Category: SME
Computer Consulting: 3 Questions To Ask Your Clients
From a customer service perspective, you can ask your computer consulting clients three questions that will explode the growth of your company.
Question Number One:
ìHow Can We Improve the Level of Service That We Provide Your Company?î
Ask your computer consulting clients this question on a regular basis; at least a couple times a year. You will be amazed at the type of suggestions they give you.
They will tell you some things youíll be able to implement without charging them another nickel or penny more because theyíre simple no-brainer kind of things. For example, ìCould you send us an email reminder the day before youíre coming in?î Obviously you donít have to charge for something like that.
Some of the others may say, ìIt would be great if you could guarantee this kind of response timeî or ìIt would be great if you could also take over finding someone who can help us with our PBXs.î
Youíre going to get some ideas, some of which are going to make sense for you, some won’t. Some of them may require a little more legwork and some of them may be great opportunities for additional revenue.
Question Number Two:
ìIs There Anything Else IT-related That Your Company Needs Help With?î
Question Number Three:
ìDo You Know Anyone Else Such as Business Associates, Friends, Family Members in the Greater Area That Could Use Some Help With Their Computer-related Problems?î
Help Your Computer Consulting Clients Help You
Spend a minute or two to tell your computer consulting clients what they should look out for. If they happen to be on the phone with a vendor or supplier or family member and theyíre complaining and moaning that everythingís running slowly or that the LANís down again or emailís not working or the server crashed.
Get your computer consulting clients trained to listen for those clues and let you know that thereís an opportunity out there. If theyíre a long-term client of yours and theyíre happy with you, they should be more than happy to recommend you. All you need to do is ask and train them to be looking for these clues.
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Don't Ignore Legal Obligations of The CAN-SPAM Act
Most small business owners are not aware that they or an employee may be breaking the law regarding spam. The advice that follows is intended to help you avoid any financial or legal consequences.
The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 was signed into law and became effective January 1, 2004. As a small business owner, you need to be aware of your obligations under this law to avoid serious problems that could cost you time and money. The law is very specific about the content you must provide in any commercial email advertising piece. Not surprisingly, many of us are victims of daily assaults with unsolicited junk mail from very obscure sources. What these spammers are doing is illegal. Taking time to complain is impractical for many small entrepreneurs, so in most cases we just delete the junk, and go about our business.
On the other hand as a small business owner you are in a different position when sending email to customers. Your credibility is at risk because you are not obscure, and may be easily identified for criminal prosecution or law suits. Understand your obligations and what you can or cannot do. In the US, the FTC, Federal Trade Commission, is the government entity for establishing and monitoring compliance with this law. Their rules are very specific as follows:
Requirements for Commercial Emailers
The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act) establishes requirements for those who send commercial email, spells out penalties for spammers and companies whose products are advertised in spam if they violate the law, and gives consumers the right to ask emailers to stop spamming them. The law, which became effective January 1, 2004, covers email whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a commercial product or service, including content on a Web site. A “transactional or relationship message” – email that facilitates an agreed-upon transaction or updates a customer in an existing business relationship – may not contain false or misleading routing information, but otherwise is exempt from most provisions of the CAN-SPAM Act.
FTC Facts for Business
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the nation’s consumer protection agency, is authorized to enforce the CAN-SPAM Act. CANSPAM also gives the Department of Justice (DOJ) the authority to enforce its criminal sanctions. Other federal and state agencies can enforce the law against organizations under their jurisdiction, and companies that provide Internet access may sue violators, as well. What the Law Requires Here’s a rundown of the law’s main provisions:
– It bans false or misleading header information. Your email’s “From,” “To,” and routing information – including the originating domain name and email address – must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the email.
– It prohibits deceptive subject lines. The subject line cannot mislead the recipient about the contents or subject matter of the message.
– It requires that your email give recipients an opt-out method. You must provide a return email address or another Internet based response mechanism that allows a recipient to ask you not to send future email messages to that email address, and you must honor the requests. You may create a “menu” of choices to allow a recipient to opt out of certain types of messages, but you must include the option to end any commercial messages from the sender. Any opt-out mechanism you offer must be able to process opt-out requests for at least 30 days after you send your commercial email. When you receive an opt-out request, the law gives you 10 business days to stop sending email to the requestor’s email address. You cannot help another entity send email to that address, or have another entity send email on your behalf to that address. Finally, it’s illegal for you to sell or transfer the email addresses of people who choose not to receive your email, even in the form of a mailing list, unless you transfer the addresses so another entity can comply with the law.
