Bartering is one of the fastest-growing techniques used by new businesses. With barter, you can achieve huge savings on all your purchases, acquire needed items for your business with money…
If you sell complex products to business, there is a right and a wrong way of going about it. Or, rather, there are some processes, evolved over time by professional…
Once you have found a product or service you want to sell and have tested it thoroughly you are ready to begin planning your business. Building a business takes time,…
A long list of satisfied customers is the most valuable asset a business can have. You must be able to attract customers, keep them coming back, and have them refer…
Leadership is the skill of persuading people to co-operate willingly to achieve results. Managing people is a mixture of motivation and manipulation. So far so good. Unfortunately there is often…
When venture capitalists hear the words 'high technology' they seldom reach for their cheque books in a hurry; it is a culture with which most of them have yet to…
Leaflets can be a very reasonable way of passing on your message to potential customers, particularly if those customers are the end users, and leaflets can be distributed directly into…
Particularly in the inner areas of our towns and cities there is a stock of Victorian and pre-First World War properties which are generally inexpensive but often uncomfortable. The building…
The law on unfair dismissal specifies that misconduct is a potentially fair reason for dismissal, but gives little or no guidance on the sort of behavior that may warrant dismissal…
Why move? There is a wide range of considerations which may encourage you to think about moving and to start looking round for alternative premises. Some firms move because they…
If you are a one-person business, perhaps working from home, probably the best method of trading is as a sole trader. You do not need to register with any official…
How many people would start a long car journey without a route map? How many would build a house extension without drawings and a detailed estimate of costs? Running a…
At one time anyone needing advice about starting a business was automatically referred to the three wise monkeys: the bank manager, solicitor and accountant. Any one of these may have…
Considerable changes have taken place in government assistance to smaller firms in the past year, though the cynics may say that change is more apparent than real, amounting to more…
In running a small enterprise, time is the ever-present enemy. The owner-manager is the firm's major asset - using that asset to maximum advantage involves a planned and fully thought…
The rationale behind this kind of provision is that survival rates among small firms could be considerably improved by making available on-site a range of business advisory, secretarial and other…