Archive for September 2009
Subcontracting To Snag Stimulus Dollars
The Wall Street Journal: For small business owners trying to find a way into the lucrative market for federal contracts, subcontracting can provide a back door. With billions of extra federal dollars being offered though the economic stimulus package, many small business owners have set their sights on winning contracts directly from federal agencies. For [...]
Chicago Toy & Game Fair 2009 Young Inventor Challenge
Examiner.com: Creative young inventors are invited to build and submit a prototype and marketing poster display for an original game or toy to be judged in the Young Inventor Challenge at the Chicago Toy & Game Fair at Navy Pier on November 21, 2009. Chicago children can turn in entries as individuals or as a [...]
Science Tells Us Which Online Ads Work
The New York Times: A technician in a black lab coat gazed at the short, middle-aged man seated inside the Walt Disney Company’s secretive new research facility here last week, his face shrouded with eye-tracking goggles. Read ESPN.com on that BlackBerry, she told him soothingly, like a nurse about to draw blood. “And have fun,” [...]
Trilingual Mom Opening New Language School
SouthCoastToday.com: As a young girl of Austrian descent living in Argentina, Dolores Garcia Laredo de Hirschmann grew up appreciating both South American and European culture, and, along the way, she picked up three languages. The experience added so much to her life, said Hirschmann, that as a mother of four living in America she has [...]
SocialNetworkingNanny.com Minds Facebook, Twitter, And LinkedIn For You
PR Web: A new virtual assistant service helps savvy businesses capitalize marketing opportunities on social networking web sites. Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are important marketing tools. They can create new opportunities — but it’s important to be consistent — and that takes time. SocialNetworkingNanny.com to the rescue. SocialNetworkingNanny.com provides administrative services. [...]
Fast Company: Some Twitter users bemoan the service’s 140-character limit. But to others, the restrictions are a source of inspiration. And any technology that has the cultural impact of Twitter will inevitably be embraced by artists (if only for the publicity). Writer Arjun Basu has made a name for himself writing 140 character stories he [...]
Find Your Primo, Clothing That Motivates
If you participate in a sport, it is important to keep your head up and your inner “winner” on hand. While that might be a little tough, Primo Activewear has a line of shirts that is bound to bring out the winner in everyone. Tanya Primo-Jones originally had surfing in mind when she created her [...]
Where Public School Buses Fail Hillsborough Man Comes To The Rescue
TampaBay.com: Work starts at 6 a.m., but your first-grader’s school starts at 8:05. He’ll have to stand at a crowded bus stop with kids twice his size, while you’re at the office, wondering if he’s still alive. It’s enough to make a mom reach for her wallet. That’s what Karina DaSilva and a growing number [...]
For Entrepreneur, Buyout Was A Piece Of… Puzzle?
jconline.com: For the following year Clauson worked in the sporting goods industry. Then the entrepreneur returned to his roots and started Lafayette Puzzle Factory — creating a variety of puzzles that are sold at retail locations. “Even while working for the sporting goods company, I found myself walking up and down the toy aisles at [...]
Happy Labor Day, Even If You’re An Entrepreneur
CommercialAppeal.com: Some say Matthew Maguire is the father of Labor Day. Others say it was Peter McGuire. Both cared greatly for an important segment of the marketplace, its workers. Regardless of paternity, such a day was first celebrated on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 1882, in New York City, when members of the CLU took an unpaid [...]
Video Conferencing Has Its Benefits
photo credit: Jakob Montrasio In today’s world we are continuously trying to come up with business ideas and inventions that save us time, money and also are safer for the planet. Small Biz Labs recently posted an article on Video Conferencing and it’s many benefits for the business owner as well as the planet. Video Conferencing [...]
Wausau Daily Herald: Any parent with young children knows how difficult cooking a meal can be when there are small hands trying to help. Rather than shoo them out, stay-at-home mom Joy Frystak invites her three young daughters into the kitchen with her. And that inspired her to start a new business. Frystak, 33, of [...]
Trio Of Mompreneurs Hosting Get-It-Done Workshops
PR.com: Running a business while raising a family can be an extremely rewarding yet challenging path for many moms. Just ask Lara Galloway, Mary Hickman and Melissa Lierman. With eight kids under 10 between them and successful individual businesses, they manage many of the same challenges other mom entrepreneurs face. “We found that we are [...]
Entrepreneur Makes All The Right Moves In The Board Game Business
The Miami Herald: Eric Poses rolled the dice in 1997, when he founded All Things Equal and took off on a cross-country sales trip in his car. Since then, revenue has grown and he now finds himself in a countercyclical sales boom. Board games traditionally do well during tough economic times. After all, Monopoly was [...]
Deluxe Sweepstakes Giving Away A Small Business Brand Makeover
Reuters: Small businesses in need of a new image will have the chance to receive up to $15,000 in prizes to transform their brand in the Deluxe Business Makeover Sweepstakes launching today. Deluxe will randomly award three grand prize winners a $10,000 gift certificate from Target Commercial Interiors(TM) featuring HON((R) )furniture and a $5,000 DeluxeBucks((R) [...]
