business card rituals are even more important overseas, especially in China and Japan. In China, it’s proper to present your business card with both hands but not to write on another person’s card. Also, using gold ink is considered auspicious. In India, it’s correct etiquette to use only your right hand to give and receive business cards. And, in Japan exchanging business cards is ceremonial. Cards are received with both hands but only given with one and are treated as an extension of the person, so they are given the upmost respect.

How would these rituals survive in a virtual business card society?

If you own a business, you need a business card—and your own website Creating and ordering business cards is now easier than ever with several online business card sites. Read more about popular business card printing companies.

According to ChooseWhat.com’s own Operations Officer, Leo Welder, “Your project management tool is the spine of your business.“

There’s no disputing that any online project management tool on the market will dramatically improve how you manage work flow.  The problem is determining which of dozens of tools and free applications available will work best for your business.  But, you can select the right tool for you by following these steps:

Look for Essential Features

Not all project management tools offer these features, and some tools handle specific functions (like time-tracking) better than other tools can.  But, in general, quality project management tools should be able to provide the following:

• Project organization
• Ability to assign people, both internal and external to your company, to specific projects
• Time-tracking
• Automatic and  progress updates on projects and tasks through the system to individual email addresses
• Ability to upload documents to particular projects (Note: Most tools do not allow you to save documents directly into the system.  You’ll have to save them on your hard drive and then upload them.)

Ideally, you want to find a tool that handles all of these functions equally well, but you’ll probably have to figure out which ones matter the most to you.

Don’t Just Try It, Test It

Testing project management tools before you buy is extremely important. Think of switching project management tools as a non-option.  Once you’ve selected your tool and begin using it, it will become increasingly difficult for your company to transfer everything to a new system.  When you test a specific tool, really press the system to uncover any limitations that might become problematic for you in the future.

Before you can test a project management tool, you need to figure out how you currently organize your projects.  Once your current project organization is mapped out, you can try to mirror your current structure on the project management tool.

When you find a tool that you think might work, sign up for a free trial/plan, enter real projects and set up profiles for real co-workers/employees.  Here are some other key actions to test:

• Enter tasks, task lists and milestones.  See if you can easily tie tasks and milestones together or group tasks.
• Create due dates and check how the calendar or upcoming due dates are displayed.  Then  change the due date, to see how difficult it is to adjust the due dates of related tasks.
• Assign tasks and projects to real people.
• Enter time in the various ways you think people would enter it into the system:  on specific tasks, work on a project not tied to a specific task, etc.
• Test automatic email alerts/updates from the system.
• Change who is responsible for a particular task.
• See what happens when you close out tasks, milestones, and projects.
• Test anything else you can think of that you might see yourself using in the system.

Read the Reports

As a manager, you need to figure out what kinds of reports you’d like to see on your project management tool.  Ask yourself the following questions, and then test your tool’s reporting capabilities to see if they offer what you want.

• What time-tracking information is important to report?
• Is it important for you to know the percentage of tasks completed for a project or milestone?
• Do you want to see a list of overdue tasks and milestones?
• Can you easily see the tasks that each person has on their plate?

Determine What You Want to Automate

As I already mentioned, project management tools can automatically email task and project updates to assignees.  But, the tools can also automate other things, such as re-scheduling tasks.  If you anticipate having multiple dependencies (i.e. dependent tasks), then pick a tool that can automatically re-schedule dependent tasks and due dates based on changes to a single task.  When you change one due date, you won’t have to change all subsequent due dates manually, which is a huge pain.

There may be other things you’d like to automate besides what I’ve mentioned.  Identifying what you’d like to automate helps you select the most efficient tool for your business.

Think Long-Term

Thinking long-term is vital when selecting the right project management tool.  The tool you choose must fit your current project structure and also be flexible enough to handle any future projects that might arise.  Consider how you will use the tool realistically to help you manage projects and work flow, and how you might use it to solve any anticipated problems.

Finally, remember that a good project management tool forms the “spine” of your business, as Leo says.  If you rip out the spine, your business can’t run or even stand.  Avoid replacing your project management tool and stalling work flow if possible.

Top Project Management Tools to Check Out:

• ActiveCollab
• Basecamp
• GoPlan
• Deskaway
• Comparison of Project Management Software

Use “Reply All” Sparingly

The Reply All button is great for businesses. It can get your response across the whole company if need be, but a lot of people ignore best practices when it comes to hitting Reply All.

• Do you really need to respond? Take a moment and ask yourself, “Does everyone need to read this?” Probably not. This is true especially if the original email was sent to distribute information.
• Answer the question. Typically a mass email is sent to get answers from a group of people. Don’t respond with “I don’t know.”
• Don’t use inside jokes. This just alienates the rest of the recipients, and it’s kinda mean.
• Don’t just say “thanks.” If someone emails the office to say they left donuts in the kitchen for everyone, you don’t need to Reply All with a “Thanks!” This just clutters everyone’s inboxes. Either respond directly or walk over to the donut bringer’s desk and say thanks in person. You can use the walk after eating all those Krispy Kremes.
• It’s okay to be silent. Only respond if you have something to say to the entire group—otherwise just respond to the sender directly.

Don’t Discuss Private Matters

Think about what you’re discussing in your email. Don’t ever send sensitive or personal information through your business email. This also applies to others’ sensitive information, such as salary or tax information. You should save these types of things for your personal email account or to discuss in person. Think about it this way: would you discuss this topic on a company letterhead or a bulletin board in the break room? If not, it’s best not to send it.

Introduce Yourself

If you’ve given someone your business card or you have only spoken a few times, it’s great practice to introduce yourself. Don’t automatically assume the person you’re emailing remembers you. Simply jog their memory before starting your email.

Never Email When Angry

File this under “good ideas for everyday emails” too. Emails last forever. They can be forwarded and printed, so it’s best to never email someone when you’re angry. Those are words you can NEVER take back. Refrain from emailing employees with bad news or firing, laying off, or reprimanding employees via email.

Go Easy on the Exclamation Points!

Don’t use more than one exclamation point per email! Why?! Because it looks childish and unprofessional otherwise! Got it?!

Respond Soon

Email was created for fast and easy communication. While you don’t have to respond to an email immediately, you should reply no later than 48 hours to a work email.

Use Correct Grammar and Language

Don’t use LOL, OMG, 4 U, NP, etc. in an email. Leave the shortcuts for chats, not professional emails. Better yet, don’t use slang, curse words, or emoticons either. While we’re not advocating creating rough drafts of emails and pouring over them voraciously for typos, give your emails a once-over just to make sure your grammar is correct.

Clean It Up

After you’ve replied to several email messages things can get messy with excessive carets (>>>>). Clean it up. Delete old messages in the reply that aren’t pertinent.

Be Clear in Your Subject Line

Don’t be vague in your subject lines. Get to the point and be simple yet descriptive. Also, steer clear of subject lines with all caps or exclamation points. Those tend to get flagged as Spam.

Practice Online Copywriting

Keep things short with lots of white space. Pretend like you’re writing for a blog or website. No one likes huge chunks of text in emails. Get to the point and be concise. Feel free to use bullet points. Your recipient shouldn’t have to dig through several paragraphs to get to your point.

Include a Signature

You don’t necessarily have to include this when replying to your staff, but your business contacts should never have to look up how to get a hold of you. Include all of your social media information in your signature, along with your company’s name, your title, phone number, website, and fax number.

Remember Your Reputation

Every email you send either builds or tears down your reputation. You want to come across to every contact as professional and collected. Make sure your emails reflect that.

Corresponding via email is nothing new, but everyone can use a refresher every once and while on how to have proper email etiquette. Business correspondence should always be professional, including the content of email marketing campaigns and faxes. (Learn more about email marketing software and online fax services.)

The Underdogs

Everyone likes an underdog and wants to see them win.  America was considered to be such an underdog in the match with England that the New York Post wrote (with some hubris) the following headline: “USA wins 1-1: Greatest Tie Against the British Since Bunker Hill.”  It’s an old story and an old theme that has been perennially replayed: David vs. Goliath, America vs. England, the small start-up vs. the large chain/big corporation.

The other side is bigger and supposedly better than you. They’ve got a larger marketing and advertising budget with a pretty face attached (let’s say, David Beckham?).  They’ve got the money to spend on resources and talent (five of the top 20 highest paid soccer players in the world are English; one is David Beckham and none are American).  They’ve got an actual machine-like giant who could crush you with his bare hands (e.g. striker Wayne Rooney).  You have none of those things.  Yet, as a small business, you have the speed of communication and action to get things done.  You have camaraderie and teamwork, and, more importantly, you understand the game.  And, like Clint Dempsey who scored the lone goal for USA from 25-yards out, you’re willing to take risks that pay off.  You know, it’s the kind of stuff that earns you the label of “resilient” in all the papers.

The Level Playing Field

Soccer is known as the world’s sport, and it’d be foolish of Americans to simply write it off as uninteresting or inferior to American sports without giving it a chance.  During England vs. USA game I noticed British sportscasters reiterating their praise of Americans becoming “well-educated” about soccer over the past few years, which brings me to the next point. To win or even to tie with the big guys, you need to level the playing field, which is getting increasingly easier for small businesses to do.  One key way to level the playing field is to be just as informed as (if not more than) your big competitors.

Stephan Groschupf of Forbes explains how cloud computing services, such as Amazon, Microsoft, Google, GoGrid, Rackspace and Slicehost are making it easy for small businesses to access big data analytics that can help with their overall business strategies.  Additionally, Twitter and other social media sites offer tons of free data; even the World Bank posts stats on Twitter.  These types of data used to be accessible only to the big companies who shelled out big bucks.  As a small business owner, you’d be wise to take advantage of what’s on the Web.

The Open Window

Whether you like it or not, soccer is a low-scoring game.  But, part of the reason it’s called “the beautiful game” is that it takes so much effort and hard work to actually score that the goals become romanticized and glorified, along with the scorers.  Soccer is about timing, precision, patience and creating the right circumstances that allow you to maintain control of the ball and the field.  Sound familiar? Being an entrepreneur is all about looking for the rare open shot, the opportunity to achieve success and exponential growth.  It’s about taking risks, yes, but it’s also about being patient.  It’s about getting that long-tail.  It’s about preparation meeting opportunity to create the “luck” that everyone else thinks you have.

Tons of people have great ideas that they believe they can build a business on, but it’s what you do after the initial idea that counts the most.  It’s the business plan, the goals, the research, the organizing and the team behind you that can help put you in a position to score later on.  Without the proper preparation and support, you can’t succeed.  The metaphorical soccer field is just too big.

No Time-Outs

In the crazy world of soccer, both the players and the clock keep running.  There are no time outs; there are no breaks.  Similarly, running a small business gives you little time for R&R.  Especially in small start-ups, you and your employees can end up working 10-hour days and rushing to meet orders and customer demands.  Like soccer players, you’ve got to think and problem-solve on the fly.  However, unlike them, you can get relief from the demanding schedule your business requires.

If you find yourself constantly running and spreading yourself thin, pass the ball to your employees and interns.  Set up the right processes for them to follow and spend some time training them, so that you can give them more autonomy and responsibilities.  Additionally, you could utilize tools to help you automate rote tasks to free up more of your time to work on the big picture things. (See 4 Ways to Automate Your Business).

The Goalkeeper

Whatever else may have happened during the England vs. USA game, to many people it came down to the goalkeepers.  American goalkeeper Tim Howard deflected goal after goal from the magnificent English striker Rooney and was treated like a hero in the press.  Conversely, English goalkeeper Robert Green–who let Clint Dempsey’s ball slip right out of his hands–will be forever known as the guy who handed over the lone goal (and England’s reputation) to the Yanks.

When it comes to your business, a strong defense and a good risk management plan can go a long way.  Many business pundits have lamented that small businesses don’t pay nearly enough attention to risk management or planning.  Don’t be caught off-guard when disaster strikes; come up with a plan that will help you survive any disaster and thrive for years to come. (See 7 Savvy Ways to Stay in Business Longer than Everyone Else)

Pick One or Two Issues

Even large companies don’t spread themselves too thin by focusing on several different causes. Think about what you have to offer and what issues best align with your mission statement.  Often there is a connection between a business and a charity, such as a contractor helping out with Habitat for Humanity, an organization that helps low-income families purchase homes. Restaurants may want to donate to a soup kitchen. Also, look for causes connected to your customers. If your clients are outdoorsy consider contributing to wildlife or animal associations, or if your clients are mainly young families, think about sponsoring a little league team.

Ask Your Employees

Poll your employees to see what issues they care about. That way you will have passionate and active volunteers in your own employees. Offer them the opportunity to get involved with your philanthropic efforts. It’s also a great way to build your company culture. Some companies, such as iContact, will even give their employees paid time off to perform volunteer work.

Start Small

Even if your company is small, you can still help out. Don’t be deterred if you’re unable to launch a giant philanthropic effort from the get-go. Even small actions can lead to something bigger. Plus, by starting your philanthropic efforts you are building your company’s reputation, which isn’t based on the amount you give to charities, but rather on your effort to give back.

Giving Doesn’t Mean Cash

Starting small doesn’t necessarily mean donating dollars to a cause, either. Other worthy contributions include your (and your employees’ time), expertise, property or resources. If you own a computer company, think about donating equipment to local schools or library. If you’re an accountant, you can offer financial advice to community causes. You should also consider donating your company’s product or service, such as a spa package or a free consultation with a financial planner, to local auctions. Sharing your skills and goods is sometimes more valuable than writing a check.

Integrate Philanthropy with Business Practices

Don’t make philanthropy something you do after the business day ends—integrate it into your business operation. Donate a portion of your sales to a particular charity, or develop green initiatives that coincide with an environmental group. Search for ways your charitable endeavors can help reinforce your everyday business practices.

Spread the Word

While it can feel good to give back to your community, there is also an added perk of building your company’s reputation. It’s okay to get attention for your philanthropic activities. You want your employees, clients, and community to know what you’re doing. Not only does it help your business but it also publicizes the charity’s cause. When you publicize your efforts, make sure to focus on the charity. You can even get them to provide you with a testimonial for your newsletter, website or press release. Focus on the results, such as who benefits from your contributions or projects instead of how great you are—that will come across anyway.

Pat Yourself on the Back

Celebrate your efforts with your team! All of you have worked hard to make a difference.

In your efforts to help others, you’ll want to keep your own business expenses low. Cut costs low by using popular small business products like email marketing software, email fax, and virtual phone systems.

Before You Move

1. Explain the Advantages of Moving

Whatever your reasons are for moving, make sure you explain them in detail to your employees.  You wouldn’t be moving if you didn’t have a good reason, so make sure everyone is on board with the move.  Ease the transition to a new place by doing a bit of research about the neighborhood you’re moving to.  Send an information packet to your employees with information about local attractions and things to do in the new area, or go the extra mile and take them out to happy hour close to your new location to help them get acquainted with it.

2. Get Employee Input

Talk to your employees about where you’re planning to move.  Discuss how the move might affect their commutes and assuage any concerns that may come up.  Have them submit suggestions if they have any.  Also, make sure to tell your employees about the move well in advance, so they have time to prepare (e.g. to look for new residences or explore transportation options.)  If the move dramatically affects any of your employees, try being more flexible about work hours or consider allowing them to work from home or “go virtual” (see Should Your Office Go Virtual?)

3. Provide Parking Options

Does the new office have ample parking space?  And who pays for parking? Explain the advantages or disadvantages of the new parking situation.  Depending on your location and parking options, perhaps you can encourage people to walk, bike or ride public transportation to work (see Tools and Tips for an Eco-Friendly Office).  Some great ways to save money on parking costs and to encourage green commuting are to reimburse employees for parking costs or provide them with a place to store their bikes.

Moving Day

1. Notify the Appropriate People

Technically, this should happen before moving day, especially for brick and mortar businesses.  Make sure that everyone involved with your business knows where you’re moving, including customers, suppliers, business contacts, etc.  Send the message through your social media accounts, your website and email marketing software.

2. Update Your Mailing Address

If you’re not using a P.O. Box, update your mailing address on all of your business accounts, your website, business cards and other promotional materials.  Remember to have incoming mail and packages forwarded to your new address.  This is a good reason to use a P.O. Box, since you won’t have to change your mailing address every time you move.

3. Cut Costs

Geoff Williams of AOL Small Business advises you to save money by hiring movers without renting the moving vehicles.  He cites resources like http://www.amlpa.org or http://www.movinglaborbrokers.com to help you find movers who will move your stuff to the vehicles you provide and into your new office.  Also, try to cut down on per-hour moving costs by geting your employees to move smaller, lighter objects in their personal vehicles.

4. Get Rid of Junk

Use moving as an opportunity to donate, recycle or sell old hardware, furniture or equipment.  The more stuff you give away, the less you’ll have to move into the new place.  And honestly, if you’re moving a bunch of clunky hardware (like giant fax machines, copiers or computer towers), it’s probably time to upgrade your stuff or switch to cloud computing tools, like online fax services and virtual phone systems.

5. Make Moving Fun

A lot of articles have been written about how to keep your employees productive during a move, but do they need to be?  Moving is stressful enough, so make it fun.  Get the entire team involved, and have an office moving party. Your employees could use a break, especially if you’re moving during the hot summer months.  But don’t let operations completely slide and be totally unavailable to customers or business contacts.  Use your virtual phone service to forward your business line to your cell phone on moving day.  You could even get your customers involved in the move by holding an event or inviting them to a grand opening party.

Moving to a new location can mean turning over a new leaf and getting a fresh start.  Just remember that the more your prepare for your move, the less painful it will be.

Develop Marketing Strategies

Although summer is a sluggish time for sales, you should still focus on your marketing strategies for the long run. It’s easy to become complacent just because clients are scarce, but now is the perfect time to test out new marketing ploys and get a little more creative. When things are slow it is the best reason to experiment and try things you normally wouldn’t have. Release a product you’ve been sitting on and see what the reaction is. Hold a big in-store event to get clients interacting with you. Try implementing guerrilla-style marketing schemes. Create a viral video. Start a company blog. Right now you have the time to brainstorm and implement tactics you might not have time for in a few months.

That being said, now is also the time to fine tune your fall marketing plans. When customers are ready to start buying again, you will want to have all your strategies firmly in place. Work on your marketing materials, line up trade shows, pencil in advertising, and beat your competition come Labor Day.

Hone Your Social Networking

Maybe you’re lagging behind the trend or you haven’t put that much effort into it, but now is a good time to beef up your social networking initiatives. Use the slower months to learn more about sites such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and more and decide how it factors into your business model.

Read more about getting the most out of social networking to build your business.

Hire a Summer Intern

It’s not too late to hire a great intern for the summer who can help you with your new social networking strategies or other tasks so that you can focus on building your customer base and making sales. Learn more about how you can best utilize interns in your small business.

Attend Camp

You send your kids to camp to learn new skills, right? So why not lead by example and develop tools to help you run your business better this summer? Learn a new skill, take a class, read a business book, attend a seminar, or form a Tweetup to make new friends and build industry ties. There is no better time to improve your skill set and grow as a business owner than when things are slow. Once sales pick back up in the fall you won’t have as much time to spend on learning new talents. Make sure you take your business cards with you and prepare to network too!

Start (or Improve) Your eNewsletter

Even though your customers aren’t calling you as much as they were you don’t want them to forget about you in the meantime! Now is the best time to start an email marketing campaign if you haven’t created one yet. If you already have an email marketing service, then summer is a great time to improve your email campaigns to get more readers to open them. Before sending out your first email newsletter you will need to build up your customer and prospect database based on all those business cards you’ve gathered throughout the year. Then you can send out an introductory email to see if they want to be added to your email newsletter list. Remember that you must have permission before you can send eNewsletters or else you could get marked as SPAM.

Sending eNewsletters is incredibly easy with email marketing software, such as Benchmark Email or iContact.

Take a Break

Once you’ve taken care of your business, set up your marketing strategies for the fall, and learned a new skill or two it’s time to unwind a bit! Vacations help you get perspective on your life and your business and allow you to recharge. If you can’t take much time off, spend some time away from the office with your friends and family. Barbeque, swim, relax! You can’t go full-speed all year long.

Create and Maintain Processes

Anything you do on a regular basis that requires thinking should have a process set in place.  Processes provide tremendous value to your business for two main reasons:

1. They create a road map for other people to follow.
2. They make the people who follow the processes more efficient.

And keep in mind that processes shouldn’t be limited to written documentation. They can include templates, workflow charts, and screencasts as well. Just create processes that are easy to follow. Creating and maintaining processes will help you maintain a steady workflow, even as you  transition from old employees to new employees. When you hire new employees, having up-to-date processes they can refer to will be very useful.

Invest in Tools and Programs

A quote from Vladimir Prelovac sums up this point well:“Whenever you can trade money for time — do it, it’s worth it.”

I’m a huge advocate of paying for tools and programs that help increase the productivity of your business. Tools and programs have a positive ROI and free up your time so you can focus on growing your business. Buying tools and programs especially make sense when they’re one time purchases; your effective cost per use continually gets lower each time you use the tool or program.

We use tools such as email marketing software and online fax in our business. Email marketing helps us efficiently email our target audience with relevant information and products. Email fax helps us by making it easier for our business to send and receive faxes.

Use Macros and Scheduled Tasks

I absolutely love to automate my responsibilities with macros and scheduled tasks. If you’re capable of doing this in your business environment, I highly recommend doing so. A macro is a “series of commands, keyboard or mouse actions that are recorded and performed automatically when a certain key is pressed or a certain command is entered.” A scheduled task is “a common task that your computer will carry out automatically at the times you specify.” I use internet macros, Excel macros, and scheduled tasks to automatically perform repetitious tasks for me. For the most basic of tasks, internet and Excel macros require very little programming knowledge and can save you lots of time.  However, if you can hire someone or obtain programming knowledge yourself, you have considerable power at your fingertips.

Resources:

iMacros – “The unique tool for instant web automation, web testing & data extraction”

Recording Your First Excel Macro – “A Beginner’s Guide on how to Record, Modify and Run Your First Excel Macro”

Using Scheduled Tasks – “Schedule any script, program, or document to run at a time that is most convenient for you”

Send Out Automated Emails

Hilary Mason, a computer scientist at bit.ly, gave a talk at IgniteNYC about using shell scripts to automate responses to certain emails. For example, she wrote a script called Nag Bot that auto generates emails to nag people who have been unresponsive to your previous emails. Automated email scripts help reduce the amount of time you spend managing your email. Hilary hasn’t released the code to the public yet but plans to share it on GitHub.

Additional email management resources:

Dispatch – “Teach your email to answer itself.”

OtherInbox – “Automatically organize and prioritize your incoming emails.”

So what are you waiting for? Choose the strategies that make sense for you, and start automating your business today.

1.Hire Now Tax Cut

On March 18, President Obama signed an $18 billion jobs bill passed by Congress, which included The Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act.  The HIRE Act (a.k.a. the Hire Now Tax Cut) gives tax credits to small businesses who hire new employees in 2010.  According to the bill, small businesses can save as much as $750 per hourly employee and $1,500 per salaried employee.  The credits include a 6.2 percent Social Security tax exemption for qualified employees hired between February 3 and December 31, as well as a credit of up to $1,000 for each employee retained for 52 weeks.  To qualify, employees must have worked less than 41 hours over the 60 days prior to the first day of employment.  There are no age restrictions, so high school and college interns are eligible.

2.Competition with Bigger Businesses for Qualified Employees

Thanks to the recession, the job market is now filled with qualified (and overqualified) candidates, whether they’re recent college grads or former employees of big corporations.  Now is a great time to get top talent for below market average salary.  Potential employees are more willing to accept a downgrade in pay if they’re getting a lot of perks instead.  To help attract potential candidates, explain the perks of working for a small business, both in your job postings and in your interviews.  As a small business owner, you can offer more flexible work schedules, more vacation time, less bureaucracy, more responsibilities and potential for job growth, than a larger company can offer.  It’s your chance to get the employees you’ve always wanted before the bigger fish swallow them up.  When the economy picks up and big businesses start hiring again, you’ll have to compete for top hires.

3.Building a Network

Even if you aren’t ready to hire a bunch of new full-time employees, you can and should hire interns and contract workers.  Not only are they cheaper than full-time employees, they also allow you to test the fit of various employees with your business and help you decide what skills and characteristics you should be looking for in future employees.  Also, if you come across a brilliant intern or contract worker, you may consider hiring him or her full-time or giving them freelance work from time to time.  A little known benefit of hiring interns and contract workers is that they can lead you to other qualified employees by word of mouth.  Even if they decide to work for someone else in the future, they might pass along the information of other qualified people or adept firms that know.  This helps you build your network and gives you a lot of resources to utilize.

4.Job Growth for Current Employees

As I mentioned last week (6 Questions to Ask Yourself Before Outsourcing), hiring new employees allows the work to trickle down, so that your current employees will be free to focus on larger tasks and bigger priorities, which in turn helps you grow your business.  While you may be tempted to stretch your current employees’ to-do lists and schedules to the max, as well as let them have a hand in every aspect of your business, they’ll be more productive if you let them specialize and spend time on what they’re good at doing.  Hire new employees to support your current employees in finishing projects and completing tasks.  If you let your current employees manage new hires, then you’ll spend less time managing and more time looking into new opportunities for growth.  You know the old saying, “Divide and conquer.”  You might be surprised at just how well it works.

