Fiscal Cliff Deal Offers Minimal Benefit To Microbusinesses |  |
- Fiscal Cliff Deal Offers Minimal Benefit To Microbusinesses
- Imation Buys Nexsan to Strengthen Data Offerings for Small Businesses
- Is Your Online Reputation Impacting Your Business?
- Beam, Straight Up: A Book About Bourbon and Family Business
| Fiscal Cliff Deal Offers Minimal Benefit To Microbusinesses Posted: 06 Jan 2013 01:00 PM PST
The deal that the President and Congress put together to force each other to deal with expiring tax cuts at the beginning of this year seemed like a strategy that was doomed to failure. The fundamental disagreement was simple and fairly typical: Democrats wanted to preserve middle-class tax cuts, raise taxes on the rich and preserve as much domestic spending as possible, while Republicans wanted to preserve all the tax cuts and find savings by cutting social programs and other non-defense discretionary spending. It doesn’t often get much more unambiguously partisan than that. In the end, circumstances forced the Republicans to meet the President halfway, giving him a final legislative victory just before showing the 112th Congress the door. I’m guessing that it’s easier to stand your ground when you have a campaign promise to keep and you are not the lame duck in the room. I’d bet that almost everybody involved is sorely relieved. Except, perhaps, House Republicans. The final compromised reached largely between Senate Republicans, led by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and his former foe and colleague, Vice-President Joe Biden, calls for the Bush tax cuts to be made permanent for couples earning less than $450,000 per year ($400,000 for individuals). Capital gains taxes would remain at the 15% level for those lower income households, while the upper income crowd would see their income tax rate increase from 35% to 39.6% and their capital gains tax rate would climb to 20%. House Republicans, in an attempt to take their lemons and make whiskey sours, are claiming victory and vindication because Democrats finally caved and made even some of the Bush tax cuts permanent — which President Bush was counting on all along. And, even though the more liberal Democrats view the President’s compromise as yet another failure on his part to hold out for left-wing purity, they are hailing the tax increase as a victory and an early instance of President Obama keeping a campaign promise. In the meantime, you might be forgiven for wondering if there is anything in this legislative bally-hoo that will be of benefit to microbusiness owners. Back in mid-December, the National Association for the Self-Employed (NASE), the only national advocacy organization specifically for microbusinesses, expressed its unhappiness with the evident inability of Congress to get its act together to avoid a tax hike that will hit middle-class microbusiness owners right where it hurts. According to the NASE’s analysis of the impact of inaction, microbusiness owners earning between $60,000 and $88,000 would have been looking at a tax hike of between $2700 and $3700 per year. Of course, most microbusinesses don’t actually make that much money. The overwhelming majority of them are nonemployers and their average annual earnings, as of 2010, were about $43,000 per year. So, while there are some high earners among microbusiness owners who might be disappointed at this legislative turn of events, the majority of them will benefit from getting to keep their current tax rates intact. The rest of the supposedly small-business-friendly items in this legislation — such as a temporary extension of the $500,000 Section 179 expensing cap and the R&D tax credit, a permanent estate tax exemption of $5 million (indexed to inflation), a permanent “fix” for the alternative minimum tax (the AMT won’t kick in until a couple filing jointly reaches an earnings level of $78,750, also indexed to inflation) — won’t apply to most small businesses. And some small business advocates are disappointed at what they are calling a stop-gap measure that falls well sure of a much-needed comprehensive overhaul of the tax system. Said Todd McCracken, President of the National Small Business Association, in a press release: "While the permanent extension for the lower tax rates is a positive, tax increases—at any level—should only have been done within the context of broad tax reform.” The NASE has not yet released a statement in response to the fiscal cliff deal. Fiscal Cliff Photo via Shutterstock The post Fiscal Cliff Deal Offers Minimal Benefit To Microbusinesses appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Imation Buys Nexsan to Strengthen Data Offerings for Small Businesses Posted: 06 Jan 2013 11:00 AM PST Storing and protecting company data is an important function for those who run businesses of all types and sizes. Of course, new technology has drastically changed the ways companies choose to handle important data over the last several years. And now, the data landscape is changing once more, particularly for small and medium sized businesses. Data security and storage company Imation recently announced its acquisition of Nexsan, a smaller data storage provider, in an effort to target medium and small businesses and strengthen its brand.
