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Government Contracts

Empty Net? Will snagging a government contract ever get easier? By Mark Henricks | Entrepreneur Magazine - May 2007 An article in the latest Entrepreneur Magazine talks about the state of small business government contracting and offers some statistics: What share of federal contracting dollars is small business getting? Here’s a closer look, broken down by the top 25 major producing agencies. Big Spenders Source: General Services Administration, Federal Procurement Data System and Global Computer Enterprises Inc.

Sales tax on mail order clothing items

Someone asked some interesting questions about sales tax on clothing items valued at under $110 when sold by mail, answered here . One of the examples that caught my attention was this, and it's not limited to the mail order aspect: If one is selling a shirt, cufflinks and a tie tack as a package for $50, then the whole thing is taxable because the accessories are taxable, even though the shirt would otherwise not be.

Survey: Small Business & Use of the Internet

One of the reasons as to why the Research Network decided recently to go all-digital can be found in the results of this survey . Wells Fargo & Gallup frequently conduct surveys of small business, with a specific emphasis lately on the role technology plays in a small business owner's management style. As you can see, this is an attitudinal survey, asking business owners what they think might happen if Internet access went away, etc. Nonetheless, such attitudes are a driving force in how business owners conduct their operations. I've handled a few recent requests where the client didn't have an email address. Since addresses can be obtained freely, I'm not sure why neither of them had one. Perhaps it's a reflection of a personal philosophy, or a sign of discomfort with certain technologies. However, perception is key, and surveys like this serve as guides as to what small business owners see as the expected norm in the American economy. It's been said many

Sobering Statistics

America and its guns * There are nearly 200 million privately owned firearms in the US * In 2004, there were nearly 11,000 homicides involving guns, according to the FBI * Total number of victims from firearm incidents was 477,000 in 2005 * A British citizen is 50 times less likely to be a victim of gun homicide than an American * One third of firearms are handguns * 16 children and teenagers are killed by gun accidents in the US each day * Guns that are kept for self defense are 43 times more likely to be used to kill a friend or family member * Possessing a household gun increases the chance of suicide by five times. * Guns are used five times more often for self defense than for crime * 24 per cent of people who draw their guns actually fire them * 5,000 gun shows are held per year across the United States * The number of gunshot wounds from assaults treated in hospital emergency departments in America fell from 64,100 in 1993 to 39,400 in 1997, a 39 per cent decline www.independen

Ning!

What’s a ning you ask? It is an online platform that allows users to create and participate in their own social networks. Librarians love these sorts of things, and nings have been a recent topic of discussion on our favorite BusLib listserve. Like a listserve, a ning can facilitate communication between individuals with shared interests, and provide a forum for notices and discussion. Unlike a listerve, you have the opportunity to post a picture, and perhaps carry on a more casual discussion than you would want to post to a list of thousands. You can create your own, or participate in an existing ning. And librarians aren’t the only ones with nings. These are all related to business . Read more about Ning here.

Charities and Tax Forms

"I have a patron who is looking for nonprofit organizations' IRS form 990" Foundation Center.org has a database. I looked for those in NYS in 2005 and discovered that 44991 documents matched, though only 100 documents are displayed, so narrowing by name will be necessary. Grantsmart.org showed 85844 Matches Found for New York, though it may cover more than one year. It claims to have over 620,000 tax returns filed by over 100,000 private foundations and charitable trusts. If you're looking for aggregate tax data about charities, or for that matters, businesses generally, go to the web page of our good friends at the IRS . Hurry up and file those taxes!

Business Lists Policy

The Research Network has had a written policy of limiting our clients to 50 records for any business list we create. (It's right there on page 185 of the SBDC's current Standard Operations Policy document . . . what, you didn't have that memorized?) We've gotten away from that, mostly because it was not a great effort to generate lists that were a bit larger. A poll of the librarians here reveals that it's been pretty common to provide your clients with lists of 50 to 100 companies, mainly because there was no consequence to us. We'd pay once for the American Business Disc CD-ROM at the beginning of the year, and that would be that. ABD was produced by InfoUSA. Last fall, I learned that they wouldn't be making the CD product anymore. Now we're using their web-based database (called Reference USA). We paid a rate for four librarians, and then have unlimited usage for twelve months. The product is up for renewal at the end of the month. InfoUSA cha

