IMPORTANT NOTICE TO ALL NEW BUSINESS OWNERS
If you don’t organize your records from the start, and stay on top of your record keeping chores daily, I can almost guarantee that you will come to grief - probably sooner than later!
Eight Tips CRITICAL to business record keeping success and sanity:
1. Never mix business and personal paperwork. For instance, by using one checkbook or credit card for business and personal use.
2. Make sure your records can be understood by anyone, not just yourself. I strongly suggest you use one of the widely accepted automated software record keeping systems. My personal recommendation is QuickBooks Pro.
3. Always use the memo section of your checks to record the specifics of the expnese.
4. Record transactions as they occur, or at least on a daily basis. Reconcile bank statements the day you receive them. Retain all bank statements.
5. Get help before things get out of control. Your Accountant, or Business Counselor should be able to help, or at least point you in the right direction when help is needed.
6. Develop and maintain a good back up system. If you are using computer software back up daily onto disk or jump drive (my preference) and store the disk or drive in a fire resistant cabinet or other safe place. All permanent records of the business like licenses, contracts, organization filing papers, leases, etc. which are paper documents, should be copied or scanned electronically, and stored the same way.
7. Unless you have a tax accounting background, plan to have your taxes prepared by an Accountant (at least the first year). Check with the Accountant to make sure you understand what records will be required, and that you will be able to supply them.
8. Prepare and carefully review a Profit and Loss Statement and a Balance Sheet monthly. Flaws in your record keeping system (or mistakes) will show up there, and can be corrected in a timely manner before they get overwhelming.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Are You Wasting Money On Telephone Yellow Page Ads?
Are you wasting money on Yellow Page advertising? Switch to Google Local Business Listing - it's far more effective, and, it's FREE.
Stop and think a minute, in spite of what the Yellow Page Sales Rep. (They are good salespersons, aren't they?) said, how often do you think someone with a computer opens the phone book to the yellow pages? Rarely, if ever. And, when's the last time you got a call you could trace back to yellow page advertising? No, today just about everyone goes to the computer to find nearby businesses.
If you are not using Google Local Business Center, you should be!
Check it out - it's FREE, you can edit your listing yourself any time you want to, you can even offer specials, show photos, and you can even login and see how many people have viewed your listing, what they were looking for, and where they came from in your area. And you get listed on the local Google map so people can see where you are, and even get directions to find you. Great marketing tool and perhaps the best marketing value a small business will ever find.
Yellow Page ad or Google Local Business Center - No Brainer. Stop wasting money and get with Google!
Stop and think a minute, in spite of what the Yellow Page Sales Rep. (They are good salespersons, aren't they?) said, how often do you think someone with a computer opens the phone book to the yellow pages? Rarely, if ever. And, when's the last time you got a call you could trace back to yellow page advertising? No, today just about everyone goes to the computer to find nearby businesses.
If you are not using Google Local Business Center, you should be!
Check it out - it's FREE, you can edit your listing yourself any time you want to, you can even offer specials, show photos, and you can even login and see how many people have viewed your listing, what they were looking for, and where they came from in your area. And you get listed on the local Google map so people can see where you are, and even get directions to find you. Great marketing tool and perhaps the best marketing value a small business will ever find.
Yellow Page ad or Google Local Business Center - No Brainer. Stop wasting money and get with Google!
Friday, February 26, 2010
The Key To Starting A Successful Small Business
The key to starting a successful small business (any kind of business) is YOU - and your beliefs and attitude.
Anyone can start a small business, it's easy - but very few can make it succeed. Why is this? Why is the success rate of business start-ups so dismal (well over 80% will fail)?
The difference between failure and success is almost always YOU.
It takes a special kind of person to start and run a small business. I don't care if it is a traditional off-line brick and mortar retail store or an on-line work from home business or even internet affiliate marketing, all require special characteristics and qualities in the person who is trying to get it started.
What are some of these qualities:
First (and probably most important) is your reason - your "Why". If the reason why you are starting a business is not big and strong enough, it is unlikely to provide the drive you are going to need to stick with it long enough to get it up and running and get a system in place to keep it going.