Imation has traditionally targeted larger businesses and enterprise clients with its scalable storage products and solutions. Nexsan, on the other hand, offers solutions that can target smaller companies such as cloud solutions. President and CEO of Imation Mark Lucas said in a statement:
With this acquisition, Imation hopes to accelerate its growth in the small business market. It's not yet clear how this will specifically change the solutions offered by Imation and/or Nexsan in the coming months or years. But the move is expected to widen Imation's offerings, particularly pertaining to disk-based and flash storage-based technology. Nexsan currently has more than 11,000 business customers worldwide, with its technology platform and disk and solid-state storage solutions. The company was founded in 1999 and also has a wide base of partners that help distribute its products and solutions to targeted businesses. The acquisition price included $105 million in cash and about $15 million in stock. The deal is expected to be completed during the first quarter. Nexsan's 200 employees, who are based in the U.S., U.K., and Canada have joined Imation, and Nexsan will continue to operate from the company's current headquarters in Thousand Oaks, California. The post Imation Buys Nexsan to Strengthen Data Offerings for Small Businesses appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Is Your Online Reputation Impacting Your Business? Posted: 06 Jan 2013 08:00 AM PST
If you own a business or are responsible for a business, do you monitor your reputation online to see what clients and other people are saying about you? Given the statistics above, if you are not monitoring your online reputation, you really need to start doing this as it can significantly impact your business – both positively and negatively. As an example, think of a product or service and then search this product or service on Google and include your city. In most cases, you will be given the Google+ Business Listings at or near the top of the search results. Now put yourself in a potential clients shoes. If these potential clients have a choice between a company with a significant amount of great reviews and one that has bad reviews or even no reviews, I would bet that in most cases these potential clients would choose a company with positive reviews over companies with bad reviews or no reviews. Give this a try. Put your product or service and your city in Google and see what the results are. You will see one of 4 results:
If you have nothing but good reviews or a very high concentration of good reviews and very few bad reviews, then keep doing what you are doing. If you have a lot of bad reviews or no reviews, then you will be turning business away and you should look at the following 3 recommendations:
If you monitor and manage your online reputation and add great reviews, this should have a positive effect on your business. Make sure that you include an Online Reputation process to your every day work practices. Keyboard Photo via Shutterstock The post Is Your Online Reputation Impacting Your Business? appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Beam, Straight Up: A Book About Bourbon and Family Business Posted: 06 Jan 2013 06:00 AM PST
Kentucky has it share of bourbon distilleries and stories. Any story of bourbon must include Jim Beam. The brand and lessons from the producer's humble beginnings are highlighted in Beam, Straight Up: The Bold Story of the First Family of Bourbon. It’s the story of a successful family business that has thrived through multiple generations. The author, Fred Noe (co-authored by Jim Kokoris), is a 7th generation Beam Master Distiller, and the great-grandson of Jim Beam. I picked up the ebook browsing NetGallery, looking for a book that shares family history with business history. Straight Up fits the bill as a great business teacher, similar in scope to Guitar Lessons. But it's also fun because of its subject matter. Food, in general, brings out the best in people. We socialize around it, be it casual or the stereotypical business lunch and alcohol was always meant to keep people relaxed. Noe also notes that impression.
In noting that, Noe immerses the reader comfortably into his world. He explains the family history and his place, including a chapter on his father Booker, and the story of how Noe came into the business. Nice twists occur with touches upon the imagined cultural milestones along the way, like prohibition. During that time, Noe says Jim Beam:
Beam ran a coal mine and rock quarry to replace the shut down distillery, though he was not as successful:
Entrepreneurs may identify with various aspects of Beam family character towards the business:
And with some interesting quirks. Such as carrying a family heirloom, a jar of yeast used in bourbon distilling, in the front seat of Jim Beam's Cadillac:
Readers also get the factoids that make nice life-of-the-party topics. Guess what color whiskey starts out as? Clear as water, adopting a brown color from caramelized sugars in the aging process. Interesting facts like that get woven into more compelling retelling, such as the robberies of stored liquor during the prohibition period. Distilleries had warehoused stock, and plenty of it – they were still caught flatfooted by the outlawing of liquor. Thieves would break into the temporary storage for whiskey, replacing whiskey they'd steal with water. Another prohibition outcome was the use of bourbon for medicinal purposes:
And Noe explains the timeline with Kentucky flair, such as his imagery for Jim Beams' retirement:
The most direct chapter that speaks to small business is Chapter 10: How to Build a Company That Lasts. This approach contrasts Guitar Lessons, another historical look at a specific industry. But this also speaks with authority – after all you don't get to be 7th generation anything without a lesson or two passed along. A family tree dating to 1770 lets you know how far along the lessons have come. The nuggets are common sense ideas, such as knowing your customer, ensuring quality, and consistency. Others are refreshed ideas that Noe personalizes, enough to compliment any business process book, such as having pride and passion – Noe gets a lump in his throat from seeing a Beam truck deliver bourbon, but he also does so as a muse for the quality and consistency he advocates. If you pick up this book, delve into Chapter 9, which details the distillery's response to decreasing bourbon sales in the 1970s. You will learn what innovation means, with an eye for balancing family tradition and marketplace shifts. A few images of the family history appendage at the book's end, as well as a small segment of Beam-based drinks and recipes. These are well done and festive in tone (I really liked the hangover cure!). The book makes for a good gift for the business owner who appreciates business history or who just needs a step back from a process or technical book. Noe writes in the prologue he had some reservations in writing a book. I am glad he chose otherwise. The post Beam, Straight Up: A Book About Bourbon and Family Business appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
There was a certain amount of unusually undignified jumping up and down and yelling about looming fiscal cliffs during the last month of last year, and with good reason.
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