5.Pro-active Problem-Solving

A wonderful effect of hiring new people is that they bring their own personal expertise and point of view to the table.  Having a fresh set of eyes look at your methods, practices, policies and processes can help you strengthen the way you run your business.  Often, you won’t be able to see everything that a new person can see, especially if you have no experience or background in the thing you’re looking at.  Let’s take accounting as an example.  Most small business owners handle bookkeeping and accounting themselves, through desktop software like QuickBooks or some other online bookkeeping and invoicing service.  However, a lot of small business owners don’t have a background in accounting. When they run into problems it can take them days or weeks to solve them, whereas it would’ve taken a CPA or CMA a couple of hours to fix the issues.   You might think that hiring new people is an expensive solution, but consider the number of wasted hours spent retro-actively solving problems.  Especially during the recession, you don’t have time or money to waste worrying about technical issues.  Hiring people who can help you prevent the problem before it starts is an investment that pays off.

Now that you’ve hired or contracted the right people, make sure you’re effectively communicating with your new employees.  Check out our reviews of virtual PBX services and online fax services to help you keep in touch with the people working for you.

If you want to take part in these grants—or you just want your company to improve its well-being—now’s the time to get healthier. Read below to find out what you can do for your business.

In-House Health Initiatives

A company investment of $100-$150 per employee each year to participate in an employee wellness program can save companies $300 to $450 for each employee every year, according to Ron Goetzel, Director, Cornell University Institute for Health and Productivity Studies. The savings can take a few years to actualize, says Goetzel, and are seen in reduced health expenditures.

On option for implementing corporate wellness programs is to hire a personal trainer or create an office gym. There are many sites online that can give you quotes on how to implement these programs.

Here are some best practices to implement wellness programs:

1. Determine if employees lead a healthy lifestyle before starting an employee wellness program. How many employees take smoke breaks? How often do you replace junk food snacks? Do employees take advantage of walking trails? The answers to these questions will give you a better idea of the employee wellness program that’s right for you.
2. Survey employees to determine their healthy lifestyle habits. Are they exercising regularly? Eating three square meals a day? Having regular physicals? A corporate wellness program benefits most businesses because employees don’t have the time or energy to stay on top of health and wellness concerns at work or when they leave the office to go home.
3. Investigate local offers. Investigate health solutions from local hospitals, such as flu shots, blood pressure checks, cholesterol screenings, body/fat ratio assessments, smoking cessation programs and free mammograms, and offer them to your employees. Give employees a chance to ramp up their healthy lifestyle on the company dime.
4. Incentivize your employees to live a healthier lifestyle. Offer incentives for making healthier choices. Prizes or bonuses can be incredibly motivating! Offer discounts on health insurance premiums for those who participate in wellness programs. Or give out prizes to those who reach certain goals, such as quitting smoking or losing weight.

A successful workplace wellness program starts with its managers and bosses, so business owners should lead by example and take part in their company’s corporate fitness program.

Inexpensive Wellness Options

Just because your business is cutting costs doesn’t mean that you have to totally let healthy habits fall by the wayside. If you don’t have the funds to start an in-house wellness program, here are a few options for you to promote a healthier lifestyle for your business.

• Train for a race. The ChooseWhat.com team participated in a 5K this month. While not everyone ran, it was a great way for the company to get together for a healthy outing. Check out races in your city, and if your employees aren’t runners set up times for them to train together. There are even programs to help people train for 5Ks, like Couch to 5K, which has an iPhone app you can download.
• Push up as a group. Can you do 100 pushups? Me neither. But, you can get your company together to train for this goal with the One Hundred Pushups program. The six week program gives you a detailed schedule to reach 100 pushups in a row.
• Offer healthy snacks. If you’re already providing snacks and/or beverages for your team, replace them with healthier options, such as teas, fruit, veggies, pretzels, nuts, etc.
• Join a gym as a group. Contact a local gym to see if you can get a reduced rate as a group.
• Play ball! Plenty of companies have softball or kickball teams that compete against other businesses. Not only will your company get in shape with these activities, but they will also have fun and build camaraderie.
• Encourage biking to work by installing a bike rack outside your office.
• Pretend you’re on The Biggest Loser by having a weight-loss competition. But make sure employees are doing this the healthy way, not by starving themselves.

Now that you’re helping your employees get healthier, help the earth stay healthy by cutting down on waste by using online fax and email marketing services!

Outsourcing used to be a scary word reserved only for large corporations who wanted to off-shore large-scale manufacturing operations.  Nowadays, everyone from large corporations to small five-person companies utilize some form of outsourcing.

Granted, outsourcing isn’t the answer for everyone.  Most business owners know whether they’re able to handle specific job functions and tasks in-house or not.  In addition to utilizing full-time employees, you might try to get the most out of interns at your small business before you decide to outsource.

But sometimes interns aren’t enough.  Though they can handle lower-level, more repetitive tasks than full time employees, interns often don’t have the immediate experience necessary to handle specialized functions like accounting or IT.  How do you know it’s time to outsource? Ask yourself the following questions.

Why do you want to outsource?

There are a lot of benefits to outsourcing, namely, saving money, saving time and keeping your employees and yourself focused on what they/you do best.  The latter is really what should drive you to outsource.  Immediate cost-cutting and time-cutting are great, but they’re short-sighted goals.  You shouldn’t attempt outsource just so you can scrimp and cut corners.  You should do it to keep your employees free to take on bigger tasks and priorities that will help you grow and expand in the future.

What do you want to outsource?

When people think “outsourcing” they tend to get visions of off-shore manufacturing plants and foreign call-centers.  But in actuality, you can outsource just about anything, including the following: manufacturing, IT, customer service, bookkeeping and accounting, PR, web or graphic design, copywriting, SEO, email marketing and social media campaigns.  Some small, creative companies even outsource their CFO positions!  Again, the trick is to outsource the tasks that you and your employees aren’t exceptionally good at, so that you can focus on what you do best.

Where do you want to outsource?

Deciding where you’ll outsource can greatly affect the quality and speed of the work being done.  A lot of small business owners choose to “near-source,” which means hiring outside contractors or consultants in a nearby location like a different city or state.  Near-sourcing can make it easier to manage the work being done and the speed at which it is done.  However, off-shoring can be significantly cheaper and can also offer high quality work.

Who is primarily handling your outsourced tasks?

You want to make sure you can rely on the people you’re outsourcing to.  Brainstorm a list of qualities you want in the people handling your tasks.  What level of education do they need to have?  Is it important that they speak English or another language fairly well?  Do they need to have specialized knowledge or skills in order to be able to do the work you want them to do?  It’s better to come up with an idea of what you want and go find it, rather than to see what’s out there and experiment.

How are you planning to outsource?

There are plenty of outsource firms out there you could outsource through, as well as a wealth of information online about outsourcing to places like India, China and the Philippines.  You just have to Google it.  You could also search for sites/resources that focus on specific functions, such as copywriting or web design.  And there are numerous sites that let you submit orders and pay only when you accept the work.  You’ll probably want to come up with a plan to test the service you’re using before you actually commit to hiring employees or purchasing work.

When should you outsource?

You should always make sure you have airtight processes in place before you hand over work to an external source.  The more times you test your technical processes, the more effective you’ll be when outsourcing.  Create a process and get a co-worker, colleague or team member who is generally unfamiliar with the process to follow it and try to produce work based on it.  This will allow you to gauge how effective your process is, as well as give you a realistic expectation for the amount of time needed to get the job done.

You should also share your outsourcing plans with all of your in-house employees and get their input.  Make sure they know what their roles are and how outsourcing will help you develop their future responsibilities.  You don’t want them to feel threatened by cheaper labor or undervalued by you.  Take some time to sit down with your employees to see what can be taken off their plates to free up time.  Let them know that outsourcing can be a support to them, rather than a hindrance.  And make sure that you and/or your employees are capable of managing an in-house team and an outsourced team effectively.

Now that you’ve decided to outsource some key job functions to help keep your business growing, you’ll need some tools to help you stay in touch with your employees.  Use tools like email fax services, which offer international fax capabilities, and business VoIP systems, which offer free international calling.

Pros and Cons of a Four-Day Workweek

Two years ago, the State of Utah ordered 18,000 of its state employees to work 10 hours a day, four days a week, and to take Fridays off. More than 75% of employees reported a positive experience a year into the program, according to a study by Brigham Young University management professors Rex Facer and Lori Wadsworth. According to the report, the employees took fewer sick days and the State saw reduced overtime costs and savings on energy bills. Employees also experienced fewer conflicts between work and family commitments, boosting morale. And because they knew they only had four days instead of five to get their work done, employees became more productive.

The program implemented by the State of Utah is just one example of the advantages of having a four-day workweek. The biggest pro for this type of schedule is the cost of maintaining your office. With one less day a week, you can cut back on your energy bills and employee parking reimbursement costs as well. Another great advantage of a four-day workweek is the boost in employee morale. Work becomes much easier when you’re looking forward to a three-day weekend!

However, not every company should try switching their work schedule. Just because your office is closed on Fridays doesn’t mean that your customers won’t need your support five days a week. Plus, for some employees working 10 hours a day could be more physically draining than working a five-day week.

How to Implement a Four-Day Workweek

If you’re going to implement a four-day workweek, you need to think through the benefits and cons of doing so. Decide what your goal is in accomplishing this switch. Do you want to save money on energy bills? Increase productivity? If so, a switch could work for your company. But there are some risks involved. Carefully think through your goals and plan accordingly before you make the first step.

• Talk to your employees. After you’ve weighed the pros and cons of changing your work schedule, you should talk to your employees before you make any move. While some employees will focus on a three-day weekend, they may not pay much attention to the 10-hour workday and the demands of that. It means less time for running errands and can make arranging childcare tricky. It could even leave some employees physically drained. A 4/10 plan isn’t the only strategy your company can take. As I mentioned, you can always try having a half-day on Fridays, or a 9/80 schedule, in which employees work 80 hours over nine business days, giving them an extra day off every two weeks. Also, you’ll have to make sure to schedule important meetings earlier in the day, before your employees become burnt out. And encourage taking frequent breaks.
• Think about your customers. A big problem for implementing a four-day workweek is your customers and how not to lose them. For your company, it may not be realistic to shut down the office for a whole day, so you might not end up not saving as much as you hoped. One option for making sure that your customers are taken care of five days a week is to establish a rotating schedule, with half of your employees taking Mondays off and half taking Fridays off. This will allow you to meet your customers’ demands. But you’ll need to consider which employees need to work together.
• Accept that it’s trial and error. Implementing a new workweek isn’t a decision to jump into lightly, so you’ll need to tread carefully and accept that you’ll probably have to try a few things before finding the perfect solution. Try starting slowly and implement one four-day workweek a month. You’ll also definitely need to solicit feedback from your employees since they’ll be the most affected. Gauge how they—and your customers—are responding to the changes. You’ll also need to monitor employee productivity to make sure goals are still being met.
• Set the right example. If you do implement a four-day workweek, then you need to set the right tone for your employees. It may be difficult for some of them to stop working on that fifth day, so you’ll have to make sure they aren’t being held accountable for their day off. This means not emailing or calling them unless there is an absolute emergency. Better yet, if you can, you should take that day off as well. You don’t want your employees to feel as though they’re slacking because the boss is still working.

If changing your work schedule isn’t right for you, maybe you can cut costs by going virtual. But if you do go with a four-day workweek, you’ll need some excellent online services to help you stay in touch with your employees, such as online fax and a virtual phone service.

1. Unexpected Marketing Strategy:

Betty White is the foul-mouthed old lady we love.

Ever since she was on The Golden Girls, Betty White’s been talking about a lot of subjects (like sex) we would typically consider inappropriate for women of her age to talk about. It’s completely unexpected and generally hilarious. She differentiates herself from other classy, unapproachable actresses her age, such as Angela Lansbury and Judy Dench, by being funny. And she stands out from the crowd of young comedians by putting funny people half her age to shame. Finally, she’s cool enough to share a stage and a hug with Jay-Z, which is a ridiculous pairing that also makes a lot of sense.

When marketing your business, think about your potential “Betty Whites.” What can you do to differentiate your services or products and make them seem unique and unexpected? Also, what can you pair or bundle together that could attract different customer demographics? Your old lady vs. hip hop king, if you will. Remember, Betty White attracts the viewers; Jay-Z gets them to keep watching the show until the very end. Similarly, you want to get customers in the door (whether physically in your store or traffic to your e-commerce site) and stay until they’ve purchased and left you all sorts of wonderful comments and reviews.

As a small business owner, you probably don’t have the big marketing budget that corporations have, but you can definitely get creative with your marketing strategy that will make you as popular as Betty White. Check out: Top 3 Ways to Market Your Small Business, Guerilla-Style

2. Social Media:

Betty White knows what Facebook is.

In her opening monologue on SNL, Betty White referenced the grassroots Facebook campaign that got her to host the show. Betty joked that Facebook is a “waste of time,” but it kind of came off as ironic, since over half a million people joined the Facebook group to help put Betty on SNL. The point is that social media has become so mainstream that it’s significantly affecting the lives of people who have never even used it or know what it is. Like it or not, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, MySpace and the like are powerful marketing vehicles. If you’re not on Twitter or Facebook yet, you’re missing out on a number of opportunities to connect with potential customers, clients and business affiliates. And if an 88 year-old woman like Betty White knows about Facebook poking, you’d better make sure you do too.

3.Target Demographic:

Why We Wish Betty White Was Our Grandma

Betty White’s appearance on SNL not only proved her success as an actress and comedian, but in a calculated way, also got her a fresh generation of fans who’ve probably never seen The Mary Tyler Moore Show or The Golden Girls but do know Tina Fey, MacGruber and Jay-Z. The regular SNL players were adeptly used as the supporting cast to Betty White’s comedic genius, which shone through in every skit.

Betty White’s SNL appearance was successful because it aimed at appealing to a younger audience. It’s a great example of targeted marketing. Targeted marketing helps focus your marketing efforts so that you’re more successful. When targeting a specific demographic, market to your customers’ established likes and familiar brands or products. This requires you to get into the minds of your targets and can be the hardest thing for a marketer to do. To help demystify consumer thoughts and buying patterns, try to poll your customers or encourage them to leave feedback. Use email marketing services to send surveys to capture important demographic data.

As Betty White knows, it’s also a good idea to get the youth on your side. Keeping your finger on the pulse of current trends helps keep your business current and competitive. You may not be able to hug Jay-Z, but try to think of other ways for you to connect to the people who can spread the word about you on Facebook.

4. Viral Marketing:

Betty White’s Genius Soundbytes

Everything that comes out of Betty White’s mouth is pure gold. It’s quotable and viral and keeps people (like me) talking about her comedic genius long after the SNL episode aired. Her YouTube videos get anywhere from 50,000 to over a million hits-an admirable feat. Lately, a lot of businesses are jumping on the viral video trend. (Just check out this video for MailChimp’s iPhone app.) Videos, links, images, etc. that can be forwarded with the click of a button generate fast results. And the best part about this type of marketing is that it’s extremely low cost. All you need is a YouTube account and a video camera, and you can make your own commercials.

Check out Betty White’s Snickers commercial for the SuperBowl (which has nearly two million hits on YouTube):

5. Iconic Branding:

The White Hair, The “White” Name

Betty White is not simply a talented actress and comedian; she’s an American icon. She’s a funny old lady with a generic name. But, somehow, the name and the white hair and just work. It actually lets you put a face with the name, and it’s a silly coincidence that someone can laugh at. In general, it only adds to her loveable persona.

As I mentioned before (7 Rules for Choosing the Perfect Small Business Name) the trick when branding your business is to create positive connotations and emotions for customers. You want to be the one name and face people think of when their searching within your niche. And you definitely want to use social media, targeted marking and viral marketing to help people connect with your brand and image.

To be as iconic, successful and relevant as Betty White is takes a lot of hard work and the right stuff. She got where she is today because she’s naturally funny. To be a small business owner, you’ve got to be a lot like Betty: good at what you do, passionate about connecting with people and still alive and kicking when the odds are against you.

Are you ready to market your business using low-cost tools and services? Check out our email marketing, business card and website builder reviews.

PDF Editors

Typically you’ll see PDF documents like contracts or applications as uneditable files. But PDFs are actually extremely versatile and can be edited, graphically manipulated and used as fillable forms if you have the right software.

There are alternatives to the pricey Adobe Acrobat, including NitroPDF, an extremely powerful editor that runs you $99 for a single license. You can quickly create PDF forms that clients can view and complete with standard software. You can also edit existing PDF documents without succumbing to printing and Liquid Eraser.

Another great paperless feature is the built-in PDF printer driver. Instead of sending an important email or website to your printer, select Nitro’s printer option and generate a full-color PDF that you can archive digitally on your hard drive.

If you don’t need NitroPDF’s full editing suite, but are looking for a way to render important documents, check out PDF995. It’s a PDF printer driver, which is an excellent way to digitally render invoices, graphic mock-ups and long text documents that you’d like clients to read, but not change—without ever having to touch a piece of paper again. Oh, and PDF995 is free.

Email Marketing Software

Do you still get those flyers and coupon books mailed to your home? I do, and they typically go straight to the recycling bin. I often wonder how much paper is being wasted on direct mail marketing campaigns. Maybe these businesses should focus on email marketing services instead. Not only does it save a ton of paper, but research conducted in 2009 by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) found that email outperforms all other forms of direct marketing.

What’s not to like about that? Read more about email marketing software and the features it can offer your business.

Online Contracts

Nearly every type of business uses contract agreements. This means printing out tons paper and gathering a signature in ink. However, for more than 10 years, e-signatures have been legally binding and a few companies have made the process of creating and sending electronic agreements incredibly efficient.

EchoSign is a service that generates and archives digital contracts. You simply upload an agreement to EchoSign and enter the recipient’s email address. They will receive a copy of the document with a link where they can e-sign. The signed contract is then stored in your EchoSign account for reference.

Pricing for EchoSign ranges in price from a free account that lets one user gather up to five signatures per month to unlimited signature accounts with multiple users starting at $40 per month.

Online Storage and Backup

While a lot of companies start off saving paper by using email fax, one of the biggest challenges to going paperless is how to archive your records and files.

One way to save paper and retain all your files is to digitize your records. While it might not save time and paper to digitize older records, you can start fresh by printing to PDF instead of paper and creating a web-accessible archive with a number of services, including:

• Carbonite
• DropBox
• Mozy
• Backblaze

Online Fax Services

Don’t fax machines feel so 1986? Jump into the 21^st century and go green with online fax! You’ll never have to print out pages just to fax over documents to your client ever again. Setting up an email fax account will assign a new fax number and use a web or email interface to send and receive faxes as PDF files. Incoming faxes will come directly to your inbox instead of the dreaded machine.

In addition to breaking you free of your fax machine woes and helping out Mother Earth, email fax services can also help your pocketbook.  Check out the low monthly prices of popular email fax providers, such as MyFax, eFax, MetroFax, and more.

If you’re looking for online tools to make your small business more productive, check out a post I wrote recently about the best Google apps for businesses.

Free Tools

Accounting & Expense Reports

Expensify
Expensify is a simple, easy tool that imports and keeps track of expenses and receipts.  You’ll be able to create and submit paperless expense reports, as well as export them to your QuickBooks account.  It’s free for up to two unique users to submit expense reports to you for approval and reimbursement.  Each additional user costs $5/month to submit reports.  The coolest thing? You can scan and import receipts from your iPhone or Blackberry.

Email Fax

eFax Free Plan
eFax offers a free plan that allows you to receive 20 incoming faxes per month indefinitely.  You’ll get one remote (i.e. non-local) fax number for free, as well as an account on eFax.com to view and manage your faxes.  However, you don’t have the ability to send faxes.  If you want send capability or exceed more than 20 incoming faxes per month, you’ll be prompted to upgrade to a paying account.

Email Marketing

MailChimp
MailChimp’s Forever Free Plan lets you send up to 12,000 emails to 2000 subscribers per month (i.e. you can email your list up to six times per month).  You have access to the same features that come with paid accounts, but you won’t be able to remove MailChimp’s logo from your emails without upgrading to a paid account.  The best part about their free plan is that you aren’t required to provide your credit card number and you are free to cancel or upgrade at your convenience.

Online Diagramming

Lovely Charts
Lovely Charts is so good, we can’t believe it’s free.  It’s a great tool for brainstorming and diagramming just about anything.  You can use their simple interface to create flowcharts, sitemaps, wireframes, network diagrams, and more.  Use it to help you build processes or create manuals/guides for employees.  Use it to map out the look of your business website.  Create training documents.  Create wireframes (i.e. rough sketches) to send to web and graphic designers.  There’s an endless list of possibilities.

Online Office Tools

EditGrid
Microsoft Office is a great software product.  It’s the gold standard.  The only downside is that it costs quite a bit.  Now, there’s an online spreadsheet tool that rivals Microsoft Excel and can be shared with as many people as you like.  EditGrid lets multiple people work on the same spreadsheets simultaneously.  It also auto-saves and live-updates, so that you can view changes as they happen.  If you want a desktop copy of your spreadsheets, just export them as an Excel document or Google doc.  As great as this product is, EditGrid doesn’t offer customer support at this time, so you’ll have to be patient with technical issues.  But the product is still worth a lot more than you paid.

Zoho
Another rival to the Microsoft Office Suite is Zoho, which has come out with an integrated series of FREE productivity and collaboration apps, as well as business apps.  These apps include word documents (Zoho Writer), spreadsheets (Zoho Sheet), document management (Zoho docs), online organizer (Zoho Planner), and an online presentation tool (Zoho Show).  The business apps also include CRM (Zoho CRM), project management software (Zoho Projects), online invoicing (Zoho Invoice) and many more free applications.

Note-Taking

Evernote
Evernote is a great way to keep track of all your notes-2-self.  You’ll be able to save ideas, things you see, like and come across all in one place.  It’s great for the busy entrepreneur with a lot of ideas bouncing around in his or her head.  You’ll be able to take snapshots of business cards, plan tickets, receipts, meeting notes, memos and to-do lists. And you can easily save business as well as personal things you’d like to remember to help you balance your business and personal lives.

Project Management

ManyMoon
ManyMoon is one of the few free project management tools on the web.  It allows you to direct workflow and productivity by assigning tasks and creating projects and milestones.  ManyMoon integrates with your Google Calendar, Contacts and Docs, which is convenient for all you Google users.  True, there are other project management tools out there, such as Basecamp, that are more well-known.  But ManyMoon provides you with the basics you need.

Security

LastPass
LastPass is a life-saver.  Are you worried about managing all your online business account passwords and login information?  Use LastPass to create a secure vault for all of your account logins.  Use it to auto-fill forms or auto-login to websites with your secure master password.  LastPass can also generate secure passwords for you, so you’ll never have to worry about anyone hacking into your business accounts.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP)

Skype Business Products
If you haven’t heard of Skype, you’ve probably been living under a rock.  Skype lets you call people using your Internet connection, which means that you won’t have to pay an additional fee for a phone service.  You can also video conference employees and co-workers to keep the lines of communication open and the flow of information running smoothly.  You can download Skype for Windows, Mac OS X or Linux for free.

Under $15/month

Accounting

QuickBooks Online ($12.95/month)
For just $12.95 a month, you can get QuickBooks Online Simple Start plan, which allows one user (plus your accountant) to manage unlimited customers, create and send invoices, track payments and generate up to 40 expense reports.  The advantage of the online version to the desktop version is that you can access and work on your account and reports from any computer.

Domain Names, Web Hosting & Website Builder

HostGator ($4.95/month)
For $4.95/month, you can get three years of web hosting space for your business website (single domain).  It’s $5.95 for a 2-year plan and $6.95 for a 1-year plan.  You can also pay month-to-month for $8.95.  We at ChooseWhat have personally used HostGator and are impressed with their exceptional customer support and service offering.  HostGator gives you a 45 day money back guarantee, a 99.9% uptime guarantee and a customer satisfaction guarantee.

1&1 ($9.99/month)
1&1 is a great website builder service that lets you create a professional-looking business website in a short amount of time.  1&1′s MyBusiness Site Basic is only $9.99/month and gives you unlimited pages, a free domain name and the ability to customize your website pages by adding Flash, YouTube videos, photo galleries and more.  It’s super easy to use, and they offer 24/7 website support.

Project Management

Project2Manage ($3.95/month)
Project2Manage has a free version, but it only allows you one project.  They’ve got a Recession Buster plan for only $3.95/month, which lets you create up to 12 projects for unlimited clients and staff members.  However, it doesn’t allow time tracking.  To get time-tracking, you’ll have to upgrade to the Silver plan, which also gives you 25 projects, unlimited clients and staff members and 500 MB of storage space.  Their project management interface is simple and really easy to use.

Security

IDrive ($4.95/month)
IDrive is the best $5 you ever spent.  Like LastPass, IDrive is another life-saver.  You should ALWAYS back up your files.  Storing files locally is fine, but you never know when disaster might strike.  What if a fire, hurricane or other natural disaster ravages your building and destroyers your server and external drives?  What if you’re the victim of theft?  Guard against these threats by protecting the core of your business with remote backups and storage.  There are several online backup services on the market, but IDrive is our top choice.   They give you robust desktop and server backups, file-sharing and real-time sync, designed for multiple users.  And they’ve got an iPhone app!

Want to learn about other low-cost cloud services?  Check out our reviews for online fax services and virtual PBX services.

