There was never a time when a business could be successful while remaining stagnant. However, with the quickly moving world of technology, the need for fast paced solutions has become even more crucial.

One way in which business management has gotten one step closer to the speed of light is through mobile applications on the Microsoft, Android, and Apple networks. As the most successful network, Apple’s iPhone provides a number of innovative business solutions. Here are some of the best.

Google Apps

Google has been providing a number of fantastic solutions for business owners, allowing them to customize their workspace and provide the most professional public face possible. This includes secure servers for email with massive storage space, mobile synchronization with individual and group calendars, cloud computing solutions like Google docs, and more. To add even more oomph to an already impressive lineup, Google Apps guarantees a 99.9 percent uptime.

Microsoft Exchange

Exchange hosting through Microsoft allows some of the most secure and reliable email server solutions to date. This precision platform allows for collaborative projects between mobile devices, the computers in your office, and anything else that you want to integrate.

Worldcard Mobile

If you’ve been networking in the business world, it’s likely that you have a large collection of business cards from people who may be useful to contact in the future. In order to make the process of adding them to your contacts smooth and simple, Worldcard provides an automated business card to contact solution. You simply take a picture of the business card with your built-in camera, and the software takes care of the rest. Beyond simply adding the name and number of the individual, other information like business name, fax number, and email are also noted.

Additionally, the software provides solutions for contact organization and management which allows you to group and retrieve the contacts more easily. Credit Card Machine The credit card machine app literally works to replace a payment processing unit while you’re out in the field. This allows you to accept payments from any major credit card, take signatures, gain gateway approval, and more, all from your iPhone. This application comes at a much lower cost than a standard credit card processing gateway, is simple to use, and has 24/7 support in case you run into any problems.

Box.net

Most word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation groups didn’t design their software with the mobile platform in mind. Luckily, there’s a mobile app that designed itself to remedy that problem. It’s called box.net, and it allows you to view, organize, and share your .doc, .xls, .pdf, and other files of many other major format types.

Due to the need to meet clients in their home territory, go to conferences, and stay up to date on your business from every location, mobile applications now play a pivotal role in your business’s success. These are just a few of the great applications provided on mobile networks. Be sure to check out your own application store for other great solutions, including a wide variety of free apps.

About the Author: Elysabeth Teeko spends her time stalking technology, social media news and interior decorating. She loves to spend her time writing on new topics and broadening her expertise. You can follow her at @Elysateek.

Photo Credit: Cappellmeister

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Using outlets like helpareporter.com or ProfNet, it’s possible for a small business to get national media attention– without the help (and cost) of a publicist. 

Once you’ve identified an opportunity to respond to a journalist’s request for leads, it’s important to send a well-crafted pitch as soon as possible. 

Here are the five steps you can take to ensure your pitch will get the attention of the media!

 1.  Be First

Both Help a Report (HARO) and ProfNet send out emails several times a day.  Get familiar with the mailing schedule, and be sure to check your inbox as soon as possible after new emails go out.  If you are among the first businesses to contact a journalist, your chances of getting noticed go way up!

2.  Use Twitter

Many journalists, including the people behind HARO, use Twitter to communicate a journalistic need that can’t wait for the next email.  By following these sources on Twitter, you could find out about a major media opportunity that only hundreds (instead of thousands) of people know about!

 3.  Follow Directions 

If the journalist asks for a particular subject line to be used in your pitch email, for example, do so.  Don’t deviate from specific requests regarding the content or format of a pitch, or your email may end up unread and in their trash.

 4.  Get to Your Point

Open your email with why you are the best candidate for the media opportunity.  Provide specific examples of your expertise or qualifications, and don’t ramble on points that are off-topic or vague.  Provide as many tips and commentary as you can in your message; many journalists won’t have time to circle back around to you and may appreciate being able to pull quotes directly from your email.

