Ooma Offers Professional VoIP Service to Small Businesses |  |
- Ooma Offers Professional VoIP Service to Small Businesses
- The Top 5 Mistakes Restaurant Websites Make
- 10 Skills Your Employees Need to Succeed
- Twitter Expands List of Certified Products for Businesses
- 9 Website Must Have’s That Your Website Needs
- Entrepreneurs in the Midwest Actively Bootstrapping
- Atari U.S. Files for Chapter 11
| Ooma Offers Professional VoIP Service to Small Businesses Posted: 23 Jan 2013 03:00 PM PST Home phone provider Ooma just announced a new product at CES that is aimed specifically at businesses. The Ooma Office communication system includes a lot of the same features as phone systems designed for large companies, but its target is businesses with fewer than 10 employees and it uses cloud technology to keep costs down.
The above photo shows what an Ooma Office product looks like. The main console hooks up to the internet and can also be used for fax machines. Then each extension device connects to employee phones so that they are included in the network. The service works with land line phones and cell phones and supports up to 5 phone extensions and up to 15 virtual extensions to reach remote workers. The office system includes features like a virtual receptionist, extension dialing, conferencing, hold music, separate modes for business hours and after-business hours, HD Voice technology and more. Many of these features are pretty standard for an office phone system, but the ability to work remotely and on-the-go is becoming increasingly important for many companies. So for modern small businesses that don't necessarily have a full staff in the office each day, this is an option for presenting a professional communication system to customers and clients without all the added cost of a phone system designed for larger companies. "The features in a business phone service are fundamentally important to establishing first impressions among customers – the first call often has a lasting impact," said Jim Gustke, Ooma's vice president of marketing. Ooma Office starts at $19.99 per line and includes a do-it-yourself setup. Gustke said that the product's price is one of its main draws, allowing businesses with small budgets to still maintain a professional phone system without using funds and resources that would be better allocated for other business functions. Many small businesses don't even find it necessary to have office phone systems anymore, with services like Skype and Google offering free or nearly free communication tools that are becoming more accepted by clients and colleagues for day-to-day communication. But for certain types of businesses, having an office phone system with multiple lines, call forwarding, and other traditional features is still important. So for those businesses, Ooma's offering presents an interesting way to cut costs, since it is much cheaper than competitive services like Vonage. Ooma was originally founded in 2004 and is based in Palo Alto, California. Ooma's home phone offering, Ooma Telo, includes free calls within the U.S. The Ooma Office system launches later this month and will be available for $249 at U.S. and Canadian retailers. The post Ooma Offers Professional VoIP Service to Small Businesses appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| The Top 5 Mistakes Restaurant Websites Make Posted: 23 Jan 2013 01:00 PM PST
Restaurant owners, below are 5 things that I often see wrong with restaurant websites and these 5 things can really hurt your business: 1) A Website That is Not Viewable on Mobile DevicesAnytime we travel, we use various apps to determine where we might eat. They give us restaurant names and then we go to websites to look for a variety of things. Sadly many restaurants are not viewable on mobile devices, so I can't figure out what kinds of dishes are offered, I can't see images of the restaurant and I can't find a phone number – because the site isn't viewable on mobile. FYI, mobile also includes tablets. If website visitors can't see a restaurant and get the information they want, via mobile, they will choose a different restaurant they can see online. Please check out your restaurant on multiple mobile devices and make sure it works well for all users. 2) Lack of Quality Images
Food images should make people hungry: They make people want to go to a restaurant to eat that dish. When taking pictures of food, you want to make sure everything looks beautiful – the plating, the background, the table the food is sitting on, the food should be fresh, etc. You are trying to sell your restaurant through an image: Perfection is important. Hire a photographer or research cameras that specialize in food (Best Buy has a couple). Also, read these tips on taking great food pictures, from one of the best, the Pioneer Woman. 3) Missing Menu(s)You shouldn't have a restaurant website without your menu on it. In fact, if you have multiple menus they should all be on it. I have one client that has a sushi menu, a takeout menu, a lunch menu and a dinner menu. All are available online, and they are viewable on all mobile devices. When ordering for takeout, people need to see what their options are: Make sure your menu(s) is available to website visitors. If you have a takeout menu, offer it in PDF form so businesses can print and share with colleagues easily before ordering. Regular menus often help people determine if they want to try out a new restaurant, so make sure the menu on your site is attractive and the dishes sound outstanding in your descriptions. Restaurant owners need to keep in mind that busy people need to find things fast and they make food decisions fast because they are hungry. So make sure website visitors can see everything you offer quickly. Make it easy and idiot proof. 