BNET blogs

"A BNET reader recently asked our Where's the Line? writer (aka "Your Conscience") what she should do after unexpectedly finding an office-wide salary list. Her dilemma? She's making less than her peers. In The Danger of Salary Secrets , the Conscience advises her not to abuse the power. Would you be tempted?" Of course, from the employers' point of view, one ought not to be leaving such information in the copier. Another recent article is The Great Workplace Wiki Divide? , where it discusses the effect of a "younger generation of workers who embrace Web-based tools in a way that often confounds older workers." I liked this recent intro: "No matter how much companies rely on technology to get to the job done faster, managers can't forget the human factor. How employees are managed, motivated, and led can make all the difference in the world about how they feel when they walk in the door and when they shut down their PCs at the end of t

Marketing to Bloggers

This is a blog with a specific audience. We don't advertise it outside the program, so consequently we don't get a barrage of emails soliciting reviews of, or links to websites for, specific products and services. That's not the case in much of the blogosphere. Lately, I've been trying to persuade other small business blogs to mention the "What's Your Signage" website , as the right blogger can be a very valuable marketing ally. It's slow-going, and requires patience, and knowing that you're sending the right message to the right blog. I came across this article: " The Must-Know Do's & Don'ts of Marketing to Bloggers ". It's written by a woman who has been receiving unsolicited email pitches for years. If any of your more technically-literate clientele discuss the blogosphere as a potential marketing tool, have them keep these tips in mind. Otherwise, they'll just be wasting their time on an audience that likely will

SBA Announces National Celebration of Small Business Week

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Small Business Administration will honor America’s top entrepreneurs – and name the National Small Business Person of the Year – at national ceremonies in Washington, D.C., during Small Business Week, April 23-24. The two-day celebration will honor the small business accomplishments of individuals and business owners at four major award events. “The SBA is proud to honor the entrepreneurial spirit of the men and women who have played such a key role in the success of the economy and the prosperity of our nation,” SBA Administrator Steven Preston said. “I am proud to represent an agency that touches so many people’s lives, not only helping them realize their dreams, but doing so in a way that provides jobs, expands our economy, and supports innovation in our country.” The 2007 Small Business Week will be at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, where more than 100 outstanding small business owners from across the nation will be recognized. A

Trendy Food

Two things we love around here: trends and new food & beverage products. Put 'em together in a lovely online journal? You get the Stagnito's New Products Online , a daily journal for product developers. Besides access to the print New Products Magazine , the site offers frequently updated news about new products, packaging and wellness trends. There's also a calendar for goings-on in the food and beverage industry and commentary on the state of the market (today's is about the importance of company behavior on consumer choices). Pleasant browsing. Good for searching. I like it.

Credit cards gone wild

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From BUSLIB: U.S. Census Bureau information from the Statistical Abstract (PDF) can be found here , especially pages 8, 10, 14, and 16. Summary from the American Bankers Asoociation (PDF) (2004) Article from MSN quoting data from Experian that 1 in 7 Americans carry 10 or more credit cards, with an expert calling that fact 'just plain nuts.'

Email Madness!

As a librarian, I'm compelled to organize things by category. This includes emails, for which I have 90 categories in Outlook. Sheesh. I don't like having too many emails in the Inbox. Those that reside in this main category are those that require something from me. Last week, I got it down to four. That's some kind of record. Soon after, I read this story from the Online Wall Street Journal. Its subtitle spoke volumes to me: “Forget Spam -- It's Unnecessary Email That Makes Our Inboxes Runneth Over”. Amen to that. The author has his tongue planted firmly in cheek (I love the idea of a "Withdraw" button), but there's truth beneath his satire. Read it - I'm sure you'll recognize others (but hopefully not yourself) in some of the suggestions he puts forth.

Income Inequality – The US Falling Behind.

I heard two stories on the radio this morning – back-to-back. The first was about how the income divide is growing in this country between rich and poor (which you hardly need research to see). The second was about how the US has fallen from 1st in the world for technology adoption to 7th according to the 2006-07 Networked Readiness Index put out by the World Economic Forum www.weforum.org , which measures the adoption of information and communications technology. This year, the number one spot was taken by Denmark, which has been steadily advancing, followed by Sweden, Singapore, Finland, Switzerland, the Netherlands and then the US, Iceland and the UK. To my mind, these issues are related – the fact that wealth is not spread, that cell phone use is a status issue here more than elsewhere. Requiring that people sign on for two-year plans in order to get a cell phone also is responsible for there being fewer cell phone owners than elsewhere. US Drops in Information Technology Rankin

A Call for Your Stuff

Does anyone out there have a basic powerpoint presentation discussing the NYS SBDC and what we do? I bet someone does. We'd like to help you share this type of information. At many special libraries, employees are required to submit copies of all their reports and presentations to the central library. The librarians then "sanitize" these documents- taking out personal information and the like, cataloging them, and making them available throughout the broader agency. Now, don't start sending us everything you do. But when you have something that might be useful for someone else, why not share it? We'll be happy to take out (or leave in if you prefer) identifying information. I know I'm always asking for things for the public website, but what about sharing things internally? We can, and should do that too. And the Research Network would love to help.