– It requires that commercial email be identified as an advertisement and include the sender’s valid physical postal address. Your message must contain clear and conspicuous notice that the message is an advertisement or solicitation and that the recipient can opt out of receiving more commercial email from you. It also must include your valid physical postal address.
Penalties May Be Severe
Each violation of the above provisions is subject to fines of up to $11,000. Deceptive commercial email also is subject to laws banning false or misleading advertising. Additional fines are provided for commercial emailers who not only violate the rules described above, but also:
– “harvest” email addresses from Web sites or Web services that have published a notice prohibiting the transfer of email addresses for the purpose of sending email
– generate email addresses using a “dictionary attack” – combining names, letters, or numbers into multiple permutations
– use scripts or other automated ways to register for multiple email or user accounts to send commercial email
– relay emails through a computer or network without permission – for example, by taking advantage of open relays or open proxies without authorization.
Department of Justice Facts for Business
The law allows the DOJ to seek criminal penalties, including imprisonment, for commercial emailers who do – or conspire to:
– use another computer without authorization and send commercial email from or through it
– use a computer to relay or retransmit multiple commercial email messages to deceive or mislead recipients or an Internet access service about the origin of the message
– falsify header information in multiple email messages and initiate the transmission of such messages
– register for multiple email accounts or domain names using information that falsifies the identity of the actual registrant
– falsely represent themselves as owners of multiple Internet Protocol addresses that are used to send commercial email messages.
Conclusion
Fines up to $11,000 per violation should get your attention. Review your commercial email policies, and revise as necessary to make sure you include the 3 most frequently omitted features: identify advertising, your physical address, and an opt-out provision. Continue your review to confirm compliance with all requirements. Finally, visit the official FTC web site for information on additional rules and press releases that may have occurred since this report was written.
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Best Small Business Idea – Overwhelm – Get It Out of Your Head
If you are like most businesses owners, you’ve experienced overwhelm in your business at one time or another. Maybe you experience it regularly and for good reason. Hundreds of things are pulling at you at one time. You’ve got marketing going, production to oversee, calls to return, employees that need your advice. It’s never ending right? How do you possibly handle it all?
Most of the small business owners that I talk to keep almost all of these things in their head. I ask them where their business plan is. It’s in their head. I ask where their employee training manual is. It’s in their head. About the only thing that’s written down is their calendar of appointments. Even a lot of their to-dos are in their head. Here’s one simple and powerful way to get out of overwhelmówrite it all down.
Your overwhelm is in your head because most of how you run your business is in your head. Start writing it down and you will start having less overwhelm. Start taking a little time each day to document your business processes. Make a list today of the processes that you haven’t recorded. Cover marketing, production, training, accounting, etc.
Then take one of these areas and document it in detail this week. Each week, for the next few weeks document another area. Within a fairly short period of time, you should have at least the basics of marketing procedures, production procedures, client follow up procedures, and employee training procedures in place. In other words, you’ve now got business processes. Processes that you can rely on. Processes you don’t have to think about. Processes that you will use to grow your business without all that overwhelm now that it’s not all in your head.
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Business Tools to Help You Run a Successful Business
Setting up a small business, whether web based or not, can be a very time consuming and difficult task. The increasing popularity of the Internet and the resources available has seen a massive increase in business tools to help you on your way.
When setting up a business, even the best prepared among us will struggle to do everything and remember everything. It is very unlikely that we will understand all of the financial and legal ramifications of a new business, especially when we need to concentrate on getting that elusive first sale or completing the first contract. It isn’t always feasible to employ an accountant and a solicitor as well as a secretary, a salesperson and any other workers needed in the daily running of the business. So, we need to be able to diversify when setting up a new business and the best piece of advice anyone can give you to help is to make the most of the widely available business tools on the market.
Financial Documents and Tools
An accountant is a very expensive commodity that many new businesses can afford full-time. It is down to us to undertake as much of the financial side of things as possible; a daunting task indeed. There is help at hand in the form of business tools.
Spreadsheets have become immensely powerful and can do much of the financial work that any business needs, even invoicing. The Internet is awash with free standard documents for almost any occasions; if you aren’t proficient at doing this yourself, you can find balance sheets, daily cash sheets and almost anything you could need.
