Turn Your Education and Training into Profits for Your Business

19 July 2012 StephanieE Small Business Tips

Guest-post by Erin Palmer, of Villanova University

If you’re like most hard-working entrepreneurs, you would love to leverage your educational background and training to help your business grow. After all, you invested many years and plenty of money in your education. Now it’s time to make it work for you by boosting your business’s bottom line.

Using Your Degree to Make More Profits Starts With Networking

Along with your degree, you “earned” a valuable resource during your college years: a network. Successful business owners know that networking can be one of the major keys to building and growing a sustainable business. Here’s how:

  • Finding unexpected opportunities: Most private companies don’t advertise when soliciting bids on contracts. The majority of sales are made through personal recommendations. Your network contacts can keep you informed about appropriate opportunities for your company.
  • Locating the best talent: You’ll have much more luck finding proven performers by asking your contacts than by placing an online ad.
  • Connecting you with mentors: No matter how much experience you have, there are other people with more. Tapping into a mentor’s knowledge can pay off by helping you avoid mistakes, improve operations and earn more profits.
  • Multiplying your knowledge and experience: Your network is likely filled with people from all walks of life who have worked for hundreds of industries, in thousands of roles. Many will have the insights you need at various times, and all you have to do is ask.
  • Growing your customer base: Network contacts can be your best customers. Plus, each has his or her own circle of friends, family and colleagues. This results in nearly endless promotional potential. Referral customers are often the strongest and will refer even more customers.
  • Establishing a vendor base: Strong businesses need solid supplier relationships. Avoid over-dependence on one or two vendors; look to your network for supplier recommendations.
  • Forming strategic partnerships: Many folks in your network share a similar customer base, but are not direct competitors. Referring work to each other is a great way to increase business.
  • Knowing key players: Many business owner needs to establish relationships with bankers, lawyers, community leaders and political figures. Rely on your network to introduce you to these key people, who could help your business when you need it.

Don’t worry if a busy work schedule has prevented you from maintaining ties with your college network. Simply join your alumni association and you’ll be instantly reconnected to a network of people, whether you were good friends and lost touch, or you never even met during college. And if you’re not already establishing business connections through social media networks like Facebook and LinkedIn, be sure to get started as soon as possible.

Another way to leverage education for the benefit of your business is through professional training for you and your staff.

Seek Out Training That Can Increase Your Profit Margins

Education is powerful, and can be extremely valuable for small business owners. Wherever you seek more knowledge, whether in an advanced degree program, professional training, or continuing education course; attending conferences; or joining professional organizations, you’ll be doing yourself and your business a favor. If you don’t stay up on industry trends or continue honing your business skills, you could quickly fall far behind the competition.

Moreover, don’t neglect professional training for your employees! Professional certifications, webinars, software classes or on-the job training initiatives will help them keep up with industry news and developments, which can pay off in numerous ways. Studies show that better-educated workers do a better job and tend to be more loyal. They will also be empowered to help drive business by utilizing their up-to-date skills, and by confidently promoting your business wherever they go.

Use Your Education in Business and Enjoy a Stronger Bottom Line

Business owners are natural risk-takers with willpower and determination to spare. While that’s a powerful combination of traits that are necessary for success, it’s not always enough. By using these tips, you can also leverage the power of your education and training to make your business stronger and more profitable, and keep it alive for the long run.

This post was provided by Erin Palmer. Erin writes about topics such as business intelligence certification. Her work helps students learn about business analyst training options.

Payroll Solutions: What Are My Options?

17 July 2012 StephanieE Payroll, Small Business Tips

If you are searching for payroll solutions, then you have surely realized the necessity to streamline the processes for such an important part of your business. The subject of payroll can be daunting with the timely tax filing requirements, employee benefit tracking, and a whole host of other concerns. What system will be best for you and your business for processing payroll accurately and efficiently?

Manual processing

Of course this is the most basic of payroll solutions! Processing payroll by hand might seem like a good solution at first, in fact, it might not be so bad to start out. But then there comes a point when things like employee benefits, wage calculation, and many other payroll functions are too difficult to track by hand or in a spreadsheet.

