Thinking of hiring my best friend for a month - Good or bad idea? small business |
- Thinking of hiring my best friend for a month - Good or bad idea?
- Has anyone won a successful dispute on a charge back as a seller?
- My bosses business is failing and refuses to accept criticism, advice, or help of any kind
- [Ontario, Canada] How can my wife and I clear out our overstock flowers?
- Reducing tax liability and best tax structure for an LLC with high revenue and limited expenses
- Hourly alarm on Conversion Rate on your website?
- How do you raise prices, and not lose customers?
- Why there are small business companies registered in Cyprus?
- Recently filed for an s-corporation. I don’t have a business bank account yet. In the meantime, am I able to have all income sent to my personal bank account?
- What is the best way to find complimentary products to offer next to the ones I manufacture?
- How do I go about setting up a business with someone outside of the United States?
- How to generate more leads for my online booking business?
- Help with small business and finding customers
- Where can I have a decent mobile and online existence for my store?
- I have a great product that people love and want to buy, but I am stuck on the packaging.
- Online Retail Store: which platform should I be selling on?
- Evaluating a Business Name Before Deciding to Use it for Your Business?
- What do you use for business cellphone?
- Services for gas stations?
- How do i find suppliers/factories who are willing to produce my product
- Need advice writing an employee handbook
- Small-batch beard care business, looking for ways to increase revenue?
- Google Authority and Ranking
- Putting together a questionairre
- Good, simple to use, low cost CRM?
| Thinking of hiring my best friend for a month - Good or bad idea? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 10:19 PM PST Hi all, I'd love some input from the community. I own two small businesses - one is just myself and subcontracted freelancers. This business makes up the bulk of my income. The second business is new. I launched it just myself a few months ago. It's B2B sales, fairly easy sales pitch. Of the 10 phone calls I've actually executed, I've closed 2. Those customers love it. Lifetime value of a sale is around $3,000. My best friend was terminated in his B2B sales role last month and is running thin on his severance while trying to land another salary-similar position. He's a great salesman. I know with a day of training, he can be well-versed in my company and selling without many issues. I want to hire him on a one-month contract as he searches for another job. His role would be solely to sell for me (no more than 20 hrs per week). I have a backlog of hot leads that I've let fall on the backburner, as well as a good pipeline to garner new leads. I would like to offer him $3,000 initially for the month. My main business supplies more than enough income to be able to justify paying him this $3,000. I would not be upset if a sale didn't come through in the month, and if he closes one deal, he would have paid for himself. I hear all the time that you should never hire friends or family, but could there be an exception if it's agreed upon to be only one month? I don't see any scenario where I would have to micromanage or ride his ass, and I know he wouldn't take advantage of the situation. What do you all think? [link] [comments]  |
| Has anyone won a successful dispute on a charge back as a seller? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 12:05 PM PST I have had a few charge backs and it seems like every time the buyer wins. All of the charge backs have been from customers who do not reply when I ask if there was any issues with the order etc. I have tracking confirming shipment to the buyers address and all of that but the buyer always seems to win. When I called to inquire about what I need to do in order to win a dispute or what I was doing wrong, I was basically told in one way or the other that the buyer will almost always win no matter what I do. Is this everyone's experience? Let me reiterate that I have tried contacting the customers to see if there was any issue or maybe a charge back by mistake and never gotten a response or any message from the customer about the order being wrong or bad. Just a random charge back a month or two after the sale was completed. [link] [comments]  |
| My bosses business is failing and refuses to accept criticism, advice, or help of any kind Posted: 07 Feb 2019 08:47 PM PST Throwaway because my boss browses reddit. I'm 25. I've never owned my own business before. I haven't gone to school for business, I haven't read any books on business, I am almost completely ignorant when it comes to this area. I watch the TV show shark tank, almost daily, that's about as far as my knowledge goes. I understand the basics, cost of goods, margins, that sort of thing. I'm decent with numbers and spreadsheets, I'm not an expert but I know how to find and learn what I need. Expert at Googling basically. My boss has been in business for about 9 years. I've been here for a little over a year. He has about 7 employees total working directly for him. 3 warehouse workers, 4 office workers. What's our business? We make a metric fuckton of products. Both wholesale to stores and online direct. I wish I could easily describe it, but we sell over 40 different kinds of products. Items ranging from t-shirts, to cutting boards(I can go into more detail in the comments but I just want to explain the bones of this business). We have thousands of unique product codes. Thousands. We have a tiny warehouse stuffed full of equipment, and inventory. We have so much equipment it's hard listing all of it. All the equipment is leased, so we don't own any of it. We have a few products that I know make us good money. Easy to produce, easy to sell, and cheap to make. I'd say there's about 5 products that have great margins. Stickers, hand made buttons and a few others. The rest, are effectively worthless. They are hard to make(several current and former employees have stressed this many times), the margins are extremely low, some products have margins that are so low that they don't break even. With labor, plus the cost to produce these items, there's just no way we make