Second is your belief in yourself, Your self-confidence, your ability to visualize what it will be like when you are successful, and ability to keep that image in mind (the goal in sight) as you go through all the steps necessary to get started.
Third (not often mentioned but very important) is your support group and the kind of people in your inner circle. If you are married, the support of your spouse is critical, and your inner circle of friends and people you regularly associate with should be positive people, hopefully many of whom have successful businesses of their own.
Some other qualities?
You must have a dream - but not be just a dreamer. Dreams don't become reality until you take action. Don't kid yourself, nothing is going to happen until you make it happen.
You must be a master planner / organizer. You are going to have to take that dream, or business idea, and get it down on paper - ultimately into a business plan and then develop a system so you can replicate success and keep it going.
You must be a decision maker. You are going to have to make a lot of decisions under pressure. And, you've got to make the right decision most of the time.
You must be a people person. You are going to be interacting with people throughout your business day. If you don't have good people skills forget about going into business for yourself and go to work for someone who does.
So you see - it's all about YOU.
Here's to you, and to your success!
Anyone can start a small business, it's easy - but very few can make it succeed. Why is this? Why is the success rate of business start-ups so dismal (well over 80% will fail)?
The difference between failure and success is almost always YOU.
It takes a special kind of person to start and run a small business. I don't care if it is a traditional off-line brick and mortar retail store or an on-line work from home business or even internet affiliate marketing, all require special characteristics and qualities in the person who is trying to get it started.
What are some of these qualities:
First (and probably most important) is your reason - your "Why". If the reason why you are starting a business is not big and strong enough, it is unlikely to provide the drive you are going to need to stick with it long enough to get it up and running and get a system in place to keep it going.
Second is your belief in yourself, Your self-confidence, your ability to visualize what it will be like when you are successful, and ability to keep that image in mind (the goal in sight) as you go through all the steps necessary to get started.
Third (not often mentioned but very important) is your support group and the kind of people in your inner circle. If you are married, the support of your spouse is critical, and your inner circle of friends and people you regularly associate with should be positive people, hopefully many of whom have successful businesses of their own.
Some other qualities?
You must have a dream - but not be just a dreamer. Dreams don't become reality until you take action. Don't kid yourself, nothing is going to happen until you make it happen.
You must be a master planner / organizer. You are going to have to take that dream, or business idea, and get it down on paper - ultimately into a business plan and then develop a system so you can replicate success and keep it going.
You must be a decision maker. You are going to have to make a lot of decisions under pressure. And, you've got to make the right decision most of the time.
You must be a people person. You are going to be interacting with people throughout your business day. If you don't have good people skills forget about going into business for yourself and go to work for someone who does.
So you see - it's all about YOU.
Here's to you, and to your success!
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Get More Traffic
I was recently asked the question "How can I get more traffic to my website?" and I thought the question might have a wider audience so here is my answer.
First check to make sure the problem is really traffic (lack of visitors) and not conversion (visitors are not taking the desired action when they visit).
If the problem is indeed traffic, there are three main ways to get more:
1. Work for it (Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Linking and Promotion)
2. Buy it (Google Adsense, or similar programs)
3. Trade it or share it (Joint Ventures)
If your site is new and/or you are new to Internet Marketing, I would suggest concentrating on 1 and 3 as they are either free or not very expensive. Disadvantage is they take work and they take longer to see results. If you need results quickly, have some skills in Internet Marketing, and have a pretty good advertising budget you can try Google Adsense - immediate results, but can be very costly, especially if you don't know what you are doing.
Assuming you would like to try FREE first:
Work for it
SEO - to learn more about SEO go to www.google.com and look for "Webmasters/Site owners help". Don't get caught up in page rankings - concentrate on proper use and placement of keywords, content linked to title and keywords, proper navigation and site map. A good read would be one of the "Dummies" books - "Web Design for Dummies" - if you need more information.
