Business Plus Baby

April 4, 2013

How to tell if your business is really a hobby in disguise

Have you been stuck in start-up mode for too long? Then perhaps you’ve got a hobby, not a business.

I’ll come clean here. When I first started Business Plus Baby, I was in a crowd with some mums who were running successful businesses and some who were making a few pounds (or dollars) from a hobby.

I was determined to run my blog as a business, dammit. I had a new family to feed and I wasn’t going to be faffing around with a hobby. In my mind, the difference between a hobby and a business was this: a hobby makes pocket money (if you’re lucky) and a business makes proper money. An income you can live on.

Continue reading “How to tell if your business is really a hobby in disguise”

March 27, 2013March 27, 2013

What should you outsource first?

Outsourcing for a small business means paying someone else to work in your business on a freelance basis rather than as employee. Being able to offload a stack of work to someone else sounds very tempting, but where on earth do you start?

The first tasks to outsource are the ones you simply can’t do yourself, either because you don’t have the skills or qualifications or because it would be a risk to your business if you tried. Good examples include:

– Web design – if you’re a complete technophobe

– Graphic design – it’s OK, most of us struggle to make graphics look good!

– Accountancy – let’s be honest, this subject takes at least three years of full-time study and it changes constantly. And that’s just the start, there are also many specialisms, such as forensic accountancy! (You can find out more about that at Frenkels Forensics if you’re curious…)

– Legal – would you know where to start when drawing up a contract? Nope, neither would I.

Once you’ve worked out all the tasks you simply can’t do your self, list all the tasks that you hate or aren’t very good at. These are the tasks that someone else can do far better than you and in a fraction of the time, too! Bookkeeping is high up on many people’s lists and you may be surprised how little it costs to outsource if you find a bookkeeper who specialises in working with small businesses.

There are plenty of mums with valuable skills who would love to help you out part-time with admin, graphic design, running a PR campaign and many more tasks. If they work from home their overheads are low and they could well do the job for less than you could. That frees up your time to do what you are really are good at, plus growing your business to the next level. You could also free up a few hours by asking a local teenager to help out with post office runs and baby-sitting, or you could get a cleaner.

The internet has made outsourcing easier than ever before. Many home-based freelancers can be found on Twitter, so it’s easy to ask around for recommendations. You can also post jobs on sites like Elance.com and PeoplePerHour.com. Make sure you read the terms and conditions carefully and look at the freelancer’s track record before you hire them, though. I’ve had some success with Fiverr.com, a site where people will do work for you for just five dollars (about £3.50). I really recommend giving that a go if you want to get started in outsourcing because it’s so cheap and easy to use.

Ultimately, you should aim to outsource as many tasks as you possibly can. That will free you up to work on growing your business, rather than working within it.

(Note: remember when hiring freelancers to stay on the right side of the HM Revenue and Customs’ rules around self-employment see www.hmrc.gov.uk/employment-status/index.htm for more)

Image courtesy of nuttakit / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Consideration was received for the writing and editing of this post.

March 21, 2013

How a little tool called Workflowy can save your sanity

Today I’m introducing a new guest blogger to Business Plus Baby – Christelle Donaldson of The Handy Marketer. Over to you Christelle!

When it comes to work, I am a very organized person and I make the most out of the tools available at hand. I plan my week, I plan my day, I set reminders, I block time on my own to work on key projects, nothing escapes me. But at home, it can be a different story. I forget to pick up the mail, to put the trash out on the right day, to call my parents when I said I would and worst, to pay bills in time. My husband keeps getting frustrated with me and told me once: “don’t you have a whole army of tools that you use at work? Can’t you use them at home too?” Good question.

I tried a few options: Evernote, Google Tasks, Teux Deux, Reminders, Remember the Milk. All these fancy apps that can do wonders, if only you stick with them long enough. But that was always the problem, getting used to the app, finding how best to use it and building a habit of looking at my tasks regularly. I found all these tools to be too sophisticated, offering too many options, needing too many clicks to update them.

And then I learned about Workflowy. I instantly fell in love with it and started using it seamlessly at work and at home.

Workflowy is an online tool for taking notes and making lists. It works quite differently from other applications in the way that you simply write lists and keep adding new lists or sub-categories. You can also zoom on a list, collapse or expand items, mark them as complete, use hash tags and search through your lists, making the tool very powerful yet simple to use.

Here is why I love Workflowy:

It’s simple: You don’t need to learn how to use it, it’s almost like writing on paper. In fact the help menu is very small since it is so easy to use.
There are no distractions: the interface is very minimalist so there are no distractions around. You just write on the page and do nothing else. Workflowy doesn’t offer the option of formatting your text, so you don’t fiddle around.
It’s online and mobile: Workflowy is a cloud based tool so you can access it anywhere as long as you can find a browser and an internet connection. This is why I love it, because I can use it at the office and at home without having to install a new software on my computer. The mobile application is also very practical and can work offline.
It’s printable: you can choose to print any part of your lists, whether big or small, and make it a full page document. Very practical for shopping lists!
It’s beautiful: this might not be important to you, but I look at my list all day so I’d rather have something pretty to look at.
It’s free: with a free account you can create hundreds of items per month. So far I never reached the limit, and I know that I can increase it if I need.

I encourage you to have a look at the tool and try it for yourself. And if you are still wondering what you can use it for, I’ll give you a sneak peek into the way I organize it, just from a task management perspective (you could use it for much more):

What about you, what tool do you use to stay organized?

Christelle Donaldson is a busy mom working as a professional marketer and blogging at The Handy Marketer. She offers practical marketing tips and is the author of Business Blogging for Beginners.

March 19, 2013March 11, 2014

Do I need a business credit card?

