Posted by Biz Central USA Marketing Team on May 27, 2010 under Small Biz and Entrepreneurship,Small Biz News | Be the First to Comment

You may be considering starting a small business and you need to decide whether or not you should operate your business from a home office or if your small business will require a more traditional office setting. Below you will see 5 reasons to operate your business from home if your specific business allows for home-based operations.

Start-Up Costs:

When evaluating your small business’ start-up expenses you will find that starting a small business and operating your business from home will usually have fewer start-up expenses. When starting a traditional office-based business you may have start-up expenses associated with 1^st and last month rent, security deposits, establishing utilities, furnishing the office with desks, computers, ect. By operating your small business from home you may be able to significantly reduce these costs or eliminate them altogether.

Hours of Operation:

While many traditional offices hours are restricted to 9 to 5, Monday to Friday, home-based businesses can be open 24 hours a day 7 days a week. With an online business designed to process payment and outsource orders to a warehouse or distributer, people from around the world can purchase your products or services on your small business website while you are working, when you’re not working, while you are sleeping, even when you are sick or on vacation.

Customer Base:

Many brick and mortar business’ customers are restricted to locals or people willing to travel to the business’s location. When you operate a home-based business, especially an online business, it allows you to have a customer base worldwide.

Start Slow:

One great benefit of starting a small business from home is the fact that you don’t have to jump in with both feet right away. You can start slow by operating your business in your spare time, while remaining employed with your current employer. You should be sure that operating your small business does not violate any noncompeting clauses that you may have signed with your current employer. You can speak to your employer or legal council before starting a business to determine if starting your new home-based business will violate a noncompeting clause that you have signed.

Resources:

It today’s environment of information at the click of a button, there is vast amount of home-based small business resources easily accessible to business owners. Much of this information is available for free or at minimal cost online. You can find tutorials, forums, blogs, courses, ebooks, and other forms of information to help your small home-based business start and grow to become successful.

With all of the benefits of starting a small business and operating it from home, unless your small business industry is unsuitable for home-based business operations, you should definitely take operating from home into consideration when deciding to start a small business. Even if you decide to operate your small business from a traditional office I would still recommend that you also build and develop a small business website and web presence where you can take orders and process payments so that your small business is not restricted to local customers and your hours of operation.

Posted by Biz Central USA Marketing Team on May 25, 2010 under Small Biz and Entrepreneurship,Small Biz News | Be the First to Comment

When you decide to hire additional employees to staff your small business, you must be sure to ask all of the right questions so that you can legally obtain all of the information required to make the right hiring decision.

When considering hiring an employee you must first decide exactly what qualities, experience and skills will be required. Write down your criteria for hiring, considering both hard and soft skills. You will need to consider the specific roles that the employee will be filling, as well as the type of personality and attitude that would be a good fit for your small business. Will they be a sales person speaking directly with your potential customers or will they spend the majority of their time behind the scenes?

Prospective employees are not the only ones who should prepare thoroughly for an interview. You should also prepare ahead of time. Create a list of questions that will allow you to acquire all of the necessary information from the interviewee.

 Avoid yes-or-no questions and ask specific, open ended questions.  ”Describe a situation in which you…” or “Provide an example of…”.If the interviewee provides vague answers be sure to ask for additional information or examples.

Avoid any questions that could be considered illegal. These questions include, but are not limited to, the applicant’s age, marital status, race and disabilities. You may decide to avoid these topics all together. If you do decide to ask the questions, you should seek more specific guidance from a legal resource on how best to phrase these questions.

When you are conducting the interview, you should be sure to accurately describe the job. This should explain the job title, responsibility, daily duties and future prospects.  Be as honest as possible when describing the position. You will want to be sure to include the level of responsibility and expectations to make that clear from the outset.

You will want to be sure to tell applicants about where the job is located, how many hours per week it is, what the salary is and describe any related benefits. You also need to a prepared response if a candidate tries to negotiate on any of these terms.

You should also decide before the interview whether or not the interview will be formal or relaxed. A more traditional, formal style of interview is based on the question-and-answer format. Some bosses prefer to forego this structure and simply start chatting to the candidate. This may help illustrate their day-to-day personality, when they are not relying on prepared answers.

Many companies require their potential employees to be subjected to one or several tests. These tests may range from behavioral, knowledge or personality. Tests can be a useful tool when narrowing down a candidate pool.

During the interview, focus on the amount of time you spend listening rather than speaking. The most important thing to take away from an interview is whether or not you have found a match for your open position. This can be deciphered by listening to the candidate’s words, observing their nonverbal behavior and body language.

By focusing on these areas you will be able to find the best candidate the job opening in your small business.