4) Missing Phone Number or One That Isn’t ClickableThe phone number is really one of the most important things on a restaurant website. In fact, it may be the most important thing on a website. Some people won't look at a website at all and just want to call the business for answers. So please make sure the phone number is on every page and close to the top of the page. Make it easy to find. Make sure that the phone number is clickable on a mobile screen: Make it easy for mobile users to call you. Often a phone number within an image isn't clickable and people have to write it down and then call. This isn't helpful for those that are driving, so make sure contacting you is easy. Restaurants using mobile versions (especially in WordPress): Make sure that the mobile version you use does not take out your phone number. I have seen this happen often. When it does, I go to the bottom of the page to look for the "full site" function to hopefully get the number and sometimes that option is not there. So, guess what? I leave and get food elsewhere because often, my family is hungry and we are in a rush. Also keep in mind, many people that are not Web savvy and don’t know to look for the "full site" function. 5) Missing Address, Map or Image of ExteriorRestaurant websites should have their address on every page of the website. You never know which page a website visitor will come in to a website on, so you want to make sure that they can easily find an address. Include a map screenshot on the website: And not one I have to click on and find via mobile and/or on my computer. If you can let visitors see surrounding streets, you help them find your restaurant easier. Include a small to medium image of the front of their restaurant: New customers need to see what the restaurant looks like so when they are driving, and looking, the restaurant is easy to find. This is especially true in strip malls and areas with many businesses around. If You Are Creating a Restaurant Website Please keep these 5 items in mind. Every website on the planet should make things easier for the audience that will be looking at the site. Think about the things you want to see when you are looking for a restaurant online or on mobile and make sure to include everything. I used the term "idiot proof" above and want to explain why. I use it all the time when planning or working on websites. Not because I think people are idiots, but because not everyone is as Web savvy as me or my clients. So I make sure things are as "idiot proof" as possible to ensure anyone can use what the website offers to meet their needs. Empty Glass in a Restaurant Photo via Shutterstock The post The Top 5 Mistakes Restaurant Websites Make appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| 10 Skills Your Employees Need to Succeed Posted: 23 Jan 2013 11:00 AM PST
CEB's 2013 Executive Guidance analyzed some 20,000 employees worldwide to pinpoint the challenges facing business teams today. Here's the biggest challenge: While employers report they will need to squeeze 20 percent more productivity from employees to meet their business goals, employees say they're already maxed out. More than two-thirds say their jobs have become more complex; 80 percent say their workload has increased; and 55 percent say they can't handle the current level of stress much longer. Given that most employers don't plan to hire in 2013, how can businesses possibly meet their goals? The answer, CEB says, is in developing employees who have the right skills for today's business environment. CEB identifies three key trends in the working world today:
To thrive (and become more productive) despite these challenges, CEB says there are 10 key skills employees of 2013 will need:
What can you do to help your employees develop these skills?
While these actions may take time in the short run, in the long run, they'll help you build a roster of employees who can make their own decisions, collaborate more effectively and handle more responsibility—ultimately easing the many burdens on you, the small business owner. Employee Success Photo via Shutterstock The post 10 Skills Your Employees Need to Succeed appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Twitter Expands List of Certified Products for Businesses Posted: 23 Jan 2013 09:00 AM PST
Now, Twitter has added nine new partners to the program, including Shoutlet, Spredfast, Sprout Social, Adobe Social, Percolate, Rallyverse, Sysomos, Simply Measured, and Visible Technologies. All of these products are built for businesses and can help them manage their social media presences, either by providing insights into social trends, monitoring conversations and interactions, or scheduling and managing important updates. Certified Products are not the only ones that brands can use to manage their Twitter presence, but a certification simply means that Twitter has acknowledged the product's usefulness for businesses and that it approves of the products integrations and its use of Twitter's API and features. To become a Certified Product, partners must solve some kind of service for businesses that Twitter itself does not address. For example, Twitter does not provide analytics services for businesses to learn about their network and their customers. But Adobe Social includes real-time insights that are updated as customers interact with your brand, among other functions. Many of the Certified Products have overlapping functions, so brands that are interested in using any of the products to improve their twitter presence can sift through the list and decide which ones best suite their needs based on features, price, and any other relevant factors. Since Twitter is a pretty simple platform compared to many other social sites, offering businesses a list of third-party products that can help make sense of data and manage more complex activity gives businesses more options, and hopefully more measurable impact, when using the site to reach potential customers. When Twitter first launched the program in August, it included twelve partners, including HootSuite, SocialFlow and DataSift. The site plans to continue adding to the list, and developers can apply to be added to the list. The post Twitter Expands List of Certified Products for Businesses appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| 9 Website Must Have’s That Your Website Needs Posted: 23 Jan 2013 07:00 AM PST