Money Talks

Of course, the No. 1 way to boost your employees’ morale is to offer them a bonus. You can incentivize specific tasks for your workers to make sure they still work hard, or you can offer to reduce some of their insurance costs. Don’t ignore the fact that money talks, and it talks loudly.

However, if spending a ton of extra money on your employees isn’t an option (we are still in hard times, after all), you can learn more about motivating your employees in other ways below.

Set a Good Example

You should always lead by example because your attitude is contagious. If you’re optimistic, chances are your team is more likely to be optimistic too. Also, make sure that everything you preach to your employees, you follow. Granted you are the boss, so it’s not as important for you to be at the office at 9 a.m. on the dot, but make sure you put in a lot of face time at the office. No one is going to feel good working for you if you’re off playing ball every afternoon while they’re diligently working.

Invest in Employee Growth

If you do have a little bit of funds available, it would mean a lot for your employees to know that you want to invest in their growth. Research some continuing education classes or certifications for them. Not only does it show them that you believe in them but also that you want them to stick around your company for a long time. That sense of stability can go a long way in a time of upheaval.

Encourage Workers to Voice Concerns

It can make an employee feel stifled when he/she isn’t able to express concerns for the work environment. A friend of mine was telling me how her company is going through several layoffs, and, while she was safe, the morale of the company was in the toilets. Something her bosses did that made her feel better was to allow the employees write lists of suggestions for the company to improve. Not only was she able to get things off her chest in a productive and safe way, but she also felt like she was being heard.

You don’t have to go to such extreme measures to allow employees the space to voice concerns. Let them know your door is always open and that they are safe to discuss complaints with you. You don’t want your employees to worry about losing their jobs because of airing concerns. Make sure you truly listen to what they have to say, and then do your best to help fix the problems.

Allow Employees to Share in Company’s Success

Your employees should want to feel invested in the success of the company. Consider starting a profit sharing plan, which would allow your employees to gain a sense of satisfaction and desire to work harder knowing that they directly contribute to the dollars in their pocket. Eighty percent of businesses surveyed by WorldatWork reported having some sort of incentive or bonus program in 2009. Learn more about implementing a profit sharing plan through this helpful Inc. article.

Allow for Flexible Schedules

If your company allows for it, try out flexible scheduling. Another friend of mine had her bosses give the company half days on Fridays during the summer by merely adding an extra hour Monday through Thursday. This way they were able to take advantage of the beautiful summer weather by hanging by the pool or spend more time with their kids.

A lot of moms have trouble picking their kids up from school, so some companies allow employees to work part-time on some days in order to maximize family time. You can read about how a flexible schedule program worked for the accounting firm KPMG in this New York Times article.

Another great way to allow for flexible scheduling is to let employees dictate start and end times—within reason. Let your employees choose between an 8am or 9am start time, for example.

Small Improvements

In addition to these ideas, there are also several small ways you can motivate your employees.

• Eat lunch with them. Lunchtime is where coworkers bond with each other. If you take time out of your day to visit with them in a friendly way, the effort won’t go unnoticed. Also, if you’re brown bagging your lunch, they won’t be disgruntled about your fancy schmancy client meals. Make sure to rotate who you eat lunch with so that you’re not starting a clique.
• Get creative with perks. Buy office snacks. Take an afternoon off and go to an arcade. Offer car wash services. Have casual Fridays. Whatever you think you might like, your employees will definitely love. One company had managers clean the snow off the windshields of other staff members. It was just a small, fun thing for its employees to participate in.
• Give compliments, both individually and publicly. Make sure your employees know that you appreciate the work that they do. If someone does a great job, recognize them in front of the group, but don’t single out the same person every time. You want all of your employees feeling good about their job performances.
• Be cordial. How would you feel if your boss didn’t say “good morning” to you or didn’t even know how to pronounce your name? Make sure you treat your employees as you want to be treated. Be friendly, kind, and courteous. It really goes a long way.

Now that you’re on your way to boosting company morale, learn more about ways to boost your company’s productivity with helpful small business tools such as online fax, email marketing services and virtual PBX.

1.    Read everything.

Any writer will tell you that the first rule of being a good writer is to be widely read.  A novice writer learns how to write well by reading good writing and learning to imitate it.  Reading different types of writing (e.g. poetry, prose, fiction, ad copy), written in different styles (e.g. lyrical, straightforward, persuasive, Meta, etc.) informs your own predilection and style choices.

Business owners are not so different from writers.  They must read everything from books on various managerial styles to case studies on successful businesses to profiles of successful entrepreneurs to self-improvement books.  Being knowledgeable about how other successful people run their businesses informs your own leadership style and business choices.

As a business person, you might tell yourself that you’re too busy to sneak a read in here and there, but you should always make time for learning.  Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, would call this a Quadrant II activity.  Quadrant II activities are those which we never seem to make time for (because we’re dealing with the immediate problems and daily crises of Quadrant I), but which would benefit us in the long run.  Devote some time to Quadrant II and you’ll be all the better for it.  Tell yourself you’ll read one new book a week (or pick any other goal).  Write it down.  You’ll be surprised at how valuable an activity it really is.

2.    Edit yourself as much as possible.

Good writers are able to recognize their own mistakes and even prevent them from occurring.  This is done by editing one’s own work.  By editing, I not only mean making sure you follow the proper rules or grammar, mechanics and language; I also mean narrowing the scope or focus of your writing so that you’re as precise and concise as possible.

Similarly, business owners should consult lawyers, bankers, accountants, other business owners and anyone else who can help them comply with laws, rules and regulations.  Business owners should also be wary of overcomplicating things and overreaching.  Try not to do too much or attempt to offer an array of services or products all at once.  Start with a niche and work outwards from there.  Focus on doing one thing right, and then expand and diversify.  Although it’s tempting to go the Wal-Mart route (i.e. do a little bit of everything), you don’t want to spread yourself too thin.  Quality over quantity is never a bad thing.

3.    Write about what you know best.

James Joyce, author of the most dense and premier postmodern fiction book Ulysses, was preoccupied with describing the city of Dublin so accurately that future people would be able to re-create the city long after it disappeared, based on reading his book.  Even fiction writers start with something real that they know well, whether it be a city like Dublin or a background in science (for science fiction).

You probably got into business to begin with because you had a passion and ability to do something well.  Whatever you’re doing, it’s what you know best.  And if it’s not, then ask yourself why you’re doing it.  Again, it’s perfectly natural to expand or diversify, but do so only when you’re prepared for it.  Do your homework.  If a writer has no clue what is possible by the laws of science, he or she cannot write realistic, believable science fiction.  These writers often consult with scientists, doctors and other people who have the knowledge they lack.  Again, don’t hesitate to seek out and consult with people who can guide you and your business in the right direction.

4.    Write in a way that makes people feel smart.

A good writer can write something that everyone can understand, but a great writer can write it in a way that also makes you feel smart when you’re reading it.  The writer does this by getting into your head and speaking to in a way that aligns with your own point of view.  Writers study their audience(s) before they write.  They always know who they need to appeal to and what they need to say to sound appealing.  They aren’t condescending, but they’re able to enlighten you in a way that nobody else could.

To run your business, you’ve got to be a good leader.  This means that you have the ability to motivate people, mitigate problems and make them focus on goals.  Smart leaders don’t talk down to their employees.  They make everyone feel smart and that they’re contributing members of the team.  Before you criticize or write them off, try to understand the needs of your employees, as well as those of your customers, clients and business partners.  Motivate in a positive way, not in a negative way.

A big mistake both large and small businesses make is that they only ever talk about themselves and not what the customers/clients want.  Whether you’re writing email newsletters, press releases, online fax material or content to build a website, make sure that you’re speaking directly to the needs and desires of your customers/clients.  If they think you understand them, they’ll be much more receptive to what you have to say.

5.    Don’t take criticism personally.

Writers often get rejected.  Sometimes nobody wants to buy your articles.  Sometimes your work gets marked up with red ink.  Sometimes you have to go back to the drawing board and re-write the entire thing.  If you don’t let these things roll off your back, then you’d have a huge self-esteem problem.  Writers know that criticism is part and parcel of daily life and that it’s really the only way that they learn and get any better.

Starting a business is going to have its share of rough patches, its ups and downs.  But, you always have the ability to turn things around.  Maybe a few customers wrote negative reviews of you on Yelp.  Use it as an opportunity to learn and get better.  Maybe next time you’ll try to prevent the bad reviews from happening, by asking for customer feedback in your store, on your website or in your email newsletter.  You could also appeal to their desires and offer them free items or invite them to come back with the promise of something better.

There are going to be a lot of people who criticize you and even tell you “no.”  For instance, you might get rejected by a bank or investor for a business loan.  But, don’t get discouraged and don’t take it personally.  It doesn’t mean that you don’t have a great business plan.  It might mean that you need to go to a different bank or appeal to different investors, or maybe you could try bootstrapping and bartering small business services for a while.

As famous TV painter Bob Ross would say, “There are no mistakes, only happy accidents.”  To be a successful entrepreneur, you must subscribe to this glass half-full idea.

6.    Remember that your first draft should be crappy.

The bad writers get stuck on the first draft and never finish the piece.  Why? It’s part perfectionism, part vanity.  They want to get it right the first time around, and so they spend hours, days, or weeks trying to get everything just right.  But, the first draft isn’t the end; it’s only a means to an end.  Good writers know that it’s what happens after the first draft that matters most: the re-conceptualizing, the editing, the revisions, the proofreading.

Being an entrepreneur requires you to power through your “first drafts” to get to the second and third and fourth.  Have no idea how to build a website? Don’t have any money to hire a designer? It doesn’t matter…put something on the web!  It doesn’t have to be pretty.  It’s just got to have your contact information, business hours and a way for people to find you.  Can’t get an investor to buy in? It doesn’t matter; it’s great that you’ve got the confidence in your business idea to put yourself out there.  So, go back to the drawing board, write a new pitch and do it all over again.

7.    Remember to proofread.

Writers are detail people.  “The Devil’s in the details,” as they say, and so writers proof their work for mistakes lurking within their magical block of text.  As a small business person, you can’t just power through everything without stopping to check the details.  If you aren’t a meticulous person, hire an employee or find a business partner who is.  That person can act as your editor; they can spot what you can’t.  It might be easier to take everything on your shoulders as a sole proprietor, but not a lot of people are equipped to do that.  If you do decide to go it alone, be sure that you’ve got a strong support system and surround yourself with people who can keep you in check and/or be a safety net.

Clean and Professional Look

Your website should look as clean and professional as possible. So don’t use any fancy fonts that may not be available on most computers. Try to keep to common and professional web fonts, such as Arial, Veranda or Times New Roman.

In addition to not using funky fonts, using every color in a 64 Crayola pack will also look tacky. Your colors should complement each other, not clash. If you’re color blind or just need help picking coordinating colors, use a website like Colour Lovers which has user generated color schemes posted. Don’t use more than three to five colors.

Clear Navigation

Once a visitor is on your site you need them to explore different pages of your site. To do this you must have clear navigation. Make sure all your important links are at prominent places. Make use of menus on the right and the left sides of the page. Make sure all your information is accessible from other parts of the site by including links. Your navigation should be easy to maneuver and have clear buttons.

Your readers shouldn’t spend 30-40 seconds trying to find a Contact or About page. They also shouldn’t have to click through multiple pages just to get to a sign up form. Get the important things out in the open. Users shouldn’t have to use your Search box to find important things.

Structure

In order to make your site clean with clear navigation, your site should be as structured as possible. We hate when we visit sites and they have a bunch of free-floating boxes of information that isn’t easy to maneuver. Use grids and boxes. There is nothing boring about symmetry, structure, and ease.

Simplicity

Don’t over-complicate things. Make things as easy as possible for your readers by pretending a 4 year-old will be viewing it.

Designed for All Resolutions

A site that is easy to use always encourages visitors to stay and read your content. If your site doesn’t look good for a particular resolution, it is very likely that the visitor will close the browser window. You should design your website so that it looks good for all resolutions. The best way to do this is to design your site in terms of percentage and not pixels. Designing stretch layouts that fit any screen resolution ensures that you know all your visitors see a good looking site.

Minimal Use of Images

Don’t clutter your site with big, bulky images that take ages to load, unless you are a retail store that needs photos to sell your products—and even then, make sure these don’t take forever to load. Use catchy icons instead. Visitors are more drawn to your site for its content rather than its design. You want that to take center stage—not a giant image.

Fantastic Copywriting

What you say on your site is often more important than a fancy design. Choosing the right words for sign up buttons, page headings, navigation items and calls to action can help you keep visitors on your site—and buying your products.

Working Links

Always check for broken links within a site before uploading it to your web server.

Cross Browser Compatibility

Make sure you check your site for Internet Explorer 5+, Mozilla Firefox 1+, Opera 7+, Safari 3+ and Netscape Navigator 6+ as they constitute 95% of browsers users use. You don’t want people abandoning your site because they can’t see your homepage.

Now that you’re ready to build your business’s website, learn more about website builders and promoting your site. And after you’re done building your site, you’ll need some help picking out a handy email marketing service provider to alert your current and prospective clients about upcoming promotions or news.

Step 1:  Email the most appropriate representative.

• Always start by emailing the guilty party (person or company) to make sure they know they have missed a payment.  Unlike a phone call, an email shows a time stamp, who received it, and written details of the complaint.  A written record of your complaint is handy, as you will always have a start date to refer back to when communicating (e.g. “John, you’ve owed me $1,000 since the 13^th…it’s now the 20th and rent is about to be due.  What have you been doing for the last 7 days?”).
• Ask for the name of the most appropriate person to speak with about this issue.  This helps expedite the process, as well as gives you a name and face to which you can direct all future communication.  When you email the person in charge of payments, explain your situation calmly and tactfully and emphasize their responsibility to fulfill their obligation to you and your business.  You want them to recognize not only that Company A owes Company B money, but also that John owes Nick $1,000.
• Give them at the most one business day to respond to your email before moving to Step 2.  Don’t go any longer without communication; you want them to take you seriously, after all.

Step 2:  Call the most appropriate representative.

• If they didn’t respond to your email, then call the person in charge of payments.  Don’t assume that they read your email. It’s very possible that they overlooked the email or casually glanced at it and didn’t give it much thought. (People sometimes disregard emails, especially ones asking for money.)  Remind them that you sent an email, but also be prepared to reiterate what you said in the email over the phone.
• Make sure that the person you’re speaking with understands the problem and is willing to rectify it.  Chances are that they might play dumb or genuinely not understand what has happened.  If they do not agree to pay you in the phone call (or if you couldn’t reach them by phone at all) tell them (or leave a message explaining) that you will follow up with an email with detailed statistics and evidence supporting your case and move to Step 3.

Step 3:  Email the guilty party, supervisors and co-workers with detailed and specific evidence.

• Try to put any invoices, statistics or evidence you have inside the body of the email, instead of in an attachment. If you include a list of attachments with your email, chances are that nobody will read them.  The more detailed and specific you are, the better.  Again, show them that you are serious, as well as extremely knowledgeable about what happened.
• CC any and all parties who may be even remotely involved in the process. State how long this problem has been going on and the steps you’ve taken to come to a resolution.  Your contact person is now not only responsible to you, but also to any supervisors or colleagues who are copied on the email. Include the person’s boss, secretary, co-workers, or any other relevant contacts you have.  Also include your own boss and/or your co-workers on the email, so your contact person knows you are acting on the part of the company, and that your company as a whole is frustrated with your contact’s irresponsibility.

Step 4:  Agree to the forthcoming phone call.

• 80% of the time your contact will try and set up a phone call with you to apologize and save face. They’re doing this because they now know that X number of people are scrutinizing them, and they don’t want to get fired.  Accept the phone call, but be sure that everyone knows the objective(s) of the call before you sit down and hash it all out. You want to know why they haven’t paid you yet and what they are going to do to resolve things.

Step 5:  Be firm.

• Before you sit down and discuss things with your contact,come up with a list of action items (read: consequences). Plan out what you will do (or won’t do) if they do not agree to pay you what you’re owed.  Be prepared for a response one way or the other.  If they agree to pay you, come up with ways to make sure that something like this doesn’t happen again.
• Always aim for the win-win. If the person who owes you money is being obstinate, try not to get mad.  Just remind them (and yourself) that you rely on one another and you would like to continue your business relationship.  It’s more effective to sound disappointed in someone, rather than get angry.  But don’t let them walk all over you either.   If you’re firm and stand your ground, they are likely to agree to your terms.  After they’ve paid you, be sure to thank your contact as well as any people involved for helping to resolve the issue quickly and fairly.

So, now you’re an expert at persuading people to pay you.  But can you persuade people to buy from you?  Check out our page on email marketing campaigns to learn more about crafting a compelling email newsletter.

Build Relationships

The biggest reason businesses start blogs is to create a sense of community for their readers and customers. A company blog offers you opportunities to create a dialogue with your customers through the comments they post. Instead of sending one-way marketing messages, a blog keeps the relationship, and the line of communication, open both ways.

Build Your Reputation

Once you’ve built relationships with others, your reputation will grow. Clients like to do business with companies they feel like they know. With your blog you can help people get to know you as a company. Post blogs about charities you’re involved with, share customer testimonials or share solutions your services provide to common problems.

Build Loyalty

The more your customers know you, the more loyal they become. If you feature new products within your blog, your loyal customers will want to try them out. You can even give back to these customers by featuring them in your blog. Offer a subscription or RSS feed to your blog, so that you know your customers will visit your blog when you post new content.

Build Credibility

If all your prospective clients see is your portfolio or a menu of your services, they might not be that inclined to do business with you. But with a blog, you are able to build authority through blog posts and your responses to comments. By building authority and credibility, you’re allowing potential customers to get to know you, your skill set, and the solutions you provide your customers.

Build Traffic

Blogs help you with your search engine optimization because they provide fresh content for search engines to feed on. Because a lot of websites tend to be fairly static, a regularly updated blog provides keyword-rich content that search engines love. This means that your site will be ranked higher in search engines, making it more likely to be viewed by more visitors, which will ultimately help boost sales.

Build Yourself as a Brand

When visitors stumble onto your blog, they find out more information about you than they would with just a website. This is where you can sell yourself as a brand but also show your potential clients a little bit about the real you. You’re sharing yourself, not being a marketing droid, and your audience will catch onto that and should respond favorably—as long as you adhere to the following tips.

Blogging Tips

• Inform readers about your products and services. Make sure your readers know what exactly you do. While we may blog about issues that are pertinent to all small businesses, we always let you know how our services and vendors alleviate these issues.
• Use a professional voice. You want to be authoritative and credible. Try to steer clear of slang and curse words. You can be informal but professional at the same time.
• Edit, edit, edit. You should always read over your posts before publishing. You want your posts to be free of typos and grammatical errors or it could hinder your credibility.
• Be personal. You don’t want to be a robot. Have personality and flair!
• But not too personal. Don’t over share or say anything offensive. You always want to remain a professional.
• Keep opinions and beliefs to a minimum. Again, you don’t want to offend anyone.
• Treat readers courteously. If someone leaves a comment or question, respond to it! You’re building a community, not just writing blog posts.
• Link to social media. Make sure people can find your blog. Write about interesting topics and post often, and then link your blog to your Facebook and Twitter accounts so that people can find you!

While building a website can help you become a credible business, starting a company blog can propel your company forward. In addition to promoting your website, you might want to also look into other helpful marketing tools, such as email marketing software, which can help keep your readers updated about new blog posts and other updates to your website.

However, once you get to the point when you want to create a brand, you can afford to spend some serious time on coming up with an appealing name.

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Juliet was completely wrong when she said those words–at least with regards to small businesses. Your brand name is the first impression you get to leave on your customers; so it’s no surprise that people spend a lot of time and money on selecting the right brand name. A bad name can make you the butt of people’s jokes, or worse, it can scare customers away.

Make sure you choose the best name possible by following these seven rules:

1. Choose positive words.

The first rule of creating an appealing business name is to choose words that have a positive connotation and invoke positive feelings in customers. When brainstorming, you’ll notice the difference between warm and fuzzy words and words that fall flat. For instance, there’s a self-service dog wash here in Austin called Mud Puppies that is rather popular.

Consider the difference between Mud Puppies and Mud Dogs. The place services dogs of all ages, but the word “puppies” is infinitely way cuter than “dogs.” The denotation is the same, but the connotation is different. Mud Dogs has a dirty connotation, while Mud Puppies has a cute, playful connotation.

2. Don’t be offensive.

Sometimes, a business owner has the zany idea to create an offensive name. Perhaps they think that they’re pushing the envelope and giving off a racy, exciting image. But in reality, offensive names are never a good idea. For instance, there’s a food trailer here in Austin called MeSoHungry that riffs on the offensive phrase “me so horny.” Although the place gets some business, I’m betting that most people would think twice about eating at a place that calls to mind such a negative phrase that has nothing to do with food.

Another local example is Pho (pronounced “fuh”) King. Doing a pun on four-letter words is never a good idea. It just doesn’t make you sound classy. You could have the best food, product or service in the world, but if people don’t think you’re professional they won’t bother setting foot in the door.

3. Appeal to what people already know/like.

This is in the same vein as choosing words with a positive connotation. There are plenty of trends out there for you to draw inspiration from, such as the Do-It-Yourself movement, eco-friendly/green trend or health conscious trends. A business name I really like is Sushi-a-Go-Go, which is the name of a food trailer here in Austin that serves to-go sushi. It’s a peppy name that appeals to people’s love of fast food and gives them a sense of urgency.

Again, you’ll have to sit down and brainstorm ideas that appeal to consumers, but you (hopefully) won’t be reinventing the wheel. In addition to trends, music, movies, popular websites and even celebrities offer a source of inspiration. An exercise you could to would be to list your own favorites/likes and see if you can find a gold nugget somewhere.

4. Think local–or think global.

If you’re a local business, try getting inspired by landmarks, popular spots and familiar locations around town. For instance, the company 360 Partners here in Austin was named after Loop 360 (Capital of Texas Highway), which runs right by their office. However, beware of picking something ubiquitous or cheesy. (In Texas, you’ll see Lonestar [Something] anywhere you go.) You want to sound familiar, but you also want to stand out from the crowd.

Perhaps you’re not a local business. Maybe you have an e-commerce business that serves customers around the country and/or the world. You can still use a locale-inspired name, but you may want to try broader terms that have more universal appeal.

Amazon is a great example of a brand that references a specific location but also has universal appeal. JetBlue is an example of a company that bucks the trend and doesn’t incorporate a location like competitors American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and others. Their name works, largely because it paints a lovely, serene picture. Think about what you want your business to say. Is it important for you to emphasize something local and familiar or to have widespread appeal? You decide.

5. Be punny.

Never underestimate the power of the pun. Puns are cheeky; their entertaining and memorable. A great example of a punny business name is G’Raj Mahal, which is the name of a popular food trailer in East Austin. It’s a play on the famous Taj Mahal that gives an edginess and humor to an otherwise cliché Indian restaurant name.

Puns require a bit more creativity than the average business name, so you might want to pull together some creative people to help you come up with the perfect pun. And remember, puns can bomb very easily and not be as funny as you think they are (see Rule #2 above)—so, beware!

6. Be memorable.

This might be the hardest thing to do when thinking up your business name. A lot of companies struggle with the balance between uniqueness and accessibility. Google is now a household name, but virtually nobody knew what a google was until the company made the word famous.

A very special or esoteric name may be great for trademark purposes and online search purposes (less competition), but you’ll probably have to do a bit more work educating people about what your company actually does when you start out. The choice between specific and generic is yours to make, but keep these things in mind:

• Keep it short and sweet. A lot of companies go with the one-word name, which is very memorable. Brands like Ebay and Etsy are short, but very effective. If you go with the one-word name, be sure that people will be able to easily relate your business to that word. Don’t pick a word that doesn’t relate at all. (For example, every day, I pass by a building here in Austin that says Milkshake and want to step in for a chocolate shake. Except I can’t—because it’s an ad agency.)
• Or make it longer and more specific. You can have a name longer name, but be sure that it’s saying something important about your business. I really like the name Walton’s Fancy and Staple, just because the words are so interesting and descriptive.
• Avoid copying other people. You may be tempted to copy the names of other popular business, but be careful of attracting the ire of competitors. If you name your company Polo Sporting Goods, you may get slapped with a trademark lawsuit from Polo by Ralph Lauren. You might be thinking that you can easily poach customers from your competitors with a similar name, but you won’t be working to differentiate yourself and establish your own brand reputation.

7. Keep promotional materials in mind.

Have you spent hours, days or weeks on picking a business name, only to find out that it won’t fit on a business card or is difficult to find on a search engine? When you are thinking about your business name, also keep in mind how the name will look when you build a website or create business cards. Also, your logo will be a big part of building your image. What images or colors could be used along with the name? Can you create an entire website or promotional theme around it?

An excellent example of a themed website is MailChimp. They put chimps, chimp noises, chimp imagery, and chimp cuteness into everything they do. Their website features a “talking” chimp, which features rotating cheeky sentences for you to read whenever you visit the site. MailChimp customer support techs sign their emails with chimp lingo: “Eep, Eep!” And, they give you Monkey Rewards for referring friends. It’s fun, appealing and keeps customers coming back for more.

Got a great name picked out for your business? The next steps are creating business cards and setting up your website. Check out our business cards and website builders reviews!

Why Go Virtual?

“We have been told by entrepreneurs, academics, and consultants that getting rid of the office and working remotely can make a company more productive, better for the planet, and cheaper to run,” Max Chafkin writes in the article.