 5.  Be Available

If you aren’t going to be in the office for several days after your email, be sure you provide another phone number you can be reached at for follow up questions or interviews.  Likewise, be sure that you offer more than one method of communication (phone, email, Skype, etc.)  If a journalist can’t reach you, they will move on to the next qualified lead.

Be confident and polite in your response to media professionals, and they’ll be more likely to take you and your small business seriously.  Your next big media mention may just be an email away!

 About the Author: Patsy is working for GO-Gulf.com, a web design company in Qatar that provides web development solution in entire Middle East

Photo Credit: Seattle Municipal Archives

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When you think of staff team building or activity days, you most commonly picture large corporate companies, or at least reasonable sized office-based businesses. Indeed team building is often marketed as a way of “re-establishing” communication channels between a growing team, or as a way to build interdepartmental relationships. But how can small start-up businesses also benefit from team building events?

Getting Out of the Office

One of the key things that new businesses have in their favor is their incredible levels of energy and determination. When you have nothing to lose and everything to prove, the drive within a new team can be staggering. However, all this energy needs to go somewhere and staying cooped up in a small office can be highly counterproductive. You start going after every lead possible and exploring every available business avenue all at the same time. What people need in this situation is to gain a bit of perspective and team building events provide this opportunity. Not only do they help staff learn how to channel their energy, but also provide some time for everyone to step back and take a better look at the direction the team needs to go in.

Staff Bonding

Anyone who says that fledgling companies don’t require team bonding is talking rubbish. By the very nature of new businesses, there are often individual members coming together to work with each other for the first time. It would be foolish to think that everyone can just ‘click’ and learn how to work with those around them instantly. These things take time and experience, and team building can help everyone get off on the right foot and act as a catalyst for the bonding process. Staff within small businesses often have better out-of-work relationships as well. That is to say, team members are more likely to spend time with each other outside of work when a company is of a modest size. With this in mind, it is good to build these friendships early on using team building because camaraderie and well-rounded team cohesion can really help small businesses through tough times.

Establishing Hierarchy

There is a natural hierarchy that takes place in every walk of life, from lions on the African savannah to the players on a football field. Despite what some people say, it is both necessary and unavoidable, and it will occur within any workplace environment. Most businesses often implement their own version of a hierarchy in the form of an organizational chart, or responsibility structure, but these are not necessarily representative of true power distribution. If you have structured your business properly it will be natural leaders who have the managerial roles, but there are power struggles that go on between colleges of the same level all the time. What team building events do is facilitate the understanding of where everyone’s position is in the wolf pack. Contrary to what you may think, people are happier when they know where they lie in the pecking order (for want of a better phase). Conflicts occur when there is no clear understanding of how the formal and informal power is distributed. A good organizational chart and regular team building activities help achieve this understanding.

About the Author: Duncan is an internet marketing and business blogger who represents a team building company. He often writes about team cohesion and business structures.

Photo Credit: lumaxart

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If you are like most people, you would rather be sitting in a dentist’s chair getting a root canal than standing up on stage in front of a few hundred people giving a speech.

But, if you get good at public speaking you’ll be seen as confident and it will position you as an expert in your field.  You’ll become well respected for your knowledge and, if you have something to sell, you’ll sell more of it.  This works for authors, attorneys, doctors and bloggers – any profession.

That’s why so many professionals give lectures at trade shows.  It gains them new clients.  Six years ago I sat in on a seminar titled Art Licensing 101, given by an attorney.  I was so impressed with her knowledge and her friendly personality that I’ve been using her for legal agreements ever since.

Getting good at public speaking is one of the most important things you can do to advance your career, no matter what you do for a living.

The problem for most of us, though, is that we are more afraid of public speaking than we are of death!  It’s an irrational fear, but it is one that can be overcome, and I should know, because I overcame it.

I was terrified of public speaking most of my life.  It was such a phobia for me that in High School I would rather take a zero instead of giving an oral report.  I was extremely shy as a child and didn’t grow out of it until my early 20’s.  Just talking to people was painful for me.  But I was determined to get over it, because these fears held me back from being who I wanted to be.  I wanted to earn more money, feel confident in crowds and feel okay just being myself.