Often times, companies miss adding items to their website that will facilitate attracting sales leads, so I thought I would share 9 Website Must Have’s that every website should have. Here are 9 Website Must Have’s that you should have on your website:
I hope that these Website Must Have’s will help you. I realize that there are a lot more than the 9 I listed above. Feel free to add any additional items that you think could benefit others in the comments section. Must Have Photo via Shutterstock The post 9 Website Must Have’s That Your Website Needs appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Entrepreneurs in the Midwest Actively Bootstrapping Posted: 23 Jan 2013 05:00 AM PST
As you read these short vignettes, notice, that most of these entrepreneurs have bootstrapped their ventures with very little infusion of outside capital. You don't hear about them, because they don't have big funding announcements to make. The entrepreneurship media ignores all these companies that don't raise big money, but they generate big revenues. The entrepreneurship media of the world is yet to come to terms with a simple fact that entrepreneurship equals customers, revenues and profits; financing is optional. WaterFilters.netFollowing a childhood filled with small-scale business ventures, including selling rulers to his neighbors, it was always clear to Minnesota entrepreneur Jamin Arvig that he would start a company. After attaining degrees in electrical engineering and law and a short time spent in the patent law practice, he decided to invest additional energy into an old venture, taking it online. Jamin and his wife come from technical backgrounds. They knew of the many opportunities associated with the e-commerce boom, and the benefits of building a business that drew upon the Internet's global audience. WaterFilters, started in 2002 while Jamin was still in college, simplifies the process of finding and purchasing water purification and treatment products. Jamin and his wife shared a limited knowledge of the water treatment industry. But they knew that the green industry was a growing trend, and they identified water filters as a key element. After purchasing around $1,000 of water filters and setting up shop in his Minnesota condo, Jamin leveraged his wife's existing connections in the industry to forge relationships with distributors, growing business slowly. These relationships allowed Waterfilters.net to list many of their products in an online catalogue. The couple also leveraged SEO and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising to acquire customers. The company reached close to $4 million in revenue by 2008. 2008 marked WaterFilters move to a custom-built warehouse that would serve as a distribution center. The business has also picked up a great many business customers, and even supplies retailers as a wholesale vendor. The company has been entirely bootstrapped to the $10 million mark, running on only Jamin and his wife's savings. Quantum RetailAlso operating from Minnesota, Vicki Raport worked in retail software for a while, before setting up her own shop to plug gaps she observed in her domain. Quantum Retail is Vicki's missing piece: a layer of applications that takes information generated by enterprise apps, point of sale, customer transaction files and radio-frequency identification data, and brings it together in a manner valuable to retailers. This data, collected in a usable and manageable format, is intended to drive quantifiable improvement in retail operations. Quantum's solutions align a company's capabilities to buy and sell merchandise in tune with consumer preferences. Vicki described the product as "technology that thinks like a business." Vicki and her five co-founders (with a sixth introduced shortly after) draw upon a common background at Retek. They began with retail analytics using small sets of data points. Using open source materials combined with the generous support of a sponsoring customer, the team developed a prototype that they used to garner initial customer validation. The prototype was funded by Guitar Center in 2005. Quantum Retail now operates on a platform that supports three key retail processes: allocation replenishment, forecasting and order planning, and assortment planning. Customers are given the option to enroll in one, or multiple services concurrently. Direct competition comes mainly from Oracle, JDA and SAP. The business is fully bootstrapped by Vicki and her co-founders. Quantum Retail grew from six co-founders to over 100 employees and to $13.5 million in revenue by 2010. Bay.ruBorn and raised in Chicago, Aaron Block never imagined a career in commercial real estate would take him all the way to Moscow, where he was to develop a newly acquired division of Cushman and Wakefield in 2005. His return to Chicago in 2010 also marked his move to Bay.ru, the first cross-border e-commerce business in Russia and the country's fastest growing shopping site. Just two years later, Aaron is its CEO. Bay.ru was founded in 2007 by the Russian-born brothers Gene and Anton Herman to help friends and family concerned