In Inc.’s case, getting rid of an office would save the company $500,000 a year! Granted, the magazine’s office is in a swanky downtown Manhattan high-rise, but commercial space is fairly expensive no matter where your business is located. Crunch the numbers and see how much you could save in rent, utilities, Internet, and parking for your office.

Another advantage of telecommuting is the lack of part of that word: commuting. Sparing your employees (and yourself) from the hassles of commuting by car or train could save everyone money, time, and stress.

Some employees who telecommute discuss how their home life actually improves when they work from home because it allows them to see their family more. Other employees cite that an advantage of working from home is the opportunity to take care of personal things during breaks, like working out, laundry or grocery shopping. How many times have you tried to go grocery shopping after a long day of going to the office and then commuting home? It can get pretty tiring.

If your employees do a lot of creative work, such as designing or writing, it can also be beneficial for them to work in an environment free of distractions. A lot of offices are not conducive to focusing.

Many business owners think that the specific technology they use at their office is irreplaceable. As you’ll note below, going virtual doesn’t mean you’ll be sent back to the Stone Age. In fact, most virtual employees can do their jobs easily with a laptop, an Internet connection, a cell phone and some nifty software programs. A lot of the traditional office hardware such as a server, fax machine and telephone switchboard can be switched out for alternative, low-cost services that have been available for years.

Tools for Going Virtual

1. Virtual PBX: When using a virtual PBX service, your calls get forwarded to your current phone at any location, even your cell phone.
2. Online fax: Online fax services convert incoming faxes to email attachments that are sent to your email address.
3. Collaboration tools:

• Dropbox: this virtual hard drive gives you 2GB of storage space on its servers, which you can access from any computer.
• Basecamp or Active Collab: these project management tools help users keep track of tasks, due dates and time spent working.
• Yammer: think of this collaboration tool as a “virtual water cooler.” This Twitter-esque tool is a private way to let your coworkers know what you’re up to.
• Google Docs or Zoho: free online office software that can be accessed by multiple people on any computer is helpful for any office worker.

Should You Go Virtual?

While we discussed the advantages of having a virtual office and tools to accomplish this goal above, we acknowledge that having a virtual office is not right for every business. Ask yourself these questions when considering getting rid of your offices.

1. Do you see clients/customers in the office on a daily basis?  Going virtual might work best for companies with minimal customer interaction, such as software companies, publishing companies, e-commerce companies, design/development, etc.
2. Are you comfortable with outsourcing?
3. Is your location worth every penny of its rent? Does it provide you with many advantages?
4. Are your processes and practices efficient and effective? If you don’t have most of your day-to-day processes and goals well-documented and executed a virtual office would be hard to manage.
5. Is your turnover rate low or high? New hires would be difficult to train without a physical office.
6. Are your employees’ goals specifically measured? Without clear cut goals and metrics, it can be difficult to keep your employees on track.
7. How high is morale? While telecommuting can sometimes create higher morale, it can also have the opposite effect on employees that are already disgruntled.
8. How effective is the communication in your office?
9. Do you NEED to be around people? Virtual leadership can be lonely for those who thrive on the stimulus of an office. For others, it may make them more productive without constant office pop-ins.

The answers to these questions will help you figure out if your company is ready to go virtual. While it can save a lot of money, telecommuting is definitely not for everyone. Some of Inc.‘s employees had a hard time balancing their children while working from home, and others really missed some of their office habits, such as walking to lunch or chatting with coworkers.

Even if your office isn’t ready to make the virtual leap, you can still take advantage of the small business tools virtual offices use every day: online fax and virtual PBX.

As everyone knows, it takes a bit of capital to get your business off the ground.  But what if you’ve got no capital and you’re having trouble getting a loan or line of credit at the bank?  Try bartering!  Bartering can help you move excess inventory, get you through a slow business periods and help you save your limited capital.

According to David Wallach, president of the International Reciprocal Trade Association (IRTA), membership in the IRTA, which fosters business bartering, has increased by 15-20% in the last year.  The annual increase has typically been 5-8% in previous years.  This exemplifies how bartering has become more popular lately, as businesses struggling through the recession are finding new ways to move inventory and save capital.

Ready to give bartering a try?  Keep the following things in mind:

Case-by-Case Bartering vs. Bartering through Networks

Case-by-case bartering means that you are making a business deal with one company or individual at a time, depending on what you need or can provide at any given moment.  Case-by-case bartering can be a great way to foster relationships between you and other local businesses, but it also requires you to do more research and persuasion.  Bartering through networks, such as the IRTA, can make it easier to find people to do business with, but you’ll probably have to pay a membership fee in order to get access to business deals.

Here is a list of popular bartering organizations:

• Atoncer Online Barter Exchange
• BizXchange
• ITEX.com– a small business community and barter network
• IRTA.com – International Reciprocal Trade Association
• PayMeWithaChicken.com
• TradeaFavor.com
• U-Exchange

Other helpful sites:

• Craigslist (Sometimes people will post trades in the For Sale, Community and Jobs sections.)
• Twitter (You can start following other small businesses and tweeting to them about starting a business deal. Or simply ask a question on your profile.  “Anyone willing to trade…?”  You’ll be surprised at the responses.)
• Fiverr.com (Technically not a place to barter, but this site lets people share things they’re willing to do for $5.)

Doing Your Homework on Barter Partners

No matter whether you’re bartering through an organization or on a case-by-case basis, you’ll still have to do a bit of research on potential barter partners before you select one (or more).  Make sure whoever you’re doing business with is reputable and not in financial trouble.  You want to make sure that they have the capacity to make good on any trades that you agree to.

Trying to Achieve a Win-Win

In order for a barter to be fair, both parties have to agree with the value of what’s being bartered.  Spend some time attaching time or money values to the product or service you are offering before you sit down with your barter partner to discuss it.  Try to come as close to an equal exchange as possible.  And even if it isn’t exactly equal, try to think long-term benefits.  Kyle MacDonald traded a cool, but non-useful, bit part in a movie to get a two-story house.  Maybe you aren’t a basketball fan and have no real use for tickets to a championship game.  You might want to take the tickets anyway.  You could trade them with someone else for something you actually want, or you could sell them on Craigslist and get some cash.  Whatever the case may be, just remember that your “win” may not be immediate, but it may be sweeter than you could have imagined.

Bartering for Ad Space

If you don’t have much of a marketing budget, you can always trade services for ad space.  Say you’ve got a t-shirt printing company.  You could sponsor an athletic event and provide free shirts or team uniforms in exchange for putting your logos on the t-shirts, banner ads, billboards, flyers, etc.  You could also trade your services for ads in newspapers, magazines and websites, or on the side of local buildings.  This is a great way to reach people without spending the big bucks.

Reporting Bartering Income

The IRS expects you to report bartering income on Form 1040, Schedule C, Profit from Loss from Business.  If you exchanged property or services through a barter network or organization, you should receive Form 1099-B, Proceeds From Broker and Barter Exchange Transactions.  Paying taxes on bartered goods may sound scary.  However, according to the IRS, if you are in a business or trade, you may be able to deduct certain costs you incurred to perform the work that was bartered, which can offset your tax liability.  Another tax advantage is to donate extra credits you’ve gotten through a bartering service to charity, which can get you an even bigger tax deduction.

Bartering can take a bit of time and effort, but it can also pay off big and be worth the costs.  With a bit of resourcefulness, you could potentially go from surviving to thriving without blowing your entire budget.

While SEO can get very tricky and complicated, below we include a few tips on the basics for SEO beginners.

Target Keywords

A keyword is a specific term that users will search for in order to find your site. You want to make sure that the pages of your site are peppered with your chosen keywords so that prospective customers can find you easily. Make sure these keywords are not vague or generic.

For example, if you’re optimizing for a web development site and you’re located in London, England, use keywords such as “web development London” or “web development services England”.

To find out how many websites are competing with you for your keywords, do a search on Google and note how many results are returned. The more sites that are competing for your keywords, the harder it will be to get on the front page.

Use Your Keywords Wisely

Once you’ve got your list of keywords, you want to use them correctly throughout your site. Use them in the following:

• The title tag
• The h1 and h2 headings in the page
• Link text (in links within the page, and in links from other pages)
• The page URL
• Image alt text
• Bold and italicized text

One of THE best places to use a keyword is in the page’s URL. For example, if you’re going after the word blue widgets, a good page URL would be:

http://www.yoursite.com/blue-widgets

This way Google can easily register your site for that specific term.

Also, make sure that that you spread the love around. Have your homepage target one or two keywords, another page target another two keywords, and etcetera. Just don’t overdo your keyword density. Try to get your keyword density between 7% and 10%. You can download plugins like SenSEO to help you figure this out.

Use Title and Heading Tags

A title tag is the text that appears in the top bar of your browser. Typically it’s the title of the article you’re reading or the name of the website. Make sure to utilize title and heading tags to convey to your visitors (and the search engines) what the pages on your site are about.

Watch Out for Duplicate Content

Search engines don’t like pages that contain exactly the same content and will rank your pages lower. So avoid duplicate content pages on your site.

Don’t Forget the Description Tag

A description tag is used to display a summary of your page in the search results, so make sure your description tag is targeted for a keyword and includes a call to action. It should be useful and compelling.

Get Other Sites to Link to You

Backlinks are websites that link directly to your website. The general thought is the more backlinks you have, the higher your page will be ranked because your website must be good if so many other sites are linking back to it. These sites must be well-respected sites, so target a few relevant sites that are ranked well on search engines and try to get them to link to your site.

Ways to get backlinks include:

• Writing good content. This will take a while to produce backlinks, but it is a great long-term strategy to build your site. You must produce unique and fresh content on a regular basis.
• Create a “link to this page” function on your page so that bloggers can easily link to your content.
• Strike up a relationship with other site owners and get them to backlink you. A happy client would be a great solution here.

Also, don’t forget to include links on every page that links back to your homepage or other landing pages with distinct calls to action. Some readers may have landed on a specific page, such as your About Us page or Contact page, without hitting your homepage first. You want to make sure they visit other pages.

Now that you’re on your way to promoting your website the right way, learn more about other small business tools, including email marketing services and online fax providers.

A business that works is effective. How can your business be effective?  According to Stephen Covey’s book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, the first step is to be proactive. Being proactive, instead of reactive, is really the key to making a business not only survive, but also succeed.

It’s sometimes hard to get in the spirit of being proactive when you’re worrying about how new tax laws, stricter loan applications, higher interest rates and the new healthcare bill will affect your business.  After all, those topics dominate the news, painting small businesses as victims of some external, insurmountable force—such as current economic trends, the government, or even bad luck.

But wait—you aren’t a victim.  Business might be slow right now, but it’ll pick back up.  You’ve got a solid business plan.  You believe in your product.  You add value to the marketplace.  You have the ability to turn things around.  Why? Because you’re proactive!  You anticipate and solve problems before they begin.  And you continually devote time to the following activities, which are:

1. Utilize the Right Resources

A great resource for small businesses is the Small Business Administration (SBA), which helps businesses with everything from getting start-up loans, to free/low-cost training for employees, to managing your daily operations.  In addition to using government agencies like the SBA, you should also consult people in different fields from your own who can offer different perspectives on a given situation or problem.  Ask your banker for tips on financing and interest rates.  They can probably refer you to some other local sources for funding.  Talk to an attorney about the legal issues regarding trade marking and advice on licensing, tax, insurance and other related business regulations.  Consult the IRS about new tax laws and deductions that could have an impact on your tax reporting.

If you’re completely new to starting a business,don’t hesitate to enroll in community business classes or head to the library or book store to do some research. There are tons of books that list forms relevant to small businesses, as well as advice on creating a business plan, getting investors, etc.  Even if you’ve been in business for years, you can still benefit by brushing up on new information.

2. Establish Good Credit

Good credit is important to establishing the reputation of your business, which can work in your favor when applying for loans.  In general, be wary of using credit cards, which tend to have relatively high APRs. But, if you are fastidious about paying it off on time, go ahead and get a credit card with your company’s name.  This can help you build up your company’s credit and also makes it easy to keep track of expenses.  For those who sometimes make big purchases that tend not to be paid off by the credit card due date, Ron Jauregui, an FDIC Community Affairs Specialist, advises people to consider getting a bank loan, which typically offers a lower interest rate than credit cards.

If you’re a freelancer, contractor or self-proprietor of any kind, you probably manage your own finances, which is fine.  But, you may want to consider hiring a professional who can manage your books and keep track of expenses meticulously. They can remind you about late payments and even help you develop an effective system that doesn’t let payments, due dates or invoices slip through the cracks.  If you have a pair of capable eyes overseeing your finances, it’ll free up more of your time to handle other aspects of your business.

3. Take Security Seriously

Just because they earn less revenue than large corporations, it doesn’t mean that small business are any less prone than large ones are to fraud.  Don’t simply assume that nobody is going to target you and that you’re safe against security threats. Stay on guard against bank fraud as well as online fraud.  Keep a vigilant watch on your bank statements and report suspicious activity immediately.  Make sure your anti-virus software is up-to-date, and use secure password software (like LastPass) to help you manage and create stronger passwords.  Also, remember to change your online passwords frequently and keep track of them somewhere, such as a spreadsheet.

4. Prepare for Disaster

Disaster can strike at any moment. You’re not being paranoid if you think so.  Take Internet fax service GoFaxer as an example.  GoFaxer‘s service was down from June 9, 2009 to July 21, 2009 due to a substantial server issue.  It took them an entire one and a half months to fix the problems that could have been prevented if they had been proactive and kept backups of their sever that could be easily accessed and utilized once their main server crashed.  Frustrated, some of their customers switched to other email fax service providers and were gone forever.

The lesson here is to back up all of your stuff frequently. It’s best to have multiple copies of documents vital to your business stored in multiple places, such as external hard drives, discs or online (remote storage).  If you go with online backup, try to pick a service that’s located far away from you so that there’s less of a chance that their server will be prone to the same disaster as yours.  You can also set your office phone to forward calls to your cell phone.  In the event that your hardware is malfunctioning or destroyed, you’ll still be able to receive calls.  (However, this will not work if the entire phone network goes down.)

5. Take Advantage of New Technology (Web 2.0, Saas, Cloud Computing)

Obviously, you need capital to grow your business.  But, being able to invest money often requires you to reallocate your funds and readjust your budgets.  You should always be looking for ways to cut operating costs, which sometimes means going beyond traditional tools and equipment. More people are already starting to reduce their overhead/infrastructure costs by going with online (hosted) services and products like online fax, virtual PBX, website builders, email marketing services, etc.  These services help businesses reduce their dependence on hardware and eliminate maintenance costs and other superfluous purchases.

Web 2.0 is a goldmine for entrepreneurs and small business owners.  In addition to the software as a service (SaaS) products mentioned above, free and low-cost applications (like Google Apps) give you access to conferencing tools, document-sharing tools, collaboration tools, etc. for a fraction of regular IT costs. Spend some time learning about and utilizing these tools, which can help you manage your business without requiring you to fork over the big bucks.  Save your money for a rainy day when business is slow.

6. Keep Your Finger on the Pulse

A lot of business owners would like to think that they’re clued in to what their customers want, but quite a few of them really have no clue.  If you’ve got a limited budget, you don’t need to pay for a bunch of fancy market research reports to figure out what customers are thinking.  Simply create a Twitter account and jump into real people’s conversations.  If you spend anything at all on marketing, spend it on these three things:  your website, a decent email marketing service, and place for customer feedback. These three tools are interactive, which means they can help you gauge customer satisfaction and improve your product/service.  You may also want to hire people who can manage all of these things.

Eliminate purchasing barriers. Make it extremely easy for customers to do business with you and give you repeat business.  Don’t do something stupid like not include your prices or business hours on your website or other marketing material. I have seen this on numerous websites of a lot of local businesses, and I am baffled by it.  Maybe they are thinking that if they force me to call them, they can persuade me to buy or come in anyway.  FYI: It doesn’t work.  Like a lot of people, I price-compare nearly everything before I buy.  If your product is relatively more expensive, give me a reason why—a reason to buy.

7. Think Forward

I think “NBC” should be the new “ABC.”  I’m not talking about the television networks.  You’ve heard of “Always Be Closing,” but an even better maxim is “Never Be Complacent.” Maybe your business has already achieved some degree of success compared to all the businesses that are floundering around you.  But, that’s no excuse to rest on your laurels.  Spend some time each week thinking about how you can grow your business.  Try to diversify, target other markets and/or work with other businesses.  Plan your investments prudently.  Venture into new (and scary) territory.  Want to make your business completely virtual? Or how about completely mobile?  Do a bit of research.  Dive right in.  Pick one day a week to test new ideas and crowd source with your employees and colleagues.  Get creative.  You just might find yourself solving your all your future problems before they start.

According to digital marketing guru Mitch Joel, a negative review won’t kill your business; it’s how you look at feedback and how you respond to it that makes all the difference.

Is the feedback legitimate?

If the customer’s negative review actually does have some merit (e.g. an employee screwed up or something went wrong) you should definitely take notice of the situation. If that feedback is 100% legitimate, then you should respond in some way. A great way to tackle this is to respond to the customer personally rather than on the online site. Make sure to apologize, and don’t use PR speak. You want to be sincere—not defensive. Offer a discount if necessary to have the customer return. Don’t ask the customer to take down his or her review. If you go above and beyond to rectify the situation, they will want to update their review.

Is the customer ranting just to rant?

Sometimes a customer isn’t so much mad at you and your business as they are mad at the world. If you go through someone’s profile and all of their reviews are bad, you shouldn’t waste your time trying to change their opinion.

Is the review factually incorrect?

If the bad reviewer is misstating the facts, you should step in immediately. Maybe they’re stating the wrong prices, hours or even something more major. Whatever the falsehood is, you should post a reply on the website the review is published on, stating the correct facts. Again, make sure to be sincere. You don’t want other customers to see you as defensive. A personal email to the reviewer might also help.

Are you upset?

If you are upset about the bad review, you must calm down first. Anything you put out into the World Wide Web while you’re upset or angry will just come off as petty. Either let another staff politely handle the situation or ignore the review altogether. It’s better to have one negative review than suffer the consequences of acting too brashly.

Can you encourage positive reviews?

It might be best to wait a couple of days before responding to negative criticism because you might be surprised by another customer coming to your defense. If you read Yelp reviews you’ll notice that reviewers don’t always agree. A good customer of yours might feel compelled to set the negative reviewer straight, and this is even better than you coming out an apologizing first because it’s not coming from a paid employee. Although, it still doesn’t hurt to apologize directly.

You could even create a call to action on your website or on your social media sites, asking customers who’ve had a good experience to post a positive review. That way you could be more proactive than waiting around for a client to post something nice.

Just remember that one negative review won’t ruin your business. It’s a matter of responding quickly and appropriately. Try to spot unhappy customers before they even walk out the door, but if you must, apologize with sincerity.

And remember that some people say that negative reviews actually establish authenticity. No product or service is without its faults: Even the top selling product of the decade, the iPod, has its cons, and reviewers point it out. If potential clients see nothing but glowing reviews they might question whether staffers wrote them all. Plus, it’s a great chance for you to learn where you need to improve your business. When life gives you lemons…

Along with couth marketing practices, a small business owner is in need of specific products to grow his business. Learn more about website builders, online fax, email marketing services and virtual phone systems.

In my previous blog post (No More Excuses for Not Having a Website!), I pointed out that  a surprising number of businesses don’t have a website.  However, there is a growing number of small business owners who would like to create a website to help market their businesses.  They just don’t know where to begin, or how much time, money and effort is involved.

We at ChooseWhat.com highly recommend that small business owners with little knowledge of websites begin by using a website builder to create their websites.  Because they’re low-cost, user-friendly and accessible, website builders will work for most small businesses.  But when your business grows, and you need a more complicated website, you might want to hire a web designer.  Check out our comparison below to help you make your choice.

Comparison of Site Builders to Professional Designers

Cost

Depending on the type of website you want to build and the functionality you want to have, site builders range from free to less than $100 per month.  Comparatively, freelance designers typically cost somewhere between $500 – $1,500, and full-service design firms usually cost from $2,000 – $5,000.

Customization

Site builders allow you to utilize and edit pre-made templates to customize your website.  They typically allow you to change the main graphics, insert your brand logo, insert pictures, insert Google ads and customize multiple pages.  E-commerce site builders like Shopify also allow you to create a store front to sell your items online, to set up security for credit card transactions, and to outsource shipping.

Freelance designers and design firms not only style your site so that it showcases your custom logo and headers, they can also create multiple custom graphics.  They can custom design the navigation of your website, so that you are not limited to what you see in the template, and can usually add JavaScript, database or email functionality as well.  Overall, professional designers can give you more design flexibility, as well as help you optimize your site for search engines.  However, with a bit of knowledge, you can easily optimize your site for search engines using site builders.  (Check our How to Build a Website guide to learn more.)

Hosting

Site builders are typically bundled with an online hosting plan for one low monthly cost, which is rather convenient.  Having your site hosted and built through one company simplifies the process of creating and maintaining your site, since you’ll only need to contact one company to handle technical issues.

If you’re using a professional designer, s/he will either host your site on their server or sign up for a hosting plan on a third party site.  Either way, you’ll probably still have to pay a monthly hosting fee, in addition to what you’re paying the designer(s).  It would be ideal if your design firm could host your site on their server, so that they could handle any hosting issues in-house.  However, you won’t necessarily save more money with in-house hosting, rather than going with a third-party monthly hosting service.

HTML Skills Required of You

Site builders don’t require you to know HTML or any other programming language.  However, they do require you to familiarize yourself with their particular systems or interfaces.  It may take a bit of time for you to orient yourself, so that you can start adding different elements to customize your site.  It also may take a bit of time for you to pick a site template that works for your business.  This is especially true when creating an e-commerce site, as e-commerce site builders give you a vast array of options to help you create a store front, shopping carts, preview buttons, etc.

Professional designers eliminate the guesswork and can pretty much handle everything from coding your website to optimizing it for search engines.  But, the downside is that you won’t be compelled to learn anything about how your website functions, which is fine, until you encounter problems or technical issues.  Then, you’ll have to call the designer and wait for them to fix the problem, which, depending on their schedule and number of clients, may take a while.  If you want to change or re-design the site after the designer has already technically completed the project, you’ll probably be charged for additional work or “consulting.”

Turnaround Time

You can build a simple information website or e-commerce website on a site builder in a matter of hours or days.  Most professional designers will give you an estimate of two weeks, but it can actually take them up to two months or more to create, test and tweak things.  Again, it all depends on how complicated your site is and how much functionality and flexibility you want.

Maintenance and Support

Most web hosting/site builder services advertise 24-hour maintenance, monitoring and technical support.  This, however, does not ensure that your site won’t go down or that it will be back, up and running quickly.  The more reputable companies, such as GoDaddy, HostGator and Yahoo, tend to be better about actively monitoring your domain and alerting you if any problems arise.  But, it’s really up to you to maintain your site and make sure it functions properly.

Although they have more direct control over your website, a web design firm might not necessarily be better at maintaining your site than a hosting service.  The size of the web design firm is a good indication of how attentive they’ll be to server issues and how quickly they’ll respond to your questions/concerns/requests.  Maintenance and support should be included in your monthly fee (for hosting companies) and in your invoice (for designers), and should not cost extra.

Whether you decide to use a low-cost website builder or a professional designer to create your site, make sure that you are absolutely satisfied with how your website looks and functions.  Remember that a little time and money spent on your website is really an investment that can lead to a dramatic pay-off for you and your business.

Want to learn more about how to build a website and promote your website online?  Visit  Build a Website.

But, which new Google Apps can help you expand your business?

Note that you will have to be an administrator on a Google Apps account before you can install apps from the Google Apps Marketplace.

Zoho Projects

Zoho and Google Apps technically offer a lot of the same services: email, word processing, spreadsheet and more. But, Zoho Projects also offers services beyond what Google Apps can do, in that it can keep track of deadlines and tasks by automatically adding them to team members’ calendars. It also serves as a kind of project intranet by providing wikis, shared file spaces and public web pages. Your team can post files in a centralized space and use integrated group chat.

This app is $12/month for unlimited users. You can try out the app for free for one project.

Manymoon

Manymoon is similar to Zoho Projects in that it is a team collaboration application that integrates with Google Apps, but it perhaps serves a more social function with Twitter-like status updates. The app integrates with Google Docs, Google Calendar and Gmail. It also created a Google Gadget which monitors tasks.

Manymoon is free and the highest-rated app in Google Apps Marketplace.

Aviary Design Suite

One of the coolest Firefox plug-ins is in the Google Apps Marketplace. Aviary Design Suite is a Web-based image and audio editor that allows you to add effects to and tweak images, along with creating logos, business cards and labels. The Aviary Google App lets you use Aviary to create and edit graphics for use within Google Docs.

The service is free.

TripIt

TripIt for Google Apps lets you see who in your apps workgroup is traveling and when. When you book travel online and get an email of your itinerary, you forward that email to plans@tripit.com. TripIt then automatically gleans your trip’s details and builds an itinerary page with useful information, including the weather, local time, directions, online check-ins and travel delays. You can then share this information with your friends and coworkers. You can also integrate information into your Google Calendar and see where employees are traveling on a company travel map.

TripIt is a free app.

