If you have heard the saying ?the customer is always right? you are among thousands, if not millions of people who have also heard this phrase. While this may or may not be the case, the customer does have a lot of say and influence in how a company or business performs and its current and potential success. Today, more and more business owners are paying more attention to what their customers say and feel.

Business owners know that their customers are the key to their success. If there are no customers there is no business. Keeping the customers happy keeps the customers returning for future business transactions, which is good for both the customer and business owner. Many business owners authorize customer surveys to be distributed either electronically through email or through the postal service.

Customer satisfaction surveys give the business owner a good idea of what the customer thinks about the services and products. These surveys allow the business owner to ask specific questions about the customer?s most recent experience, a particular product, and the freedom to provide any additional comments that he or she may want to share. This survey system is incredibly useful in keeping a business on target with what its client base is interested in and wants.

What a customer thinks of a particular product or service is vital information to a business. Knowing what the clientele is thinking allows a business owner to get the upper hand on competitors and to provide customers with what they want. The happier the customer is, the happier the business is, so to speak.

Businesses that actively seek out the opinions and thoughts of their customers usually attain loyalty from those customers and clients. Loyalty to a particular brand or business is essential to success. With this loyalty comes free marketing in the form of word of mouth advertising. In most cases, satisfied customers will tell their family and friends about a great new product or a great service provided by a particular business. During these discussions, the customer?s friends and family will consider the item or service then check it out for him or herself later. Word of mouth advertising gives the business more credibility than simple paid advertising.

Any business owner that wants to ensure success for his or her company is wise to consider the thoughts of the customer-base. Listening to the customers? thoughts, needs, wants, and ideas can help improve business dramatically and thus ensure customer loyalty. New customers help businesses grow, however returning loyal customers make all the difference. It is easy to get a customer for the first time, however it is much more difficult to get the customers to return if they are not satisfied.

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I’m about to share with you the common thread that ties together all successful entrepreneurs. This single trait launched the businesses of Microsoft, Intel, Hershey, JP Morgan, Amazon.com, Nike and so many others. It’s not anything you’ll be taught in Business School, it has nothing to do with accounting, and it doesn’t even have anything to do with what you’re selling or how you’re selling it. I’ll sum it up in two words:
GET STARTED!

That’s it! It’s laughable at first, but the more you think about it, the more it makes sense. It’s the missing “million dollar” idea, hiding in plain sight. We hear variations of this all the time: A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Think back to your first writing classes in school. How were we taught to write a paper? First we start with a basic outline – that’s our money-making idea, whatever it may be. Next, we make a rough draft – that’s right, we start working on something that we know for a fact will be imperfect. Finally, we use our rough-draft as a basis to begin revisions, eventually ending up with a final draft, the “perfect” version.

Planning for tomorrow is a sound business strategy. It’s good to spend time thinking about the future, and how to handle the challenges it will bring. But, if we want to succeed, we must create the future by taking action today. We can’t possibly predict everything that might happen once we start doing business. Microsoft started out selling programming software. After a few years, an opportunity presented itself to sell a computer Operating System to IBM, and they took it. The result was MS-DOS (which they didn’t even create themselves, they bought it from someone else when they saw how much money they could make!), followed by Windows; quite possibly one of the most lucrative products ever. If Bill Gates and Paul Allen, the founders of Microsoft, had sat on the sidelines of the growing computer industry thinking “programming software is an OK idea, but it’s not perfect, there really isn’t a big enough market for it…we need something better”, would they be where they are today? Would IBM have given them that golden opportunity? Not likely.

Did Michelangelo’s sculpture of David emerge from a single tap of a chisel upon a block of marble? No, it took Michelangelo over 3 years of effort to release his masterpiece from the stone, one tiny chip of marble at a time. It probably wasn’t very pretty after only 1 month, or even a year. But years of careful improvement resulted in a classic work of art.

I hope I’ve made my point. Do something. Do anything! If you do something, and the result isn’t what you wanted, what’s the worst that could happen? You either have something to improve upon, or you have a very good idea of an approach that doesn’t work (think of it as addition by subtraction…the process of elimination). Either way, you’re one step closer to success than you were before you started.

Go for it! Give it a shot! Your financial success is waiting for you, go and get it! Get Started Today!