money. My boss, to his credit, is a fantastic salesman. He can sell anything, and this is the area he does best in. But he makes very little time for his employees, and he continues to add products to our offering without even checking to see if we can produce the item. He is in full panic mode everyday. He is so stressed out he snaps easily at his employees over the most mundane, unimportant things around the office. Coffee mug left on a random desk? It's time for everyone to stop what they are doing and find the demon that DARED leave a coffee mug on a random desk. Put away an item in slightly the wrong area? Time to pull everyone into a meeting and explain for over an hour why you should put things back where they belong. It's insane. I've tried bringing these problems to his attention in the most gentle way I can. I've even made spreadsheets explaining how low his margins are, OUTSIDE OF WORK, just to show him how he's failing. He always takes it as a personal attack. This conversation always explodes into a massive argument until we're both yelling at each other over nothing, picking apart mere words. I'm set on quitting, I'm already looking for new jobs, but my intentions are not bad. I want him to do well, but he just refuses to listen to me or anyone. I'm not the only person who's tried to bring this to his attention. There are so many problems it's even difficult for me to list them in one post. What can I do to help my boss and his business? TL;DR my boss is making a ton of terrible business decisions and is unknowingly about to go out of business. [link] [comments]  |
| [Ontario, Canada] How can my wife and I clear out our overstock flowers? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 11:20 AM PST Hello Reddit, My wife is a budding entrepreneur and runs a home-based floral and wedding accessory business. Over the last week she had a booth at a local mall and made floral arrangements for Chinese New Year. All together, she worked five 12 hour days and got a ton of exposure in the process. I for one couldn't be more proud of her. Unfortunately, we ordered far too many flowers and didn't clear our stock. We would really like to get our costs back if we can, but any advice you can offer would be much appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Reducing tax liability and best tax structure for an LLC with high revenue and limited expenses Posted: 08 Feb 2019 03:54 AM PST Good morning, my girlfriend recently formed a 2 member LLC for her business and I am trying to get some direction on how I should elect the LLC to be taxed and other advice on reducing her tax liability. The business is expected to generate about 1MM in revenue this year, I am estimating total expenses will be under 25k, business would be comparable to a consultant, all service based, limited to zero overhead. I have a meeting with a CPA planned but want to make sure I have a solid baseline of knowledge before hand so I can make the best use of that time. Generally speaking does it make more sense to elect to be taxed as an scorp or an partnership? As expense are so limited are they going to be smashed in the face by the tax man come next April ( I am aware they will need to make quarterly tax payments this year) ? Any basics I should be aware of to reduce their tax burden? Any other advice for me? [link] [comments]  |
| Hourly alarm on Conversion Rate on your website? Posted: 08 Feb 2019 03:22 AM PST In there a way to set up alarms on your webpage to notify you when there is an anomaly in traffic on your website ? Google analytics offers it on a daily basis, but that's already too late and can generate 10 thousands of € in damage in a 24h window. [link] [comments]  |
| How do you raise prices, and not lose customers? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 03:24 PM PST We have just renovated our business and were charging a discount rate since we have been open for a year and a half. We are offering much more than we were in the beginning and think it is ti.e to raise our admission fee. Just wondering how is the best way to go about letting people know of the change so they are not suprised. Any suggestions? [link] [comments]  |
| Why there are small business companies registered in Cyprus? Posted: 08 Feb 2019 03:05 AM PST Why? Because of its lower tax? And seems many of them are actually operating the business in another country, therefore, is this the so-called "offshores company"? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Feb 2019 02:06 AM PST |
| What is the best way to find complimentary products to offer next to the ones I manufacture? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 06:21 AM PST I make and sell steel targets and I'd like to offer other items that people would commonly use along side them. Shooting is a personal hobby of mine so I have a pretty good idea but I'm wondering if there are some more scientific ways of determining which products would be the best to start with? [link] [comments]  |
| How do I go about setting up a business with someone outside of the United States? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 01:03 PM PST Hi, we're completely new to this side of things, so please bear with us. Myself and my partner have been working together on an app for almost a year. It's complete, runs fluidly on its native platform, and it's relatively bug-free; i.e., it's ready to be released. We decided we want it to be ad-supported, and we found Appodeal (amongst others) to be appealing. However, upon making an Appodeal account, we were faced with submitting a single tax form. I live in NY, and he lives in Uruguay. We don't want to submit just my tax form or just his, and then worry about filing taxes with different totals from what's been recorded due to splits. Initially, we had planned to get the ball rolling, and after making some money, we would formally open a business. We don't even know if this (or any of our future apps) will make money, and we're hesitant to take any steps forward because we don't even know if it's possible to form a business between ourselves because of our location. TL;DR: is it possible/necessary to make a company between 2 individuals in different countries, and if so, how do we do it & which type would be optimal? Thanks for any advice & apologies if I'm asking in the wrong place! [link] [comments]  |