Box.net

Box.net is a full-fledged content management system similar to Microsoft Sharepoint. In addition to an unlimited storage system, the Cloud Content Management app for Google Docs will let you access and integrate your Google files directly within the Box.net ecosystem, meaning you can create a Google Doc as a file type within Box, and then utilize the collaboration tools. You can also access your Box content directly from Gmail or Google Calendar. You can be alerted when any changes are made to your content with an Update feed.

The Google App is free for Box.net business users and $15 per month for new users.

SlideRocket

As an alternative to Power Point, SlideRocket is a full-featured presentation editor that can be pulled up on any computer with Internet access. With SlideRocket, you can integrate video, audio and live data feeds into your presentations. You can also utilize analytics to see who views your presentation and when. You can then embed presentations easily on your website or blog.

SlideRocket is $12 per month per user. A free “lite” version is available.

Intuit Online Payroll

Intuit, the makers of Quicken and Quickbooks, has an online payroll tool that allows users to access their payroll or paychecks from anywhere in Google Apps. Intuit Online Payroll lets your employees to access their paystubs from their Google Calendars. You can seamlessly integrate your payroll and Google Mail, which helps you easily keep track of invoices and bills. You can also track payroll dates on your Google Calendar, print checks, use direct deposit, pay taxes and file forms electronically.

You pay $39 per month for one employee and for filing taxes in one state. Each additional employee is $1.50 per month; filing taxes in each additional state is $12 per month. There is a free 30-day trial.

That sentence is going to serve as the crux for today’s blog post about women running small businesses.

I generally like Akon as a musical artist and find many of his songs to be pop-y, catchy and fun.  But, I think many women would have varying degrees of difficulty listening to Akon’s lyrics.  In the modern world, where women everywhere are fighting to be as respected by their superiors, colleagues and employees, it’s pretty much a slap in the face to hear a guy groping for the right words to express “respect.”  On top of that, after I had Googled the song, I found out that its real title is “Sexy (B-word)”—not “Sexy Chick,” which is the clean version played on the radio.  So, here we have a song that professes to be treating women with respect, while simultaneously being offensive to women.

The Effect of Expectations

What does all of this have to do with running your business?  The answer is expectations.  Akon’s song sets up a positive expectation about the woman he’s infatuated with.  And it is contrasted with a negative expectation about other women: “She’s nothing like the girl you’ve ever seen before, nothing you can compare to your neighborhood who’e.”

Expectations are the focus of Ch. 9 of Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational, which refers to an experiment on common stereotypes (by Shin, Pittinsky and Ambady) about Asian-Americans and women.  The experiments focused on a group of Asian-American women, half of whom were reinforced by the positive stereotype about Asian-Americans excelling at math, and half of whom were reinforced by negative stereotype about women performing poorly in math.  The outcome of the experiment showed that both groups were influenced about perceived stereotypes about themselves.  (That is, the group that was reminded that they were Asian-Americans performed well at math, and the group that was reminded that they were women performed poorly.)

Staying Positive about Running Your Business

What both Akon’s song and the predictably irrational experiment show is that, even though we hope and believe that stereotypes don’t exist, they do.  And worse, they are powerful and can be difficult to overcome.  In the face of negative perceptions about your ability to do the job–coming from people who say they respect you but have no real faith in you–it’s important to stay positive about yourself and your business in order to succeed.

As a small business owner, you’ve got enough to worry about—how to fund your business, how to expand and grow your business, how to market yourself, how to maintain your quality of service or product, etc.—and the last thing you need to do is compare yourself to what male CEOs or entrepreneurs are doing.

What you need to do is be like the group who were reminded of a positive stereotype, instead of a negative one.  A simple way to stay positive is to spend some time thinking about your advantages, both personally and professionally.  What you do well? (In business, this is your competitive advantage.) And what do you have to offer? (In business, this is your value proposition.)  It’s especially important for both employers and employees of small businesses to believe in the mission, in the goals of the company and in your leadership as well.  As corny as it might sound, you’ll find that spending some time psyching yourself up will have a positive effect on the success of your business.

Why Women are “Less Profit-Driven, More Risk Averse”

According to a survey taken by the nonprofit Count Me In (for Women’s Economic Independence), 94% of Americans believe that women are more focused on “contribut[ing] to their families and not grow[ing] a business.”  The survey also found that 84% of Americans believed that women in business were more risk-averse than men, and that over 75% believe that women don’t care as much about profit than men do.

Why do the majority of Americans overwhelmingly believe that women are less profit-drive and more risk-averse?  I don’t know.  Does that widespread belief make any of the so-called differences between businessmen and businesswomen true?  Yes and no.  There are probably quite a few businesswomen out there who don’t fit the stereotype.  And yet, there are probably a few women who buy into people’s negative perceptions about themselves and actually do shy away from taking risks and maximizing profit.

Whether you actually are averse to risk or uninterested in profit or not, the important thing to recognize that it’s the stereotype.  You can do one of two things with this information: You can prove the stereotype wrong and push yourself to take more risks with your business to get more profit, or you can keep saving money and not taking risks.  In fact, there is absolutely nothing wrong with being conservative about your spending—which could be the smarter option for you and your business.  Whatever you decide, make sure that it’s right choice for you and your business, not just the popular thing to do.

Trust your instincts, which you have in abundance.  Otherwise, you would have never gotten into business in the first place.

Owning It—Your Business and Your Sexiness

After all is said and done, you’ve got to be able to let negative perceptions about you roll off your back.  If you don’t, you’re going to be stressed out and constantly obsessed about whether you’re doing things right or not.  You own your business; you know better than anyone what you need to do to make it successful.  You’re sexy. And, it’s really the “sexy” that matters, not the b-word.  (At least, that’s what I tell myself in order to be able to continue listening to Akon.)

So, be yourself and act like the savvy businesswoman you are.  And delete that Akon track from your iPod.

Start-Up Expenses

You can deduct the expenses of running your business off your taxes (see below for more), but nothing can be deducted before you open for business. You can only deduct up to $5,000 in start-up and $5,000 in organizational costs for the first year of business. Expenses that are not deducted can be amortized over a 180 month period, which begins when you open your business. These expenses include market research, advertising, employee training, business travel and other costs.

Auto Expenses

You can deduct your mileage, parking fees and tolls for the business use of your car. A lot of business owners will merely take the standard mileage rate deduction (55 cents per mile for 2009, which will decrease to 50 cents for 2010) because it’s easier to keep track of your mileage records, but you could actually get a larger deduction if you keep track of everything, including repairs, maintenance and insurance. Also, if your car is fairly new, you can also deduct the depreciation on the vehicle if you tally up all the actual expenses. Make sure to report your mileage for each trip. You can only deduct the business portion of your auto expenses if your car is used for both business and pleasure, so keep track of the usage accurately.

Equipment and Furniture

Some small businesses can deduct the full cost of equipment the year they purchased them, rather than capitalizing them—that is, deducting their cost over a number of years. According to the IRS, you can deduct up to $250,000 of the cost of new equipment on your 2009 tax return. Some assets don’t qualify, such as real estate or property bought from a relative.  For this year, there is also a first-year bonus depreciation deduction that allows taxpayers to depreciate 50% of the adjusted basis of qualified property during the first year the property is used.

Advertising and Promotion

The cost of advertising, including business cards, Yellow Page ads, commercials, etc. is deductible on your 2009 tax return. Promotional costs that create business goodwill, such as sponsoring a little league baseball team, are also deductible as long as there is a definite connection between the sponsorship and your business. This would include naming the team after your business or including your logo on their jerseys.

Education Expenses

You can deduct educational expenses only if they are related to your current business or occupation. The expense can only be deducted if you are furthering your education to maintain or improve skills required for your job.

Interest

If you used credit to finance business purchases, the interest is fully deductible. This also goes for the interest taken on a personal loan. You just need to make sure you conform to the IRS’ rules if you borrowed money from a relative or a friend. Also, you must prove that the money borrowed was only used for your business.

Travel Expenses

When travelling for business, you can deduct the cost of the airfare, costs of operating your car, taxis, lodging meals, telephone calls and more. You must have records for all of these expenses. If you’re combining business and pleasure, you can only deduct these expenses if business was the primary purpose of your trip. You cannot deduct the expenses of taking your spouse or your family on your trip, however.

Entertaining Expenses

The IRS will approve the deduction of up to 50% of entertainment expenses for your business, but you must follow these rules: it must be directly related to the business and business must be discussed (such as a meal catered to the office), or it must be associated with the business and the entertainment occurs directly before or after a business discussion. Make sure when you’re keeping records to make note of the business purpose of these entertainment outings.

Professional Fees

Professional and legal fees are deductible, but if the costs are part of your start-up expenses, you may need to amortize the cost over 60 months.

Charitable Contributions

If your business is a partnership or a limited liability company, your business can make a charitable contribution and pass the deduction to you to claim on your individual tax return. If you own a corporation, the corporation can deduct the charitable contributions on the company’s taxes.

With online tax software, filing your tax returns is a breeze. Learn more about e-filing and compare tax software companies at Tax-Compare.com.

Use the Power of Freebies

Give away “free hugs.”

You know what’s so genius about the Free Hugs phenom?  That it’s is so innocuous and so non-business. Small businesses have a much greater ability than big businesses to really connect with their customers on a one-to-one level.  So, connect!  Giving away your time, energy, knowledge and expertise is a great way to market your business without seeming like your marketing.  It’s the business equivalent of a free hug.  Hold a free class on the weekends; give a free evaluation, consultation or demonstration….or simply a free hug!  Or a free dance, or a free high-five, or a free fist-bump, or a free pat on the back.  The list is endless.  You’re sure to get a positive buzz going.

Start a crazy contest.

Perhaps the most ubiquitous contests for restaurants are eating contests.  An air guitar contest could do wonders for virtually any business.  Online businesses could come up with any type of contest (wacky or normal) and hype it on their website, blog and press releases.  The prize you come up with could be anything from a cash prize to bragging rights.  You could even hand out a relatively boring Customer of the Month award, which people still really love (it makes them feel like a supa-star).

Pander to kids.

There are a lot of parents out there who find it a hassle to take kids out of the house.  Make it easy for parents to have a fun night out without worrying about having to keep the kids entertained.  Direct mail bibs or toys with your business info on it, encouraging parents to bring the kids along.  This tactic could also work on pet owners and their pets.  The key is to get them out the door with the promise of more to come.

Pander to college kids.

College kids are really good viral marketers and most of them don’t even know it.  They simply like free stuff.  So, give it to them.  Give students discounts, or offer to host fundraising events or mixers.  Invite them to become fans on Facebook and spread the word.  You’ll be surprised what a kid will do for a free t-shirt.

Use the Element of Surprise

Sneak into the library, book store or grocery store.

Sneak into your local book store and hide business cards, coupons and flyers in between book or magazine pages.  Find books or products that are related to your business.  You could get creative with your printed ads and turn them into treasure or scavenger hunts.  Lead your customers on an exciting chase with a reward at the end, or have them solve a puzzle to win a prize.

Flash mob!

Flash mobs can be weird and creepy and intrusive….but they can also be fun and unexpected.  The flash mob phenom works because an entire group of people are into it.  However, be wary of offending people, and remember to be fun and amusing, instead of annoying and awkward.  See this example of a successful flash mob setup: Sound of Music | Central Station Antwerp (Belgium)

Use local landmarks.

Put up funny/ironic ads and signs near local landmarks to attract customers.  You could also use high-traffic areas to stage your flash mob scene or freebie giveaway.  Just make sure that you have a permit to solicit in whatever area you’re targeting.

Above All, Use Humor!

Star in your own reality show.

According to ChooseWhat’s own Nick Middleton, “People wanna see real people online—not stock photos and robots.”

It’s true…too many businesses take themselves way too seriously in attempting to project professionalism and quality of service.  You can be professional, but you don’t have to be dry.  (Take the popular email marketing service MailChimp, for instance.  They’ve done away with cheesy stock photos of people on computers and instead feature an amusing talking monkey.) There are a lot of ways to convey realness.  Some people post pictures of their employees or offices on their website or blog.  Other people make virtual tour-type videos that take you into the heart of a testing lab, kitchen or customer support center.  If you’re feeling creative, hire a couple of film-major interns to create your very own Jersey Shore –like series of webisodes.

Make YouTube vids.

YouTube is a great medium for generating a buzz around your business.  Consider David Choi, who did a little rap about one of the top tax software companies—TurboTax.  His video got over 100,000 views on YouTube and is rated 4 out of 5 stars by nearly 1,500 people.  He’s not even affiliated with TurboTax; yet he took the relatively dry subject of tax software to another level.  Make your own videos, and initiate your own contests.  You can do similar things on your website or blog.  It’s a cheap, easy and hilarious way to market.

Got a successful small biz marketing tactic?  Share it with us!

Map out duties

Before your intern even walks in the door on his first day, you should already know exactly what you want his duties to entail. Put that into writing, and make sure to give him a copy. It’s a great idea to give your intern ongoing duties, such as checking the mail (always the iconic intern duty), but also finite projects with deadlines. Specific tasks help the intern feel a part of your company, and it will give you greater insight to what he is capable of, which is often more than just clerical work.

Assess natural abilities

Once you’ve had a better chance to see what your intern is capable of, feel free to let him branch out to more complicated tasks. Our ChooseWhat interns help out with our larger projects, such as researching vendors, writing reviews and helping out with marketing and paid search. Try to aim your intern’s duties to his field of study and what he excels in. For example, if you have a business major, let him help you with billing or invoicing, or if you have a marketing intern, gear the duties towards social networking initiatives.

Don’t scrimp on training

Your intern will need to be adequately trained in order to complete his assignments with little supervision from you or another employee. When you first hire an intern, spend the time to train him properly. The more you teach your interns, the more you’re going to get out of them, and the more they’re going to get out of their internship.

Appoint a manager

You need an employee to supervise your intern—that could be you, or it could be the person responsible for the projects the intern is assigned to help with. That manager needs to regularly check in with the intern to make sure he is comfortable with his assignments and doesn’t have any questions. This would also be the person who could help write a recommendation at the end of your intern’s internship.

Explain the rules

On your intern’s first day, you should make a point of addressing your company’s code of conduct. Explain everything they’ll need to know—or what’s expected of them. That means explaining the dress code, logging hours, Internet access, music playing, etc. If they are going to have contact with clients, you will definitely want to make sure they know what the office’s protocols are.

Consider your size

Look at your company’s size; if it’s fairly small, it might be best to only hire one intern at a time. You want to make sure they have enough projects to be productive and that your employees have enough time to manage them. If you have too many all at once, it could become an issue. Try to stagger their work days and times as well.

Address concerns

If you recognize a problem with your intern, address it immediately. Let him know what the issue is and how to correct it. For most of your interns, this could be their first job and they might not know what the correct etiquette is. Allow them to ask you questions and learn processes correctly, but also feel free to step in when they’re doing something wrong. Your job is to make sure they succeed and garner a great learning experience, not watch them flounder or slap their wrists.

Reward them

If your intern did a great job, let him know it.  At the end of his internship, write him a great letter of recommendation, or even better, give pointers on how he can craft the perfect resume that outlines the duties he completed while at your company. And, if you have a spot available, and he was an excellent intern, consider hiring him onto your staff. Interns make great employees because they are already loyal to your company, and they know the ins and outs of your business without having to be trained upon hire.

While interns are a great tool for small businesses, your company can utilize other great, low-cost resources, such as virtual phone systems and online fax to keep your business running smoothly.

7 Most Useful Business Card Designs

The Mini-Card

Why this works: This type of business card gets right to the point.  Because the card is smaller than a standard business card, your text will stand out much more, getting people to read the pertinent information more quickly.  Mini-cards are often cheaper and more eco-friendly than standard business cards.  They’re also smaller, which saves a lot of space in people’s wallets and cardholders.

The Map

Why this works: The first business cards were originally used in London to direct people to the stores when no formal street numbers existed.  People are as lost today as they were a couple of centuries ago.  Instead of having to google directions, people can use your business card to find you easily. (For example, I once went to a lunch at a place that had quite a few business cards displayed at the front of house.  One card I picked up was for a cupcake place nearby.  I was able to use the map printed on the back to get cupcakes afterwards, which I probably wouldn’t have thought of doing that instant if the map hadn’t been there.)

Menus/Recipes

Why this works: This naturally works for restaurants and delivery services, but the basic idea behind this design trick will work for any business.  Give people a useful piece of information that they can use in the future, and they’ll be more likely to hold onto your card longer than they normally would.

Coupons

Why this works: Again, you want to give people a reason to hold onto your business card.  Attaching a coupon to your business cards encourages people to take a few and give them to friends.  Remember, word-of-mouth referrals tend to be the most valuable.

Rulers/Measurements

Why this works: This is along the same lines as the menu.  You’re providing written information that people could use in the future.  This design works great for number-crunchers, architects, designers, contractors, clothing tailors and any industry that deals with custom designs.

Hairpins/Paper Clips/Seeds (Free Items!)

Why this works: People love free things.  So, add some useful, tangible and free objects to the design of your business card.  Below you’ll see examples of free items successfully incorporated into card designs. (The hair stylist’s card includes real hairpins, and the other card is actually a packet of plant seeds.)

The USB Drive

Why this works: Attaching a USB drive to your business card can be tricky, but it can also pay off, especially if you’re in a creative field like art, music, performance or film.  You can save your portfolio, video or music clips on the USB so that potential employers can access them easily wherever they go.  Just make sure that your USB drive is relatively small and is detachable from the rest of the card.

7 Terrible Business Card Designs

The Chunky Card

Why this doesn’t work: This card has chunky plastic letters because…?  Plastic or metal cards might seem cool and unique, but sometimes they’re just cumbersome.  Try to steer clear of cards that won’t fit neatly into a cardholder, wallet or card binder.  I’m not saying it can’t be done, but exercise caution.

Google Me

Why this doesn’t work: This card has been around for a while now, and while some might think it modern and cool, we think it’s terrible.  If you hand me one of these things, you’d better work for Google; otherwise, I’m going to lecture you about wasting paper and ink just to be condescending.  I’m going to google your name anyway and probably write your number on a piece of paper, you idiot, so please just write your down name, title and phone number for me.  Thanks!

Facebook Me

Why this doesn’t work: Please see above.

The Hard-to-Read Font

Why this doesn’t work: Sometimes you think a particular font or font color would look lovely on a business card, and then you get a card with illegible text.  Stay away from light fonts on light backgrounds and dark fonts on dark backgrounds.  Also, be aware that textured card stock can make your text difficult to read.  It’s important to note that when you order business cards online, the preview will often look more legible than the actual card.

The “What do I do with this?” Design

Why this doesn’t work: You shouldn’t have to explain to me what I need to do with this business card in order to read your information.  The picture here shows a stretchy piece of rubber handed out by a gym for people to use to exercise.  So, should I stretch this card out with my hands and call you with my foot?

Peanuts

Why this doesn’t work: I’m not exactly sure how they were able to print on peanuts, but somehow they did.  Edible foods generally do not make good business cards.  The same goes for perishable items like pencils, erasers, napkins, wrappers and anything that can be thrown in the trash.  Free items are a good idea, but they should be separate from the actual business card/information.

MeatCard

Why this doesn’t work: This is really, really weird.  I’m not sure who would want to carry around a piece of jerky with words on it around with them.  It’d make for a good gag gift, but if you’re gonna go the animal route, leather is definitely classier.

Are you ready to design the perfect business cards for your small business?  Check out our reviews of Business Card Printing Services.

Try to Out-Do Yourself

Snowboarder Shaun White already had a 2006 gold medal when he stood at the top of the snowboarding halfpipe last week. He knew this was his medal to lose as he flew down the course. White completed his first run with a score of 46.8 (out of 50 points)—a full 4 points higher than his closest competition. For the second run, White was positioned to compete last. As he watched his teammate fall during a landing, White began celebrating—he had won the gold medal.  White didn’t even need to complete his second run, but he pulled out his Double McTwist 1260, two board-over-head flips inside of 3½ turns, and nailed the risky move with a score of 48.4.

Sometimes winning isn’t always the end goal—you should always strive to do your best and continually push to out-do yourself. Apple is a great example of a business that achieved this kind of tenacious, outperforming feat because when the company launched the iPod it was experiencing a boom in profitability due to the iMac. This branching into MP3 devices took Apple to another level when it could have easily rested on its laurels of producing computers. After the launch of the iPod, Apple continued to improve on their successful models until eventually releasing the iPhone, which catapulted Smartphones into mainstream America.

Be Classy

In the first day of competition, Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvii died in a horrifying crash at Whistler Olympic Park. In a time where the media tends to confuse modern-day Americans with ancient Romans hungry for blood and gore in the gladiator stadium, NBC did a tasteful thing: they refused to air the footage of Kumaritashvii’s fatal crash. NBC knew that viewers could scour the Internet to find the clip, potentially causing people to turn the channel, but they didn’t want the Olympics to be marked by tragedy.

What we can glean from NBC’s decision is that every business should choose ethics over exploitation. You don’t have to be immoral to be in business, and merely making a profit isn’t the be-all/end-all. Case in point: TOMS Shoes. For every TOMS Shoe sold, founder Blake Mycoskie donates a pair of shoes to someone in need. According to their website, there are more than 1 billion of people at risk at the world that could be helped simply with a pair of shoes. With a large following of young hipsters, the company could just be extremely profitable, but Mycoskie was inspired to help others.

Bigger Isn’t Always Better

Instead of being remembered for his skating skills, Evegeni Plushenko will go down in history as this year’s biggest sore loser. Plushenko skated a near flawless short routine in men’s figure skating, beating USA’s Evan Lysacek by half a point. The reigning gold medal winner was heavily favored to repeat gold when the men’s free skate competition began two days later. Lysacek took the ice and completed a spectacular routine—albeit one lacking the quad, the hardest jump a male figure skater can complete. He scored a 167.37. Plushenko, who earlier stated “the quad is necessary,” took the ice and bobbled slightly while landing the difficult jump. He took the silver medal instead.

While we’re not advocating not trying your best, what Plushenko has taught us is that bigger isn’t always better. Sometimes it’s best to focus on doing one thing really well instead of trying to do too much. This is definitely the case when it comes to business. You have to truly focus on what it is that your company excels at. A great example of a company who stretched itself too thin is Cosmopolitan magazine. Did you know that the popular women’s magazine, with 58 international editions, once tried to sell yogurt to its readers? Seriously. Not being content with its domination of women’s magazines, Cosmo launched a line of “sophisticated” low-fat yogurt in the U.K. in 1999. The company had high hopes to sell in other countries, but 18 months later the line had soured.

Give the People What They Want

When NBC decided to air folk ice dancing, instead of the highly anticipated Canada/US hockey game last weekend, grumbles were heard everywhere. Even NBC employees complained via Twitter. The hockey game was shown on cable channel MSNBC, a channel not available to every cable subscriber. And worse yet, the only way to watch the game online was to log in—as a cable subscriber. What a total NBC fail.

A business is nothing without clients, and in order to turn a prospect into a client, you need to offer something they want. Your business will not be successful if you don’t have a product people want to buy. Domino’s Pizza is now one of the largest pizza restaurant chains in the world, but that wasn’t always the case. In order to drum up business in a market heavily saturated by pizza delivery joints, the company gave customers something they really wanted: pizza fast. In 1973, they implemented their policy of “30 minutes or it’s free,” and business boomed.

Persistence Pays

The biggest lesson any business owner can learn about how to become successful is the old adage “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.” Look at China’s pairs figure skaters Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo who recently won the gold medal—the first time a non-Russian couple has lost the gold. Bronze medalists in the last two Olympic Games, the couple retired in 2007, got married and lived the easy life. But the duo was missing something: the gold medal. The fact they had even won bronze 4 years earlier was a huge feat considering Zhao ruptured a tendon in 2005. The couple returned to skating as the oldest couple in Olympic contention. The first to skate on February 14, Shen and Zhao scored the highest of the night with a record-breaking 72.40. They took home the gold medal the next night after their free skate.

The Chinese pair wanted to officially retire on a high note and kept trying even though they were, according to some, a little past their prime. Persistence is your biggest friend in business. You will hear ‘no’ more times than you will hear ‘yes,’ but you have to push on. Take Harland David Sanders, better known as Colonel Sanders. When he was 60 years old, Sanders had to close his restaurant because a new highway was being constructed. Wishing to retire, Sanders decided to sell his fried chicken recipe. He travelled across the country looking for a buyer. He heard 1009 “no’s” before he heard a single “yes.” Less than 10 years later, Sanders sold the Kentucky Fried Chicken corporation for $2 million. It goes to show that persistence truly does pay.

A small business owner and reader of Mr. Strauss’ column asks a very salient question: What does a small business owner do with an employee who performs well, but who also exhibits signs of a lax work ethic (e.g. coming in late, calling in sick too much, spending too much time on non work-related activities)?  Should the owner allow the employee to get away with undesirable behaviors in favor of retaining her top producer?

Mr. Strauss offers the following answer:

You are not in business to make friends with your staff. You are in business to make a profit, and the fact is, making a profit is easier when everyone is on the same page. So that begs the question: How do you get them on the same page?

By being the boss, that’s how.

Sometimes you get people on the same page by coaxing them along. Sometimes it is by offering incentives. Often it is by being a mensch. But sometimes, it is by being the tough guy.

The employee who is taking advantage of your kindness is akin to the unruly child whose parents do not know how to set limits. And it is only by setting limits that that child learns a) what is expected, and b) who is really in charge.

