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50 Ways to Save Money There are countless ways to save your business money. Unfortunately, many Australian businesses are overlooking them, or simply don't have the time to go searching them out. Fire the CEO If you are the boss and you think your job is to run the business, you are dead wrong. Your job, the most important job in any business, is to market the business. Computer Related Habits From Small Business Owner - Be Prepared, Avoid Despair Aside from the fear of losing a spreadsheet or research project prepared for a client, what prompted me to write this article was the realization that it takes nothing short of persistent follow up to stay ahead of computer threats which could ruin my business. I also accepted the fact that keeping my computer free of viruses and spam is paramount to ensuring my computer is not going to harm others. Over Disclosure Hurts Businesses Many investors and business ethics professionals are calling for more transparency and regulators are calling for more disclosure. Yet in the franchising industry this can spell disaster indeed. Often Competitors seeking information about companies will collect these documents and use it to the disadvantage of franchising companies. Are You Ready to Own and Operate a Business? How often has someone thought of starting a business based solely on the fact they think it will be easier than working for someone else. Fact is, owning and operating a business can be one of the most grueling experiences you will have. Granted, there are many advantages, but unless someone has actually run a business there is much to consider before you make that decision. Technology Community Helps SMBs Focus on Their Core Business If you're starting your own business or currently work for a start-up, you wear a lot of hats. Any disruption in your business can eat up hours of your time and kill your productivity. Many start-ups are so focused on getting their business off the ground, that they overlook technology considerations that can help increase their productivity and enhance their efficiency. Unlike mid to large corporations that have dedicated IT personnel, start-ups typically do not have in-house IT resources to evaluate and deploy new technologies to pre-empt unforeseen issues, such as virus attacks, and streamline processes to increase efficiency gains. This is due partly to time and partly due to budgetary constraints. Small businesses want to focus on the next sale, not the next purchase. Largely for this reason, many small to medium businesses (SMBs) are categorized as laggers on the technology spectrum -- classified as conservative IT buyers and slow adopters of new technologies. This profile make it seems as if SMBs are risk adverse, when in actuality, SMBs are more risk takers than corporate employees ? after all, they've started their own business or are part of a start-up where the P&L is felt throughout the company. Gold Medal Delegation When the recent Games of the XXVIII Olympiad came to a close in Athens, two events stood out in my mind as perfect examples of the importance of time management: Becoming Recession Proof A lot of business owners I've spoken with lately have commented how their business is slow because of "the recession." If you are one of these people, you might want to reconsider your position. Before blindly saying a condition is being caused by a recession, you might want to ask yourself, "What will it cost me to buy into this?" Consider if you will that your thoughts create your reality. If you doubt that, study any spiritual, religious, philosophical, writing over the last 5,000 years and you will see this lesson over and over. For example, "The destiny of man is in his own soul," Herodotes (5th century B.C.). "Our life is what our thoughts make of it," Marcus Aurelius (121-180) and on and on throughout history, people have been carrying this message. The Single Most Powerful Small Business Marketing Tool On The Planet Let me get right to the point. The single most powerful small business marketing tool on the planet is a marketing plan. Now before you roll your eyes and run for the hills let me clear a few things up. Pressure Washing Business and Post Fire Cleanups Many have not experienced a fire up close. One year about 15 years ago I almost lost my house as did our neighbors to a wild fire. It moved so fast and the sky so black, with cinders everywhere and soot like a nuclear fallout horror movie. Luckily our neighborhood was spared except for a couple of homes. The fire fighters did a good job that day, others living further down the path of the fire and lower in the canyons did not fair so well, a few people even lost their lives. From that day on, I take fires seriously and you should too. Operational Aspects on P and L Statements of Mobile Services Businesses What kinds of things effect mobile service businesses P and L's? Well this is an excellent question and as I see the Annual reports of companies who do mobile services, such as Ecolab, Service Master, Halliburton, Luftstanza Food Services, etc. I see many similarities. For instance we have noted as many of the others the climate conditions, El