| How to generate more leads for my online booking business? Posted: 08 Feb 2019 01:48 AM PST I work for a company called SuperSaaS appointment booking system as the Marketing Manager. We have been trying to increase the number of new leads and traffic on our website. We've tried guest blogging, improving our site internally, connecting with audience via platforms like Quora and Reddit, we've put in efforts on Social media marketing but none with effective results. We advertise on Google Ads and Bing Ads but it's not a big source of our traffic. We want to improve our SEO rankings and reach out to people who need us. Can you share some practical tips on how I can do that? PS: I have read many articles but none very helpful except generic information. One of our biggest problems is that we don't want to target the big market where our competitors are, but we're trying to target users who are looking for an affordable solution and whose needs aren't served by these big and famous systems. I appreciate your help. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Help with small business and finding customers Posted: 07 Feb 2019 12:17 PM PST Hello fellow small business owners, I am starting a new window cleaning business, I just want to know if anyone has any idea how I can rack up some work, I know online is easier to reach further but also that means you have to make it stand out above the crowd, people have told me to just get out there and talk to people and canvas, I'm a bit stuck as im currently doing it for other people 8-4 through the week, but I want to start on my own and I can't pack it in with them until I've got a decent enough income to support myself, any help is appreciated thankyou. :) TLDR: Need customers for my window cleaning business. Any advice please [link] [comments]  |
| Where can I have a decent mobile and online existence for my store? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 09:59 PM PST I'm planning to open a small store (clothes and accessories), and honestly I feel that there is kinda isolation between the online stores and offline stores now. Is there some place that can provide me with a seamless integration of my store online? Like having a customizable shop on their application with my products synced while I have control on my customers with even paid offers targeting, access to marketing campaigns, QR codes support, and the ability for customers to pay through the app, while showing location info and pickup/delivery options I feel Facebook is somehow noisy and more suited for brand awareness, I need other fully integrated shopping solution [link] [comments]  |
| I have a great product that people love and want to buy, but I am stuck on the packaging. Posted: 08 Feb 2019 01:13 AM PST Hi all, I make small scale vegan bean to bar chocolate that I am in the process of trying to scale up. I want to use every part of the ingredients I use: selling cacao nibs, cacao tea, and the chocolate bars as well, but I cannot find a good packaging solution. I feel completely stuck when people ask me how to buy my product, and all I have to offer them is the bar of chocolate I have in a small cellophane bag. I don't even know what to do about the tea other than putting it in a jar. I have found companies on Alibaba that need a minimum order of 10,000+ units. I have found one-off options that don't have my design and cost like 5+ dollars per unit which wouldn't allow me to make any money. A friend designed a box for me, and while it looked nice, I don't think it was entirely practical shape wise, and I would like to hire a professional to help me but I feel overwhelmed with options and underwhelmed with good solutions that I am finding online so far. I just feel completely lost, and I have no idea where to look for solutions as a small business. Does anyone have any advice or recommendations on what I can do to get unstuck from this stage? [link] [comments]  |
| Online Retail Store: which platform should I be selling on? Posted: 08 Feb 2019 01:11 AM PST Hello! Long time viewers, first time (finally) poster. In terms of an online retail store what are the favorite options for launching a website/store? squarespace, shopify, bigcommerce, etc I do not have much coding experience so the more user friendly the better. what have been your regrets? recommend platforms? useful tools? background: business would be retail, max 25 ish items at a time. examples: https://www.thoseseendancing.com/ https://www.hammamandhome.co.uk/ https://thejowa.com/ [link] [comments]  |
| Evaluating a Business Name Before Deciding to Use it for Your Business? Posted: 08 Feb 2019 12:23 AM PST No one really wants his/her name to be spelled wrongly, pronounced wrongly or given the wrong meaning. We would want to immediately correct whoever is attempting to murder our names because we feel our names deserve some respect, isn't it? So is our business name; it deserves some respect too! While many have argued that there is nothing in a business name, I am yet to see a business that is nameless. Even a "nameless" business is still a name. Lol! We have seen situations in which the launch of businesses are being delayed for weeks or even months because names or befitting names couldn't be gotten for them. Of a truth, many people find it really hard to come up with a name for their business. Some even complain of having no clue at all as to what or how to name their business. This is to show that a business name plays a role in creating an identity for a business. And for the fact that no one wants to bear a bad, senseless name, it is also important that we keep our businesses from bad, senseless names. And one pathetic scenario is when a person who didn't have a clue as to what or how to name his business finally found a name. However, he/she found out later that it was totally a mistake to have gone for such a business name. The point I am trying to make is that proper name evaluation is key to finding an effective, suitable name for a business. We need to evaluate those names we have come up with before we finally decide to use any of them for our businesses. How Important is business name evaluation? The points below show how important us it for us to evaluate our business names.