Sources for notification of company earnings announcements

Stolen from BUS-LIB: The person was looking for "any kind of electronic source, preferably FREE, that would notify me in advance of an earnings announcement of a U.S. public company. Not sure if any one is the best one, but the majority of the ones recommended to me certainly do seem to provide exactly what I wanted." Here's the summary: Forbes has a pretty nifty site: http://forbes.ccbn.com/earning.asp?date=20070213&client=forbes It gives Highlights, Earnings, Webcasts, Conference Calls (with links!)and major Economic Events. You can search by company ticker or by date. Earnings Whispers http://www.earningswhispers.com/calendar.asp Cantos http://w3.cantos.com/cantos/dyn/main.php?t=a (Primarily limited to UK companies.) Many firms also offer email notification of upcoming events of interest to investors...check the "Investor Relations" sections of websites of the firms you are monitoring. Of course, if you are monitoring a large number, that could be tediou

Internet Crime Report - 2006

Who among you haven't had a client who wonders or worries about being taken in an online scam? It's a topic I've written about since we developed this blog. Since e-mail & the Internet aren't going away soon, it might be helpful to you & your clients to read the Internet Crime Report: 2006 . It's a 27-page report issued from the Internet Crime Complaint Center (the IC3), and it provides insights into the current trends being used to con people out of their money via electronic means. (You can just read the highlights here , too.) The report identifies nine broad types of online fraud, including identity theft, investment fraud, phishing, spamming, cyberstalking, and other nasty things. Appendix II of the report offers tips on how to avoid falling prey to perpetrators, too. The report represents just a fraction of the online fraud that goes on. Most crimes don't get reported. If you or any of your clients feel like they've been victimized, have t

Innovation & Brainstorming

InnovationTools provides entrepreneurs and innovators with a focused, growing collection of the best resources on business innovation, creativity and brainstorming. Our goal is to help you to learn more about the tools, strategies and techniques you can use to be more creative in your business -- and to help your company to increase its capacity for innovation and change. Brainstorming tools: http://www.solutionpeople.com/kbtool.htm A little about creative thinking and problem solving: Critical Thinking and Creative Thinking Skills Scott Isaksen's and Donald Treffinger's critical thinking and creative thinking model. By Mary Bellis adapted from materials written by the USPTO Mindmapping blog: http://mindmapping.typepad.com/the_mind_mapping_software/ focuses entirely on mind-mapping and lists many mind-mapping software products. http://thinksmart.typepad.com/headsup_on_organizational/ is another blog – this time on organizational innovation and mentions the supposed end of inno

Looking for a marketing plan?

Unfortunatly, we at the Research Network don't always have access to as many sample marketing plans as we (and you too) would sometimes like. Palo Alto Software would like you to buy their "Marketing Plan Pro" software (much like our friend "Business Plan Pro"). But if that's not in the cards, they also offer a handful of free marketing plans at Mplans.com . These include plans for a bed & breakfast, shoe store, accountant, car wash, catering, fitness club and more. So while they don't cover every type of business, there is some variety and some fairly common businesses.

Reading the Fine Print

Hooray for Edgar Dworsky. Dworsky runs Consumerworld.org , which highlights consumer issues of general interest to the public. He says he scans 1,000 news stories a day to find links for his site. The site is funded by commissions from a shopping comparison tool and a long-distance service on the site. Now he has started Mouseprint.org ; the name refers to "print so small that only a mouse could see it." The site discloses that really small print at the bottom of some advertisements and those really fast-talking disclaimers on radio or TV ads. Here's one recent example: A $400 airline ticket will require 60,000 points. To earn 60,000 points under Capital One’s revised system where every dollar spent earns 1.25 points on their regular card [up from 1 point], you would have to purchase $48,000 worth of goods and services.