Linking - is getting back links to your site from other (preferably high traffic) websites. Linking is actually also a part of SEO, but it pays to think about it separately as it is one of the most effective ways of getting traffic. Good ways to get links back to your site are by participating in forums and writing articles (check out Ezine Articles and Go Articles as they are two of the best) about the subject or business of your website.
Promotion - more than I can list here, but investigate participation in Twitter, FaceBook, etc. (watch spamming) - Blogging - Writing Articles - participating in forums - teleseminars and/or (my favorite) Blog Talk Radio - and don't forget to think about off-line promotion as well. Perhaps the easiest (but often overlooked) things to do is put the website address on everything you send - or give - out, such as stationary, business cards, email, etc.
Trade it or Share it
Joint Ventures - where you team up with a related (but not directly competing) website to do a joint promotion of some sort. You mail to and get traffic from both lists. I use this technique on teleseminars or Blog Talk Radio where I invite the second party to be a guest on the show. They get to show their expertise and advertise their site while I am doing the same and (hopefully) we get listeners and from both our lists and promotions.
Hope this helps. Good Luck - Here's to you and to your success!
First check to make sure the problem is really traffic (lack of visitors) and not conversion (visitors are not taking the desired action when they visit).
If the problem is indeed traffic, there are three main ways to get more:
1. Work for it (Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Linking and Promotion)
2. Buy it (Google Adsense, or similar programs)
3. Trade it or share it (Joint Ventures)
If your site is new and/or you are new to Internet Marketing, I would suggest concentrating on 1 and 3 as they are either free or not very expensive. Disadvantage is they take work and they take longer to see results. If you need results quickly, have some skills in Internet Marketing, and have a pretty good advertising budget you can try Google Adsense - immediate results, but can be very costly, especially if you don't know what you are doing.
Assuming you would like to try FREE first:
Work for it
SEO - to learn more about SEO go to www.google.com and look for "Webmasters/Site owners help". Don't get caught up in page rankings - concentrate on proper use and placement of keywords, content linked to title and keywords, proper navigation and site map. A good read would be one of the "Dummies" books - "Web Design for Dummies" - if you need more information.
Linking - is getting back links to your site from other (preferably high traffic) websites. Linking is actually also a part of SEO, but it pays to think about it separately as it is one of the most effective ways of getting traffic. Good ways to get links back to your site are by participating in forums and writing articles (check out Ezine Articles and Go Articles as they are two of the best) about the subject or business of your website.
Promotion - more than I can list here, but investigate participation in Twitter, FaceBook, etc. (watch spamming) - Blogging - Writing Articles - participating in forums - teleseminars and/or (my favorite) Blog Talk Radio - and don't forget to think about off-line promotion as well. Perhaps the easiest (but often overlooked) things to do is put the website address on everything you send - or give - out, such as stationary, business cards, email, etc.
Trade it or Share it
Joint Ventures - where you team up with a related (but not directly competing) website to do a joint promotion of some sort. You mail to and get traffic from both lists. I use this technique on teleseminars or Blog Talk Radio where I invite the second party to be a guest on the show. They get to show their expertise and advertise their site while I am doing the same and (hopefully) we get listeners and from both our lists and promotions.
Hope this helps. Good Luck - Here's to you and to your success!
Friday, September 11, 2009
Trouble Ahead For Small Business
In these troubled economic times, most businesses, big and small, are struggling to stay afloat, much less generate the levels of profit needed to make the business a viable investment for their owners and shareholders. Now, three pieces of pending legislation offer more problems especially for small businesses:
Health Care Legislation - Would require employers to offer coverage to their employees and contribute at least 72.5% of the premium cost for single coverage and 65% of the premium cost for family coverage of the lowest cost plan that meets the essential benefits package requirements -or- pay 8% of payroll into the Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund.
There would be reductions in the percentage for smaller employers with ranges of 8% for employers with payrolls of over $400,000., to 0% for employers with payrolls of less than $250,000. My concern is that there is even a percentage at all listed for the smallest employers. Why not just say employers with payrolls of less than $250,000. are exempt?