In my late 20’s I was offered a large promotion at the insurance company in which I worked.  I was excited because it meant a lot more money and life would suddenly get real easy for me.  But there was one problem:  it required me to go out and speak to groups of people.

I accepted the promotion, and I had to get good at public speaking, but I had two very big things standing in my way:  a paralyzing Fear of Public Speaking and a lack of knowledge of how to deliver a good speech.

I have a love affair with money, so I was determined to get over the fear and do well in my new job.  But   it wasn’t until ten years later that I truly overcame the fear.  It was a strong shift in my thinking that cured me, which I will share with you in this article.  I now give seminars and talks to large audiences at trade shows and other events.  And it feels great to have this monkey off of my back once and for all.

The trick is to get a handle on your fear and to learn how to give a good speech.  These two things can be mastered with practice.

Getting Over the Fear

The real reason for your fear is EGO.  Yes, your ego is getting in the way of your public speaking.  Your ego says that you should worry more about how you look and what people will think about you than the most important thing:  what your message is.

Most speaking fears look like this:

• I’ll look bad
• I hate the sound of my voice
• I shake and my face goes red – everyone will know I’m nervous
• People will discover that I’m not that smart

Fear tends to cause your speeches to come across as weak.  It becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.  You’re scared you’ll blow it and because of being scared, you blow it.

If you can get over your bad self just long enough to realize that what you’ve got to share is not about you at all, it’s about your audience, than you can confidently give a speech that will knock their socks off!

The Shift from Being Fearful to Making a Contribution

A few years ago I was asked to moderate a panel of five successful artists for a Business of Art Seminar.  I was flattered, but terrified at the same.  Being moderator meant that I was the person who opened the seminar with a speech, introduced each speaker, and closed the event by giving a summary to the audience.  It was a big responsibility.

In the days before the seminar I was a wreck.  I feared that I would get so nervous that my white face would turn red for everyone to see my insecurities.  It would be so much easier to fake confidence if it wasn’t written all over my face. 

But I knew that this opportunity was a turning point in my life.  If I could lick this fear, I could do so much more with my knowledge in the business of art that would help so many others.  A few days before the event, after a couple sleepless nights, I was struck with a brilliant shift in thinking that changed everything for me.

It was this:  People were coming to the seminar because they want to learn what we’ve got to teach.  They needed answers, and we had them.  If I could remove the “I” (my ego) from the equation, and focus entirely on “Them” (the audience) and what they will gain, than I could stop worrying about how I look and what will they think of me.

So, I shifted my thinking from “How will I look” to “How can I be a Contribution to them”.  The shift was small, but strong.  My mental focus moved to what was important and by making that focus shift, I forgot about myself and stopped worrying.

Surprisingly, it worked.  Not to say I wasn’t nervous – I still was, but it was manageable because I took my ego out of it.  The seminar went so well that I started teaching my own seminars and continue to this day.

I’m still always nervous for the first few minutes of any speech that I give, but after I start talking, I’m okay.  I continue to remind myself to focus on how I’m helping them, and it takes the “me” out of it.

Here’s a list of tools you can use to help you:

Ten Tools to Get Over the Fear of Public Speaking

1.)Make a shift in your mental focus from “I” to “Them:  Lose your ego and focus on what contribution you can give to the audience to help them.  They won’t notice that you have a crooked nose or your voice is funny if you give them good information!

2.)Remember your Purpose:  The purpose of your speech may be to inform, to share ideas or to motivate the listeners to action.  Remember what your purpose is – it will help you to keep your ego at bay.

3.)Be well prepared:  The more prepared you are, the more natural you’ll feel giving your speech.  Don’t wait until the last minute – practice it at least a dozen times.

4.)Share your Passion:  When you talk about something you’re passionate about, the worlds will flow more naturally from you.