Good Luck!
Jeff

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Looking for a serious investment opportunity? You may want to consider buying a small business in the United Kingdom. There are several ways to turn a good profit in small business, but there are some important things to keep in mind if you are looking for an investment opportunity, especially if you are an investor from the United States, Canada, and elsewhere.

Any investment opportunity naturally comes with some risk. Foreign investors will need to calculate an additional variable when figuring up the possible amount of profit margin, loss ,and potential for both, as well as the exchange rate. How well is your currency doing against the British Pound? Be sure to include some ?wiggle room? in your budgeting for fluctuations in the exchange rate.

For those already living in the UK, concerns such as taxation and local regulation are familiar topics. To those in overseas locations, it?s important to look up the laws of the land pertaining to your type of business, the taxes for which you will be liable, and how to properly account for them. This may seem elementary to those with experience in putting money into an overseas investment opportunity, but for the first-time investor in a UK small business, there are many laws and policies that might surprise you. The key is to do your homework, get the advice of a good UK legal expert, and be prepared for a new and different way of doing business.

If you want to buy a small business in the UK, it?s good to do a bit of research into the type of business you want to use as an investment opportunity. Are there ways that you can expand the business onto the Internet? Can the Internet be a help to you in increasing sales, market visibility, or media awareness? All of these factors are important to keep in mind. The most successful small businesses are the ones whose owners know how to take advantage of the Internet, while still meeting local needs and demands with speed and precision. It?s not so different than doing business anywhere else in the Western world. It?s important to understand how the buyers in your area of the UK respond to and utilize the Internet when it comes to commerce.

You?ll also want to give your competing businesses a good hard look to see how they are using the Internet. Are you thinking of investing in an already crowded market? If so, you?ll need some fresh ideas to give your version of the business a new approach so that you can set it apart from the competition.

A UK investment opportunity in small business may bring some unexpected surprises if you are considering investing in a ?rising star? business. For example, twenty years ago, nobody had ever heard of a ?cyber caf

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Today I decided to take a walk to my daughter’s school (something a bit unusual, but not unreasonable since the gas prices went up) for a change. I was totally enjoying the break from my small office routine when it hit me — ” my neighborhood has changed. Too many small businesses had just disappeared and on their windows were signs: “For lease”

Being a small business owner myself, I know how fragile a startup can be, how easily your marketing efforts could be lost in this noisy world. There is an ocean of businesses out there, and everyone is fighting for survival.

So how can you succeed? Well…it’s easy — you have to STAND OUT FROM THE CROWD! That, of course, is easily said than done.

There is one very clever way which I strongly recommend: Use Humor! Clever humor is always appreciated and if you can make your clients smile, they will always come back to you.

Before you start, ask yourself:

1. What is the main message I want to send about my services, products, company?
2. Who are my customers?
3. What is my point of difference and how can I use humor?

Once you are clear on your goals, there are many easy, effective ways to add humor and make you stand out:

1. Get a Cartoon Logo: The logo is the very face of your business. You have to be really careful (read: not cheap) when you decide on a logo design. Too many places use the same fonts, the same colors, the same globe and whatnot. The final result? The all look the same. So set yourself apart — get a custom drawn cartoon logo. There are too many benefits to mention, but I’ll give you just one example: check out Eskimo Joe’s in Stillwater, Oklahoma. His owner Stan Clark started with a simple Eskimo and dog cartoon logo design, created by an amateur designer. Today Eskimo Joe’s is a multi-million dollar clothing company with t-shirt sales only surpassed by the Hard Rock Cafe! Now, that’s amazing!

If you want a cartoon logo, I strongly recommend http://www.humorlogos.com/

2. Humor advertising: It goes without saying – humor, at least in advertising, sells as much as sex. Just turn on the TV and observe. Do you know that the new Apple advertising campaign (Mac vs PC) is probably the most effective one ever? Why? Because it is funny, and people remember it. But there is much more to advertising… There are:

Printed ads:
- newspapers
- fliers
- Yellow pages, etc.

Online marketing:
- web sites
- viral marketing
- email campaigns

Street advertising:
- Street banners
- Vehicle wraps, etc.

If you want a humorous advertising campaign, I strongly recommend http://www.funnysells.com/

3. Who said Presentations? If you have to do presentations, always consider starting with a joke or using cartoons in them. Humor is the most effective way to break the ice and add a flavor of trust to the audience.

For PowerPoint Presentation cartoons, I recommend http://www.bettercartoon.com/

Of course, there is much more that goes into building a successful small business. But my point is – work hard, work smart and get noticed!