The Legal Minefield
Mention legal documents to a new business owner and most will curse you. Again, paying for a lawyer to create all your contracts and other legal documents is a cost that new businesses may not be able to afford. Look at other contracts, get ideas off the internet and take a look at the standard contract and terms and conditions guidelines and when you’re ready, book a session with an affordable attorney and let them look over everything. This way you will only pay once and get all the information you need for an affordable price.
It is important that you get any legal documents checked at least once. A poorly written contract can cost you a lot more than the lawyer’s fees.
Human Resources
Human Resources, or personnel as it was once known, will become very important when you start to employ staff. There are a lot of rules and regulations to abide by as well as a lot of extra information to store that is both important and
confidential.
You can get time and attendance software, standard contracts, standard terms and conditions and software to look after your payroll details.
These are just a few tools available to new business owners. To do a job right requires the right tools. It is better to spend time researching your options first to find the right tools, than to get yourself into a real bind attempting to do the job with the wrong (or no) tools. You will find that the time it takes to get the right tools will pay off time and time again.
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Computer Consultant 101: How to Build a Stable Business
Know How To Bill and What to Charge
Computer Consultant businesses need to implement good business practices. Make sure you implement the strategies in this article and you will become a successful computer consultant.
Without knowing how to bill and what to charge, youíre going to lose a lot of money thatís really yours. If you get your billing and pricing wrong as a computer consultant, you’ll send a bad message to people that youíre trying to quote for business.
You’ll be screaming that youíre a rank amateur rather than a skilled computer consultant. It could take you years to recover from this. A lot of times you would need to scrap existing clients and completely start over because certain clients you brought in at the wrong level.
Perform IT Audits
If you know how to do them right itís an incredibly powerful technique. You get paid to write proposals and do needs assessment work. If you donít know how to do this youíre going to wind up doing a lot of exploratory work for free. You can actually get paid for your initial consultation time for doing the technology assessments and the IT audits.
Build Local Partnerships
Youíll need partnerships as your computer consultant business evolves. These will get you some of your best clients along the way. If you donít have good local partnerships, you can almost guarantee that youíll lose clients along the way with this as well. You need to learn how to find these key players and how to negotiate with them.
Exceed Client Expectations
If you want to get paid the big bucks as a small business computer consultant, your clients will expect a lot from you. Your clients’ idea of perfection may be different from yours. You need to learn the magic words you need to know to avoid a lot of the stress and intense pressure. You want to come out smelling like a rose to exceed their expectations.
Maximize your Utilization Rate and Profitability
Making as much of your work-week billable as possible and eliminate a lot of the non billable, time-draining non revenue draining computer consultant activities. Itís all about delivering small business virtual IT services and how to build a stable business; how to get clients for life.
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8 Important Elements for Small Business Web Sites
Key visitors to your commercial pages include web robots that crawl the internet and catalog your content. Having proper HTML source code, plus the right combination of text and graphic presentation, is just one secret to success. Proper code may mean higher robot ratings, and the “look” is equally important. Once a new prospect finds your web site, you have 5 seconds to get them to stay.
As a small business web site owner, you may have asked “Why don’t we get any hits?”. Did you know web pages can load and appear correct with improper or deprecated HTML code? A browser may ignore your mistakes, and display what it thinks you meant, and it may look great. Web robots may not be as forgiving.
Following is a list of 8 basic elements for good search engine placement that need to be considered in your design and web site promotion. For details on code issues from the worldwide authority, visit the World Wide Web Consortium to view DOCTYPE and other quality standards.
1. DOCTYPE Statement
2. Page Title
3. Proper HTML Code
4. META Description
5. META Key Words
6. First Paragraph of the Home Page
7. An Extra Page of Just LINKS
8. Backlinks (Links to your pages)
These 8 key items are either missing or poorly designed in 85% of all web sites. Some search engines may only list the other 15% in their directories. In other words, as few as 15% of the 6 billion web pages online ever make it into some search engines. Even worse, there are mistakes that may result in your page being blacklisted, and the search engine web crawlers may never come back to see if it’s corrected. This could explain why you “never get any hits”.
Web sites can be simple and professional without using fancy software to create your pages. Veteran programmers hand code and many create the HTML in NotePad. Web authors who choose to use flash, frames, or the latest software may be losing a significant portion of new visitors (customers) because the visitor may lack the technology or newest version of browsers. If they are turned off and leave without giving your site a fair viewing, it could mean lost profits.