about the security of items purchased online outside Russia's borders. While in Russia, Bay.ru is designated as a 'middleman' operation, in the Internet industry, the company is known as a cross-border e-commerce company. Working in the 'cross-border space' implies that purchases are made from one country, the shopping is done from another, and goods are delivered directly to the consumer from a third. As for the business itself, the supply chain is almost entirely U.S. based. Products are shipped to the company's Chicago warehouse, where they are inspected for quality and checked against the customer's original order. Additional services for quality assurance, such as photographs and consolidation, are also performed here before orders are shipped to the Soviet Union. By ensuring that the vendor never sees the consumer, Bay.ru has established itself as a single point of trust with its buyers. Bay.ru has further established its success by integrating popular American catalogues, such as eBay and Amazon, into its online inventory. Perhaps the largest generator of business, however, is the offering of 500,000 separate "touch points" in Russia available to take orders. Because Russia allows pre-payment, Bay.ru has established a strong presence in kiosks, bank branches, post offices, Western Unions, and online payment systems, making it possible for the customer to pay in whatever manner is most comfortable, at any time. Gene and Anton, with the help of family loans, bootstrapped the business on their own. The company has also raised $2.3 million in angel investments. Bay.ru became profitable in March 2012, and was scheduled to reach the $40 million mark by the end of 2012. Profits are generated in part through product markup above retail price, which can be anywhere between 9-45%. The value-added services performed in the Chicago warehouse add more margin. Additional profits are made by purchasing shipping at wholesale prices, as well as wholesale purchasing of freight, postal and courier services. So you see, if the Midwestern journalists focused on companies with good, solid revenues, they would have many strong entrepreneurs to write about. As it stands, though, they are more interested in which venture capitalist has funded the company. What a silly idea! PerBlueShortly following the releases of the iPhone and Google's Android operating system in 2007, then-University of Wisconsin student Justin Beck became intrigued by the possibilities that these new mobile technologies brought to the world of gaming. He began work on a concept for Parallel Kingdom, a location-based massively multiplayer game that uses the GPS on a player's mobile device to place them within a virtual world overlapping their reality. The first version of Parallel Kingdom, "The Age of Exploration," was released in 2008 as the first game of its kind. The release coincided with the founding of PerBlue, Justin's Madison, Wisconsin-based mobile and social gaming software company. Beck and his business partner, PerBlue's CTO Andrew Hanson, both boast double degrees in Computer Science and Computer Engineering. The two bootstrapped the business, providing initial funds on their own and offering early employees stock options in place of a paycheck. Justin's concept garnered a great deal of attention, and soon demand was high enough for the release of a second installment of the game in March 2009, "The Age of Gathering," as well as a third, greatly expanded version in November of the same year entitled "The Age of Emergence." The most recent release, "The Age of Thrones," launched in October 2010 and focused on the game's social features. It joins two other mobile multiplayer RPG's (role-playing games), Parallel Mafia and Parallel Zombies, to round out PerBlue's products. PerBlue eventually raised some financing, but more importantly, the company has crossed $2 million in revenue. And now, onto some entrepreneurs that are just about starting to get their businesses off the ground. SimaForeIn 2010, Bala Deshpande and the three coworkers who would become his fellow team members were working in Ann Arbor, Michigan as resellers for a software startup, building an all-purpose analytical tool capable of identifying and managing risk in complex situations. Through his work in sales, Bala came to realize that not only were most companies incapable of extracting value from such complicated analytical tools, oftentimes the purchase of such software did not solve their original problem. With the assistance of these same coworkers, Bala decided to work toward a more tailored solution, avoiding the broad aspirations of general purpose analytics software. SimaFore is a reliable way to convert data into an informational asset, providing analytics-based solutions to companies that cannot afford expensive software or a staff to extract value. The company develops custom-built apps tailored to solve specific issues based on a business need. Such services may include identifying key performance indicators, optimizing product quotes using cost forecasting, and overhead cost tracking, among others. By leveraging emerging trends in open source technology and cloud computing, the solutions SimaFore offers remain affordable. The target market for SimaFore is small and medium-sized businesses, with an ideal customer that has between 10-100 employees, possessing at least some resources for collecting and managing their data. SimaFore hopes to deliver custom apps to at least 25 SMBs in 2013. The solution is set to be priced at $1000 for the first year, with an ongoing maintenance fee of $300-500 per month per customer thereafter. Over time, some of these apps would be productized and sold to larger numbers of customers in specific segments. LinguistaLogixAs a language