5.)Breathing Exercises:  A few minutes of deep breathing or meditation prior to your speech should help ground you and calm you down.  This really works – try it.

6.)Acceptance:  Accept that you will feel jitters no matter what.  Even the best, most seasoned speakers get nervous.  Trust that after a few minutes of speaking, you’ll relax into it.

7.)Practice, Practice, Practice:  Take on every opportunity to give a talk.  You’ll get better each time you do it.  Begin with small, forgiving audiences.  Volunteer to speak at the local school during career week.  I started giving seminars at a local art store to small groups of 20 artists at a time.  It’s helped me gain the confidence and practice to handle larger audiences.

8.)Join a Toastmasters Organization:  There’s a Toastmasters group in every city in the world.  They meet weekly and are an encouraging place to learn public speaking and leadership skills.  It’s very affordable and you can join for 6 months at a time.

9.)Use Affirmations:  In the days leading up to your speech, spend five minutes each morning repeating affirmations to imbed positive thoughts into your subconscious, such as “I am a confident speaker.  My speech will help people.   I connect deeply with others through sharing.”  Make up your own that will help you.

10.)For the Severely Scared:  Try Hypnosis.  There are hypnotists that specialize in this fear, and I’ve heard that there can be great success with it.

Make Your Speech Memorable

So, now that you have a handle on your fear, here are a few techniques that will help you give a good, memorable speech:

Memorize a strong beginning:  Making a strong statement right when you reach the podium will get the audience excited about hearing the rest of your message.

Memorize a powerful ending:  Ending with a powerful statement will allow your speech to end strongly and will avoid an awkward “ummm, thanks, that’s about it.”  End your speech with authority. 

Speak from the Heart:  Try not to use notes.  It’s helpful to have a list of bullet points that you want to cover so you don’t forget anything, but don’t read from a script.  Speak from the heart instead.

Tell A story:  People remember stories and they love to listen to them.  Even if you are talking about something boring such as aluminum siding, you can come up with a great story about someone who had bought aluminum siding and how it changed their life!  Make sure it’s a short story that is interjected in your speech to prove a point.  Your story should have a beginning that draws them in, a middle and an end.

Make them Laugh:  People love to laugh.  Interject some humor to lighten the mood.  I usually poke loving fun at my husband’s bad habits of throwing clothes on the floor like a teenage boy, or at myself for being blonde.  I’m not that funny, so that’s the closest I can come to humor!

Be Yourself:  People want to know who you are. Show them.  Be personal, warm and genuine.  You do this by interjecting personal things into the speech.

Use Eye Contact:  This takes practice, but proper eye contact draws people in and allows you to connect with them.  Take a few seconds to look directly at one person in your audience, as though you are talking directly to them.  Then move onto the next person for a few seconds, and so on.

Never Apologize:  Never apologize for your clothing, your nervousness, or anything.  Your audience is not going to notice unless you point it out to them.

Keep within Time:  Usually there’s a time limit for speakers at events.  Be sure you are respectful of it.  The best way to do this is when you practice your speech at home, time yourself.  If it’s too long, shorten it.

I know from my own experience that anyone can learn to be a good public speaker.  Just like learning to play the piano, it takes practice.  As time goes on you’ll get better and better at it.

Public speaking gives you the freedom to share your ideas and your expertise with the world, while at the same time, earning you great respect in your field.  So go on, make a contribution and spread your ideas!

Maria Brophy

Guest post written by Maria Brophy, self-proclaimed Art Marketing Queen, professional artist’s agent and published author.  Maria writes a blog that helps creative people to design the lifestyle and career of their dreams at http://www.mariabrophy.com.

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Managing your reputation is not always easy. You work really hard to build a respectable brand and then someone comes in and tries to tear it down. Luckily for you though, here are some great online reputation management tips and tools that can help you stay on top of the game.

