Archive for the ‘Small Businesses’ Category

When starting your own business, you more often than not have to start small and develop your business to match not only demand but also your ambition and ideas. When a business is small, every step towards protecting it and its assets matter, sometimes more so than when it’s big.

The first step any new, small business owner should look to take towards protecting his or her business is making sure all of its assets are insured. For some this may prove easier than others, but one way or another you have to be insured in case the unthinkable happens: severe malfunction, theft or any sort of natural disaster.

Each business insurance package will ultimately depend on the type of business you run, the assets you have and the duties involved on a day-to-day basis.

There are several insurance protection schemes that you can get for your business, which may in the long run save you quite a lot of money if the need to make a claim arises. A specific type of insurance some businesses may need is professional indemnity insurance. This type of insurance is there to make sure that if anything goes wrong with the service that you are providing with regards to advice given and legal action is taken against you, your legal fees will be covered amongst other things.

Naturally, in an ideal situation you would never need this kind of insurance, but if you do get sued and you don’t have it in place you may have to pay a lot of money in court fees, lawyer fees and perhaps compensation to any injured party as a result of your actions.

Other specific types of business insurance cover SME’s may need include employers liability insurance and public liability insurance.

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When you want to go into business, there are many things you have to worry about. One of the biggest things you should think about is what makes some new ideas profitable small businesses, and why others fail within a year. There are many things you can do to help get things going, but if you forget the most simple things, you are going to fail. Though you may think they are huge secrets, in reality, they are actually quite obvious. They cant save every single business, but they can give you a leg up from the start.

Most people think about inventory, but they dont know if they have what someone wants. The truth is, there isnt much that anyone needs to have, not really anyway. The basics are food, clothing, shelter, and water. Everything else is just gravy. You have to find ways to make people think that they have to have your product, even if you know darn well they dont. You have to make everyone believe their life will be better because of it, and if they pass, they are going to regret it. That might sound strange to someone selling stuffed bears or something like that, but thats the attitude you have to have. Its a great key to profitable small businesses.

You have to tweak this message and you have to advertise it everywhere you can. Dont just put a few different ads in a few places, you really want to make sure everyone in your projected demographic can get the message that they need to come see you right away. Too many potentially profitable small businesses end up going bankrupt just because they didnt bother to put enough money into advertising. You can have a great interior, amazing product, and the most highly trained staff in town, but you cant know that youll have one of the most profitable small businesses unless people know where to find you and what you have to offer.

Also remember to make customers the main priority once you get them in the door. Too many business are forgetting the fine art of keeping the customer happy once they manage to get them in the door. You might think that its okay to brush off one person, but you might find that this has a bad chain reaction. It only takes one disgruntled and very talkative person to drive away future business.

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Continuing from my earlier article. If you haven’t read the article then I highly recommend you to do so. These tips will help you launch your freelance career or your small business with more confidence and surety.

# 4. Learn to Sell Yourself: if you are anything of geek like I was 9 years ago. selling, negotiating and marketing might sound like an alien words. But trust me, if you learn how to sell yourself, you’ll make 10 times of money you are making right now… Again, I can’t give justice to a topic like this in small list so I’ll write another post on it.

So far Here’s my advice to you. Go to Google and search for “Scientific advertising” by Claude Hopkins. Download this book(it’s free) and read it from cover to cover at least 10 times. It’s an old book, but it’s philosophy still applies and it’s universal. Doesn’t matter if you are from India, Slovakia or United states.

# 5. Network with like minded people: I so regret not trying networking when I was starting out. Find people who are freelancers in your niche. Get to know them and ask them if you could help them.

There’s good chance of someone giving you small projects from their own.

# 6 No Work is Small: Don’t mind doing small work like “assembling someone’s computer or speeding up computers performances”. Its better than sitting and doing nothing.

# 7. Think Obvious: Now too many people try to think out of the box. Trying to think different. Its not bad thinking different. But also think about the obvious. Lets say you are a computer geek and want some work.. What’s the most obvious thing to do?

You know what? Find people who have computer and solve their problems.

What’s the next obvious thing to do? Find people who own a small business running on computers and solve their computer problems.

If you don’t get people like these what’s the next obvious thing to do? Well, leave your card with all the people you found above & giving them assurance of fixing their computer even if its 2 am.

Are you still trying to be different? You better not.

# 8. Be frugal : If you are just starting out as a freelancer. The only money you need to spend is on your business card. Everything else like office space, fax, copier etc etc are just expense you don’t need right now.

Don’t make the same mistakes I did. If you don’t mind doing some grunt work, you might see yourself working on good projects in no time. Now print this list out and paste with your mirror. So that you slam these points in your mind.