Cap and Trade (Emissions trading) - This bill would place a limit on emmissions any business could emit into the atmosphere (the Cap). This limit would be issued in the form of credits for the amount of emissions that could be emitted. Business that could not limit emissions to this amount (Cap) would have to reduce emissions -or- could buy credits from a business that did not need to use all their credits (Trade credits).
The concern of course is how costly it would be for a business to reduce emissions -or- buy (trade) credits to emit more. For certain types of industries this could prove very costly, and is just another form of government control over business.
Card Check - The "Employee Free Choice Act"--better known as the Card Check bill--is a proposed law that would change how unions are allowed to organize workers in the United States. Big labor unions like the AFL-CIO, SEIU, and the Change to Win Coalition spent heavily during the 2009 election, and are pushing Congress to approve this law. Union membership has been declining--currently about 7.5 percent in the private sector--and they hope this law will change the rules and reverse that trend.
There are two problems with Card Check:
1. Eliminating the Private Ballot
Card Check would effectively eliminate private voting.
Under the existing law today, workers have a chance to vote for or against unionization in a private-ballot election that is federally supervised. Under Card Check, if more than 50% of workers at a facility sign a card, the government would have to certify the union, and a private ballot election would be prohibited--even if workers want one. By forcing workers to sign a card in public--instead of vote in private--Card Check opens the door to intimidation and coercion.
2. Government Arbitration and Control
Card Check could put government regulators in charge of private business decisions.
Once a union is certified, the business and union would only have 120 days to reach agreement, before facing the prospect of being forced into binding arbitration. This means a panel of government arbitrators who may have no understanding of the business could impose a two year contract deciding all workplace terms--without any vote by the company or its employees. By placing government regulators in charge of a two-year decision, business flexibility is limited--at a time in our history when it is needed most. Very small businesses would probably be exempted - but for how long?
Regardless of your stand - get informed and make your voice heard on these three issues!
- Health Care Legislation
- Cap and Trade
- Card Check
Health Care Legislation - Would require employers to offer coverage to their employees and contribute at least 72.5% of the premium cost for single coverage and 65% of the premium cost for family coverage of the lowest cost plan that meets the essential benefits package requirements -or- pay 8% of payroll into the Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund.
There would be reductions in the percentage for smaller employers with ranges of 8% for employers with payrolls of over $400,000., to 0% for employers with payrolls of less than $250,000. My concern is that there is even a percentage at all listed for the smallest employers. Why not just say employers with payrolls of less than $250,000. are exempt?
Cap and Trade (Emissions trading) - This bill would place a limit on emmissions any business could emit into the atmosphere (the Cap). This limit would be issued in the form of credits for the amount of emissions that could be emitted. Business that could not limit emissions to this amount (Cap) would have to reduce emissions -or- could buy credits from a business that did not need to use all their credits (Trade credits).
The concern of course is how costly it would be for a business to reduce emissions -or- buy (trade) credits to emit more. For certain types of industries this could prove very costly, and is just another form of government control over business.
Card Check - The "Employee Free Choice Act"--better known as the Card Check bill--is a proposed law that would change how unions are allowed to organize workers in the United States. Big labor unions like the AFL-CIO, SEIU, and the Change to Win Coalition spent heavily during the 2009 election, and are pushing Congress to approve this law. Union membership has been declining--currently about 7.5 percent in the private sector--and they hope this law will change the rules and reverse that trend.
There are two problems with Card Check:
1. Eliminating the Private Ballot
Card Check would effectively eliminate private voting.
Under the existing law today, workers have a chance to vote for or against unionization in a private-ballot election that is federally supervised. Under Card Check, if more than 50% of workers at a facility sign a card, the government would have to certify the union, and a private ballot election would be prohibited--even if workers want one. By forcing workers to sign a card in public--instead of vote in private--Card Check opens the door to intimidation and coercion.
2. Government Arbitration and Control
Card Check could put government regulators in charge of private business decisions.
Once a union is certified, the business and union would only have 120 days to reach agreement, before facing the prospect of being forced into binding arbitration. This means a panel of government arbitrators who may have no understanding of the business could impose a two year contract deciding all workplace terms--without any vote by the company or its employees. By placing government regulators in charge of a two-year decision, business flexibility is limited--at a time in our history when it is needed most. Very small businesses would probably be exempted - but for how long?