Most designers use prepackaged software to create web pages. If the software leaves out any of the key elements, the code is hidden, and you’ll never know your site was not optimized for search engines. The designer may not know, or care, about these items as long as the page looks attractive. Note: Search engine algorithms vary by company, so some elements such as “an extra page of links” may not be as important today with some search robots. Backlinks refer to marketing your site and getting other web sites to link to yours.
Finally, business visitors want information. They do not visit your home page to be entertained. Most have a need (problem) and want a fast answer (solution), so designs should be created to minimize the use of music or video unless that’s your core business. Anything that distracts from a positive first impression may violate my “5 Second Rule”.
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Don't start it, buy it!
Why should you buy a business versus starting
your own? Here are ten solid reasons:
1) The success rate for businesses purchased is much higher than the success rate for a new business startup. Just ask your accountant.
2) An established customer base means immediate cash flow! Enough said.
3) It is much easier to find capital to buy an existing business than to start a new one. Why? See reason #2 above. Bankers are not dumb. They know the statistics. Bankers are much more willing to lend money when there is an identified source of repayment already in place.
4) Many sellers are willing to carry-back financing at very reasonable terms. Why? For income tax reasons. They would prefer to defer any gain over a longer period versus taking a gain all at once. And if a seller is willing to carry back any part of the purchase price, it tells you the seller believes that the business will continue to succeed under your management.
5) Projections for a startup are nothing more than an educated guess. Projections for existing businesses for sale are based on historical results. Which is more reliable?
6) Startups always, I repeat, ALWAYS cost more to start than expected. For the money you will end up spending to start that new business (which may or not succeed) you could have probably purchased an existing business with immediate cash flow.
7) You may actually need to come up with less cash for your down payment plus working capital when you buy an existing business than you would need if you started your own business. Why? With owner carry financing and a performing track record, your existing business purchase is very bankable. A new startup is not very bankable. The cash required to get the new business to a cash flow positive is unknown. And it eats cash.
8) An established web site presence. Although each business will vary, most businesses rely to some extent on a business web site. The longer a web site has been established, and the more traffic that web site receives, the more value search engines place on that site. This is important as your web site ranking determines your placement in search engine results. In other words, building a new web site is not enough. Customers still need to find it. A quality, established web site can be a real asset, something that a new startup will not have.
9) Many businesses listed for sale are actually very fairly priced. One can often find a business for sale that will sell for three to four times cash flow. Think about it. Four times cash flow equates to a 25% annual cash return on investment. 25% will usually cover all debt service and still leave a decent return for the investor.
10) Less brain damage. Just ask anyone who has been ‘wrung through the wringer’ by starting their own business. Always wondering if customers would really come.
Think about it. It really is a pretty easy decision.
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Computer Consultant Startup: Identify Your Business Skills
Computer consultants need to have the right mix of business and technical skills to succeed with small businesses. Do you have the right skill-set to be a successful small business computer consultant?
Since you’re taking the time to read this article right now, it’s a good sign that you have what it takes to become a computer consultant. You’re in the small minority of people who have recognized that this is a business and needs to be run like one.
A Good Computer Consultant Has More Than Just Technical Skills
It’s not about playing with the latest routers or wi-fi device or VPNs or firewalls. Sure, you have to have a certain amount of skills to make a successful computer consultant because people are buying your expertise. At the end of the day, though, it’s a business.
In order for the business to be successful, you have to know a few things about getting revenue in and keeping your expenses down. You also need to forecast and be able to bill, negotiate, and network properly.
There are a lot of stubborn techies out there who think that studying the Windows Server Resource Kit is going to tell them what they need to know about running a business. Not true. It’s going to teach you about registry keys and directories and things like that.
Even a Computer Consultant Needs a Good Resume
If you’re currently self-employed, you may not have an up- to-date resume, but for most people looking to transition into the business to become a computer consultant you probably do have a resume. Take out a copy of your resume and a yellow highlighter marker and go through and highlight every sentence or phrase in your resume that describes a project or a job or a skill that you think would be relevant or marketable to the owner of a small company.
Categorize the Items on Your Resume
Go through it and look for all the phrases and the jobs and the projects that you’ve worked on for the past couple of years and think about what’s going to catch the eye of a typical small business owner or manager. Once you’ve done that, go back through each highlighted item and mark whether it was IT related, whether it had to do with understanding how to run a business or whether it had to do with being able to communicate effectively.