Think Domain

The first thing you have to do is buy domain names. Yes, multiple ones. Buy .com, .org, .net, and almost every other domain extension associated with your brand so that no one else can use it against you. If you use an exact match keyword domain name, then it may be hard to get the .net and .org versions, which is fine. But if you are a VA mortgage lender, you best be sure that you own every exact match domain name for your brand. And thanks to Google suggest, things like ‘reviews’, ‘sucks’, and ‘scam’ along with your brand keyword are a lot more prevalent, so buying domains with these keywords in them (ex. brandsucks.com) can help manage your reputation.

Choose Your Tool and Start Monitoring

My favorite tool for monitoring your brand on the web and blogosphere by far is Google Alerts. It’s simple, free, and sent straight to your email. You can have it set up to send an email once-a-week, once-a-day, or whenever something comes up. And since most people use Google to find businesses online, knowing what Google is keeping track of is very important. Set up a Google alert for your brand name and you can even use it to keep track of other keywords (and competitors if you really want).

Content Builds Brands

The biggest thing you can do is be a content creator. The real-time web is now in the search engine results. And the pervasiveness of Facebook and Twitter mean that people will seek you out on these platforms for good or bad. You must participate in them. It would be foolish not to. Set up an account (personal and/or company) and start engaging and creating content. Also, make sure to have a blog that is consistently being updated. Use it to post news, industry trends or whatever fits for your company/brand. This will become valuable if you ever need to respond to a situation.

Manage Your Social Web

Use a program such as HootSuite that allows you to manage all three social networks with one easy to use interface. It allows you to schedule tweets, status updates, and even integrates with Ping.fm. Plus, by keeping your search column open, you can monitor your brand at all times allowing prompt response. And you can post to your Wordpress blog through the application. Having an application like this can greatly increase your productivity regarding online reputation management. If you don’t like HootSuite, try CoTweet or something similar but managing a company’s social media platforms cannot be done on twitter.com itself.

Proactive Not Passive

By actively managing your reputation online now, it will make it a lot easier when something bad actually does happen and you need to do damage control, so it’s good to be proactive and not passive about this. If you have a voice, you’re much better positioned against attacks, and will gain credence with the online generation.

About the Author: Kevin Kaiser is a entrepreneur who deals with online marketing and reputation management for start-ups he’s involved in and can be found writing at Startup Biz Blog.

Photo Credit: nicasaurusrex

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Small business owners don’t always have the luxury of having an exorbitant budget to spend on travel and lodging expenses related to client presentations.

Luckily, videoconferencing technology has brought the presentation to their front door step.

While videoconferencing has become a fairly standard practice, many small business owners still lack the basic knowledge of proper videoconferencing etiquette. I hope this post can help shed some light on the proper considerations when preparing and engaging in a web conference.

Test, Test, Test

As the old business adage goes, time is money. The last impression you need to be making to your client is that you don’t value their time and by simple deduction, don’t care that you are costing them money.

Significant time should be allocated to setup and testing of all systems prior to the start of the videoconference. Inattention to these details sends the wrong signal and can potentially ruin the possibility of a successful business relationship before it’s had a chance to blossom. Discovering all issues and resolving them in advance to the meeting ensures that the conference starts on the right foot.

Details to consider when setting up include:

• Camera placement – When placing the camera, try and fill the frame as much as possible with people, rather than extraneous room objects such as tables, chairs, etc.
• Camera and TV presets – Check and make sure that your TV’s brightness and contrast is optimally set. This ensures that you can see the client and more importantly, their gestures and reactions to your presentation. Additionally, make sure that your camera is optimally set to make certain that those on the other end of the meeting can properly see you.
• Lighting – Lighting is one of the few variable factors in a videoconference and needs to be considered when setting up. Sunlight from windows can throw off the camera’s exposure, making it difficult for the client to see you. Having drapes or shutters drawn will help mediate this problem.
• Microphone volume – Unless your client is accomplished at reading lips, problems with your microphone could render the videoconference meaningless. Not only should you check and see if the mic is working, but you should verify that the volume is at a sufficient volume.
• Computer Applications – Collaborate with your client’s IT specialist beforehand and make sure that all software applications such as PowerPoint or Word will work successfully.

