Closing Shop: We Hope Not

We had an interesting week with some minor fallout from the second presidential debate that once again failed to address small business in any real and lasting way but played a great deal of lip service. There was also a strong theme in the news this week about the changes Facebook has made to the way business pages operate - and specifically how they are aggressively moving to charge businesses for putting their status updates in front of their own followers. It's Facebook's platform to do what it wants with but I fear that int he long run Facebook's position as the top social media and marketing solution for small business may be damaged.

We also looked at what extraordinary bosses have in common, some great credit card perks and also gave a tip of our hat to a possible new trend - insourcing. And next week look to see some new writers covering bookkeeping and general business operations.

If you haven't taken the plunge yet, hopefully some of these articles give you the impetus to

Read More »from Facebook, debates, the real issues for small business, and extraordinary bosses: Small Business Reading

When you make purchases on your credit card, you're automatically eligible for secret perks that almost nobody knows about.

I'm not talking about the standard "cash back" or "frequent-flier miles" perks, which are great.

These are hidden perks that can easily be worth over $1,000 per year to you.

I got sick of credit card companies taking advantage of readers on my blog, so I wanted to figure out how to take advantage of every perk they offered. I spent almost two years studying these perks and testing them to figure out which were worth using. For example, did you know:

• If you buy something and it gets stolen or broken in the first 90 days, your credit card will write you a $1,000 check?

• You get an automatic extended warranty up to 1 year, which means no need to waste money buying extended warranties?

• Your credit card may offer a "concierge" service that can get you hard-to-find tickets...for no additional charge?

Here are my 7 favorite secret credit card perks (but do check your card

Read More »from Secret credit card perks that could save you thousands

Small business owners fear what comes after the election

Despite both presidential candidates' promises to cut taxes for small businesses, reports today on a new survey of small business owners say a vast majority of them believe the reverse will happen. More than three-fourths believe their taxes will go up next year, according to a survey from The Hartford. USA Today reports:

Both candidates have said that if their opponent wins they will mess it up for small businesses. Are those the negative messages that owners are taking home?

The Hartford's study, which surveyed more than 2,000 small-business owners, shows they are hanging on to every word the candidates say on small-business policy. About 83% of them say they'll be thinking about it when they cast their votes.

"All they're hearing is how one side is going to screw it up and how the other side is going to screw it up," says Garrett Sutton, author of Run Your Own Corporation. "That has an effect with business owners. They're sitting on their hands waiting to see what's going to

Read More »from Still undecided? Review the top 7 small biz issues

pickingsmallbusinesspocketIn our last roundup of small business news, we focused heavily on the changes in how Facebook is dealing with 'likes' and how it then puts news from liked businesses in front of people who liked their pages. Basically Facebook just unilaterally massively cut back the number of people it shows status updates to while at the same time heavily promoting its new pay-to-promote business. As this article points out, that is completely within Facebook's prerogatives.

But the article ignores completely our prerogative as small business owners to really strongly dislike this change. It inevitably undercuts the value and utility of Facebook for small businesses as a marketing tool. Sure, there's a lot of entitlement floating out there in InternetLand about how everything should be free but in this case it has been free. It's no surprise that we are going to whine a bit when the rug gets yanked out from under our free-loading feet.

The typical cycle for content-driven marketing for a small

Read More »from Small Business Today: More Facebook plus lending fund, names and Staples – small business reading for 10-17-2012

Presidential candidates answer small business questions that aren't asked.

Last night's Presidential debate was presumably the last chance for the candidates to battle over whose policies will best serve small business; the one remaining debate on October 22 will focus on foreign policy. But none of the questions posed to the candidates by citizens in the Hofstra University town hall session yesterday inquired specifically about small business. President Obama and Governor Romney nevertheless managed to make 23 mentions of the term that has been a campaign favorite--Obama 7, Romney 16.

Katie Vlietstra, Director of Government Affairs for the National Association of the Self Employed, who live-Tweeted the debate at @GAatNASE, called the event entertaining television but frustrating for small business owners. Considering that the self-employed account for at least 76 percent of small businesses, Vlietstra said, "It seems to me that both candidates and campaigns are missing the boat when talking about small business."

President Obama claimed that 97 percent of

Read More »from Debate 3: Candidates aren’t asked, talk small biz anyway

Net profit margins are returning to pre-recession rates, a report shows

Small businesses this year saw net profit margins increase by the highest rate in seven years, according to a report generated by the Raleigh, NC-based financial information company Sageworks.

The report reflects activity exclusively among privately held companies with under $1 million in annual sales in more than 20 industry categories including real estate, construction, retail trade, scientific and technical services, healthcare, accommodation and food services, and manufacturing. Sageworks collects more than 1,000 financial statements daily from certified public accountants and banks nationwide. The company generated its report from this audited data.

According to the report, in the last 12 months profit margins of small companies were up 6.01 percent over the year-ago period. It marks the first period since 2005 that profit margins rose more than 6 percent. In 2004, profit margins among the group rose 6.65 percent, and in 2005 they rose 6.78 percent. Profit margin increases were

Read More »from Small biz profit margins at pre-recession rates, report says

inhouseBy Carol Roth

In today's lackluster business environment, small businesses are focused more than ever on ways to improve their companies. This has led to a trend of in-sourcing- bringing back functions in house that used to be outsourced.

Here are three reasons that you may want to look at in-sourcing business activities.

Cost: The top reason that many businesses are now in-sourcing is cost. Many entrepreneurs that previously were looking to save time are now looking to save money. This may mean firing your bookkeeper and instead, purchasing software like Quickbooks to streamline your accounting and invoicing. It also means evaluating savings for other business functions. A company I work with, Fellowes, has a nifty tool called the Savings Analyzer at savingsanalyzer.fellowes.com that lets you see how much you can save on in-sourcing functions like records storage, document shredding, presentation binding and finishing. Hunter Rich, a VP and General Manager at Fellowes, says that small

Read More »from Three Reasons that You May Want to Consider In-sourcing

SMB-Branding-Infographic-Clives-Car-detailIn many circles people talk about Facebook as a miracle marketing solution for small businesses. And lots of businesses have been doing very well there, with some even skipping their own website to make their Facebook page the hub of their online strategy. Well, those businesses might want to rethink that strategy. This absolutely fascinating post explains why. It's pretty technical stuff but the key lies in the paragraph where the post authors point out that Facebook is effectively asking you to pay up to get the people who liked your business page to actually see posts from it in their feed. "Most brands or business pages have acquired their likes through Facebook advertising. Not all of them, but a large percentage. The whole idea is that you get people to like your page and then you engage with them through content and updates. What is happening now — with the introduction of promoted posts — is that Facebook is trying to get brands to pay to be seen by all the people who already

Read More »from Small Business Today: Facebook suddenly not delivering for small business – small business reading for 10-15-2012