Nino effects, Mud Slides, road closures, snow. low temperatures, Hurricanes, etc. Business Owner--Educate Thyself! Remember the training programs, seminars, and workshops you had to attend when you were on the corporate side of the table? You were expected to complete course after course for professional development and skill enhancement. Well, where do you get your training now that you are on your own? Do you learn from your clients? Are they the best teachers? What about your competitors? Professional House Cleaning - The Dirty Little Secret Are you tired yet of all the books out there telling you how easy it is to start a house cleaning business? I'm not inferring that all their information is bad, but let's be honest about how "easy" it really is. Increase Your Profits with a Point of Sale (POS) System Whether you operate a chain of restaurants, a mom-and-pop convenience store, or a medium-sized retail shop, you are in business to make money. And, one of the most critical aspects to your profit and loss is your ability to track information? you need to know which products are making you money, what items need to be re-ordered, who your customers are, and so on. This is where today's point of sale (POS) systems play such a valuable role. Carwash Franchisor Case Study There are only a handful of car wash franchises in the world. This might offer some insight on how car wash franchises come into existence. This is a crazy story. It is the history of our company and how we ended up in the Carwash Franchise business. One of our franchisees of our mobile car wash business; The Car Wash Guys, was in Idaho, was the son of a wheat farmer, the areas largest farm family land holder in Idaho's banana belt. About a month before he called us I put up this web site called www.detailguys.com and said what the hell, I will put up a form in case someone wants to buy a franchise for only auto detailing and not mobile car washing we can make a sub franchise out of it. Previously I did a couple of trade shows. The Black Expo and a BizOp/franchise show, great results and really I did not need any leads. But what I learned was their were significant people wanting low-priced franchises. So I put up the website and put a form on it and the very next day I get a lead from Phil the farmer in Idaho, looking for a simple business. He wanted to start a business, but stick more with auto detailing on a mobile bases, which was slightly different than that of our mobile care wash franchise. So he wanted a franchise ID. But heck I was in CA and ID seemed like another World at the time. It was. Things went good, because we made it work and Phil then bought a car wash guys mobile truck and later an auto detailing trailer and hired on some more workets. How to let go of your EGO When does your ego get in the way? Pressure Washing; How to Bid Concrete Cleaning Jobs Remember the cleaning business is all about time ratio to money. You want to be making at least a $1 a minute when doing concrete work at a minimum and aim for $100 to $200 per hour if you can get it. If you are not achieving this income level then you work too slowly or you did not bid correctly on the accounts you are taking. You need to have a work order form. This form should have an area for time it took to do the job, how many people were on the job, gas to get to the site and mileage to get to the site. If you need a sheet like this the trainers we believe the best program to create this in is the new Microsoft Word, it has some incredible new features which make the formatting so easy you might think of yourself as a graphic designer. Franchise Rule to be Revised; Why? The FTC, Federal Trade Commission, is considering modifying the franchise rule. So far it has be a ten-year process; just imagine working that slow in your business? In 1995, 1997 and 1999 when the comments were first considered and taken in, which spans a ten-year period. When you combine those comments with this current rule making period they may have broken the record for the longest rule making session since voting on the slavery issue; one heck of a long rule making period by any means. Employee Relations Manual Sample Outline Most smart entrepreneurs and all large corporations have Employee Relations Manuals. Nearly all businesses with over five or more employees have some sort of employee manuals but not all have Employee Relations Manuals for their managers. It is important in today's litigious lawyer trap to have a good policy in place to protect you from a bad decision or improper handling of an employee situation by a manager. All too often a minor incident can lead to a problematic situation and end up in court, union arbitration or a hefty fine from a government regulatory agency which often tend to side with the employee, regardless of fact. The 5 Habits of Highly Successful Small-Business Owners Have you ever wondered what the difference is between a business that consistently grows and another that struggles just to make ends meet? Or why a business that was started in a basement of a home can outperform some of the best-run "big" companies in sales and profits?
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