Basic Training On Starting A Business
photo credit: TheAlieness GiselaGiardino²³ So you have made the first step and decided to start your own business, congratulations! Now you need to know what it takes to run your own business, resources, who to hire, how to market, and all of the other avenues that need to be explored. For now, I will [...]
Start And Grow A Very Successful Blog
photo credit: milena mihaylova Many business owners are coming to the realization that having a blog is a very powerful tool for their business to have in its corner, but many of them don’t really know how to start a blog or how to make it grow into something great for that matter. Choose your [...]
The Top Creative Business People In The World Today
photo credit: woodleywonderworks I recently came across an article naming the top 25 most creative business people in the world today. Some of them i found to be quite interesting and not someone that i would have ever thought of until i read this article. Below are a few of these top most creative [...]
Simple Planning Can Save Your Biz In The Face Of Disaster
The Dallas Morning News: There’s a brush fire bearing down on your business. You have one hour to evacuate – which means you have one hour to execute a disaster preparation plan. This is a scenario similar to what thousands of small business owners face each year. Luckily, that’s enough time to take care of [...]
Where To Look For A Great Business Idea
photo credit: werkunz1 When people start thinking about starting their own business, they wonder where to find a great business idea that will be as profitable as they would like. Many don’t realize there are about a dozen business ideas around their own home and property! Take your garage for example, there are several different [...]
You're Not SuperMompreneur, Don't Try To Be
MSN Business On Main: Oh, the freedom of being your own boss. So many working mothers see it as the answer to their work-life balance woes, but once they embark on entrepreneurship many get a harsh dose of reality — it can be harder than working for THE MAN. Take Renee Wood, a mother of [...]
Could You Sell Unassembled Snowmen?
Sometimes finding a business to start requires that you turn conventional wisdom on it’s head.
Business Week on the creation of IdeaPaint: Sometimes a product idea is as obvious as the wall right in front of you. In 2005, three Babson College undergrads were brainstorming on a whiteboard, but had to keep erasing proposals to make room for more. Then, recalls Jeff Avalon, one of them said, “Wouldn’t it be [...]
photo credit: chanchan222 Many are up in arms about the recent announcement of Disney buying out the long time favorite Marvel comics. Many wonder what this will forecast for Marvels many characters in the future. Will they change drastically, will they get rid of some of the characters that people love? One sure thing about [...]
Right And Wrong Way To Hire People
photo credit: c h e e s e roc In today’s large unemployment line and as many businesses look to fill positions that they cut out during the toughest times, it is being seen that some guidelines are becoming obsolete in the hiring process. Businesses are just so eager to fill a much needed position [...]
Interview Questions You Might See When Applying To Work From Home
If you have decided to take the route of applying for a work at home job then you need to be prepared. If you are familiar with the traditional interview process, some of these questions will come as no surprise. However, some of those traditional questions now have a new twist on them. Here are [...]
Great Online Tools For Your Small Business
photo credit: Stabilo Boss With online businesses growing before our eyes, I feel it is important to provide these online business owners with as many tools to help them in their venture as possible. We all know that you can never have too many resources and helpful suggestions to fall back on. Below are [...]
A Model on Your Bottle of Water
Ballard News Tribune: While most people see only bland depictions of mountains or umbrellas when perusing the seemingly endless varieties of bottled waters on grocery store racks, Ballard resident Marie Nicholas saw something else: Opportunity. With Nicholas’ Model on a Bottle, instead of a mountain, thirsty customers get musclebound and shirtless “Pro Fitness Model Hitch.” [...]
From His Head to Space in 21 Months
WBAY TV: Filar developed a specialized digital eye camera that attaches to a scope doctors use to look into a patient’s eyes. It plugs into a computer and takes pictures or video, “and I can actually see the inside of the eye here.” Filar says he had the idea for a portable device like this [...]
One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s House
NY Times: Among the traditional brick and clapboard structures that line the streets of this sleepy East Texas town, 70 miles north of Houston, a few houses stand out: their roofs are made of license plates, and their windows of crystal platters. They are the creations of Dan Phillips, 64, who has had an astonishingly [...]
photo credit: Stéfan I’ve never been much of a manager myself. That’s no big deal, of course; lots of people aren’t managers. In my case, though, people expected me to be, because I’ve had a lifetime of successful entrepreneurship. But entrepreneurship and management are different things. Stated on BPlans.com. I recently read over Tim Berry’s [...]
photo credit: AMagill Billionaire Mark Cuban has written a very information post explaining how not to ask for money in email: The first thing I do at this point is look at the senders email address. Is it an email with the company name in the URL ? If it isnt.. ding, ding, ding. They [...]
photo credit: madebytess When setting out to hire new talent for your company, the challenge of finding the absolute best there is can be very frustrating and time consuming. With so many people out of work today, you are bound to have hundreds of applications rolling in just for one position to fill! I [...]