Dress in Your Sunday’s Best

On the day of the presentation, set your alarm clock 15 minutes earlier than normal to make certain that you will allow an adequate amount of time to look your best.

Men should certainly shave/trim all facial hair. Dress attire should be professional, but busy patterns should be avoided.

Cameras seem to have difficulties interpreting these detailed patterns and may create unwanted artifacts in image quality. Believe it or not, pastel or muted colors tend to do best on screen.

Extend Greetings

Once the conference begins, treat it as any other meeting. Just because it’s broadcasted over an Ethernet cable does not mean that introductory formalities should be forgotten.

First, ask if they can hear you. Once sound is confirmed, introduce yourself. Speak in a normal voice and avoid shouting.

Microphones are fragile pieces of equipment and loud sounds can lead to uncomfortable feedback or echo for those on the other end of the call.

Try not to interrupt and/or “double talk”. Not only is it rude, but “double talking” is another source of unwanted feedback/echo. Lastly, when listening or passing the microphone, verify that it is muted.

Consider Learning Styles

All people learn differently. For every person who considers themselves an audible learner, there is another who considers themselves a visual learner.

Best practices would tell us to use both audible and visual sources in our messaging. In fact, studies have shown that hearing AND seeing a message has been shown to increase message recall and message understanding.

I can’t verifiably show that using these steps will help improve your web conference communication, but I’d like to extend it as a challenge. Follow these few tips in your next videoconference and I’ll let you come to your own conclusions. I think you’ll be surprised with the results.

Guest post by DBS>Interactive, a Full-Service Web Design and Internet Marketing company located in Louisville, KY. Pay them a visit at http://dbswebsite.com for more information on how DBS>Interactive can help you with your Internet marketing needs.

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Small businesses are more mobile today than ever. No longer are we tied to physical locations, or limited by technology in communicating with partners all around the world.

This is extremely exciting on one hand – great freedom for the business owner, larger reach, and an opportunity to work with the best and the brightest from literally around the world.

On the other hand this freedom offers up a real challenge when it comes to collaboration.

Assembling Virtual Work Teams

What is the best way to put together a work team that may not be centrally located to where you do business?  How do we build teams, and transfer necessary information across work groups? 

These are questions I think many small businesses owners are asking themselves. And the good news is that many online collaboration tools are now available to help facilitate the new way in which we do business.

What to Look for In Online Collaboration Tools

There are many choices, and numerous advantages in using an online collaboration tool. Here are the five main things you need to look for when deciding which provider is right for you.

#1 Security

Got to put this at the top of the list. If you are going to be putting a lot of your work, confidential or proprietary information, onto the web in order to collaborate you need to be sure the provider you choose is secure. Do they auto backup data?  Do you have the option for enhanced security on your pages (https)? Don’t let a breech in their security become a breech in yours.

Do your homework – Online Security Safeguarding Your Business (via3.com white paper)

#2 Flexible and Reasonably Priced User and Storage Options

You want an online collaboration solution that offers enough storage for all the documents and files you expect to be sharing across your work teams.

Also you want to be sure you can add user accounts as your work teams grow. Most providers will offer graduated pricing based on the storage you need and the number of users. Look around until you find one that looks like it will allow you to grow as your business grows without any hidden upgrade fees, or sky high pricing.

#3 A Robust Suite of Tools

The basis of online collaboration is to collaborate, right?  You’ll want to be sure your provider offers a suite of collaboration tools to fit your needs.

The basics should include:

• Tasks management
• Contact management
• File sharing and storage
• Private messaging
• Chat
• To do lists
• Message boards
• Email integration
• Calendars

The sky is the limit when it comes to features, you’ll also find that some providers offer:

• Blogging
• Polls
• Photo sharing
• RSS feeds
• Wikis
• Social media tools

Pick the one that offers the right selection of tools you’ll actually use. All the bells and whistles sound nice, but if you’re not going to use them you could be paying more for these features just to have them sit there.