Good luck!

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If you’re a sole proprietor, perhaps you’ve considered incorporating your small business or self-employment activity.

And so maybe you’ve been wondering, “When is the best time to incorporate?”

From a legal standpoint, any time is the best time. The sooner you incorporate, the sooner you make the move from the world of unlimited liability to the world of limited liability.

From a tax savings standpoint, any time is the best time. The sooner you incorporate, the sooner you will start putting more money in your own pocket and less in Uncle Sam’s.

But from a **tax reporting** standpoint, there is one time of year that stands out as best: January 1st.

Why is that?

Assuming you have a sole proprietorship (or other entity, such as a partnership) that is up and running as of January 1, and assuming you then incorporate that existing entity on any date other than January 1, you face the possibility of filing not one but two business income tax returns for that year.

Here’s an example to clarify this important point . . .

Let’s say you’ve been operating your sole proprietorship for a few years, and in early 2006 you decide to incorporate. In January you get around to starting the paperwork, but life gets in the way and you finally get it done in late February. By the time your state processes the Articles of Incorporation, the start date of your new corporation is March 1.

For 2006, you must file a Schedule C for the period of January 1 through February 28, when your business was still a Sole Proprietorship. And you must also file a corporate income tax return for March 1 through December 31.

Maybe that’s no big deal. Maybe you enjoy filing one business income tax return so much, filing a second one doesn’t bother you. And it may be that the inconvenience of filing two tax returns in 2006 is far outweighed by the legal and tax advantages of incorporating.

Keep in mind, too, that 2006 will be the only year you have to do this “double duty”. In 2007 you will only have to file the corporate income tax return.

But if you are thinking about incorporating, the best time to do it, from a tax paperwork standpoint, is as of January 1. Only then do you have a “clean break” from the old sole proprietorship to the new corporation.

This timing issue can also be relevant if you decide to make the switch late in the year. If the effective date of the incorporation is November 15, you will have to file a Schedule C for January 1 through November 14, and a corporate return for November 15 through December 31. In that scenario, you should ask yourself, “Do the benefits of incorporating outweigh the convenience of waiting until January 1?”

So before you decide when to incorporate, take a moment to reflect on the tax reporting consequences of incorporating on January 1 vs. any other date.

Sometimes it may make sense to wait a few weeks (as in the second example), and sometimes it makes sense to “do it now”, especially when January 1 is nearby.

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Asking new workers about their previous safety education and work experience helps businesses ensure the workers know the basics of workplace safety. Too many accidents occur because businesses assume that everyone knows the basics. Businesses many times will find the worker did not know the basics only after an accident occurs. Ensure every new worker knows their rights and responsibilities.

Workers must know they have the right to participate in health and safety training and safety programs in the workplace. They also have the right to know about hazards they may be exposed in the workplace. They have the right to refuse unsafe work and they have the responsibility to follow safety procedures and wear any personal protective equipment that may be required by the company and that is required by law.

New employees are more susceptible to accidents than those who have experience in the business? workplace. New workers can be classified many ways. The most obvious is any new hire; this can be permanent or temporary personnel and can include supervisors, with or without experience in the business or even the industry. Student workers, co-op placements or apprentices are also obviously new to the workplace. Less obvious are current workers who are assigned new jobs. Contractors, subcontractors, and visitors to your workplace all need to know the general safety rules of the workplace.

Orientation is more than just a tour of the workplace. It should cover emergency procedures, workplace safety rules everyone must follow at your workplace, general requirements for personal protective equipment, first aid provisions, information about where the safety board is posted and any other essential health and safety facts. If possible introduce new and young workers to the health and safety committee members or the health and safety representative during orientation and show them where their names are posted.

Supervisors need to be in regular contact with workers. With new personnel additional contact will be required. Communication should freely flow two ways between the supervisor and the worker. Questions on unsafe working conditions should be dealt with immediately. Supervisors must provide instruction and ensure safety regulations and rules are followed.

Providing a safe working environment and ensuring a safe start when new personnel come to work will ensure the workers are fully capable of performing work and in a safe manner. Safety legislation includes a general provision requiring employers to ensure their workers have been provided with proper information, instruction and supervision to protect their health and safety while they perform their jobs. These regulations are to protect all new personnel to the workplace. These regulations are also set to protect the company as long as documentation can be provided if there is an accident.