If we take time to evaluate our business names (considering some of the points above) before we finally decide to use them for our businesses, we would have saved the money that we could possibly and unnecessarily lose (to rebranding) in the near future. What do you think? [link] [comments]  |
| What do you use for business cellphone? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 11:48 AM PST Self Promo Portion--- My mother and I are in discovery phase of our new business, TrueBlue Insect Protection located in Central Massachusetts (a mosquito/tick/insect deterrent business that will come to your home and spray outside on all foliage, getting an 85-90% reduction in activity.) My mother will be working in the office and I will be in the field as our only technician. My question--- Do you have any advice for cellphone plans? Apps, phone companies, etc. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2019 11:57 AM PST I am a distributor to a lot of gas stations and have gotten to know a lot of owners. I'm wondering what else can I offer my clients to capitalize on the network I've built. An example is that I currently offer pressure cleaning or offer to change their lights to LED. Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| How do i find suppliers/factories who are willing to produce my product Posted: 07 Feb 2019 09:49 AM PST Hi, I have a question and as the title says: How can i find suppliers/factories who are willing to produce my products? I searched all over the internet but i couldn't gind anything. I want to start a jewelry brand. Thanks in advance! [link] [comments]  |
| Need advice writing an employee handbook Posted: 07 Feb 2019 02:46 PM PST Hi, I'm trying to write an employee handbook for my soon to be replaced secretaries position in a way that can be understood easily by a new employee. Her position consists of dozens of small jobs including but not limited to: filing all different kinds of taxes, answering the phone, payroll, writing invoices from work orders, ordering parts, managing payables, receiving payments, checking e-mail, handing workers comp/unemployment/ins. claims, ect. How can I write an employee handbook that has the steps for all of these tasks organized in a way that a new employee can actually understand it? [link] [comments]  |
| Small-batch beard care business, looking for ways to increase revenue? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 01:04 PM PST Hey all, I'll make this short: Been in business going on 6 years. I was mainly selling in person, F&F, and at farmer's markets here in a popular college town. Branched out to Etsy in 2017 and have seen wonderful success, want to keep up the momentum. What I made the entire year in 2017, I made in the first couple months in 2018. 2018 was a GREAT year. I prefer Etsy because it's a heavy traffic platform, I can customize with coupons and sales, and it's super simple to set up shop. I am hoping to drive my sales more as each year progresses, but unsure what to do in regards to spending vs. my profits. I don't want to cut into them too much, but would like to explore other marketing options. I am familiar with Google Ads and Facebook platform, but unsure of others. I also have recently started a mailing list that I am slowly incorporating in. If it matters, I do all the marketing, branding, labeling, packaging, and shipping myself. Not looking to outsource any of that. Link for reference: https://www.etsy.com/shop/redwoodsbeardco Any advice? Suggestions? Feedback? Incentives you may think of would be beneficial? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2019 08:25 PM PST Hi everyone, We were just wondering if anyone had any advise on how to rank better on google or bing and increase our site ranking. We have definitely improved our SEO in terms of meta descriptions and images, but that doesn't seem to be having a huge effect. Some people say, the more things you have the better you will be, we have about 5000 products and plan on more. As you can probably tell we are a newer site and fairly new to the whole small business idea. This is our site here. We would really appreciate any help or assistance. We have been going for about half a year and haven't had a heap of success. [link] [comments]  |
| Putting together a questionairre Posted: 07 Feb 2019 05:22 AM PST Hi gang, I have a deli in a rural location with 6 other businesses. We're combining marketing efforts in order to draw more footfall and awareness but I'm also putting together a survey to get people to think about their own business. Questions I have so far are; What are your 3 best produ ts in terms of profit? What is your lowest grossing product? What product would you like people to think of when your business is mentioned? What are your 3 highest costs? Can you think of any others I should include? [link] [comments]  |
| Good, simple to use, low cost CRM? Posted: 07 Feb 2019 03:44 PM PST Title pretty much says it... I run a small company selling commercial fueling equipment. Mobile refueling trailers, above-ground fuel storage tanks, etc. We get about four inbound leads per day, and usually sell about 8-10 units per month. Average sales price around $18-20k. We do this with just two of us in sales, primarily me. Honestly, I'm terrible at follow up. We've tried Method CRM, but it seemed too cumbersome, hard to use. I really would like to do better follow up, I bet I could double our sales if I did it consistently. Suggestions for an easy to use CRM? [link] [comments]  |
| You are subscribed to email updates from smallbusiness: Starting, owning and growing a small business. To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |
No comments:
Post a Comment