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Common Mistakes Small Businesses Make and How to Avoid Them
Unfortunately very few start up businesses make it beyond their 3rd year. Failure is usually down to a number of clearly identifiable mistakes, which if small business owners are aware of, can increase their chances of survival.
Here are the top 10 common mistakes which small businesses tend to make.
<b>Lack of Market Research</b>
When a budding entrepreneur comes up with an idea for a new business he assumes that because he would buy such a product or service then everyone else will. This may be the case for day-to-day necessities but for other items this is usually not so.
It’s important that when you start up you carefully research the market to check that:
– There is demand at a level which would lead to a sustainable business
– People are prepared to pay the price required for you to make a decent profit
Undertaking market research may appear time consuming but the effort will pay off.
<b>Poor Record Keeping</b>
Some business people are not born administrators; they feel more comfortable getting out there and ëdoing the business’. Paperwork is too easy to ignore but can never be put off indefinitely.
Sales, purchases and other expenditure must be carefully documented, so you know whether you are making a profit or not. Invoices must be issued on time and chased up promptly if there is a delay in payment. It’s all very well having the sales but poor record keeping can hold you back.
Having your paperwork in order will also save you time when it comes to your accountant doing your year-end books!
<b>Insufficient Capital</b>
When starting off it’s easy to decide what capital is required for fixtures and fittings, machinery and stock. What many new business owners forget about is the cash needed to fund day-to-day requirements, i.e. cash to pay expenses before your customers pay you. This is known as your working capital requirement.
Small businesses can fail because they have insufficient cash to start off to meet these immediate expenses. If you wish to survive make sure you set aside enough cash to meet all your needs for the first few months.
<b>Ineffective Marketing Or None At All</b>
You cannot afford to treat the cost of marketing as an unnecessary expense. A business with no marketing is like waving in the dark ñ you know you are doing it but no one else does!
There are many ways to promote your business on a small budget; it’s just a case of being inventive and creative. What ever you do, don’t assume that people will quickly know you are in business ñ they won’t, unless you tell them.
<b>Ingoring Changes In The Market Place</b>
As a small business owner it’s very easy to get immersed in your business and not see what is happening around you in the market place. Always keep your eyes and ears open to what the competition is doing and what your customers want. Don’t get left behind.
<b>Owner’s Attitude</b>
Attitude is everything in business. Don’t forget that the real boss in your business is the customer. Running a business may make you feel important but don’t let this develop into an ëI am better than you’ attitude. Do this and you will quickly chase your customers away.
<b>Spending On The Wrong Things</b>
Being in business can be exciting, especially as the cash starts to roll in! However, don’t be tempted to spend it on a new car, a house or just a good time. If you are to own a successful business then you have to keep some cash back to fund future growth. A business cannot grow without cash, so commit to spending business money on the business.
<b>Dependent On A Small Number Of Customers</b>
Don’t fall into the trap of setting up a business just because one person says they will buy from you every week or month. Setting up and running a business, which is dependent on one customer, is not a recipe for success. What happens if, one month after you have spent all your cash to set up your business, that customer says he has changed his mind and has decided to buy elsewhere? Unless you can find other customers very quickly you are faced with closure.
Before embarking on a new venture make sure you have a sufficient number of customers such that if a few go elsewhere you can still continue trading.
<b>Growing Too Quickly</b>
Surprisingly, growing too quickly can be a problem. You have to be disciplined enough to only take on work you can handle. If you are tempted to accept too much you could end up disappointing not only the new client but also your existing ones.
Also, don’t under-estimate the impact rapid growth can have your administrative burden. As I mentioned earlier, getting behind on the paperwork can have an equally damaging effect on your business.
<b>Trying To Do Everything</b>
Finally, the problem most small business owners have is the fact that everything falls on their plate. Inevitably this is how it’s likely to be in the beginning, when the limited budget means that staff are a luxury, but as the business grows be aware that you cannot continue to do all tasks. There will come a point when you become inefficient and not have enough time to complete everything in sufficient detail. Taking on an extra pair of hands will increase your costs but you will be surprised at how much time will be saved, allowing you to do what you do best ñ getting the business in.
Take a look at each of the mistakes and make sure that you don’t fall into these traps.
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