Mr. Strauss’ authoritarian view of small business relationships is old-school, at best, and disastrous, at worst.  By following this advice, a small business owner would likely drive her top producer away, rather than motivate the employee to stay.  Mr. Strauss fails to realize that small businesses survive because of good leaders, and that good leaders do not act the way he is suggesting.

Here are a few things for small business owners to keep in mind when deciding how to treat their employees.

1. Good leaders know that there is no “I” in Small Business.

You might be in business to make a profit, but you wouldn’t be making a profit if not for the work of your dedicated employees.  Teamwork is key for any small business.  If one employee’s behavior is causing the rest of the group to be jealous, unmotivated or resentful, then you need to fix the problem. You can either allow everyone to be late or call in sick all the time (which you probably don’t want to do), or you can incentivize to reward employees for the work they put in.  You can involve your employees in setting up goals and choosing corresponding rewards.  Make employees be accountable to themselves, as well as to you.  They’ll be happier than if you simply told them what to do.

2. Good leaders don’t say “Because I said so.”

You could boss employees around like a jerk, but that would just create more work for you in the long run.  You don’t want to micro-manage—that eats up a lot of your time and energy.  The best way to get employees to think and act the way you want them to is to lead by example.  If you’re taking two-hour lunches every day, don’t demand that your employees clock in/out on their lunch hour.  Nobody wants to work for a hypocrite, so don’t be one.

3. Good leaders pick their battles wisely.

Sure, you could berate an employee every time he’s late, but what would be the point?  Think about the larger aim of getting your employee to be more productive.  Being late means less time spent working and less productivity overall.  With an incentive program in place, you could remind your employee that more productivity equals greater rewards (positive reinforcement).  Also, show a bit of empathy and understanding.  If an employee is calling in sick a lot, he may actually be sick.  Or depressed. Or any of a number of physical or emotional things.  Be lenient, but also reiterate what you expect of the employee.  In a small business, chances are that one person’s work (or lack thereof) will significantly impact everyone else’s.

4. Good leaders focus on character traits more than rules.

Sure, you could create a bunch of rules, but you’re a small business owner (damn it)—not a legislator.  If you have to create a book of rules in order to make sure that your employees act a certain way, then you’re essentially treating your employees like children (which is what Mr. Strauss advocates).  You want to hire people who have good character traits (i.e. honest, hardworking, and reliable) because they will make better employees than others who need their hands held.  In general, if an employee is behaving inappropriately or has a poor work ethic, you should probably just fire him/her and find someone with a better attitude.  It’ll save you time, money and a giant headache.

Tailor Your Message

Decide what the voice and style of your social media networking should be. If you have a public representative who handles press and speeches, it may be beneficial to have him/her handle your social networking sites as he/she will already knowhow to tailor the company message or mission to appeal to different audiences.

Types of Social Media Accounts:

• Totally corporate account: These have no specific employee or public persona tied to the account in any way. The focus is just on promoting business news or deals.
• Corporate-led persona account: This account allows your business to tweet as a company but also to include a bit of personality and an actual person behind the account. These are corporate accounts, but they have a branded persona helping to build a community.
• Strictly personal account: These have no obvious tie to a business. This is your personal Twitter account.
• The business/personal hybrid account: This account mixes both the personal and professional. You can tweet about what’s going on in your field mixed with what movie you’re going to see. Both worlds are mixed, and this is a relationship-driven approach.
• Character account: This is an account from the perspective of a character or mascot of a company, such as @MrsButterWorths.

Jazz Up Your Profile

Your account is an online representation of your business, so be careful of how you act on social networking sites. Here are a few tips to follow:

• Get personal. Include hobbies on your Facebook account or discuss events you’re attending. It will make you (and your business) seem friendlier.
• But don’t get too personal. That is what purely personal accounts are for. There is such a thing as TMI.
• Share photos and videos. Multimedia gives your account what Office Space deemed as flair.
• But no booze shots. You’re still a professional, after all.
• Don’t be a blank slate. Keep your social networking accounts lively and updated.

Avoid These Social Networking Faux Pas

1. Don’t become a broken record. It’s fine to sync a couple of your social networks but avoid redundancies that make you look like a neophyte.
2. Don’t over-promote yourself. People will only follow you on Twitter if you have interesting things to say consistently. No one wants to become bombarded by advertisements all the time. Change things up a bit by posting links or retweeting interesting things others in your industry are saying.
3. Don’t be boring. Show some personality!

Turn Followers into Gold

The companies who are most successful at converting friends/followers into actual dollars are those who interact with users and frequently post brand-related content to their sites. Creating a Fan Page on Facebook is a great example of marketing through social networking sites. If someone becomes a “fan” of your page, it will show up in their newsfeed for all of their friends to see.

Utilize these Fan Pages by:

• Commenting on other users’ content
• Asking questions on your wall
• Posting links
• Posting events

Promote Without Being Pushy

It’s a social network, not an advertising network. Don’t scare off friends and followers by only pushing promotions.

• Create benefits. Make customers feel the need to participate.
• Talk about new features.
• Include discounts.
• Don’t always have sales-related messaging. Friends will ignore you if you’re pushy.

Learn more about how businesses use Twitter by following some of ChooseWhat’s vendors. Email marketing service MailChimp and online tax software provider TurboTax both use Twitter as a secondary form of customer service by answering customers’ questions via the social networking site. Both also use their accounts to announce new products, services and blogs.  Although both companies are fairly large, you can still take their lead in how to utilize social networking sites to expand your small business.

Cut down on paper.

Use note-taking software.

During a meeting, nobody in the room should be filling up legal pads with pages of notes.  Note-taking software offers an easier way to take notes, which can help save a ton of paper.  An example is Microsoft Office OneNote, which comes with MS Office suite.  Our favorite is currently Evernote, which is compatible with Mac OS X, iPhone, Windows XP/Vista/7, Windows Mobile and Palm Pre.  Also, you might want to check out new technologies like Netbooks, Kindles and iPads, which make note-taking much easier and speedier.

Check this Wikipedia page for a full list of note-taking software.

Get rid of the fax machine and fax online.

Faxing online does not require paper or toner.  It doesn’t even require a fax machine!  Online fax allows you to send and receive PDF faxes, which means that you can pick and choose which faxes you’d like to print and which you’d like to delete.  Not only will you save paper and toner, but you’ll also save energy required to run a fax machine.  This will keep your energy bill low, and you won’t need to spend money maintaining a piece of hardware.

Learn more about online fax services.

Order mini-cards or business cards printed on recycled card stock.

One way to cut your paper consumption in half is by cutting your cards in half.  Instead of ordering regular business cards, consider buying mini business cards.  They are small, inexpensive, and light-weight.  Nobody has any room in their wallets to carry extra cards anyway, so make it easy for yourself and for your contacts.  (One company who offers mini-cards is Moo.)  You could also order business cards printed on recycled paper and/or find a company that prints with soy ink, which requires less energy to produce than petroleum-based ink.  (One business card printing company that offers soy ink and recycled paper options is Uprinting.)

Check out more online business card printing companies.

Make recycling easy.

Put office recycling bins in strategic places.

People will want to recycle, as long as you make it easy to do.  Putting a paper recycling bin next to the office printer can have a dramatic effect.  You can also stick a recycling bin for glass and cans in the office kitchen or break-room.  Create handy signs and reminders to help point people to the bins.

Designate a box for old electronics and one of ink cartridges.

Don’t throw the defunct junk away; put it in a box and take it to an authorized e-waste recycler.  A lot of corporate chains now have recycling programs and allow you to drop off your old electronics and ink cartridges to be recycled.  Some places will accept electronic brands like Dell for free, or they may charge a nominal fee to take your old office equipment.  (Staples is an example of a company that accepts and recycles electronics and ink cartridges.)

Reward employees for going green.

Reward employees who choose to walk or bike to work.

If you’re employees aren’t driving, then you don’t have to pay for their parking.  Put the money you’re saving back in their hands by giving them a bonus for green commuting.  You can also get your office excited about walking, running or biking by entering in a local marathon or race for charity.  Last year, our ChooseWhat.com team entered our local Bun Run, sponsored by Schlotzky’s Deli, and we had a lot of fun coming up with our team name: the Numba Bun Stunnas.  Healthy employees are happy employees, so encourage green commuting in your office.

Ban Styrofoam and initiate contests for best office mugs/lunch boxes/dishes.

Styrofoam is bad. It can’t be recycled, and worse, it doesn’t biodegrade.  Avoid buying disposable cups and plates for your office. Instead, buy washable mugs and cups.  You can also ask employees to bring a personal mug to work and turn it into a contest for the best/funniest office mug.  (We tried this very contest here at ChooseWhat.com, and it was a big hit.)  You could also try this contest with lunch bags or dishes.  Reward the winner with a cash prize or voucher for free lunch.  You might be spending some money on the prize, but in the long run you’ll save a whole lot more by not buying disposable items.

Saving the planet is a really big task, but there are a lot of little things people can do around the work place to help.  Got your own tips for going green at the office? Share them with us!

Subject Lines are Your Friends

Make sure to use a compelling subject line. No one wants to read something so boringly titled “October Monthly Newsletter.” Don’t give your readers an excuse to delete your emails. Also, shorter titles are better. It’s been proven that titles with fewer than 50 characters improve responses by 50%.

Target the Right Demographic

Getting your email in front of the right eyes is almost as important as what you actually say in your eNewsletter. Your subscribers should be people or businesses that are highly likely to purchase your products or services. In layman’s terms: market to the right demographic.

Timing is Everything

It is typically better to send out emails in the middle of the week and after the early morning email rush. Be savvy about your timing. If you’re promoting events, try to send out your campaign a couple of days before, but not too far out that people might forget about it. If you’re a restaurant, send out your eNewsletter around lunchtime to entice your readers to stop by for some munchies.

Compelling Content > Promotions

People get tons of email, and if your content isn’t compelling, they will not open your newsletter, much less click through it. Make sure your content is not only relevant but also unique. Don’t just promote yourself, but also provide your readers with useful content.

Think Above the Fold

You have the subject plus three lines to get the attention of your readers. If they aren’t hooked by the time they read those lines, they will delete your email. Make sure to think “above the fold,” which means putting the most important information at the top, so that your reader doesn’t have to scroll down before getting the gist of your email.

Code Like It’s 1999

Keep it simple and avoid overly complicated HTML design. Think of your email as existing in 1999. Nearly 75% of all email clients use Outlook, which doesn’t support background images, forms, Flash, JavaScript or other plug-ins, animated GIFs, CSS positioning or floats. Make it attractive—just don’t make it too complex.

Other Helpful Tips

• Use specific, clear and measurable calls-to-action.
• Test, preview, measure and test again for accuracy.
• Personalize where possible, but don’t become excessively familiar.
• Start with a good list and keep it clean.

To learn more about email marketing service providers, read our Email Marketing Reviews.

According to a joint Nielsen Online and Webvisible survey taken last year, 44% of small businesses don’t have a website.  Furthermore, the survey found that 82% of consumers and small businesses find information primarily through search engines, as opposed to Yellow Pages and other sources.  You would think that the latter statistic would have affected the former, but the fact is that not enough small businesses are putting effort into marketing their brands online.

By now, it’s conventional wisdom that if you have a business, you need a website. Any arguments against this rule are simply excuses; there are so many benefits to having a website that outweigh any potential costs.  Here are the main ones:

Benefits of a Website

1. A website makes you visible to people who are searching for you. If eight out of every 10 people are using search engines instead of Yellow Pages, doesn’t it make sense for you to put yourself online?  If you had a website, you could create multiple pages and target keywords (or search terms) that are relevant to your business.  This lets people find you in the search results when they are searching for a specific term.  For example, if you had a cookie delivery service in Austin, TX, you might want to target “cookie delivery Austin” and other similar terms.  You could also submit your site to the local listings on the top search engines where the people in your community (i.e. your potential customers) could find you.
2. A professional website makes customers think professional service. Even if you aren’t selling things online, your website exists to promote your product or service.  A brochure, or informational, website serves as a snapshot of your business that can attract potential customers.  A professional website takes a bit of thought and effort to create, and customers will appreciate the time and effort spent on a functional resource.  They will likely equate your customer service with the professionalism displayed on the page.
3. The web is your oyster! The web often levels the playing field for both small and large businesses.  Many times, I have seen small business websites that rival or surpass those created by big businesses or national chains.  Your website can help you build your brand image and create a buzz online.  These days, things go “viral” in a matter of seconds, and with a few clicks you can market yourself to an audience of thousands.  Website = cheap, effective marketing.
4. A website lets you control your message. Sometimes I’ll type a name into Google, and the first thing I see is a Yelp page.  If I don’t see a website owned and operated by the actual business I’m searching for on the first page, I shake my head and go “tsk tsk tsk.”  It’s such a TRAGEDY!  Although Yelp can be a great resource, it isn’t the definitive, authoritative one.  If I had a question about the correct usage of an obscure word, would I poll the students of a high school English class, or would I consult the Oxford English Dictionary?  I’m pretty sure I’d go with the latter.   If you own a restaurant, I want you to tell me how late you’re open.  I want you to tell me exactly what’s on your menu.  I want to know exactly what I’m getting, and your website should be able to do that.
5. A Facebook or Myspace page doesn’t cut it. (I realize that this is not the actual benefit.  The benefit is actually that a website can support growth and expansion.)  I hate it when people throw up a Myspace page or Facebook page in place of a website.  I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Facebook pages and Myspace pages are meant for Facebook users and Myspace users.  If that’s all you’ve got, then you are excluding a large chunk of the population who don’t use and aren’t familiar with social networking sites.  Unlike web pages, a website can be accessible to all user-types.  Your site can simplify the process of finding information with easy navigation and multiple pages.  You can also give customers a place to contact you or provide feedback.  As your business grows, your website can too.  You could include e-commerce features like order forms and shopping carts; you could create forums and help pages. The sky’s the limit.  Facebook is great, but it can’t give you that functionality.  It’s not a website.

OK, so you’re convinced that you need to build a website to promote your business.  What else do you need to know?  Head over to our How to Build a Website guide to find out.

Although many small business owners and entrepreneurs have created business cards using brick-and-mortar printing companies, there are several advantages to ordering business cards online.  Read below to learn why you should consider buying your business cards online.

Low Cost

The No. 1 reason small business owners order cards online is price. Online business card printing sites, such as VistaPrint or Uprinting, offer significantly lower prices than brick-and-mortar printing shops. Basic business cards created online can cost as low as one penny per card.

Do-It-Yourself Design

Online business card printing companies give you to ability to design and customize your card yourself. There are several sites that allow you to play around with a WYSIWYG editor, which allows you to edit the content of your business cards directly on the electronic representation of the card. And there are even a couple of sites that have a full design team that can create custom cards for you from scratch.

If your needs are fairly basic and you want to design cards yourself, you can always create your own card on WYSIWYG editors when you order online. The online editors are incredibly flexible, allowing you to upload a background image and move your text around. For the most basic cards, you can use templates from these sites, which help you create a professional design quickly.

Extras

When designing cards, you can easily upgrade the finish and card stock of your cards or opt for raised lettering. Upgrades allow you to customize your business cards based on your profession. For example, raised print creates an elegant, professional look, which many lawyers love. Conversely, a person in a creative profession may appreciate a glossy card instead of a plain, matte one. The stock of your business cards is also incredibly important. You don’t want a flimsy card if you’re passing them around to hundreds of new contacts at a trade show or other business function.

Turnaround Time

Not counting overnight shipping, you can typically receive your cards in as few as 3 days if you order them online. The typical turnaround for local printing companies is around 7 days, unless you want to pay extra to expedite them. If you need your cards in a hurry–or you’re just impatient–ordering cards online is a great option.

For more information on business card printing companies, check out our Cheap Business Cards Reviews.

The AP recently reported on the increasing number of people who are taking tax deductions for their home offices.  Since quite a few people are now running their businesses out of their houses, garages and apartments, business deductions for home offices have become more standard. However, you could still get audited by the IRS if you don’t adhere to the rules.

Here are some things to keep in mind when taking tax deductions for home offices (via IRS Publication 587 for Business Use of Your Home).

1. If your home is your “principal place of business,” then you can take the home office deductions. You can still take the home office deductions if you rent space elsewhere. The IRS simply wants to make sure that some part of your home is dedicated to business activities.
2. If you “meet patients, clients or customers in your home,” then you can take the deductions. Even if your home is technically not your “principal place of business,” you can still take the deductions if you demonstrate that your home was used for work-related activities.
3. If you home office is a “separate structure” from the rest of your home, you can take the deductions.  “Separate structure” doesn’t have to mean a separate room or enclosed space like a garage; it simply means a space that is solely used for business and not personal use.  For instance, if you use your dining room as your desk during the day and to eat on at night, then you couldn’t deduct your dining rooms as your workspace.
4. If you use your home for providing daycare, you can deduct business expenses for that part of your home, even if the space is also used for personal use.Under state law, you must have a license, certification, registration or approval to run a daycare center or group in order to take the deductions.
5. To get the Business Percentage of your home, compare the square footage of the space used for business to the total square footage.  Example 1: If your home office is 240 sq. ft., and your home is 1,200 sq. ft., then your business percentage is 20%.  Example 2: If you use one room as a home office, and you have five rooms of similar size in your house, then your business percentage is 20%.  This percentage is used to calculate your deduction.
6. If your gross income from your home business is less than your total business expenses, your deductions are limited.  To deduct otherwise nondeductible expenses (such as insurance, utilities and depreciation of your home), you’ll need to take your gross business income and subtract 1) mortgage interest, real estate taxes, and casualty theft and losses that are related to your business and 2) business expenses that related to activity in the home, such as business phones, supplies and equipment depreciation.
7. Beware of deducting exorbitant sums. Home office deductions are closely monitored by the IRS.  Suspicious deductions could get you audited, so make sure that you can back up your claims as much as possible.  This means keeping receipts, invoices and detailed records of your expenses

Still haven’t filed your taxes yet? Check out our online tax software comparison to select the best product that can handle your business tax and personal tax returns: Tax-Compare.com.

Security

Last Pass: Last Pass is a great application for storing your passwords and log-ins securely.  You can use the desktop version to access all of your passwords online, simply by entering a master password.  You can also download the browser plug-in that allows you to auto-fill password fields on any website.  The iPhone app is a nice complement to the desktop version, offering mobility and security for business owners on the go.

Productivity

Documents To Go: Documents To Go lets you create and edit files for MS Word and MS Excel.  You can also view Adobe PDFs, MS Power Point files, Apple iWork files and more.  The editing tool allows you to cut, copy, paste, select, delete and align with ease.  Sync it with your desktop application or email files to/from your mobile app.  You can also create folders for quick organization.  The best thing about this app is that it’s available to so many phone brands—Blackberry, iPhone, Palm OS, Windows Mobile, Maemo, Android and Symbian.

Project Management

Basecamp: Basecamp is one of the most highly rated project management tools for small businesses, non-profits and entrepreneurs.  There are several iPhone apps that have been created for accessing Basecamp: Insight, Outpost, Minivan, Groundwork, BC Files, Cheiftent, Sherpa and Projects.  They each give you access to specific functions, such as time-tracking, creating and deleting projects and to-dos and posting comments and messages.

Social Networking

Seesmic: Seesmic posts to all of your social networking sites with the click of a button.  Easily set up your account to post to networks like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, LinkedIn, Plaxo, Tumblr and many more.  It’s the cheapest (and hippest) way to market your business!  Send coupons, updates, sales, contest info and whatever you like to all your customers, from your smartphone or desktop.

Onlywire: Much like Ping.fm, Onlywire lets you auto-syndicate content with a click of a button.  Share information on dozens of sites, like Digg, FriendFeed, Multiply and Slashdot.  You can download the browser plug-in to help you auto-submit your content, or you can download the iPhone app that makes mobile communication a breeze.

Communication

RingCentral: RingCentral offers a suite of cloud communication tools, such as internet fax and hosted PBX services.  If you sign up for RingCentral’s hosted PBX service, you’ll be able to manage your office desktop phone via their iPhone app.  The coolest thing about the app is that you can set your caller ID number to show your office phone line, instead of your personal phone number.  You can also check voicemails and create away messages, as well as set up call forwarding.

ConstantContact:   ConstantContact is one of the leading email marketing services used by small businesses.  ConstantContact’s FREE email marketing app allows you to add contacts, manage your email campaigns and contact lists and check stats for any of your email campaigns while you’re away from your computer.—perfect for small business owners who network frequently!  Let’s say that you’re at an event and you’ve just met someone who’s interested in your business, product or service.  Add that person’s email address and contact info directly to your email marketing list via your iPhone, and send him/her your next email newsletter or promotion.  It’s quick, painless and oh-so-savvy.

Hope you liked our list.  Feel free to comment with your personal favorite applications that help you run your business!

If a company is savvy enough, they’ll offer a free trial to potential customers who want to experience the product or service before making a buying decision.  Nowadays almost every service provider offering services such as email marketing services and online fax services offer a free trial, with the exception of a few companies who offer 30-day money-back guarantees.  Even online tax services give people a form of free trial, allowing them to utilize the service for free until the point of e-filing.  This is all well and good—companies should be offering free trials. But, a problem arises when the users themselves begin to expect the “free” to last forever.

Case in point: A woman once used the trial version of a popular online fax company to send a fax quickly. She doesn’t send faxes often, so the free trial worked for her. The next time she needed to send a fax, she used another free trial from a different company.   The third time she needed to send a fax, it turned out to be time-sensitive. She was faxing her application for graduate school to an out-of-state university.  But it just so happened that the third company she used resulted in a time-delay that caused her fax to be sent late, meaning that she missed the application deadline.

What could she do? If she had complained to the company she used, they probably wouldn’t have listened or cared. After all, she wasn’t a paying customer.  Her frustrations could be taken out on nobody but herself—and on the Twittersphere, which is exactly where I found this true story.

Email marketing offers another example of someone misusing the concept of “free trial”—to the service provider’s advantage.  Let’s say there’s a hypothetical man (probably a small business owner) who wants to start using email marketing tools to market his new company.  He signs up for the free trial on Constant Contact, which allows him to send emails to 100 contacts for 60 days.  Eventually, his contact list grows. But, instead of converting his free trial to the paid version, he decides to switch to iContact, which gives him up to 250 contacts.  After more list growth, he switches yet again to MailChimp, which actually offers a free plan for a list size of 500 contacts. “This is great,” he thinks. “I’ll use the free version for a long as possible, forever maybe.”

This is great—until the man’s list size exceeds 500 contacts.  When that happens, he’ll be forced to upgrade to MailChimp’s 2500-contact plan at $30/month, which may or may not be something he’s willing to do.  Now, let’s say he has 501 contacts.  He could commit to MailChimp and pay $30 for 1999 contacts he doesn’t yet have, or he could pay $12.95 to Benchmark Email for 1,000 emails to allocate as he’d like (a more economical choice).  But because MailChimp is the third company he’s tried (and because he likes the product), he’s already sold on the upgrade.  It’s genius.

In both examples, the consumer’s motivation to make “free” last forever (Ariely would call this “keeping doors open”) resulted in a waste of time as well as limitations in utilizing the product/service (the hidden “costs” that are typically unforeseen).

On the one hand, service providers would do well to recognize this bit of behavioral economics and strategize accordingly.  On the other hand, consumers might want to spend more time evaluating whether “free” is actually worth it (or, in the case of small business owners, whether a business can be built on it).

We just re-launched our sister site, Tax-Compare.com, with new reviews and information about filing your taxes this year.

We’ve added a Price Calculator that determines your Recommended Products and tells you exactly how much you’ll pay for the products. We’ve also added tax company ratings on four main categories: Ease of Use, Tax Support, Tech Support and Reliability. Your employer should be mailing your W-2s soon, so it’s a great time to shop for your tax software product. Check out Tax-Compare.com!

Taxes on internet advertising have been a hot topic for a while. Although Amazon and Overstock are safe in California, they haven’t fared so well in the state of New York, where the so-called “Amazon Tax” has been passed and upheld. Because of the bill, Amazon was ordered to being collecting taxes on sales made in New York, and Overstock bailed on the state completely. So far, the majority of states have yet to pass similar legislation. Check out and join CJ’s Facebook page here: Thank You Arnold!

Filing an extension can give you advantages which I will discuss shortly; however, it can also increase the total amount you’ll be paying via interest and late fees. So, depending on how close you are to completing your tax returns, you’ll have to gauge whether to file or not to file by the April 15thdeadline, or rather, whether you should file for an extension or not.

Here are some common reasons why you might want to postpone filing your taxes:

• You haven’t compiled all the necessary paperwork needed to file your taxes correctly. You want to make sure you’re recording every single deduction you can take.
• You own a business and want more time to fund tax-deductible retirement plans. A Keogh Plan, for example, lets you deduct either 20% of gross self-employment income or $49,000 (whichever is less) in 2009.
• Your accountant will have more time to address your specific tax issues and needs. If you shelled out the money to hire an account, you want to make sure you’re getting your money’s worth. Your accountant will have more time to devote to completing your return when they aren’t rushing to complete a dozen other returns.
• You probably won’t be audited. Usually, tax auditors fill their quotas before the April 15th deadline. So, the more time you spend on getting your tax return right, the better.