Whenever advertising or articles regarding pension plans are mentioned, they are usually ignored by small business owners and the self-employed. Small businesses are often under the impression that pension plans are only for large corporations and do not apply to them. However, by ignoring these messages they are missing the opportunity to take advantage of the benefits that pension plans have to offer.

Businesses that offer this type of fringe benefit increase job satisfaction among their employees which can often result in a decrease in staff turnover. Another benefit pension plans can provide significant tax deductions for business owners and deferred earnings for employees.

Nowadays there are an abundance of plans and options to choose from. Many plans are very convenient to implement and require very little paperwork. So, there is no time like the present to implement a retirement plan for you and your employees.

In order to choose the plan that fits your company’s needs, you must begin with a sound understanding of what your options are. There are pros and cons to every plan so each should be carefully considered. To assist you in making the right decision for your company, below is an overview of the current and most common plans:

The 401(k) Plan

A 401(k) plan is a retirement plan sponsored by employers. With this type of plan, employees may choose to have a portion of their salary deferred to any of the 401(k) investment choices that have been selected by the employer. The employer may also contribute to the employee’s 401(k) by matching a portion of the investment. The benefit of a 401(k) is that employees are not taxed on the contributions they or their employers make until they withdraw from the plan. Another benefit is that accumulated earnings on the account are tax-deferred as well.

A 401 (k) can be more complicated to establish and maintain then other types of plans and there are annual IRS reporting requirements associated with it as well. Also, the law requires that if low compensated employees do not contribute enough by the end of the plan year, then the limit is changed for highly compensated employees.

There are individual 401 (k) plans that can be set up by a company (incorporated or unincorporated), in which the owner is the sole proprietor and/or only employee. The key advantage to plans such as these is that they permit larger contributions than other plans. The individual 401(k) also tends to be a little less complicated than the traditional 401(k).

Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) Plan

Often referred to as a SEP-IRA, this is essentially a retirement plan set up by a small business employer or by a self-employed person. This pension plan allows employers to contribute to SEP-IRA plans on behalf of their employees in an amount greater than traditional IRA limitations. The main advantages of the SEP-IRA to the employer is that the administrative burdens are few, the plan is simple to install, and it does not have the start-up and operating costs of conventional retirement plans.

Because you decide the amount to be contributed each year to SEPs, this plan can offer a great deal of flexibility. However, they can only be funded through employer contributions and annual contributions are limited to 25 percent of each employee’s pay. Another benefit of SEPs in contrast to other plans is that you can establish it up to the extended due date of your tax return.

Savings Incentive Match Plan for Employees (SIMPLE)

The SIMPLE plan gives small businesses an affordable way to offer retirement benefits through employee salary reductions and matching contributions similar to the SEP. A SIMPLE plan is available to yourself and eligible employees and is made up of individual retirement accounts (IRAs). A SIMPLE plan can also be set up as a 401(k) plan. Both of these types of SIMPLE plans can be established easily using a “model” plan document which is available from the IRS. With a SIMPLE plan, employers offer matching contributions equal to employee contributions or fixed contributions equal to a percent of employee wages.

Requirements and limitations for the SIMPLE plan dictate that employers must have fewer than 100 employees and must generally be established before October 1st of the calendar year. Employers that currently sponsor another retirement plan generally cannot sponsor a SIMPLE plan.

The Keogh (H.R. 10) Plan

A Keogh (or HR 10) plan is a tax-deferred retirement savings plan for self-employed individuals and their employees. Most self employed individuals who have earned income from self-employment are eligible under this plan.

Keogh plans have gained popularity in recent years thanks to tax legislation that has made it possible for contributions made to Keogh plans equal to that of plans held by large corporation. Outlined below are the two key types of Keoghs:

1. Defined contribution plans: These plans come in a few different forms such as target benefit plans, money purchase plans, and profit sharing plans. Each plan requires contributions that are based on either a percentage of an employee’s wages or percent of an owner’s profits. The amount the contributions have accumulated by retirement will dictate what benefits the participants will receive when they retire.

2. Defined benefit plans: Plans such as these have a set amount of retirement benefit that the plan will pay out upon retirement and contributions made are based upon the payout amount. Any benefit that a participant will receives upon retiring is limited by law and requires actuarial calculations to determine the amount of annual contribution needed.

One major drawback to all Keogh plans is that the reporting requirements are more complicated than the SEP and SIMPLE-IRA plans. Another disadvantage is that a business owner is required to make contributions for eligible employees and therefore cannot only cover themselves.

Contributions can be made to Keogh plans up to the company’s tax return due date (extensions included). However, they must be established no later than December 31st of the tax year that you will begin taking a deduction for contributions.

