Small Business Community News

Like the communities we create around our brands, small business owners make up a community too. Sharing news and information to improve our businesses is a vital part of that community spirit. We hope this latest small business news roundup helps our small business community thrive and we hope you share it with yours as well. We all benefit from the information we share. Please pass it on.

Management

Tips for building an online community. It can be a critical part of boosting your brand, product or service online today, but done wrong it can be ignored at best or actually do harm to your online reputation at worst. Here are 10 tips you should consider while building a small business community online.  BizSugar

The boss your business needs. A recent guest post also from our sister site BizSugar.com looks at another important discussion out there in the small business community, namely how to run your small business. Hope you enjoy and will share the post and thanks for the opportunity to share these thoughts with a broader audience. BNET

Accounting & Legal

Six accounting solutions. Nicole Fende, “The Numbers Whisperer” takes you on a video tour of the top accounting softwares for small business, and no, Quickbooks is not your only choice. Watch a demonstration of capabilities and have a look at the positive and negative of each along with an evaluation of the kinds of businesses each is best for and a price breakdown. Matt About Business

What business structure is right for you? There are Limited Liability Companies, S-Corporations and C-corporations, all with their own positives and negatives. But which one is right for your business? In this guest post by Nellie Akalp, we get a picture of the different formats and consider the choices, especially from the perspective of a solo or mompreneur. The Work at Home Mom

Marketing

Adding audio to your text-only marketing. Actually, Morgan Barnhart, in this guest post, is talking specifically about turning ebooks into audiobooks, but the principle can be applied broadly to many of your print marketing materials. Imagine increasing the accessibility of your message by adding a brand new dimension: sound! FamousBloggers

8 tips for the e-mail newsletter. Alan O’Rourke gives us a look at the best way to create newsletters these days: e-mail. The process is simple and inexpensive, but there are still some important tips to keep in mind. Here are eight of the big ones. Tweak Your Biz

Startup

Don’t let these seven mistakes kill your startup. Believe it or not, they are more common then you’d think. The key takeaway? Being bummed out by the economy is NOT a promising beginning. It’s important to focus on what you want to do (you’ll be stuck with this business for a while.) Then figure out how to reach customers and create a plan. Yahoo! Small Business

10 steps to building a business. These are not the steps you necessarily take to create a successful business, but the steps taken to create your business, period. The list comes from David Ronick, co-founder of Upstart Bootcamp and is fairly self-explanatory, but important. Enjoy. Inc.com

Tech

How is your business using QR? If your small business’s idea of cell phone innovation is sending out a text to a preferred customers list, listen up. There’s a whole new game out there and it’s called “Quick Response.” If you’re not already using it, you may want to consider it fast, before rapid moving mobile marketing leaves you behind. WSJ

Policy

What policy changes do most small businesses need? Scott Shane insists one is a loosening up in regulations, but also says some of the policy being pushed for in Washington these days will mean little to many small businesses owners. If small business is the key to economic recovery, it’s time public policy start addressing these needs. Bloomberg BusinessWeek

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