Category: Advice
Increase Your Bottom Line: Evaluate Your Online Presence
Evaluate Your Business’ Online Presence to Grow Your Profits Each year, as more of your customers spend more time online, your business’ online presence becomes increasingly important. The hardest part about building your online presence is the ever-changing rules and best practices of the digital world. The best practices that worked last year, let alone…
Strategic Borrowing Benefits to Increase Your Loan Options
Increase Your Loan Options with Strategic Borrowing Without adequate capital, it’s difficult for small businesses to grow and thrive. This is true whether you fund your business through cash flow, investment, or borrowing. Taking a strategic approach to meeting your business’ need for capital to fuel growth and fund any other ROI-generating activities will ensure…
Content Marketing: An Interview with Industry Guru Joe Pulizzi
I met Joe Pulizzi shortly after he published his first book, Get Content Get Customers. The company I was with did a two-day workshop with him to develop a content strategy in 2009. This was in the very beginning of what would become a content marketing revolution and eventually lead to the creation of the…
Facebook Page vs. Website: Which Should You Use?
A strong digital presence is key to success in our tech-oriented society. Maintaining a website, however, requires time and money that small business owners don’t always have in great supply. If you’re looking for ways to simplify your online efforts, Facebook’s recent updates might seem pretty appealing. But are they good enough to stand in…
6 Ways to Make Working with an Independent Contractor Successful
For certain tasks and projects at your business, it may make sense to find a contractor to get the job done. Follow these common-sense guidelines to get the most value out of the experience. 1. Use a Contract Every time you work with a contractor, use a written contract that both you (or a representative…
Thanks, NASA: How Space Inventions Help Small Businesses
What does the recent exploration of Pluto have to do with your small business? Well, the research and development investment that the United States makes in the name of sending a spacecraft like New Horizons to discover that there’s flowing ice at the heart of the dwarf planet, that often trickles down to technology that…
Is it Time for a Business Pivot?
Pivoting is a popular term for making a quick, often dramatic change from your original business focus. It’s often associated with venture capital-backed startups. But there are lots of ways to pivot, and your small business may be able to improve business or fend off a slump by learning how to be flexible, making small…
Is Your Small Business Prepared for Disaster? How to Make Sure You’re Ready for Anything
Small business owners can control what they sell, whom they hire, and how they do business. Having the power to make decisions is one of the reasons many business owners like running the show, rather than working for someone else. All that still doesn’t give owners power over outside events. Natural disasters, financial crises, and…
Underdog’s Brewhouse Making a Case for Better Beer
To celebrate our recent Canadian expansion, we held contests in Toronto and Vancouver to give small businesses the opportunity to win $5,000 (CAD) by answering one simple question, Why Do You Love Being a Small Business Owner? Underdog’s Brewhouse, based in Oshawa, Ontario, is our Toronto-area small business winner. We’re checking in 60 days after…
3 Small Business Payroll Mistakes to Avoid
Handling payroll can be one of the most stress-inducing responsibilities of a small business owner. However, neglecting payroll–or doing a poor job of it–can bring your business down, and fast. Here are some of the most common payroll mistakes, and how you can overcome them. Mistake #1: Doing Payroll on the Fly As a small…
The Art and Science of Building a Successful Business: An Interview with Paul Butler
Building a successful business is the goal of every entrepreneur. Paul Butler, one of the authors of the book Think to Win: Unleashing the Power of Strategic Thinking, recently suggested that business success is really a combination of art, science, and the ability to think strategically. He and his co-authors, John Manfredi and Peter Klein,…
Are You Familiar with the Mandela Effect? It Can Hurt Your Business
How often have you followed up with an employee about an assignment or project only to find out that he or she completed it differently from the way you’d expected? You were sure you had explained the task just so, and your employee seemed to understand. However, somewhere between your explanation and the completed task,…
Driverless Cars: A New Opportunity for Small Business
Driverless cars seem like the kind of sophisticated, auto-pilot technology that sci-fi readers have been dreaming about for decades. But this is no futuristic novel anymore; this is reality now. And some small businesses are finding ways to make the technology work for them. Big Developments for Driverless Cars This summer’s big news on driverless…
Independent Contractors or Employees? When Contractors Make Sense for Your Small Business
Are Uber’s drivers contractors or employees? The question has been in the news in California, where a judge is willing to hear a class action suit that asks if the cabbies are truly employees but treated as contractors. This matters because companies—both large and small—seek out contractors in order to access a level of expertise…
Back To School? Small Companies Can Support Student-Employees
Word that Starbucks was offering its employees the opportunity to earn a degree at no cost spread like wildfire when its partnership with Arizona State University (ASU) was announced in early 2015. Starbucks employees can now take courses toward a degree online through ASU. As a small business, should you follow suit and help your…