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Going paperless in professional offices, such as those of CPAs, sometimes could become inconvenient for the professional to work. When a CPA is working on a client?s tax return and needs to refer to prior year return, it is easy for her to look at the paper printout while working on this year return on the computer. However, if her filing system is paperless it would be very inconvenient for her, sometimes, to switch between screens to take a look at the prior year return and come back to this year return ? back and forth. This could even result in use of more paper than before if the CPA ends up printing a copy of the prior year return to refer during the return preparation and then destroying it. That would result in her printing almost all her clients? prior year returns and then destroying them because she has an electronic copy of the return.

The technology available at this time makes it easy to avoid this problem. Over time it has become more and more easier for CPAs to go paperless as some of these inconveniences have been addressed by the available technology.

A small investment can help CPAs resolve this problem forever and would save them all the inconveniences related to it. Windows XP allows the use of multiple monitors with one computer. This feature is already there in the Windows XP. However, the user would need to buy a special video adapter to attach to the computer to connect multiple monitors. Multiple means up to 10 monitors can be attached to one computer. There are numerous benefits of this convenience in Windows XP.

If all your prior client documents are already in electronic format on your server and you need to refer to several of them at once to work on a particular project, you could open each of those on separate monitors connected to the same computer. This would eliminate the need to switch between different screens each time you need to look at another document.

The set up for connecting additional monitors to your Windows XP computer is not very complicated. If you use a notebook computer you can use the feature of Dualview which is also available in XP. You can just connect an external monitor to your notebook and set up your XP, from Control Panel, for Dualview. The limitation with Dualview is that your notebook or laptop monitor would always be the primary monitor. The other feature, that of multiple monitors, allows you to set any of the monitors as the primary monitor.

Once you set up your computer with multiple monitors, you can eliminate one of the major inconveniences that staff faces in a CPA offices, that of referring to multiple documents from the file and having to switch between screens while working. Even if you have already become comfortable switching between screens on one computer, you may still want to test out this feature of multiple monitors and you may be pleasantly surprised by the ease it brings to your life. The details on setting up multiple monitors are explained on the Microsoft website.

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Would you like to run your own small business? Have you an idea for a small business but do not think that you could make it work? Are you bored of being an employee and yearn to become your own boss? Have you the required skills to run a small business? In this article I look at the type of skills that people need to possess to be able to successfully run a small business.

My name is Stephen Hill and I have been running my own business for around nine years now. Previously I had been employed by a major insurance company and even though I progressed well during my time there, I always wanted to run my own business, to choose my own hours of work and basically have no one to answer to etc.

I am now a speech coach helping people who stammer/stutter to achieve fluency and I also help people to promote their websites as a form of web marketer or web promoter.

I love what I do as it allows me to to take my children to school as well as to pick them up from school. I am able to watch their football and netball matches and attend their school plays and other functions.

I am not bound by what hours I work, for example nine to five. I sometimes work late at night when I do the web promotion work but have the day free to relax. This is not to say that I do not work hard, because I think that I do work very hard.

Self belief is an important skill required to be your own boss. If you have an inner belief and self confidence that you will make the business succeed, then you will have a great chance to make it work. There will be times when during a month you only earn a small amount of money but in other months you should earn quite a lot. Some people prefer to know exactly what their income will be each month and these people may struggle to be their own boss.

Discipline is another requirement if you are to be a success at running your own small business. It is very easy to become lazy and to watch too much television or to have an extra couple of hours in bed in the morning. Even though you may have nobody to answer to, you have to be of the character to ensure you put in the required amount of hours and work.

I also think it is important to have a positive attitude. There will be periods when business is slow, this is where you may start to think in a negative way. This can lead people into becoming very stressed and even depressed. By thinking in a positive way and by working even harder to attract more work is the only way to react in this situation. This of course is not that easy to do but in my opinion there is not enough time in the day to get depressed.

Lastly is the ability to always try and improve your own self and to learn from any mistakes you make. We all make mistakes which is fine and natural. There is again not enough time to beat ourselves up over these errors, all we need to do is to learn from them and to then move on. We should always be looking at ways of improving the business as well as our own knowledge. Standing still and treading water is no way to continue.

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Recent case studies of 5 small business owners who had their web sites disappear from the internet may be the subject of an upcoming eBook. The situation happens more frequently than some people realize, so the following advice is being released now. Free domain registration information is easily retrieved and should be reviewed by any site owner who is unfamiliar with the term “WhoIs”.

