Blog Posts by Owen Linderholm

Yahoo! Small Business Advisor launched officially early in 2012 and it's time to take a look back at the year and just about the best way to do that is to look at the popular articles from the past year. This is a mix of the top articles by readership mixed with the top articled by time spent reading them. We had a little bias toward our own articles and blog posts rather than those aggregated from third parties, but there are a few of those in the mix as well.

We didn't include anything from our new Startup Diaries series - that's too new for us to gauge its popularity yet.

The nature of popularity being what it is this list tends toward articles that are more applicable to the general population than just small business owners.

We ordered the articles by time rather than by popularity rank.

Wayfair's Road to $1 Billion

The Path to Recommendation - What every small business needs to know

How we founded myYearbook

Young entrepreneurs turn a Tweet from Richard Branson into $1 Million

Read More »from Ten top articles from 2013

As the year comes to an end it is fitting that we look both backward and forward in this week's recommended reading. For many reasons it is a good time for reflection and using the lessons of the past to help move forward. It's also a good time to look to the things closest to us - family, friends, and yes, our businesses - and take a look at the bigger picture and make changes to improve where we are headed. This week in our Startup Diaries series we took a look at a business that made the tough decision to hit reset and postpone a launch rather than get it wrong. We also looked at one that looked inward and to the past to make the decision to take the leap into getting started.

The Small Business Administration continued to demonstrate why it is an effective branch of government for the small business person with the launch of a new program to help transition people from unemployment to self-employment. On the topic of getting people to work we also has an interesting op-ed looking

Read More »from Making hard decisions and employment: Small Business Reading

Here at Yahoo! Small Business Advisor we started a new series this week - Startup Diaries. This series is going to follow between four and eight small businesses as they go through the ups and downs of establishing and running their businesses. Some are already established, some in the middle of starting up and some still in planning. But we are committed to bringing their stories and lessons learned regularly and in the authentic voices of the owners themselves. First up was a customer service insight from Art Cardenas and next a quick look at the kind of side task small business owners have to undertake in order to get from point A to point B. In this case some remodeling by P. Quick.

We also took a look at how technology is driving entrepreneurship and job creation, a really great article with seven reasons why a strong budget is a good idea and seven different viewpoints on what our politicians can do to help small business.

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

Read More »from New Startup Diaries Series, technology, budgets: Small Business Reading

holidaycrowdsWe are in full flow for the holiday season now and retailers are hoping that consumers are going to be cracking open their wallets and pocketbooks. We just finished the biggest shopping weekend of the year and reports are mixed. It was clearly a huge success for online retailers with more sales than ever before. For example, here at Yahoo! Small Business we say an overall 8% increase in dollar sales volume from last year. But traditional retailers are reporting mixed results. Analysts suggest that we need the rest of the holiday shopping season to remain strong. With that in mind, here are four tips for upselling and cross-selling that hopefully will be helpful over the next month. We continue to hear that business credit is a serious issue for small businesses of all kinds (not just retail) and that access to credit is still very tough. So it's a good idea to maximize your opportunities by building good business credit. Finally - as a great example to us all, here's an interview with

Read More »from Holiday sales, business credit, Hooters and Trader Joe’s: Small Business Reading

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

Read More »from Small Business Today: Small Business Saturday, Free Twitter Ads and a Sales Webinar

SBS_Launch_Infographic_-_FINALsmall

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

Read More »from Six Reasons To Support Small Business Saturday

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

Read More »from Small Business Saturday, Help from IBM, Intuit: Small Business Reading

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

Read More »from Heads Up: Taxes and Year End