Chicago City Treasurer’s Small Business Expo, featuring Stephanie D Neely, July 16, 2010 at UIC Forum, Chicago, IL USA (2). Mayor Richard Daley addresses audience and provides encouraging words about the economy and it’s impact on small businesses. Daley also highlights an IT training program opportunity that is being expanded. A representative of Northern Trust Bank, the lead sponsor of Small Business Expo, also speaks to attendees.

Exchange server 2003 is a core component of Small Business Server 2003. Exchange allows Small Business Server users to communicate with each other and others via email. This video provides a brief overview of Exchange server in a Small Business Server environment.

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Running a big commercial venture is not that tough as running a small venture is. Here you need to be far more cautious and you can’t do a single mistake in planning for your venture. You may need to take finance from the lenders at times and this should be cheap and affordable enough. For this, you can try Small Business Loans.

These finances are available for almost any of the needs related with your commercial venture. You can take the cash to buy raw materials, buy factory space, to buy machines, to do interior decoration, to buy a plot for commercial purpose or for anything else falls in the commercial zone. You can have the bucks both to start up a new venture and to spruce up your old industry.

The funding is available in both the regular loan packages, secured and unsecured. If you have the collateral for the cash advance, you can have the money at cheap rates and with much flexible rates of interest. This happens because your collateral is able to confirm that you will repay the amount in due time. However, you can also pick up the unsecured options from these sources. Here you don’t have to pledge any collateral for the cash and this makes your go easier with the finance. This is in fact, the favorite choice among the tenants and the homeless since they are the people generally without having the capacity to put collateral for the money. Anyway, these finances are also available for the bad credit holders and they can have the finance only with a slight difference in the interest rates, which again, remains within a moderate limit.

There is the online facility that makes these finances easy. Applying is free and is through a small and easy application form that takes barely 2-3 minutes time. To have the deals in of small business loans you need to place however, a design of the business and this makes your deal better.

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People who have just started a new trade, they are usually in need of borrowing money for smooth functioning of the venture. Often, they require Small Business Loans, which are especial funds for variety of purposes. For instances, they can buy raw material, equipment, machinery, office furniture or they can clear old debts as well.

Before you apply for these loans, ensure that you have your credit report. The lenders first study it in detail for assessing the risks for them. Therefore, make sure that all your past payment details find correct mention in the report. Know your FICO credit score as well.

Secondly, keep all the documents related to your trade ready. Your past tax records, bank statements, cash flow records etc are crucial for the loan approval.

Small business loans come in secured or unsecured options. The secured loan will require you to pledge your residential or commercial property as collateral. The loan amount will depend on value of the property and so you can have access to greater funds. These loans carry a lower interest rate. You can choose to repay the loan anywhere from five to 30 years. However, a longer duration will result in you ending up paying high interest.

The unsecured loans are of smaller amount as you get it without collateral. In the absence of collateral, the interest rate goes higher. Your repayment ability and credit history are generally the two main parameters for the loan approval. Its repayment duration ranges shorter from few months to 15 years.

As far as your blemished credit history of making late payments in the past, having arrears, defaulting on payments or having CCJs is concerned, while the secured loan option is easier to avail, the unsecured loan will depend on the lenders’ faith on your trade prospects and repayment ability.

Make sure that you have first applied for rate quotes of as many small business loans offers on internet. If you take the loan through online, then the interest rate will be competitive as compared to higher rates of banks and financial institutions. Repay the loan on time for escaping any debt accumulation.

Small business people are always in need of financial assistance. They require the funds for variety of purposes. However, if such people have a blemished credit history, then availing a small business loan becomes harder. Hence, they should take all aspects of a loan into account, before approaching to a loan provider.

Usually, the lenders provide these loans against the borrowers’ residential or commercial property. Such a secured loan is easier to avail, as the lenders have little risks. In the even of a payment default, the lender has the option of repossessing the property for recovering the loan. Hence, taking out a secured loan is a way to ensure its approval. The loan amount, however, will depend on the value of the property. Apart from being an easy loan to avail of, you can borrow greater amounts at lower interest rate. The repayment duration ranges from five to 25 years. Refrain from larger duration, as you may end-up making high interest payments.

However, if you need only smaller amount of say up to £25000, then it is accessible under the unsecured loans option. Such a loan comes without pledging your property, as collateral. These loans carry higher rate of interest. The loan repayment duration ranges from five to 15 years.

First, take out copies of your credit report from all the three agencies. Make sure that the report has correctly mentioned all the payments, which you made in the past. Know your FICO score as well.

Make a good search for a suitable loan. Each lender has different rates and additional charges on Small Business Loans Bad Credit. Apply for the rate quotes and compare the offers that come your way. Ensure that you repay the loan in timely manner. This way, you can improve your rating.