Regardless of your stand - get informed and make your voice heard on these three issues!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Internet Marketing; The Value of Education For Beginners
No more than you would jump into the deep end of the pool if you could not swim, you should not jump into internet marketing if you don't know how.
Yes, I know that you get offers saying things like "Follow my system and have passive income of $xxx.xx per month while you are lounging by the pool" - or some such nonsense, but trust me, for about 95% of us it doesn't work out that way.
Doing business on the internet is little different than doing business out of a retail storefront. One does business in a neighborhood or city - one does business all over the world. Both have to attract customers to their sales site - both have to have good quality and value products to sell at a reasonable (& competitive) price - both have to convert visitors (shoppers) into satisfied buyers. Starting and doing business is just that - business. If you are the right person for the business, and you know how to do that business, you may succeed - if you don't you are likely to fail.
We know the statistics for the retail storefront. Four out of five fail. Yes, 80% of all new small businesses will fail - will never be profitable, and will not last 5 years in business.
Statistic's for internet businesses are much harder to come by, but here are some numbers that are often tossed around; 97% will fail (yes 97%). Fully 50% of people trying to do business on the internet made no profit in the last month, only 6% made over $1,000. profit in the last month and less than 3% made over $10,000. Are you surprised that the top 3% is largely made up of the people that are selling the "can't fail systems" to people like you and me? Don't get me wrong - there are a lot of very successful internet marketers that are making huge amounts of money but, trust me once again, they know what they are doing and the best ways to do it. And, although many of them have enviable lifestyles, most are putting in a lot of working hours.
So here's what I suggest. Even if you plan to use and follow one of the "systems" I think you should learn the basics of doing business on the internet before you jump into this business. Take it from me. I was a successful corporate executive, had three small businesses of my own and had served as a volunteer Small Business Counselor for SCORE before venturing into internet marketing, and my first attempts at doing business on the internet were a total failure. Where would I learn "the basics", you ask? Well I'd suggest you consider the same program I've used - ProfitLance. I have investigated (and in one case tried) programs that were far more expensive but came back to ProfitLance as the best educational value available.
Now to be fair, ProfitLance also has ready made programs you can use to make some money fairly quickly, but the real value is the educational content. It's a complete internet marketing education - lessons, videos, online tools and more.
Bottom line, please get some smarts before you jump in. It will save you a lot of grief and heartache, and maybe your life savings as well. If you like, you can learn more about ProfitLance at my website; http://smallbusinessyesyoucan.com/Featured_Product.html
Yes, I know that you get offers saying things like "Follow my system and have passive income of $xxx.xx per month while you are lounging by the pool" - or some such nonsense, but trust me, for about 95% of us it doesn't work out that way.
Doing business on the internet is little different than doing business out of a retail storefront. One does business in a neighborhood or city - one does business all over the world. Both have to attract customers to their sales site - both have to have good quality and value products to sell at a reasonable (& competitive) price - both have to convert visitors (shoppers) into satisfied buyers. Starting and doing business is just that - business. If you are the right person for the business, and you know how to do that business, you may succeed - if you don't you are likely to fail.
We know the statistics for the retail storefront. Four out of five fail. Yes, 80% of all new small businesses will fail - will never be profitable, and will not last 5 years in business.
Statistic's for internet businesses are much harder to come by, but here are some numbers that are often tossed around; 97% will fail (yes 97%). Fully 50% of people trying to do business on the internet made no profit in the last month, only 6% made over $1,000. profit in the last month and less than 3% made over $10,000. Are you surprised that the top 3% is largely made up of the people that are selling the "can't fail systems" to people like you and me? Don't get me wrong - there are a lot of very successful internet marketers that are making huge amounts of money but, trust me once again, they know what they are doing and the best ways to do it. And, although many of them have enviable lifestyles, most are putting in a lot of working hours.