You’ve already got one personal credit card – or maybe more. So do you really need one for your business too?

Having a credit card for business use can actually be a very smart move. This is because a credit card can effectively give you a one month interest-free loan – if you use it responsibly, that is. Businesses often find they need to pay for something while they are waiting to be paid themselves. So you’ve earned the money, but your client hasn’t yet paid you and in the meantime you need to buy more stock, a credit card can help you bridge this gap.

Another reason for using a credit card is that you are more likely to get your money back if you’re a victim of fraud than you are with a debit card.

But do you really need to go out and get a business credit card? If you’re just starting out and you’re not spending much on your business, then it may just be easier to use your personal credit card. (You may want to check the card’s terms and conditions to make sure they allow this, though). But once you’ve got going, it’ll probably be easier if you separate your business credit card purchases from your personal ones.

Here are some things to think about when you compare credit cards:

APR (Annual Percentage Rate)

This is the annual charge of the card based on the cost of purchases, but won’t usually include fees for things like late payment or withdrawal fees.

I had a quick nose around the web and found that the APRs for business credit cards had a similar range to those for personal cards. That said, there was a wide range of APRs on both business and personal cards, so do shop around if you’re looking for either.

Minimum repayment

Credit card providers will require you to make a minimum repayment you need to make each month. You can compare both this and the fee you’ll be charged if you miss a payment.

Fees

Both personal and business cards can charge an annual fee, although this seems to be much less common for personal credit cards than for business cards.

Other benefits to compare

Some personal credit cards offer rewards such as Nectar/Tesco clubcard points or cashback and some business cards offer discounts on AA cover or travel insurance. Both types of card can offer balance transfers.

Minimum income

Most of the business credit cards I checked needed you to have a minimum income expected income of £10,000 over the next 12 months. Many personal credit cards don’t specify a minimum income.

Credit limit

This is the maximum amount that the credit card company is prepared to lend you on your credit card. It’s always good to have some spare credit available on your card to allow for interest to be added. Otherwise you may go over the limit and be charged a fee.

And finally – keep a good credit rating

Your credit rating is the financial information held about you at the credit reference agencies. Most companies that offer credit (for example for mortgages or mobile phone contracts) take your previous credit history into account, so it pays to keep a good credit rating. You can do this by paying your bills on time and staying within your credit limit.

Here are other articles in this series, why not take a look…?

Do I need business insurance?

Do I need a business phone line?

Do I need a business bank account?

Do I need a business plan?

Note: this information applies to UK readers only.

Image courtesy of David Castillo / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

March 17, 2013

Whatever happened to my new blog, WomanPlusBusiness.com?

Just a few weeks ago I launched my new blog, WomanPlusBusiness.com. And I’ve decided to close it down already!

Why on earth would I do that? Let me explain….

Back last year I realised that I was blogging about subjects here at Business Plus Baby that would be useful for any woman with a small business, but that by having ‘baby’ in the title that I may be turning some readers away. Also, I know that many mums of small kids are just starting out with their businesses and need beginner-level info, whereas some of my readers who have been with a me a few years are ready for posts with a bit more depth to them.

So Woman Plus Business was me broadening out and opening up to more readers.

My intention just after the Woman Plus Business launch was to get as much feedback from new readers as I could. I wanted to make sure I posted articles and videos that were incredibly useful and just what my readers wanted. So immediately after readers signed up for my mailing list I asked them (in a video) what their number one business challenge was. I also talked to women micro-business owners face-to-face at networking events.

This was a great strategy and I felt I got a good idea of what this group really wanted. It turns out that they desperately wanted help with online marketing. The good news was that I could absolutely help with this and was excited about doing so.

So it made total sense for me to focus on online marketing instead of the wider range of topics I’d been planning.

The not-so-good news was that after just a few weeks I had a blog that was focused on the wrong subject. I worked out a way of twisting Woman Plus Business into an online marketing blog but it didn’t feel right. I kept procrastinating over promoting Woman Plus Business. For me that was a sure sign that something was wrong because I’m not normally a big procrastinator. So I went with my gut and decided it was time to move on.

Rather than come up with a new brand for another new blog I decided to keep things simple and just show up using my own name. So from now on I’ll be blogging about online marketing over at HelenLindop.com, as well as continuing as usual here at Business Plus Baby.

Even though Woman Plus Business wasn’t working for me, I’ve written some posts there that I’m really proud of, so I’ll be republishing them on either HelenLindop.com or here at Business Plus Baby depending on where they fit best.

If you’re wondering what I’ve learned from all this, then here it is…

1) I spent months trying to get Woman Plus Business ‘right’ before I launched in January. I should have launched earlier and got feedback sooner because I would have saved myself some time.

2) You never know if something is going to work unless you put it out there for other people to see. The great thing about web-based products and businesses now is that you can keep trying out new stuff without wasting tons of time or money. Experiment and don’t be afraid of failure because failure is an integral part of the process. If you’re going to fail then you need to do it fast so you can learn and move on.

3) Always, always listen to your audience. They will tell you if you’re on the right track in a way that going around in circles inside your own mind never will.

4) If it doesn’t feel right it probably isn’t right. I had bad vibes about Woman Plus Business on the run up to launch, but I told myself it was pre-launch nerves. I need to learn to listen to my gut more.

So what’s next for me? I’ll be blogging about online marketing and social media over at Helenlindop.com, so I’d love it if you fancy popping over to say hello. My next project is a Twitter marketing online course, and I’ll let you know when it’s ready!

And huge thanks to you for your support as I launched Woman Plus Business, too. 🙂 I really do appreciate it.

Image courtesy of phanlop88 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net