#4 Simplicity of Design and Function

Using online collaboration should make your life easier, not more stressful. Look for a simple to use tool that encourages users to, well, use it!  If it is too hard to understand, too cumbersome to work with, and more trouble than the end result, you’re going to have a hard time rallying the troops to make the switch to online work groups.

#5 Offers a No Obligation Free Trial

You really don’t know what you’ll be getting from any provider until you are in there using the software day in and day out. Do not sign up for something until you’vehad a chance to test drive the product and make sure it works for you and your business. Most will offer at least a 2 week trial so you can get the feel for how the system works before committing.

What are the Choices?

The choices are vast, and you will need to do your research. Early this year Business Pundit put out a great article, The 10 Best Collaborative Web Tools for Business , which should help you in your search.

They list their top 10 providers, as well as pros and cons of each, and a comprehensive overview of the software and service. OfficeMedium (latest sponsor of this blog) was rated as the #1 choice.

If online collaboration is something you’ve considered we recommend you head over there and check them out, see if what they offer is right for you.

Final Thoughts

The world is getting smaller, and we small businesses owners are able to do business in places we could only dream of a few short years ago. Online collaboration could mean a greater reach, with more efficiency to the small business. If you’re considering getting your teams together virtually, do your homework on the options out there and try out some of the solutions that look like they could work for you. 

Photo Credit: lumaxart

 
It has been a fun week collecting entries to win our HP iPaq Glisten smart phone. This feature rich phone looks awesome, and now it’s time to give it away to one lucky reader!

To Recap

To quickly recap how our contest worked, in order to be entered each contestant had to:

1. Leave a comment on the contest post so that we know you found out about the giveaway through this article, and tell us how this phone will help improve your busy life, and/or make your more efficient. You needed to leave us your Twitter user name for part 2…

2. Follow @HP_PC on Twitter, and send the following tweet to your followers:

I just entered to win a new HP iPaq Glisten from @HP_PC and @Smallbizbee, here’s how you can enter to win too http://tiny.cc/Q3wTf

The above got you one (1) entry into the contest. You had to do both to get the one (1) entry

Then, if you wanted extra credit you could post about the contest on your website or blog, and once you let me know you made the post we gave you three (3) more entries.

The maximum number of entries from any one person was four (4).

And the Winner Is

The list of entrants was loaded into Random.org, randomized, and the person at the top of the list is our winner.

Congratulations

Our winner is Kasey Armstrong, who said that the Glisten will help simply life as a student an make things a lot easier.

Kasey, we’ll be contacting you via email to arrange shipment of your new HP iPaq Glisten.

A Big Thanks

A big thanks to HP and HP_PC  for making this giveaway happen. And also a big thanks to everyone who entered.

Until next time… 

 In this guest post Brenda Harris shares her thoughts on the pros and cons of outsourcing for the small business owner.

It’s an issue that is kicking up a storm today because of the high rate of unemployment – President Obama has on his agenda the issue of moving jobs back to the USA from India, China and other countries where they’ve been outsourced to take advantage of low costs and a capable workforce.

It’s the larger corporations that are now in the line of fire – they’re being called tax evaders who have moved much of their operations overseas so that they’re able to make huge profits. But if you take a closer look at this phenomenon called outsourcing, you’ll find that almost all businesses are guilty of it at some time or the other.

Outsourcing is Out There

For example, banks outsource debt collection to private agencies or individuals who buy the loans from them at a slightly lower rate. Telecommunication and other service-oriented companies outsource their customer service and troubleshooting operations to smaller organizations. And even the U.S. Defense Department is guilty of outsourcing auxiliary military duties to contractors in Afghanistan so that US military personnel are free to take care of “core” tasks.