Payroll software

Payroll software refers to a software application that is installed at your physical business location. Once the system is installed and working, your data is entered and also stored and accessed from your location and on your computers. Many people like the control offered by keeping the software and data in-house, rather than outsourcing it. Things like accessibility and security are completely within your control.

Payroll Service

Payroll services take some of the burden of payroll processing off the shoulders of the employer. While payroll services vary greatly, one of the key benefits is that the service takes care of the punctual filing of tax payments. Payroll services can also provide other services such as the distribution of employee checks and providing reports.

Only you can decide between payroll solutions and which one is best for your business. Things that go into the decision would be the size of your business, the complexity of your payroll, and how much control you wish to have.

Keyword Research - Getting Started

13 July 2012 StephanieE Marketing, Small Business Tips

If you have a Web site for your business, you have surely heard of keywords. Keywords are your connection between what people are looking for on the internet, and your Web site. (Or in the case that nobody is finding you, it’s not quite a connection just yet, but it could be!) You might be asking yourself, “Why would I waste my time researching keywords? Why are they so important?” Well, the answer is that people type in words on the internet when they are trying to find something. Each search engine has its own “algorithm”: their own proprietary program and method for finding the most relevant web sites based on words that are typed in. If you aren’t using the keywords on your Web site that people are typing in, your web site probably won’t be found.

You might be completely surprised when you begin researching keywords, that the things you thought people were searching for are not actually the words people are using. Give the Google Keyword Tool a try and see for yourself. Like so many other tools Google provides, their keyword research tool is extremely helpful and is 100% free. Type in a keyword (which can be more than one actual word) that you think people are searching to find your Web site. If you are not signed in to Google, you will need to fill in the code to prove you are a human and then click on the ‘search’ button. Then you will see how many times per month that keyword is searched for globally and also locally (within the U.S.). You can also see the competition, which refers to advertiser competition within Google AdWords paid advertising. In addition, Google will give you a long list of similar keywords you might be interested in, along with the data for each of those terms. Note: the default option for this search tool is “broad match”. This means that the numbers you see come from searches done on your term and its related terms. If you want to get numbers only for that actual exact search term, click on the ‘Exact’ option on the left-hand side, and uncheck the ‘Broad’ option.

Just click on the link below to get to the tool.

Google Keyword Tool
http://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

So, what do you do with this information? Knowing which keywords to use is a good first step in your Web site being found, a.k.a. Search Engine Optimization (“SEO”). Be sure you are using the right keywords on your Web site, in natural way rather than planting them in here and there. Keyword research is absolutely necessary for your Web site to be found!

Publish Pay Advice: "A Huge Win"

09 July 2012 StephanieE Payroll, Small Business Tips

Wendy Velarde, VP of Human Resources at U.S. Water Services, noticed one day that somebody was walking around the office handing out pay stubs to employees. She thought it seemed inefficient and wanted to see if there was a better way. They were using CenterPoint Payroll by Red Wing Software at the time, so she contacted Red Wing Software to learn more about streamlining that process. Shortly after, they began using the electronic publish pay advice feature offered within CenterPoint Payroll. “Employees have been extremely happy with the online access to their pay information,” said Wendy, “Now they can access their pay data anytime.” Wendy also mentioned several situations during which the electronic access to pay advices could have come in handy. “Once during a snow storm, an employee needed access to his pay information, but only a very few employees had made it to the office. Having the pay advice function back then would have given him immediate access to that data, as long as he had access to the internet,” said Wendy. Also, employees all around the U.S. had to wait for their paper pay stub from the corporate office via mail. The employees are now much happier, having immediate access to their pay information instead of waiting for their stub to arrive in the mail. Providing immediate access to their payroll information allowed one family with a son going to college, to access the financial information they needed for their son’s college easily by using the online pay advice system. Wendy added, “Adding the publish pay advice function has been a huge win from an employee perspective, and it has also saved our company time and money.”