Filing an extension

To file an extension for personal taxes, you’ll be using Form 4868; for a business tax extension, you’ll use Form 7004. To file a business tax extension, all you need to provide is your business information (name, address and tax ID) and an estimation of your total income tax payment (which can be done easily by multiplying your past year’s profits by the applicable tax rate). Any major tax software will usually help you estimate the number. The IRS strongly suggests making a payment based on your total tax estimation by April 15th, in order to reduce the amount of interest and late fees (which can get up to as much as 25% of your income tax) you’ll have to pay post-deadline. Don’t worry about overpaying. In fact, the IRS will send you a refund if your estimated payment ends up being too high.

Audit triggers

Rhonda Adams in USAToday cited nine triggers that can lead to a tax audit. Many of the triggers relate to conflating personal expenses with business expenses. In other words, writing off your recent African safari adventure as a business expense is not a great idea. Also, unwarranted and frequent lavish parties (which you might have actually cut down on this year due to the recession) are likely to come under scrutiny. Another major item that’s been increasingly scrutinized lately is home office deductions. If you own a small business, it may be tempting to take home office deductions even if you don’t actually have a home office. To err on the side of caution, take these deductions if you’re positive you have the proper documentation to back them up.

Tips

You can use the free authorized e-filer FileLater (FileLater.com) to file your personal and business extensions. Their Personal Tax Extension system is able to file both personal and business extensions for you on one form, which is convenient for sole proprietors or single-member LLCs. If you used one of the well-known tax software providers to file your returns, you can easily file your extension through their web site. TurboTax has a new, free service called TurboTax Easy Extension this year. Similarly, H&R Block’s TaxCut offers TaxCut Online/Software Extension, although they charge a fee of $19.95 for e-filing your return. As an added incentive, TaxCut also gives you $10 off TaxCut Premium or Signature when you file your extension through them. However, this offer would most likely apply to people who started their tax return with another software provider and found themselves dissatisfied with the service.

E-filing errors

Here’s another compelling reason to file for an extension on your taxes: e-filing errors. If you’re a major procrastinator, don’t assume that you can be up late on the 15th, frantically rushing through an online system. This isn’t your freshman history paper—no partial credit if it’s not completely finished. Getting through the filing steps on a tax software service is just the first part of the process. Because you’re human, you’ll be forced to review and fix items in your return that may pose problems and delay your e-filing.

And don’t think that once you e-file, you’re home free. The IRS still has to approve your e-filed return. If you selected the direct debit/credit payment option, but for whatever reason your e-filed return was rejected, then your payment may be considered late unless you file an extension. The error could be as simple as incorrectly entering your birth date (i.e. your birth date not matching your SSN) or spelling your last name incorrectly. (For a more detailed list of common e-filing errors, please visit the E-filing Errors and Issues on TurboTax‘s support page.) No matter how thorough you think you are, you can be just as prone to simple mistakes as anyone else, which you have a greater chance of making if you’re filing last-minute.

For more information on filing for a tax extension, visit Tax-Compare.com

What is Hosted PBX and what does it have to do with mobile phones?

Virtual PBX (also known as a “virtual” phone system) is a “cloud technology” that allows you to manage your business phone system online through a web-based interface. Many businesses and small businesses already utilize virtual phone systems instead of costly traditional phone systems. If the majority of business phones will be mobile phones by 2011, as Gartner predicts, then we’d have to assume that the transition will be made possible by virtual PBX, which allows you to route calls, to let multiple people receive a call from one phone number, and to transfer calls between employees. A virtual PBX gives you all of the functionality of a traditional business phone system, but it also allows you to access and manage your phone system from any computer, or mobile device.

Is switching to mobile phones practical right now?

It depends. There are a few factors to consider when evaluating business PBX on mobile phones as a viable alternative to traditional PBX systems. Even though more and more people are purchasing Smartphones nowadays, utilizing virtual PBX on these phones takes a bit of work.

According to ChooseWhat.com’s own Nick Middleton, “Although incoming calls to office extensions could easily be forwarded mobile devices using basic plans from providers like Phone.com or RingCentral, outgoing calls require the mobile user to manually call into their system, log in, and then place the call. However, it is impractical for cell phone users to complete this process every time he or she wants to make a call.”

The solution? Recognizing the challenges facing pbx/cell phone users, RingCentral has released an iPhone application that automatically logs on to the RingCentral system and lets the user easily make outbound calls.

Other competitive virtual PBX providers are expected to follow suit in the near future. As new Smartphone PBX applications become more available, utilizing business PBX capabilities on a mobile device will become increasingly easier. If the majority of people in your office are already using Smartphones, then utilizing business PBX capabilities would be a matter of simply installing an inexpensive app on the phones. If your employees do not currently own internet-accessible phones, then you may need to evaluate the costs/benefits of replacing or supplementing their mobile devices.

How should I start going mobile?

Gartner outlines a four-step plan that companies ought to follow in order to transition from traditional hardware to mobile systems:

1. Plan (how and when to make the switch)
2. Procure (a reliable service plan)
3. Manage(costs, standards and security)
4. Remove (hardware)

A plan for switching to mobile pbx systems might be rather detailed and complex for large corporations, but for many small businesses, the process may be rather simple. While it may take a large corporation several months to internally implement the phone system change, a small business can do so in a matter of days.

Not ready to go mobile?

The report from Garter simply outlines a growing trend for business telecommunications. In no way should it dictate the choices you make about how to run your small business. So, you shouldn’t feel pressured into going mobile if you feel you or your company just isn’t ready. But, even if you don’t decide to take your business from traditional phone systems to mobile PBX overnight, there’s no need for you to wait until 2011 to start utilizing virtual PBX services, which can replace your current phone system with low-cost desktop phones with full business PBX functionality. In fact, since the economy is forcing many enterprises and small businesses to cut down operating costs, virtual PBX is quickly becoming the preferred alternative to traditional phone systems.

1. Brick-and-mortar stores (especially “mom ‘n pop shops”) can benefit more than they realize by optimizing online.

Example: There’s a local cupcake shop that only sells cupcakes in one city. But the cupcakes are so good that people drive half an hour, an hour, or more just to buy cupcakes from that one store. These people may not stay in that city; they may move away, which people often do. But while they’re away, there’s a strong chance that they’ll crave those cupcakes and want to order some online. If this store had a website, and it was optimized for specific search keywords, a person could easily find information about the store and have a place to request orders. So, even if the cupcake shop doesn’t do deliveries yet, they’ll at least be able to gage when/if they should expand. So, online optimization is mutually beneficial for the cupcake shop and for its customers.

2. Being visible online helps get you on the radar for any journalists who might write about your business.

Journalists are being asked to do more with less these days—that’s why they’re always searching online in lieu of other research methods. And even if they’re not using search and social media tools now, a great majority of them will in the near future. So, it’s very possible for your business to get on the 10 o’clock local news via optimized keywords on Twitter. And who doesn’t want free publicity for their business? It pays to be online.

Mr. Marks begins with a “statistic”: 40% of small businesses don’t have a web site. He then uses this statistic as support for his central thesis, which is simply that not every small business needs a web site. I’m sure you can easily spot the non sequitur. (Answer: Just because some small business owners don’t have a web site, it doesn’t necessarily follow that they don’t need a web site.) In fact, there are so many reasons why you should have a web site that I decided not just to comment on Mr. Marks’ post, but to write a rebuttal article dispelling the web site myths Mr. Marks seems so eager to propagate.

Myth #1: Site Rank is the only indicator of web site value.

Mr. Marks asks you to do a “fun exercise”: check the rankings for some of your local small businesses and see how low their sites rank online, “[w]hich means that no one, other than [the site creator's] mother (and my mother), is visiting it.” Marks’ conclusion? You shouldn’t waste money on a site that nobody visits. When people say they are “ranked” they usually mean indexed by a search engine for a particular term. Indexing is only important if you are using search engines to drive traffic to your site. For instance if you provide landscaping services in Austin, Texas, it would be valuable to you for people searching for “landscaping in Austin” to be shown your website as a search result. However, the majority of small business owners simply need to be easy to find for people who are looking for them specifically. Your goal would be to provide information to people who are trying to learn more about your business, which is the main reason why you need a web site. Mr. Marks would have you believe that, if you’re going to create anything online, a single web page will suffice. By the end of this article, I will have explained why a web page is not a viable solution to lacking a web site.

Myth #2: Creating a web site takes lots of time, money and outside help.

Mr. Marks makes a distinction between a web page (which he admits most small business owners should create) and a web site, which he defines as “a collection of many Web pages” with “[l]ots of pretty pictures…Flash videos…Pop-up windows…High-definition graphics.” But it’s a distinction that didn’t need to be made at all. Just because a “web site” contains multiple “web pages,” it doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily harder to create than a single web page. In fact, creating a web site is the next logical step if you already have a pre-existing web page (which I’ll explain in the next section).

Quite a few people still think that if they don’t have the first clue about setting up a web site, they ought to immediately go out and hire a bunch of expensive experts, or, as Mr. Marks likes to say, “one of those turtleneck-and-vest-wearing, greasy-haired propeller heads.” But the truth is that many free web site builders and site creation wizards give you the ability to do what the experts do, without having to spend many hours or dollars. The most popular and affordable web hosting providers like GoDaddy include such tools with their service for free. You can use and edit pre-created web page templates or even input your own HTML or CSS code. There are even a few free flash site builders out there that can help you create a site that looks like it was professionally done.

My advice? Sign up for a free trial of any web hosting service and test it out. You’ll find that it’s a lot easier and more fun than you probably thought it would be. Just last week, our entire office did an exercise that proved this point to be true. Each person, myself included, signed up for a web hosting service and created sites using free site builders and/or free web site creation tools found online. At the end of the week, everyone from our Office Manager to me, a writer with little to no experience in programming or graphic design, had easily created a professional web site that could rival many others already indexed on search engines.

(Check out some of our staff’s web sites, created using inexpensive site builders: TextThings.com, The-Fax-Guide.com, Compare-Fax.com, ExecSuiteFinder.com)

Myth #3: Web sites are only good for web businesses.

The assertion that websites are good for web based businesses is intuitively obvious. The assertion that they are worthless to non web based businesses is ridiculous. Many small service businesses such as lawyers, accountants, etc. use their websites to inform potential customers about their services and to generate leads by capturing information from such potential clients. These are clearly not web based businesses, but they will clearly benefit from an easy to use, professional looking website.

Mr. Marks argues, however, that web sites are necessary for some specific small businesses (i.e. “if you’re in the Internet porn business, or sell things online”) and superfluous for others (i.e. “gas station owners, restaurateurs, insurance agents, shopkeepers…CPAs, architects, landscapers, plumbers, and electricians”). The latter group, he says, doesn’t have money to waste on web sites because they need to invest elsewhere. “They’re O.K. with no web site,” Marks declares.

My question to him would be, “Are you O.K. with just O.K.?” Does O.K. sound like a small business that’s exceedingly successful? The fact is that if you’re operating your small business under a “simply getting by” mentality, then you certainly will not get by, especially not in this economy—when each and every potential new customer plays a crucial part in helping your business survive.

Let’s use one of the groups that Mr. Marks claims can get by without a website, restaurateurs, as an example. Just a few days ago, I decided to Google one of my favorite local restaurants. But instead of an official web site, I saw a MySpace page at the top of the search results. And I groaned.

What’s wrong with a MySpace page (or Facebook page, or any other type of page which might serve as a business card or brochure for your business)? A MySpace page is created for MySpace users, just as a Facebook page is created for Facebook users. So, the problem is that there just wouldn’t be any way to transcend that very specific user-niche with just a single “web page.” This is why Mr. Marks is very wrong. A MySpace page ought to be a supplement to a web site—not the other way around. In fact, if you’re actually paying somebody to host a single page that displays nothing but contact information, then you’re probably throwing your money away.

Imagine if the restaurant I Googled had a web site where information was easily accessible to any and every user. Imagine pages of information—not only contact information and business hours, but a full-scale menu, a page to place orders for delivery or pick-up, a page about the products they use, the freshness and quality of the food, a feedback section or forum for people to discuss what they like or don’t like, pop-ups with weekly coupons or daily specials. That, my friend, is a full-fledged web site. And it is something that could very well attract enough people to keep a restaurant operational for a long time. Finally, it is something you can create yourself for as low as $10 a month and a couple of days.

• ChooseWhat newsletter going out tomorrow today! Useful info on taxes, phones, faxes, and email marketing stuff.
• We reviewed a new internet fax service today! Check out the review of Venali on our Online Fax Reviews section.

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Correctly Calculate Your Recovery Rebate Credit for 2008:

Many news outlets have already reported that a recent sampling of already-filed tax returns shows that 15% of filers have miscalculated their 2008 recovery rebate credit. What is the recovery rebate credit?

In short, it is the amount the government owes you if either 1) you did not receive a stimulus check last year, or 2) you received less than what you should have received. There are a few simple steps you can take to easily avoid miscalculating your rebate credit.

First of all, do not put down the amount of the rebate you received on the recovery rebate credit line. You need to enter what you haven’t yet received. To find out what you’re owed, all you need to know is the amount you have received. If you don’t know this number, it’s best to check with the IRS by calling their Recovery Rebate Hotline at 1-866-234-2942.

If you’re using tax software to file your return, you can put in the amount of your stimulus rebate, and it will automatically calculate the difference, i.e. what you are owed. You’ll spend a lot more time if you try to calculate the number by hand or use the IRS worksheet (which is more than one page long) to calculate it. If you want the IRS to calculate it for you, you can enter “RRC” next to the recovery rebate credit line. If you want nontaxable veterans’ disability or death benefits to be factored, also add “VA” next to the line. If you want nontaxable combat pay to be factored, also add “NCP” next to the line. (This information is taken from the IRS website.) However, for the fastest calculations, and to expedite your tax refund, use tax software to automatically calculate your recovery rebate credit for 2008.

According to CNET, Skype will allow phone users to import their Skype contacts into their phone address book and utilize Skype’s instant messaging client. But more importantly, users of the new phones will be able to make free and low-cost calls via their phone’s internet connection, or VoIP as it is now commonly called.

VoIP has been lauded as cost-effective means to call internationally, as the rates are much less than they would be on traditional international phone plans. Hot on Nokia’s heels, Sony Ericsson has also announced plans to integrate Skype into their own line of smartphones. Ready to get your hands on one of these phones? Not so fast. As of now, the phones will be primarily available outside of the U.S., where Nokia and Sony Ericsson have bigger pieces of the market. The reason? Domestically, where AT&T, Verizon, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile are major players in the cellular phone market, there hasn’t been much enthusiasm for integrating VoIP services with phone plans—at least not from the service providers.

The only provider who seems to be embracing VoIP (willingly or not) is Apple, whose iPhone App Store website now sells some non-Skype VoIP applications to iPhone users. So, why should cell phone users here in the U.S. care about the Nokia-Skype partnership? Well, because sooner rather than later, cell phone users in the U.S. are going to be sitting around, fiddling with applications, wasting more time and money, while their European counterparts are saving a ton of money and time which will eventually be used in one way or another to figure out how to take over the American markets. And then we’ll all wish we had Skype to begin with. I admit I’m exaggerating a bit. But, actually, if you read the comments posted on websites now, you’ll find statements like the following:

• “Skype need to be in iPhone” (from Berke.h)
• “After this announcement, I believe “official” Skype is a must on iPhone even i support this” (from friends_forlifetime)
• “Skype should replace the entire world’s phones. It may be a monopoly, but it’ll be better than our situation now, right?” (from JetStone)

While, I’m sure the majority of Americans would not be as disposed to the idea of a monopoly as the last commenter, I’m quite sure they’re just as peeved about the fact that we can’t find a way to work out the VoIP issues. And what if the major U.S. phone companies aren’t willing to work it out? In that case, instead of “Have my people call your people,” let’s just say, “Have your VoIP people call our VoIP-less people.”

Here is my snapshot of each of the options given on Mashable’s list of free applications.

Best:

• Bootstrap – Not only does this app let you view income and expenses, but it also gives you two other very valuable tabs: Taxes and Reports. View estimated tax liability and receive email notifications of quarterly tax due dates. The reports section gives you a robust interface with expenses segmented into categories such as “contractors and freelancers,” “taxes and licenses,” “utilities,” etc. This app gives you the full feature set for free, but expect to be charged in the future for some of the features.
• Zoho Invoice—Though the free plan is pretty standard (5 invoices/month and unlimited customers), you also get templates & layout customization, multicurrency support, pdf file invoices, invoice tracking, overdue reminders, online payment integration, thank-you emails, recurring invoices, reports, SSL encryption, unbranded emails and integration with Zoho Projects integration. We wouldn’t expect anything less from Zoho. I give this one an A for functionality.
• Invoice Journal – This site has a great interface and basic service. Invoices are not only filed in an easily manageable list, but they also can be marked and viewed as “open,” “draft,” “closed,” or “overdue.” You’ve also got the ability to change your invoice email settings, Paypal settings and even your invoice template to suit your needs. A “Reports” section, which would allow you to view your invoices by date, client, product or tag, is forthcoming.
• Shoeboxed—You can upload unlimited receipts and create unlimited email receipts with the free app. The other paid service plans will scan your receipts and business cards for you, starting at $9.95/month.

Useful:

• LiteAccounting – “Lite” is exactly right. Use this app to create lists in 3 categories: Products and Services, Customers and Invoices. A free account gives you: unlimited Products and Services, unlimited Customers, 5 invoices/month, email invoices, unbranded emails, pdf file invoices, secure SSL connection and your logo on site and invoices. However, recurring invoices are NOT available.
• CurdBee—It’s quite like LiteAccounting in that it only gives you 3 tabs: Invoices, Clients and Items. It’s not the best, but it’s not the worst either. The functions are also something you could probably do yourself in an Excel document.
• Endeve –Free unlimited invoices and customers, digital signature, pdf file invoices and email notifications. The free account, however, does not include unlimited expenses or unlimited contracts.
• ContractPal – This service, which allows you to complete, validate, sign and process your contracts online, is not actually free. You can get up to 10,000 transactions per month for $1.49 per contract.
• Zapproved—This is a useful free service for creating, sending and storing proposals. Your maximum attachment size is 1MB, and archive storage capacity per person is 50MB. Data is stored for up to 60 days, but if you upgrade to paying account, you’ll give unlimited storage retention, 1MB archive storage and 4 MB maximum attachment size.
• Mumboe—This is a free trial that gives you up to 10 agreements and 50MB of storage space. Not really for accounting purposes, but probably useful for some people.
• Invoice Place—Use this app if you’re going to be doing a lot of international business. Its advantage is that it sorts and handles multi-currency invoices and expenses. Otherwise, the free feature seat is lacking. Although you get unlimited customers in your list, you only get 5 invoices/month and 100 products/services, which is actually really terrible.

• Accounting, Billing, Invoicing, Estimating & Contracts
• Calendars & Scheduling
• Charts, Diagrams, and Whiteboards
• Collaboration & Workgroups
• Conferences, Presentations & Meetings
• Crowdsourcing, Networking & Community
• Customer Relationship Management, Customer Service & Contact Management
• Database, File Storage & Information Management
• Email (Marketing)
• Employee Management, Payroll & Human Resources
• Feedback
• Marketing & Publicity
• Money Making & eCommerce Solutions
• Office Applications
• Organization & Management
• Phone & Voicemail
• Task Lists, Planning & Project Management
• Time Management & Tracking
• Virtual Office Platforms
• Website Tools
• Industry-Specific
• Miscellaneous (e.g. Resumes, Contact Management, Research, etc.)

The list, which is described as the crème de la crème of web apps, covers every area of business management and resources that one can think of. But though every application is summarized and sourced for your convenience on their website, Mashable doesn’t (as of yet) provide any reviews of the applications they mention. So, look forward to more detailed info in the near future. In the meantime, if you have some time during the holidays, feel free to have a look at the Mashable list for yourself. Pick just a couple of the best-sounding, most applicable web services, and try them. You’ll probably be surprised and enlightened at what you learn.

1. Entrepreneur Peter Justen says that there are some advantages of starting a business during an economic downturn (via “Starting a Business in a Downturn”, BusinessWeek.com). These include:

• the ability to get retail at lower costs
• office and warehouse space at lower costs
• being able to more easily negotiate with landlords
• cheaper and readily accessible office equipment and furniture
• less competition
• soft ad rates
• more mutually beneficial partnerships to increase business survival

2. Stacy Perman explains how labor is becoming a buyer’s market, as large corporations lay off more and more employees. These employees have tended to flock towards small businesses, which benefit by the influx of cheap, good, readily available workers (via “What Layoffs Mean for Small Employers,” BusinessWeek.com).

3. Whether they’re out of a job or just venting frustrations about the limitations of today’s economy, people are networking more. Using social network sites can potentially be a good thing. They provide an outlet for anxiety and frustration and allow people to share experiences, empathize with one another and support one another. The friends and contacts you make today could be your gateway to better jobs or even better employees in the future (via “The Recession: My Facebook, My Therapist,” BusinessWeek.com).

4. Yes, it’s a bad time. But are entrepreneurs letting it faze them? They never have, and they aren’t now. There are reports of studies, showing that small business owners and entrepreneurs are maintaining positive attitudes and that optimism is rising. Take this one for example:

“I think we need to change the mindset,” said Travis Sims, owner of Extreme Entertainment. “Instead of cutting back, we need to explore how we can grow. We have to remain positive and remember that the strong will survive. It’s all about meeting new people and building positive relationships,” (via TMNews.com).

In general, due to the recession, small business owners and entrepreneurs have been compelled to rethink their business models and to re-design to meet customer demand and to stay afloat. If these businesses succeed now, we have every reason to believe they will flourish in better times.
Setting yourself up for future prosperity and success isn’t such a bad thing. It’s actually a glass half-full kind of thing.

Junk Fax Lawsuit

Faxed advertisements from Envarion were sent to 57 different counties in Indiana and garnered 1,842 complaints, which is the largest number of recorded infractions since the state’s Do Not Fax law was enacted in last year (source: InsideIndianaBusiness.com). Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter is quoted as saying, “These fax offers are frustrating for business owners who bear the brunt of the costs of unsolicited junk faxes. We don’t want Indiana citizens wasting their time sorting through unwanted piles of paper each day. Home-based businesses also have the added frustration of interrupted privacy during the owners’ time spent with family.”

Understanding Why Unsolicited Faxing Happens

Junk fax lawsuits never fail to surprise me. No matter how many states enact anti-junk fax laws, the problem of receiving unsolicited advertisements through fax machines doesn’t seem to disappear. This lawsuit is just the latest case of unwanted faxes to surface in the news. And it likely won’t be the last. Though we can’t be entirely sure of the reasoning behind sending junk faxes, we can guess that companies who do it either don’t realize the consequences of sending junk faxes (which isn’t very likely) or choose to disregard the consequences in favor of large-scale advertising through a relatively low-cost medium. The latter reason is also the reason why we still find spam e-mails in our inboxes despite the CAN-SPAM Act and other anti-spam legislation.

Realistically speaking, laws can only do so much. Despite the fact that we have laws that are supposed to deter people from despicable actions, there is a small minority who will break the rules for their own gain. That said, when a threat to our privacy and freedom exists, good sense dictates that we ought to take every measure available to prevent something bad from happening. In other words, be proactive.

Solutions

Let’s use spam email as an example. If you keep getting spam emails sent to your inbox, what do you typically do? Do you automatically call up your email host and complain that someone is violating the CAN-SPAM Act and then wait for them to take care of the problem? You would probably make sure to follow appropriate procedures to eliminate spam on your own first. You’d mark the messages as spam, add them to your blocked senders list, be careful not to open similar messages in the future, and report the sender to anti-spam organizations and blacklists. If we can be proactive when it comes to email, why can’t we be just as proactive when it comes to faxes? After all, junk faxes can be much more costly and more time-consuming than junk emails. Faxes waste paper, toner and the time you could have spent sending or receiving necessary faxes. For that reason, I strongly advocate using online fax services.

One of the biggest advantages of using an internet fax service is that your service provides you with an online interface that allows you to see where an incoming fax is coming from and who’s sending it. Your received faxes are stored on hosted web space that you can access through a login. This feature allows you to choose the faxes you wish to print and to delete the faxes that you suspect are junk. If you wish to tie your fax account to an email address, you can view the received fax in your inbox and easily delete junk faxes.

With an internet fax service, you are also able to alert your provider to junk faxers and easily block them, or simply choose not to print them. The service can potentially save you from a lot of grief and is as low as $10 a month, which is cheaper than the cost of a dedicated phone line. It really is that easy and that sensible. And it’s there for a reason. Please, for the love of God, I don’t want to hear any more about junk fax problems in 2009. Start using online fax today.

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According to the report, 20% of the companies surveyed continued to send email messages to recipients after they had requested to unsubscribe, and at least five companies admitted to sending emails 10 days after they’d received an unsubscribe request, which is a violation of the federal Can Spam Act. The reason behind the flubs is not entirely clear. They could have occurred because marketers, in spite of potentially ruining their reputations, attempt a last ditch effort to keep customers, or simply because they don’t realize they’ve made a mistake (via Top Firms Fumble Opt Outs: Return Path, DirectMag.com). The latter, however, could easily be remedied by marketers surveying their email list and asking for customer feedback. Whatever the case may be, receiving a bunch of unwanted email messages from a company always results in negative consequences.