Outsource Something, Not Everything

So even if you’re a small company, there’s no guarantee that you’re never going to outsource any of your operations. In fact, if you’re a small business, it makes sense to outsource, especially those tasks that are routine and not tied explicitly to the operations of your company. Most small organizations outsource their annual audit and tax preparation or their technical programming/coding process. This is because they don’t have customized needs for these operations, so they’re bound to get them cheaper from companies who are dedicated to tax preparation and offering technological solutions for fields like customer service, business intelligence, data mining and so on.

Be Selective

One aspect that most companies forget to take into consideration when they outsource is to check the difficulty of the integrating the result of the task they are delegating to other organizations with the entirety of their own operations. The task itself may not be that hard, but when the finished product is in, it may have compatibility issues with the rest of the operations of the organization.

As a simple example, if you outsource your customer service and later find that the company who takes care of this aspect for you is at the receiving end of a host of negative criticism, it is your organization that loses face and repute, not the one that you outsourced your customer service operations to.

Final Word

In general, it is not wise to outsource critical or sensitive operations – those that are essential to the existence and survival of a company, and those that require the highest level of security. Also, if you don’t manage your outsourced operations and ensure that they are compatible with your in-house operations and that quality is at the highest level, all the cost benefits that you gain through outsourcing tend to be lost in the resultant confusion.

This guest post is contributed by Brenda Harris, who writes on the topic of executive mba programs . She can be reached at her email id: brenda.harris91@gmail.com .

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The following is a guest post by Sean Harper, one of the co-founders of TransFS an online comparison shopping website that helps business owners quickly and easily compare credit card processors. Here Sean shows you how to be an informed shopper when shipping from credit card processing. 

The majority of businesses now accept credit cards, and for many it is the most important financial service – the one that is most mission-critical and most expensive.  Unfortunately, the majority of business owners get a really lousy deal on their credit card processing.  According to a Federal Reserve publication (P.20) The Merchant-Acquiring Side of the Payment Card Industry: Structure, Operations and Challenges businesses with less than $1M in credit card receipts / year pay between 0.69% and 1.82% more than the wholesale (interchange) price that Visa and Mastercard pay for transactions.  Here are my 5 steps for getting a good deal on your credit card processing.

1. Be Professional and Know What you are Looking For

If you need a particular processing setup to work with your POS system or internet gateway know that in advance, you will sound like you know what you are talking about and it will screen out processors that are not expert at dealing with that situation (which costs more in both the short and long run). 

2. No Cancel Fee

Never, ever, ever agree to a cancellation fee.  The majority of processors will waive their standard cancel fee to seal a deal.  Having a cancel fee which often range from $300 to $several thousand gives the processor a terrible incentive to provide you good service and keep your fees constant.

3. Interchange Plus Pricing

- there are a number of structures for credit card processing contracts.  Interchange plus is the best because you are charged the visa/mastercard "interchange" or wholesale rate and then a predetermined, constant markup above interchange.  It’s like buying a car for a set markup over the invoice price, you know that the car dealer is selling you the car for $500 more than they bought it from the manufacturer so you know you are getting a decent deal. 

As a friend of ours who runs a software company said: "saying interchange plus is like saying – ‘I know better, so don’t try to rip me off’".  Steer away from ERR (Enhanced Recover Reduced) and Tiered pricing schemes.  This blog article has some quotes from an executive at Global Payments, a bit credit card processor, about how they make less money on interchange-plus because it is less confusing . 

4. Shop Around

Interchange plus offers are easy to compare to each other, so shop with at least 5 processors, make sure they understand that you are shopping around and they need to be competitive.

5. Don’t Rent or Lease Equipment

For the most part credit card processing equipment is quite cheap now.  Those little black terminals that you see in small retail stores usually cost $100 – $300 and a full-fledged POS system is a little more than a desktop computer, less than $2000.  If you own your own equipment there is less chance for them to sneak in extra profit by padding your lease payments and it also makes it easier to switch if something goes wrong in the relationship.

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Photo Credit: Andres Rueda