I was at the Small Business Summit recently speaking about taming your technology. Technology seems to be an issue so many of us struggle with in our growing businesses. After my 10-minute panel discussion, so many people approached me after to talk about how much my tips meant to them. I always […]

“If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we aren’t really living.”
-Gail Sheehy
Many of our clients ask me how I keep up with all the changes in technology that happen every minute. They want to know if I spend hours upon end online keeping up with the digital tornado that keeps […]

To some degree we all are a little out of synch with fantasy versus reality when it comes to our businesses. For me, it used to be finances. Somehow I figured the receipts would just sort themselves. Needless to say, this never happened.

The World Wide Web has opened up the possibility for so many people to start selling their products online. Every day someone looks at the web and they say to themselves – “How can I capitalize on this growing medium?” The story is a common one, today Martha is making cookies or jewelry or pillows […]

While we should have been protecting the environment well before Al Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth, the reality is it took that movie to send a shockwave throughout the human race. Now more than ever, we’re looking at our individual lives to see how we each can make tiny changes that add up to a […]

Green is the theme on everyone’s mind nowadays, and big businesses are finding out that going green can be helpful for the environment and their wallet(s). Company’s like Google and Hewlett Packard are paying close attention to the energy used by their computer networks. They are both using and finding ways to cut energy consumption […]

Lately I’ve been thinking about the plethora of marketing activities that businesses have to engage in just to remain competitive and ahead-of-the-game: ezines, strategic alliances, referral harvesting, writing articles, delivering presentations, direct mail campaigns, keep-in-touch strategies, etc, etc, etc! Then, just when you’ve hit your stride, you’ve got your integrated marketing system humming down the […]

Technology has made keeping in touch infinitely easier with wireless Internet access and mobile communication devices that fit inside the palm of your hand. But, it needs to be done the right way. Looks like Evelyn’s got the right formula…
Big Corporation just called and their event planner folded at the last minute. They want you […]

Men outnumber women in information technology (IT) leadership positions by as much as 72%! Granted, many women are leaving corporate IT positions and starting their own businesses (yeah!) but, new businesses do not account for the full disparity. So, what’s really going on here?
In a word: self-pity. I’m probably not going to make a lot […]

Podcasting - a term that seems to have everyone buzzing. What is podcasting and why should you care?
What is Podcasting? A podcast is simply an audio recording that can be listened to online, on your computer or on a player. Many times this service is used for Internet Radio. The term podcast has no relation […]

Print this checklist out and as you obtain each item, check it off your list. The items in bold are must-haves for any healthy, functioning home-based business. Enjoy!
HARDWARE
□ Computer system (i.e. Dell XPS 400)
□ All-in-one printer, scanner, copier and fax (i.e. HP OfficeJet 4215)
□ Personal Digital Assistant [PDA] (i.e. Palm Treo or HP iPaq)
□ Surge-protectors
SOFTWARE
□ […]

There’s something that happens when someone starts talking about vision. People tune out. This I can understand. Talking about one’s vision is…well…starting to get boring. I mean, how many times can you be told to set S.M.A.R.T. goals, break your large projects down into chunks or think about your future or raison d’etre […]

In the year 2005 many businesses have web sites and over the past year I have been part of redesigning many company sites including my own. This made me wonder: how do you know when it is time to give your web site a facelift?
Here are 8 ways to know it is time to redesign […]

Outside of close day-to-day interactions with family members, one of the top challenges that family-run businesses face is succession planning.
It usually goes something like this:
Paul Parent has spent decades growing his hardware store the old-fashioned way – elbow grease, keeping a watchful eye on the bottom-line and service with a smile. He’s no millionaire but […]

The Internet is very much like a toolbox. You have a problem; you go to your toolbox, select a tool and fix your problem. But, in light of the current economic state, what should you do while sales are low and the light at the end of the tunnel is quite dim? What tool is […]

Big businesses spend millions of dollars on branding their names, focusing on being everywhere and playing the odds that consumers will eventually notice their product or service when the time is right. As a small, but growing business, I do not have that luxury nor do I have the budget to accomplish that task. So […]

Without proper long- and short-term planning, technology mishaps can wreak havoc on your overall business goals. To get value from your technology investments - whether it’s a networked office or a customer relationship database - a plan must be developed, tweaked and followed. Your plan will help you to increase productivity, streamline your processes and […]

For a longer time than I care to consider, technology planning has been mistakenly seen as an exercise only for “big businesses” or for businesses with a certain amount of revenue. Not so. Think about it logically – big businesses have Olympic-proportioned technology budgets with the funds to absorb blunders large and small. Smaller businesses […]

I am about to say something so strange and so foreign that I am sure, at first consideration, it will seem both impossible and improbable. Here goes: It is possible to actually work with your competition for the betterment of your business. There, I’ve said it. But wait, hear me out.
Since the Industrial Revolution, business-owners […]

However, this month’s article is not about technology, it is about business. About being a woman in business and how technology contributes to our growth and success.
Over the last year and half I started to approach my business differently. I really started to focus on how to work smarter, not harder. I’ve tried to take […]