In light of the reports about big businesses, it’s understandable that small businesses have under-utilized or ignored email marketing tools. But the fact is that successful companies, who often see an increase in revenue of 50% or more, continue to use email marketing tools to reach customers effectively and instantaneously. That’s why people like me keep writing about it. If utilized correctly, email is a powerful, valuable means of marketing online. Jeremy Saibil, director of deliverability at Campaigner, says that email marketers should empathize with email recipients to fully test the deliverability and effectiveness of emails before sending them. He advises:

Have your IT folks set up a pristine, never-before-used e-mail box. Take this new address and subscribe to all of your own marketing programs. Now take a step back and put yourself in the shoes of your users and ask yourself how many e-mails you send a week as a company (The e-mail deliverability blame game: Marketers need to look in the mirror, DMNews.com).

Always remember that the full responsibility for your marketing efforts should never fall solely on your service provider. You should take the time to make sure your email messages are worth someone’s time and interest. And that means choosing an email marketing service provider who can meet your expectations. In an economy like ours, marketers can no longer afford to waste time and money on ineffective practices.

Advantages of the service include the ability to share desktops with co-workers, colleagues and partners and the option to utilize blogs, wikis, texting and other social networking tools simultaneously with video and audio to share information. The majority of web conferencing service providers have thus far tended to offer free service for a trial period, after which the user is prompted to select from a tier of service plans. OpenaCircle.com, however, offers full access from the get-go to web-based “meeting and information-sharing spaces,” which are private and fully equipped with convenient work tools for presentations, A/V conferencing, storing/sharing files and planning and scheduling meetings.

Here are some of the best features:

• Secure, private rooms
• Permanently open 24 hours a day
• Create a new circle for every customer, project or team
• Live presentations and desktop sharing
• Advance schedule meetings, presentations and events

What I love is that the bigwigs at OpenaCircle.com explain on their blog the positive implications of utilizing web applications not only on pocketbooks, but also on the green initiative. Here are a couple of quotes from the blog:

What will drive business travelers to go GREEN isn’t a sense of creating a smaller carbon footprint or being a responsible corporate citizen (though 40% of frequent business travelers say they are concerned). No, it is the simple fact that it doesn’t make financial sense anymore to travel to “get the sale.”

Just think about how much bandwidth you have at home compared to what you have at the office. Sure, you have a large pipe coming into the office, but shared amongst how many people. And what if 1/3 of those users are sending live video or sharing their desktop.

So, maybe going GREEN might mean also, sending your workforce home. Think about it – less office space, a smaller carbon footprint, and your workers not having to drive into the office (Jul 30, 2008).

I couldn’t make the point any better. OpenaCircle.com illustrates the notion that “going green” isn’t really a notion anymore. It is becoming not a matter of choice, but a matter of sustainability for businesses everywhere. At the end of the day, “alternatives” aren’t simply for those willing to gamble or for those with the luxury of time to test-drive something new. They become part of your bottom line.

Do high PageRank sites show up first when you do a search? No. In fact, if you do a search on Google for “search engines”, www.google.com doesn’t show up at all. Do the same search on Yahoo and www.google.com shows up in spot number 2, behind www.yahoo.com of course. If Google doesn’t manually interfere with their algorithm, and their homepage is a search engine with a PageRank of 10, why does their site not show at all in the search results?

This is what Google has to say about PageRank: “PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page’s value.”

In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves “important” weigh more heavily and help to make other pages “important”. That’s great information, right? Unfortunately, I couldn’t find that information on Google’s site. Instead, I found it on Wikipedia, which is only a PR 7 site. Google itself, on the other hand, gets a PR 10. When searching for Google’s own PageRank, wouldn’t you expect it to be easier to find information from Google, a PR 10 site, rather than Wikipedia at a lowly PR7?

For a while, my conclusion was that the whole PR thing is a scam and that Google is the only PR 10 site. I was wrong. The United States Federal Government’s homepage, www.usa.gov, is also a PR 10. The US Senate (www.senate.gov) is a PR 9 as is the Library of Congress (www.loc.gov/index.html) and fellow search engine, Yahoo (www.yahoo.com). The US House of Representatives (www.house.gov), the US Supreme Court (www.supremecourt.gov) and all three branches of the military (www.airforce.com, www.army.mil and www.navy.mil) are all only PR 8s. However, if you’re looking for information on any of these organizations, I recommend slumming it with PR 7 Wikipedia.

Children lollygagged around, bored and listless, with not much to stimulate their minds—no activities, no play areas set up. The guy standing in front of me was heard to utter “This sucks” under his breath several times. The event, though described as a family affair, was clearly more targeted to adults—those humans with wallets and credit cards and the power to buy lingering inventory. It was no surprise that the new store Vivo Chocolato! was brimming with parents and kids alike. (Chocolate, in my mind, is very much the G-rated version of an alcoholic beverage.) Thinking about the economy makes me want to get choco-faced.

Thanksgiving isn’t even here, and it seems that people have been talking about Black Friday since before Halloween. Following the recession this year, the post-holiday shopping sale event has a special significance. It could actually make or break many businesses. That reality has caused many retailers to slash prices to such an extent that has never before been seen. “In response [to the recession], retailers have been rolling out non-stop bargains. Wal-Mart offered 10 popular toys for $10 in October, Toys “R” Us has touted its “lowest prices of the season” and Gap Inc offered 30 percent off last weekend — all well before Thanksgiving,” writes Nicole Maestri (Reuters).

As I wrote in my previous Black Friday post, there are quite a few deals out there, and there is also plenty of time to buy. Many retailers are opening their stores as early as midnight and extending the sales through the entire weekend. Online retailers are planning to promote sales until Monday, which is aptly being called Cyber Monday. As a small business owner, you’re trying to save money and trim spending during this time. But it may be wise to purchase while the deals are good and the equipment is low-cost. Thanks to a change in the 2008 Federal Tax Code, tax write-offs for property that directly relates to business activities (such as printers, scanners, projection screens, etc.) are at an all-time high (MarketWatch). It is likely that businesses will save more by purchasing now rather than by waiting until they have extra in their budgets. If you’re upgrading your equipment from equipment that is used and not malfunctioning, then donate your old equipment to a place like Goodwill. You’ll get a tax receipt, which allows you to write off even more. It’s a good thing.

To keep up with consumers who are now thoroughly discriminating value from price, retailers will have to know exactly what consumers are looking to buy this season and shrewdly price items. The “price-as-product-feature” model is going to have to go away, at least for a while. Not many people are thinking that expensive is necessarily better anymore. They’re going to have to evaluate the crappy coffee they buy every morning from Starbucks. Maybe people will finally realize that $5 really is way, way, too much for unhealthy additives that make the bland coffee taste better and the rather noisy, energy-wasting “barista ambience.”

While you’re in between shopping trips, check out products that can help save your business time and money spent researching products and services, such as internet fax services and hosted pbx services. And for comparison information on taxes and tax software, visit Tax-Compare.com.

Two notable providers of online software are Google Apps and Zoho, both of which offer downloadable word processors, spreadsheets, document management and presentation tools (among other things) that emulate the applications of Microsoft Office. And the best part about web-based software is that it’s completely free. Most of us are used to MS Office—that’s why we keep coming back. I, for one, have downloaded a 90-day free trial of MS Office 2007 on my home computer, which allows me to use the most up-to-date software without spending a dime. Of course, if you opt to use a free trial, you must also remember to check the box that will prompt you to buy the software once your trial expires, instead of the one that will automatically renew your software and charge you.

But there are also advantages to browser-based applications. “Because the applications reside on the Web, developers can quickly eliminated bugs and add bells and whistles, like the ability to insert headers, footers and pagination…” writes Anna Hamilton (Time). Riding the trend train, Microsoft is expected to put out a free, light version of its software on the Web by 2010. It’s a long way off. When my MS Office free trial ends in January, I’m not planning on renewing my software. At least until Microsoft puts its apps online, we can utilize Google Apps and Zoho without hesitation.

Even more interesting is the fact that those with personal incomes between $200K-$350K are seven times more likely to have over 150 connections. So the next time your boss catches you on your favorite social networking site, just let him or her know that you’re making friends in order to make more money.

My first response is to point out that there is no “top of the search engines.” Each word or phrase (keyword) you search for will have its own set of top results, so the first thing you need to do is figure out which keywords are most important for your website to appear among the top listings. The three factors that you need to consider when making this decision are:

1. The likelihood that the person that typed the keyword into the search engine is someone who would purchase the goods or services that you offer on your site. How “qualified” are these people?
2. The number of people searching for the keyword: Even if you think a keyword is very relevant to your business, if no one is searching for it, top search engine rankings for that keyword isn’t going to help you much.
3. The “competitiveness” of the keyword versus the expected financial benefit of being one of the first 5 listings for the keyword: Reaching the first page of results for some keywords is very difficult, some are very easy, and most are somewhere in-between. For example, if you have just built a site for your mortgage brokerage, the keyword mortgage may not be a good target for you. Although the relevance of the word mortgage is high and there are millions of searches per month for the keyword, the competitiveness of that term is so high that you would not likely be able to reach the first page of results of that keyword for several years, if ever.

If you are going to actively try to get your site ranked higher on the search engines, selecting the right keywords to target is the most important step. Once you’ve chosen your keywords, you need to take steps to “convince” the search engines that your site is the most relevant to these keywords of any of the websites online. This is done in two primary ways:

1. Using the keywords strategically on your site: The most important place to have the keywords is in the title bar (this is the blue bar on the top of your Browser- on ESPN, the title bar says “ESPN: The Worldwide Leader in Sports”).
2. Getting other websites to link to your website: Any link to your site is helpful, but the most valuable ones are the ones that come from sites with a high page rank (Google assigns every website with a page rank 1 through 10. The higher the page rank, the more powerful the site), have content relevant to the keywords that you are targeting, and link to you using your targeted keywords in the anchor text (anchor text are the blue words with the line underneath them that you click on to go from one web page to another).

There have been roughly a bazillion articles, blog entries, and web sites written on the above two steps. I’ll continue to provide information about this is we go along, but this entry is simply to provide you with a basic foundation from which to start.

Deal

The deal between Google and Yahoo would have allowed Google to expand their paid search marketing presence through ads placed on Yahoo search pages. In turn, Yahoo would have gained an estimated $800 million in annual revenue, which is substantially higher than the $47.5 billion offer from search advertising competitor Microsoft. Now, Yahoo will need to find an alternate means of recouping losses that have left its market price at half its previous value and of raising revenue that will improve its floundering status among search advertisers. If the deal were to have gone through, Google and Yahoo would have controlled over 80% of search advertising in the U.S.–which is precisely the reason why consumers, competitors and the government expressed concerns about price-fixing the paid search market and a possible monopoly arising over e-commerce.

No Deal

Some have speculated that Yahoo will be forced to renew talks with Microsoft and to consider selling shares at a much lower asking price than was offered the first time around. CNNMoney also reports that “Yahoo has been discussing a possible acquisition with AOL’s corporate parent, Time Warner Inc.” Walking away from the table has left Google no better or worse than before. The search giant had everything to gain and nothing to lose from the partnership. As Google forges ahead to “drive down the road of innovation” (as stated by Google’s chief legal officer David Drummond), Yahoo is left reeling at another lost opportunity. Microsoft, on the other hand (or other scale, in the balance of power, if you will) had been concentrating on driving a wedge between its other two competitors by actively and vocally opposing the partnership. Many expect Microsoft to come back to the table to negotiate with Yahoo soon enough. While Google has walked away relatively unscathed, some critics argue that damage has been done to brand reputation, nonetheless.

Google’s attempt at paid search advertising domination is “damaging its brand,” says Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy. “The perception of Google has changed.” But has it? As Google has grown larger, expanded its online presence and pioneered the way into new revenue-rich territories, the move to partner/control/attain Yahoo was almost expected, unsurprising. And there is another way to look at the loss, one which is framed in such a way that Google ultimately comes out a victor, undeterred in its efforts at expansion. Sorry, Yahoo. It’s rather difficult to drive down the road of innovation when Google controls all the traffic lights.

According to the Annual Small Business Holiday Outlook released by email marketing company, Constant Contact, eighty-six per cent of small businesses worry that the decline in the economy will harm their holiday sales which, for some, account for up to half of their annual income. As a result, many small businesses will be giving fewer holiday bonuses and hiring fewer seasonal employees to make up for this predicted loss.

The recession has triggered a boost in email marketing as companies are increasing their investments in lower cost marketing mediums. Small business owners are more likely to use email marketing this holiday season than direct mail to inform their potential customers of promotions or sales. If they are going to send their target audience a piece of direct mail, doing so either right before or right after an email hits inboxes could lead both mediums to be more effective than if sent independently of each other.

Gail Goodman, CEO of Constant Contact, says “Email marketing and online surveys are catalysts to the success of small businesses in any economic environment, but they can make the critical difference in trying times. History shows that small businesses have led the way to better economic times in the past, and we are confident that today’s small businesses will do so again.”

Click here for email marketing options for your small business.

Microblogging sites, like Twitter, serve as a supplement for many bloggers who post short descriptions of their latest entries and links to their sites. The social network obsessed now use aggregator sites like FriendFeed or Spokeo to manage their various accounts on Facebook, MySpace, etc. At this rate, it can’t be long before someone builds an aggregator that aggregates the aggregators. Many businesses are embracing social networking by setting up Twitter-like systems within their own work place and creating Facebook groups – like our very own, ChooseWhat.com. Companies like Comcast, Dell, H&R Block, and Kodak follow what’s being said about their company on Twitter and even respond to comments and questions.

The plan would remove restrictions on the Small Business Administration’s ability to provide guaranteed loans to businesses (with good, not bad, credit) that are unable to procure credit from banks. This would entail waiving administrative lending fees and bolstering the SBA’s efforts with increased funding and expanded staff. SBA spokesman Mike Stamler voiced concerns about SBA’s involvement and ability to take on a larger role in lending.

The difficulty for small businesses to get loans hasn’t been exactly clear. While some pundits argue that banks have begun lending to smaller fish after the fall of commercial giants, others say that banks have become increasingly conservative in extending credit to anyone, much less small businesses. Newsday reports that, despite maintaining good credit for 10 years, small business owner Annemarie McMullen only received one quarter of the $40,000 loan she applied for and was forced to finance the majority of her payroll out of her own pocket. Schumer’s plan aims at reducing the instances of the above scenario by stimulating small business growth rather than stagnation.

In the midst of both Obama and McCain calling for relief to small business throughout the election cycle, Schumer’s proposal stands as the first real attempt to stimulate what everyone says affects over 75% of jobs in America– –Which is why it ought to be strictly scrutinized. The plan may never come to fruition. It may not even be factual (since I haven’t found anyone but Newsday reporting or blogging about it yet). And like every hopeful budget proposal this one begs the question(s): Where is the money coming from? How are we going to maintain strict oversight on expansion of this independent entity? What is the SBA, really?

With regards to the last question, there have been reports that post-9/11, the SBA lent leniently and incorrectly to businesses who were, in fact, not suffering from the World Trade Center disaster. Whatever the reason for the alleged flub, it’s enough to make one skeptical of their proposed role of the organization and to Schumer’s proposal in general. But at least now the governments really beginning to think about small businesses, right? Kind of. Asking the SBA to help small businesses weather the crisis is like telling cops to catch criminals (it’s part of their job description).

“Take care of your own” is what the plan seems to say. But everyone knows that small businesses don’t get bailed out. Although they account for 75% of the job market in the U.S., they don’t get bailed out. Why aren’t we using our own money to bail ourselves (read: small businesses) out instead of sending to far-removed, corrupted Wall Street? Because it’s never been a question for us to decide. It’s not in our job description. It’s in someone else’s, and we’ve got less than a week to find out who that someone else will be. Let’s hope he encourages the Senate to come up with something better.

Instantly and unexpectedly, the site that the sisters of Alpha Phi had set up had vanished completely, the garish pink logo and lewd images leaving no trace of what had once been an appropriately named domain. It ‘s not hard to set up a website for your small business or organization. All you have to do is find a reliable web host, choose your new domain name, put content on your pages and let the traffic roll in, right?

It would be nice if you could just “set it and forget it” like Rotisserie Ron says on those infomercials, but that just isn’t the case. Aside from continually putting fresh, updated content on your website, a big part of actively maintaining your website is staying knowledgeable on web hosting policies and terms of agreement. One important thing to keep in mind is that your domain name won’t be yours to keep forever (Otherwise, how would web hosts and domain registrars continue to make money?).

It is vital that you or the person who maintains your website remembers to renew the registration for your current domain name. In fact, web hosts have begun advertising automatic domain registration and renewal, which gives domain owners the ability to check a box that will automatically renew your registration when it expires. You’ll most likely have to pay a varying fee, which means that making sure that the credit card associated with the account/domain name hasn’t expired is also important.

An expired credit card was, in fact, the downfall of Alpha Phi’s domain name, which, in turn, had an expired registration and was up for grabs to the creepiest bidder. Most people are unaware that it is possible for anyone to use a bot to scan for expired domain names, which allows that person to purchase a domain name once it expires. Spine-chilling. So if you don’t want to see “baby apes in boy band clothes” or something equally disturbing, please for the love of bees maintain your domain.

Well, it was a crackbum deal according to Jerry Yang, CEO of Yahoo—but not according to everybody else who has since lambasted Yang for what would have been a lucrative deal in light of the significantly smaller $18 billion that now represents his company’s market value. But jumping ship on Microsoft and into bed with Google hasn’t been easy. The two search giants have been blocked by major advertising associations, Microsoft, and more importantly, the U.S. Department of Justice who has been investigating the agreement for infractions against antitrust laws. The partnership had raised concerns that a merger between the two companies would constitute a monopoly on the paid search advertising market and also that Google and Yahoo might agree to set a price floor for paid search, which would essentially be illegal price fixing.

Google has, of course, come out and repudiated the notion that there would be a merger with Yahoo, arguing that giving their competitor a boost in revenue would help preserve competition in paid search and encourage others to invest in Yahoo. Yet, if Microsoft has anything to say about it, they’d swear that the deal is anything but competition-fostering. The third major competitor in the paid search area, Microsoft has been very vocal about its aversion to the ad deal. In the face of a Google-Yahoo alliance, Microsoft would be virtually unable to compete in paid search.

Once upon a time there was a balance with Google on one scale and Yahoo and Microsoft on the other. And then one day, fearing the advances of Microsoft, Yahoo hopped onto the other scale, tipping it in a glaringly noticeable way. But Lady Justice just ain’t havin’ it. The DoJ hasn’t come to any conclusions yet, and time is ticking for both companies who were hoping to rise above the floodwaters of current economic strife. No word on when, or if, the DoJ will unshackle the internet pigs and let them fly.

As Roger Parloff notes in his CNN fortune blog Legal Pad, there are plenty of ways for the partnership to get scary. He notes that whatever revenue Yahoo is getting out of the deal isn’t going to be anywhere close to what they need in order to keep themselves competitive (The deal would probably look like a 90%/10% split). He also explains the inevitability of price fixing: Yahoo would always run the more expensive per-click ad, whether its one of Google’s or one of their own, because it’s been proven to garner the most revenue. And more money for Google would mean more revenue for Yahoo. It’s just a bit sad that the premiere search engine in 1994 with higher revenue than the fledgling Google at the time has resorted to this. Yahoo needs to fight back. You don’t see MySpace ponying up the props to Facebook or PC taking the Mac ads lying down. To be fair, paid search is a whole different animal. But the general consensus is that Yahoo—and Yang—has had its fair share of chances.

“I love good food,” said Zilker Ventures staff member Koby, wistfully.

“I do too,” says ZV office manager April.

We all do, Google. We all do. So how about you spread the food, and the love, around?

Our feeble entreaties may very well fall on deaf ears, however, as Google has set up their ivory tower (read: bubble) overlooking the popular cross section of 6th and Congress, where they have set up a mini-Austin world of “Barton Springs Pool” conference rooms, Clay Pit and Bucca di Beppo stocked cafeterias and theme rooms featuring Lone Star flags, barbeque, Astroturf and carbon footprint-reducing bikes. Sounding kind of like an Austin Epcot Center, the new office is the hope and wish of every Austinite who dares to speak its name: “Google’s in Austin?!”

The name is practically aspiration, the ooooh syllable being stretched out in a tone replete with awe and wonder. Gooooogle. Oooogle you, is what I’ll do. In fact, Google’s presence in Austin is so esteemed that, for some unknown reason, even crazy homeless Joe was struck with profound fervor. “Google’s in Austin! GOOGLE’S IN AUSTIN!” raved the vagrant, who manifested his overwhelming emotion like a dream mere feet away from Zilker Ventures CEO Gaines Kilpatrick some weeks ago. We’re excited too, dude. Can you taste the innovation, Austin? It’s here—and it’s as delicious as a tikka masala from the Clay Pit. And it’s as natural and inherent as a mouthful of Barton Springs water or Town Lake sweat.

The game ads are part of an attempt by Google to push into new and different ad markets, a move that was prefigured in February 2007 when Google purchased Adscape, a portal for game advertising, for $23 million. Google is actually late to the game here (pun intended). Their bid for Adscape came on the heels of Microsoft’s 2006 purchase of in-game ad leader Massive.

Riding shotgun in the bandwagon, Yahoo has recently scooped up competing game ad networks NeoEdge and Double Fusion. Apparently, Google has tapped out all of the other ad markets so that they’re now beginning to care about the millions of 18-35 year old nerds who have long been ditching television in favor of more interactive forms of amusement.

From what I’ve read on forums and postings so far, Google’s attempt to shank captive gamers with 15 to 30-second ads isn’t sitting well with its target audience. Cries of “Nooooo, I was just about to level up!” are bound to be heard from computer desks around the world, as a between-level ad promoting weight loss drug Hoodia beckons flabby cave-dwelling gamers to get fit and trim without leaving the comfort of their cushy office chairs and oily keyboards. You can almost envision South Park’s Cartman screeching “What the h—l!” as an ad chastising his double-chinned physique interrupts his mesmerizing 2-D video game.

Murmurs of revolt are stirring among hackers everywhere. Ad blocker? I smell a challenge. I love playing video games as much as the average person does, which is to say that I love playing games that are easily accessible and which don’t require me to waste even more of my time trying to learn how to play them or waiting for them to load. It’s a consumer mentality that Nintendo has exploited with the Wii and that has lead people to believe that hardcore gamers and consumers in general aren’t going to like the idea of Adsense for Games. But I’m optimistic.

Electronic Arts, for one, has already begun incorporating product placement ads into the highly successful Sims game, which is noticeable but not too intrusive. I base this entirely on the fact that I continue to play The Sims with anticipation of the latest accoutrements, strategically placed or otherwise. But The Sims is obviously a perfect format for product placement. It’d be a little weird if your Level 8 Gnome Hunter were showering with Axe shave gel. Or maybe what the nerds say is true. In the world of online gaming, anything is possible.

Essentially, Fring is an application that one may download onto his or her iPhone, which allows a person to integrate all IM buddies to one list, to make free calls, to utilize live chat, to access Skype, Google Talk, Twitter, AIM, Yahoo, MSN Messenger and ICQ.  Arguably the biggest draw of the application is its VoIP, or Voice-over Internet Protocol technology, which lets the user switch inbound calls from using regular phone minutes to free WiFi internet access instead, resulting in a lower monthly bill.

Ever since the iPhone emerged as the premier phone for Internet users, as well as the most expensive, consumers and application developers have been trying to circumvent the attached costs of owning the phone. VoIP applications, such as Truphone’s VoIP App and Packet8 MobileTalk, began sprouting up ubiquitously, promising of low-cost solutions to Apple’s high-end, release-it-now-troubleshoot-later panache. Eventually, with the release of the iPhone 3G Apple started endorsing third-party applications through their website.

Though VoIP is hardly new (Market leader Vonage has been around for a while now), the idea of using mobile internet connection to make and receive calls on your phone is a recent, still-developing capability, which sounds counter-intuitive to quite a few phone users.

“I’m not sure why you would use the internet to make calls on your phone,” says an anonymous observer. “Why wouldn’t you just use the phone?”

“Another worthless iPhone app,” writes an online commentator.

“[A] call on the AT&T network would have cost me well over $4/min … using Fring it was less than $0.10/min,” writes another web commentator and Fring user.

Worthless or worthwhile? You be the judge.

We weren’t sure if Zilker Ventures was entirely ready for solid foods, especially after a mid-week scare that involved much beloved office manager April Coburn having choked a little bit on an unusually dense piece of pita bread and having had to be saved via Heimlich Maneuver from Zilker Ventures CEO Gaines Kilpatrick.

By Friday, however, April was happily munching on a chocolate chip cookie, as were the rest of the Zilker Ventures team. The carousing continued with Zilker Ventures watching the ingenious video from “misheardlyricsguy” who has splendidly synched the lyrics of Pearl Jam’s classic song “Yellow Ledbetter” with hilarious images of Bill Clinton and Mr. Potato head, among others.

Check it out. “Yellow Ledbetter”

It wouldn’t have been much of a fiesta without some TexMex food from Matt’s El Rancho, another Austin standard, which fully satiated the hungry mouths of all the ZV babies, more eager than ever to get the word out about fax services, email marketing, cheap business cards and virtual PBX.

“I can’t believe that we’ve been around for one year and are still going strong,” said ZV staff member Koby Wong, his eyes shining with childlike glee.

In an apropos manner, the birthday celebrations gave everyone a chance to marvel about Zilker Ventures and ChooseWhat.com. And perhaps more importantly, it has given everyone a renewed sense of pride in the service that the company provides to small businesses and entrepreneurs looking to optimize their online efforts.