So here's what I suggest. Even if you plan to use and follow one of the "systems" I think you should learn the basics of doing business on the internet before you jump into this business. Take it from me. I was a successful corporate executive, had three small businesses of my own and had served as a volunteer Small Business Counselor for SCORE before venturing into internet marketing, and my first attempts at doing business on the internet were a total failure. Where would I learn "the basics", you ask? Well I'd suggest you consider the same program I've used - ProfitLance. I have investigated (and in one case tried) programs that were far more expensive but came back to ProfitLance as the best educational value available.
Now to be fair, ProfitLance also has ready made programs you can use to make some money fairly quickly, but the real value is the educational content. It's a complete internet marketing education - lessons, videos, online tools and more.
Bottom line, please get some smarts before you jump in. It will save you a lot of grief and heartache, and maybe your life savings as well. If you like, you can learn more about ProfitLance at my website; http://smallbusinessyesyoucan.com/Featured_Product.html
Monday, July 13, 2009
Review - "ClickBank for Newbies" by Harvey Segal
'ClickBank for Newbies' is must reading for anyone thinking of doing affiliate marketing on the internet using ClickBank. And, one of the best things about it is that it is FREE!
This short 17 page E-booklet by ClickBank guru, Harvey Segal, introduces you to ClickBank and shows you how to succeed using ClickBank to market affiliate products - or your own vendor products. ClickBank is one of the easiest and most reliable ways of marketing digital products on the internet, and Affiliate Marketing of digital products is one of the most common and easiest ways of making money on-line. You are given an affiliate link identifying you, and which leads the customer to the sales site. If a purchase is made, you get a commission on the sale. You do not have to have your own products, make the sale, process the order or provide customer support. Your job is just to direct potential customers to the vendors sale site (and do a little pre-selling if you are wise).
ClickBank makes setting up your account and getting affiliate links to products you can sell easy. And ClickBank marketplace has over 12,000 products you can link to. The average commission on products listed in ClickBank is 55%, but they have many vendors with products that pay up to 70%. Founded in 1998, ClickBank still advertises that they have paid member commissions "on time - every time".
Having said all those good things, there are two problems buried in the Accounting Policy section of the client contract that have caused many new affiliate marketers to quit affiliate marketing with ClickBank before they really got started. Those policies have to do with initial payout of commissions, and charges on balances in dormant accounts.
GOOD NEWS - in his free report "ClickBank for Newbies", Harvey Segal shows you how to solve these problems - and more, much more.
You can get YOUR free copy of "ClickBank for Newbies" by clicking this link; http://www.supertips.com/reports/?id=1076&b=6
Here's to your success in Affiliate Internet Marketing.
This short 17 page E-booklet by ClickBank guru, Harvey Segal, introduces you to ClickBank and shows you how to succeed using ClickBank to market affiliate products - or your own vendor products. ClickBank is one of the easiest and most reliable ways of marketing digital products on the internet, and Affiliate Marketing of digital products is one of the most common and easiest ways of making money on-line. You are given an affiliate link identifying you, and which leads the customer to the sales site. If a purchase is made, you get a commission on the sale. You do not have to have your own products, make the sale, process the order or provide customer support. Your job is just to direct potential customers to the vendors sale site (and do a little pre-selling if you are wise).
ClickBank makes setting up your account and getting affiliate links to products you can sell easy. And ClickBank marketplace has over 12,000 products you can link to. The average commission on products listed in ClickBank is 55%, but they have many vendors with products that pay up to 70%. Founded in 1998, ClickBank still advertises that they have paid member commissions "on time - every time".
Having said all those good things, there are two problems buried in the Accounting Policy section of the client contract that have caused many new affiliate marketers to quit affiliate marketing with ClickBank before they really got started. Those policies have to do with initial payout of commissions, and charges on balances in dormant accounts.
GOOD NEWS - in his free report "ClickBank for Newbies", Harvey Segal shows you how to solve these problems - and more, much more.
You can get YOUR free copy of "ClickBank for Newbies" by clicking this link; http://www.supertips.com/reports/?id=1076&b=6
Here's to your success in Affiliate Internet Marketing.
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