Cut Your Costs Rather Than Your Employees
photo credit: lepiaf.geo In today’s economy we are seeing so many people being put out of work only to find that the company still ends up going bankrupt. Why is this? A big reason is because often times no matter how many employees are let go, the costs that the company has still ends [...]
photo credit: davitydave All business owners are constantly trying to find better, easier, and cost effective ways for obtaining more customers and thus increasing their profits greatly. I recently came across an article on Small Biz Bee that listed some ways to win more customers for free! Charities. Name Tags. Freebies. Better voicemails and voicemail [...]
LA Times: As far as the Rev. Darrell Best knows, he has the fastest church in Illinois. His 1942 firetruck is by no means a Ferrari, but it is equipped as a fully functioning chapel. “I’ve had it up to 55 mph,” Best said. “It gets a lot of attention on the highway.” Mechanics from [...]
Facebook Page Factors To Remember
photo credit: benstein Everyone is jumping on the Facebook train including businesses, at least if they are smart they are. There are tens of thousands of users on Facebook, that is a lot of contacts that you could be targeting for your company and bringing yourself a ton of traffic. However, when setting up [...]
Business Week: On a visit to Portland, Ore., about three years ago, Bill Leikam watched curiously as his brother used an odd piece of plywood to pull a hot rack from of the oven. “I said: ‘What was that?’” recalls Leikam. It was the family’s “oven buddy” he was told. Like every inventor, Leikam believed [...]
When you play golf, do you carry your own clubs or pay a caddy to do it for you? One golf course in Cedar Mountain, North Carolina has decided to differentiate itself from the other local course by offering a unique variety of caddy: llamas! Llamas are available every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday from 9am [...]
When It Comes To Your Work-At-Home Income, Diversify
If you depend solely on one source for income, your business just as likely to take a nose dive when a situation arises as someone who depends on one sole income from an employer. To avoid such a circumstance, you need more than one revenue source to stay afloat. CurrentMom recently elaborated on revenue sources [...]
photo credit: pfala In business it can become very difficult over the years to continuously manage your cash flow. Often times as business owners we get into a groove of letting things slide here and there, letting customers slide here and there, and before we know it our cash flow is much less than what [...]
Cashing in on Cash For Clunkers
ShoeMoney: Huber Chevrolet told me about how they had a separate sales division that did nothing but answer phone calls and emails from internet leads and they valued each of those at XX (they asked me not to reveal the specifics). I told them I would charge them $10 per internet lead (a small fraction [...]
photo credit: trec_lit Slate: Given the equine subterfuge that precipitated the sack of Troy, Trojan condoms are curiously named—deception is not a quality one typically looks for in a prophylactic. Consumers, however, don’t seem to mind: Trojans reign supreme in America’s nightstand drawers and billfolds. The various types of Trojan—Ultra Ribbed, Magnum XL, Warm Sensations—account [...]
Company Enlists Reps To Sell Their ‘Scent’sational Products
For many direct selling has offered them a viable source of income with all of the benefits of being their own boss. By offering the flexible hours that some people require, companies like Scent-sations have helped many launch their own home business. Scent-sations is home to the well known Mia Bella brand. They offer a [...]
John Nese is the proprietor of Galcos Soda Pop Stop in LA. His father ran it as a grocery store, and when the time came for John to take charge, he decided to convert it into the ultimate soda-lovers destination.
Do You Have A Great Dorm Room Product Idea?
Your invention could be sold in Bed Bath & Beyond® Edison Nation is seeking new product ideas to acquire that could be sold in Bed Bath & Beyond stores! Going away to college or university means squeezing your whole world into a room the size of a closet. Bed Bath & Beyond has teamed up [...]
Credit Building Mistakes For Businesses
photo credit: Logan Cyrus Most people don’t know the right way to go about building credit for their business. They do several things that might actually hinder their chances of obtaining credit, or they simply don’t do the simple things that would ensure their business credit. To help in light of the current credit crunch, [...]
photo credit: h.koppdelaney With so many trials and tribulations in the world today with cancer, paralysis, kidney disease, poverty and more, everyone continues praying for big ideas to come on how to fix our many problems. Here is a list of some ideas I recently came across on AOL Small Business that are sure [...]
Your invention could be sold through the World’s Largest Online Store! Amazon Green has partnered with Edison Nation to find innovative home products that save time, money or energy. Keep in mind the range of product categories available on Amazon Green: • Landscaping equipment to power without air pollution • Lighting and electrical solutions to [...]
photo credit: kristafurry So you have decided to take the step out of your 9-5 job and become an entrepreneur. First, congratulations on your new venture. Second, there are some things about being an entrepreneur that you should know and realize what you are about to get yourself into. Being an entrepreneur means loving day [...]