specialist for over 20 years, Ohio-based Professor Rex Ferguson often finds he is called upon for his services. While working as a Spanish language medical translator, he observed his work save a child's life. He realized that hospital personnel were not given the language instruction necessary to successfully do their job while working with ESL patients. In response to this industry deficiency, Rex created LinguistaLogix, an educational software business focused on teaching oral proficiency targeted toward medical professionals. Of course, there are many more entrepreneurs working throughout the Midwest, often unsung due to the media's obsession with venture-funded startups. It is every bit our intention to highlight their stories. Midwest, USA Photo via Shutterstock The post Entrepreneurs in the Midwest Actively Bootstrapping appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Atari U.S. Files for Chapter 11 Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:30 AM PST When a company as iconic as Atari files for Chapter 11, it could be game over, but any business big or small can find itself in legal trouble from time to time. Knowing how to avoid the pitfalls in the first place is the best way to dodge difficulties. We’ll look at the Atari case, then go on to some other tips for keeping your business on the straight and narrow. Penny ArcadeTwo player. Actually, the filing for bankruptcy protection by Atari’s U.S. operations is simply an attempt to extricate itself from a troubled French parent company. The plan is to take the game company private and develop a business based on products for digital and mobile platforms, sources say. Sometimes legal issues arise out of simple business necessity. Make sure you know your options. Los Angeles Times Be prepared. In fact, Marsha Friedman, who today heads her own Florida-based PR firm but started her career as an entrepreneur by launching a Greenwich Village-style coffee house in Venice Beach, CA 42 years ago, insists that knowing the legal ins and outs of any business you start should be a top consideration. “It doesn’t matter whether the law is a major one or a technicality, violate it and it can kill your business,” Friedman warns. EMSI The Bigger They Are…Private property. Whether it’s a patent, trademark, or copyright, legal protection can also be applied to certain inventions, processes, and the intellectual property used in your business. However, according to intellectual property attorney Steve Hansen, entrepreneurs interested in this kind of protection should first make absolutely certain the process or invention is truly original and has commercial applications before pursuing a potentially costly and time intensive application. B4B Connect Endangered. Small businesses also need legal protection against very real dangers like personal injury claims. These can be damaging to any business, say business bloggers and consultants Harry and Sally Vaishnav. Their post looks at nine tips every small business owner should consider when trying to avoid costly litigation. Read to discover whether your business might be taking any unnecessary risks. Small Biz Viewpoints Data on the Duchess. Circumstances surrounding a prank phone call to a hospital treating the Duchess of Cambridge that apparently resulted in the tragic suicide of a nurse raise surprising questions about business liability, says commercial lawyer Flor McCarthy, in this guest post about the importance of protecting data in your company. The now infamous prank demonstrates how sharing personal data inappropriately or without permission can lead to trouble for any business. Tweak Your Biz Make No MistakeI was a teenage hire. Many people landed their first jobs while still in their teens. In fact, here in the U.S., an estimated 18 million teens will work this year, and most will work for small businesses, reports small business expert Daniel Kehrer. However, there are rules employers need to understand about tapping this valuable labor market. They include minimum wage, overtime, and child labor laws, which are enforced by the U.S. Department of Labor with fines and sanctions levied against violators. BizBest A good place to start. These six tips will help you take some steps you either should have taken already or will definitely want to take before heading into the new year. They cover everything from preparing for legal liability to the need for contracts and to retain legal counsel. If there are any points here you haven’t really thought about for your business, do yourself a favor and revisit them, suggests business writer Rieva Lesonsky. You’ll have a better 2013 if you do! Grow Smart Biz The post Atari U.S. Files for Chapter 11 appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
Images are powerful, especially on a restaurant website. It is difficult to take great pictures of food because your need to have the proper lighting, angles and camera. If a restaurant takes pictures of their food and the food doesn't look very appetizing, the images should NOT be used on the website. The only time a food image is used is when the food looks amazing.
Last year, 
I work with small and medium sized companies to help them attract more sales leads. One of the starting points that we look at is a companies website.
The Midwest is often overlooked as a hub of startups, overshadowed by Silicon Valley on one coast and New York City on the other. But it is merely a common misconception, as the companies I will introduce you to here will prove that the Midwest is alive and well as a center of creativity and entrepreneurial activity.| You are subscribed to email updates from Small Business Trends To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
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