Many web site owners may not know what WhoIs means, so here is the short version and action plan. Do this today!

Web sites disappear for a variety of reasons, and small business owners are particularly susceptible to this problem because they are too busy running a business to learn about risks involved with a www domain or hosting.

Here is an outline of the basic cause in each of the 5 case studies:

1. Inactive Administrative Contact Email Address
2. Hidden Registrar and Incorrect Registrant
3. Expired Credit Card for Hosting
4. Hijacked Domain and Identity Theft
5. An Example of an ISP Shown as the Registrant

Learn from the mistakes that others have made, and in a few easy steps you can prevent this unfortunate surprise. Advice includes a cast of characters that may not be familiar. Let’s introduce them first so you understand the difference between registry, registrar, and registrant.

Registry – the worldwide authority that controls issuing of www domains to avoid duplicates

Registrar – a service company authorized to register or renew domains with the registry

Registrant – the entity, person or company, who owns the license for a particular www domain
* Note: No one owns a domain. Registering is an exclusive license for a set period of time.

Most web site owners acquire a www domain for personal or business use through a registrar who acts on your behalf and applies for your domain with the registry. Approval is usually received within 24 hours. Your registration information is then kept on file with the registry. This is long forgotten until a problem occurs, usually by surprise!

The solution: Using any major search engine, do a search on “whois” and follow the links to access a whois database. Most have a search box for entering your www domain name, and once you hit enter or the go button the report is retrieved in a matter of seconds.

Reports may vary in format, however, all should display key information including registrar, registrant, administrative contact, technical contact, and perhaps billing contact. Confirm the accuracy of each, however, if any ONE piece of data is critical it is the administrative contact. It should be you, and it should list a current active email address. If either is untrue, it needs to be corrected. Next, let’s explore the importance of the administrative contact.

The only recognized authority for controlling your domain, including changes, is the administrative contact, but wait. Changes can only be made by email correspondence, therefore your name as the registrant (or admin contact) does not make you the authorized person for changes. It is whoever answers the email listed under administrative contact, so an old or invalid email address will not work. The admin email address needs to be yours, and it needs to be kept current.

Review your registration information. Problems? Begin with your internet service provider to learn how to have entries corrected. You may need to contact your registrar, also.

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We know logo designs are important. Logos are the symbols of your businesses and you display them more often–and in more places–than anything else associated with your efforts does.

Logos are critical to everyone, but in order to have a logo design that really works magically, you must understand what makes a logo successful. Let’s look at three traits shared by all successful logo designs.

The Logo Design Must Send the Right Message

A beautiful design isn’t helpful if it doesn’t communicate the right story to prospective buyers.

A rose-themed logo might be perfect for a florist, but it wouldn’t communicate the appropriate message for a men’s fitness center!

Logos are symbols–just as words are–and it is important that they “write” the correct story. This requires skill and a real sense of how people perceive shapes and colors.

The Logo Design Must Work Everywhere

Logos appear on letterhead, websites, advertisements, business cards, clothing, giveaway and promotional items, and in countless other spots.

Sometimes, the logo design will be large and the center of attention. In other cases, it will be a smaller accent.

Logo designs may be in vibrant colors in some settings, but black and white when faxed or photocopied. This makes it important to have a logo design that communicates effectively at any size and doesn’t rely on color alone to work.

The Logo Design Must Grab Attention

That doesn’t mean logo designs have to be outlandish or wild. They do, however, need to be carefully crafted in a way that will convince people to look a moment longer than usual, or to take a second glance.

People develop first impressions quickly and scan millions of items every day without giving them a second thought. A great logo design inspires that second thought and helps put a business into the memory of the person who sees it.

We design logos that are instantly recognized symbols! That means people take a good look at them!

Knowing what makes a logo successful is only the beginning. Knowledge is power, but that power is limited if you cannot put it to good use.

One of the best ways to make sure your logo design is a marketing masterpiece is by utilizing a logo design service that specializes in creating memorable logos.

That’s where we enter the picture. We not only understand the traits of a great logo, we know how to put them into action, too.

The perfect logo design isn’t just a matter of connecting dots. It’s an art form.

Talk to us about your logo design needs. We can combine the talent for effective expression and an understanding of what makes great logos “click.” We can design the perfect symbol for your business.

Written by Ricco Richardson
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