Small Business Administration Deputy Administrator Marie Johns reminds shoppers in an op-ed for the Washington Post today not to spend all their holiday gift dollars at the big box stores on Black Friday or online shopping on Cyber Monday. In between them is the American Express-inspired Small Business Saturday, November 24. Is your business doing what it can to take advantage of the opportunity to get new customers in the door this weekend?

With free tools and materials available for download, it's not too late. Here are some ways you can still get in on the event:

• If your business accepts American Express, you qualify to download free customized in-store signage, online banners, and templates for social media or email from American Express Shop Small.
• Even if you don't accept American Express, a Shop Small poster and other free marketing materials are available for download here.
• Waste no time writing your own Tweets or Facebook posts to promote Small Business Saturday to your

turkeysGiven the short work week - for anyone NOT involved in retail - and the LONG work week for anyone who IS involved in retail, we are running a shortened version of our weekly roundup. First up is a reiteration of the importance and value of Small Business Saturday - for both retailers and shoppers. It's also worth pointing back to a couple of articles you may have missed last Friday: one about the fiscal cliff and the startling lack of agreement about how it will affect small businesses and the other taking a look at the new crowdfunding rules for small business.

Outside the confines of Yahoo! Small Business there were a couple of interesting pieces of news. First of all, Twitter has decided to offer the first 10,000 qualified small business to apply a $100 in free advertising on Twitter. So apply now... The second is a neat sales webinar taking place December 13th at 11AM with six experts talking about the best sales tools for 2013.

If you haven't taken the plunge yet, hopefully some

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I'm re-running a post from last week below to let you know why Small Business Saturday is so important (and to let you see that nifty infographic again). But I thought I'd add a quick list of why you should shop local.

1. Suport your community - your friends and neighbors who own local businesses

2. Get great deals

3. Free $25 courtesy of American Express.

4. Support your local economy - dollars spent at small local businesses stay in the local economy. Dollars spent at big box retailers do not.

5. Get outside and walk around your town - good for your health both mental and emotional.

6. Make new friends - while you are out and about why not make a point of getting to know a new person in your town - even if you've lived there for 50 years there's always someone new to meet.

Small Business Saturday is a great opportunity for small businesses to get some additional business in the peak holiday shopping period. It is basically a special day that American Express picked to provide a

In a post-election panel discussion Monday evening this week, the Economist's Matthew Bishop asked five Washington insiders whether they believe Congress and President Obama will arrive at a deficit reduction plan in time to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff. Tax increases and spending cuts will automatically go into effect in the absence of such a plan on January 1.

The panelists at a technology industry conference represented a spectrum of political ideologies: Forbes Media Chairman Steve Forbes, a two-time GOP presidential nominee; Hill + Knowlton Strategies U.S. President and CEO Dan Bartlett, who was White House Communications director under George W. Bush; AOL founder Steve Case, Chairman of President Obama's Startup America Partnership; Markle Foundation President Zoe Baird, former associate counsel to Jimmy Carter and a Clinton nominee for Attorney General; and Andrew Rasiej, the founder of Personal Democracy Media.

All five panelists, Republicans and Democrats alike, said they

We are rapidly heading toward Thanksgiving and the busiest time of the year for retailers. In particular, this is the time to take advantage of Small Business Saturday. It's also time to take stock of finances in preparation for the end of the year. Taking a completely different tack, we also looked at export issues for small businesses. Despite the seriousness of these topics, there's always time for a lighter point of view and with the release of the new Bond film, what better time to review maverick leadership styles? And our most popular article this week was about some commonalities between people who have been remarkably successful.

If you haven't taken the plunge yet, hopefully some of these articles give you the impetus to start your own business — and if you do, we have tools to help. Besides our domain name, web hosting and ecommerce products, we also have just added an innovative marketing dashboard that you can try for free even if you don't use our other products.

Some

In the run-up to the enactment of the JOBS Act, passed by Congress in April 2012, officials are scrambling to meet their January 2013 deadline for nailing down regulations for equity-based crowdfunding portals, which will be legalized by the bill. Proponents of the new fundraising method predict that it will make as much as $300 billion in investment capital available to entrepreneurs to start new businesses.

More than 70 crowdfunding industry stakeholders participated in a discussion on rulemaking with Securities Exchange Commission and White House officials in Washington yesterday.

But the conversation made clear that many details remain to be sorted out before the legislation goes into effect. Joining the conference by phone or in person were industry pioneers including SoMoLend founder Candace Klein, International Crowd Funding Association board chairman Mark Jones, Jason Burmer of EarlyShares, A KickIn Crowd founder Tony Reynolds, RocketHub COO Jed Cohen, and Crowdnetic founder

It is just about time for small business owners to tear themselves away from the final end of year sales push (and holiday madness) to take a couple of hours to get their financial ducks in a row for year end financials and taxes. In addition for online businesses there are a few new wrinkles that just popped up - in particular the IRS is cracking down on 1099's in general and the 1099-K for online income reporting in particular. The word is that the IRS is sending 20,000 letters out this week about 1099-Ks. If you get one, don't panic immediately - it may just be a general inquiry about what you are doing with them - but take the time to understand and respond. If you don't get a letter, not to worry but do remember that 1099-K income has to be included as income - no matter how small it is.

Here are some current article on year end financials and tax.

Is your part time business legal?

Non-filers beware - who's that knocking at your door?

IRS to enforce 1099 compliance

Counting down

Business services are big business in the U.S., but they're missing out on major opportunities overseas, say experts. How to increase exports for small- and medium-sized businesses was the focus of a discussion at a tech conference in Tucson this week.

Zoe Baird, president of the Markle Foundation, which pursues tech solutions for healthcare and national security, moderated the discussion at Techonomy12, a meeting of tech industry CEOs and investors. She said that as technology and networks are lowering barriers to markets worldwide, a new focus on exports, especially from the service sector, could be a way to create jobs and reverse the flow of the outsourcing pipeline that is exporting jobs. By taking advantage of internet and cloud capabilities, exporting services can be done largely from home without sending U.S. employees overseas, she noted.

Baird asked a panel that included Bradford Jensen of the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University and Ambassador Miriam Sapiro,