Small Business News

A quality website can go a long way toward communicating your brand message with customers. Whether you run a local business or luxury brand, there are a few key elements you must consider when designing your site. Learn key tips from members of the online small business community below.

Web design is an art, but it’s also a science. The golden ratio can help you ensure your website directs visitors’ eyes where you want them. Learn more about it in this Pixel Productions post. Then head over to BizSugar to see what members are saying.

Keywords are an essential part of every website, since they can help relevant visitors find your site. Before adding keywords, research the topics that are most relevant to your target customers. John Jantsch details the process in this Duct Tape Marketing post.

Pop-ups aren’t exactly popular among website visitors. But there are ways to make them a bit more appealing. In this Content Marketing Institute post, Evian Gutman goes over the principles you need to know if you plan on including pop-up ads.

WordPress is one of the top platforms for building quality websites. There’s so much to learn about WordPress sites, which you can learn from these statistics from Matt Moran of Blogging Wizard. BizSugar members also chimed in on the post here.

If you want to build a luxury brand, your website should be a big part of your messaging strategy. So it’s important to keep your luxury customers in mind when designing it. Get tips in this Small Biz Daily post by Mark Hook.

Many local businesses are struggling to bring customers back after COVID-19 closures. But it is possible to foster the loyalty you and your customers once enjoyed. Read this Bright Local post by Raul Galera for details.

Your website isn’t just a tool for attracting new customers. It can also help you foster deeper connections with existing ones. To attain this goal, read the tips in this Marketing Land post by Cynthia Ramsaran.

Online security is a must for protecting your website and other online assets. And different types of sites face different threats. Becca Williams details some of them in this Smallbiztechnology.com post.

Visuals can be a huge part of your website — especially when it comes to your content. If you’re ready to improve your web content this year, check out the visual trends in this Search Engine Journal post by Julia McCoy.

Once you have a quality website in place, it only garners results if people actually engage with it. If you’re looking to increase engagement on your site and other online assets, learn from the tips in this Biz Epic post by Ivan Widjaya.

If you’d like to suggest your favorite small business content to be considered for an upcoming community roundup, please send your news tips to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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“Due Diligence” applies to both buyers and sellers of a business.

Due Diligence means you are diligently researching every aspect of the business. Aside from the financials, you’re looking into the business reputation and its potential.

When you are ready to buy a business, you should know that the seller is doing Due Diligence on you! The seller will want to delve into your financials, your reputation and your potential to run the business. The seller will want a copy of your credit report, at a minimum.

Before you seek information about a business, prep your own financial info so you’re ready to make a move when that perfect opportunity presents itself.

After you read our Buying a Business Checklist, you can download BizBuySell’s Guide to Buying a Small Business for more information.

There are lots of advantages you get when you buy an existing business. Think of it as “coming in hot.” You’re not going to have the potential glitches that occur during a new business start.

There are other advantages:

Before you make the decision to buy a business, take a step that isn’t an “action” step. Think about your reasons for wanting to buy a business and what type of business fits your lifestyle.

Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could love what you do? A business purchase should suit your goals and style. Agricultural? Construction? Entertainment? Restaurant? Manufacturing? IT? Accounting? Where are your skills?

Are you more suited to be a sole proprietor? Do you want to own a business overseen by executive committees (boards of directors)? Or would you rather oversee a management team? Would you like to be an owner of a seasonal or year-round business? Own a C corp?

Do you want to buy a franchise from its current owner? Keep in mind that the sale must be approved by the original franchisor of the franchise, in most cases. You would be treated as a brand new franchise owner when applying to make the purchase.

And due to our extremely challenging operations during the pandemic, there’s a new question that is of utmost importance: Has this business, or can this business, find a way to operate during Covid restrictions?

A Business Broker is a type of real estate agent. The Business Broker specializes in commercial properties.

Most even specialize further into types of businesses. For example, there are Business Brokers who handle transactions for manufacturing companies.

To get started on your own, you can type “Small Business for Sale” into a search engine online. You can also check businessmart.com and bizbuysell.com.

If you know where (city, region or state) you’d like to make a business purchase, you can make specific searches there. Find the local Chamber of Commerce or economic development association. Look up local residential real estate companies and see if they also handle commercial properties.

You could argue that no one would sell the “perfect business” and you’d be – partly – correct. One of the ways to determine whether or not a business entity is “perfect” is to learn the reason it’s for sale.

Here are reasons that may be given for a sale:

As you move through our buy a business checklist you may run into factors and details about the pending sale that raise red flags:

Are there red flags? Problems? But are you still starry eyed with optimism? Bring in an impartial advisor, a friend or trusted business associate. If the red flags are too ominous, go back to Step 2.

Lenders like financing business operations that are already proven money makers when they give a loan to buy a business. That’s one of the reasons that it’s a good decision to buy an existing small business.

Here are places where you may finance the purchases of businesses:

There are also different types of sales within the sale:

Asset transaction – specific assets are sold after the main sale of the business. This is most commonly done with inventory. The transactions will take place on a time schedule.

Stock transaction – the buyer purchases an ownership stake in the business.

Finalizing the sale by signing documents is the last step of the sale process. Get copies of the settlement documents in advance. Check the documents and have your business attorney check them.

Before you commit to the business purchase, research.

Of course you will delve into all the financial records involved with the business operations. But there’s much more to learn before you commit to the sale:

Does the type of industry – creative arts, construction, environmental stewardship, hospitality, retail, etc. – thrive in the area?

What about the physical location of the business? What’s the history there? What type of business development is pending in the area?

For example: You’re thinking of buying a manufacturing company that’s so successful, there are three shifts of employees. But a quick search shows you that a huge distribution center, offering higher wages, will be opening in the same county within six months.

Will the employees of your company jump ship? Will you have to offer a better employee wage and benefit package?

Being able to maintain a stable work force is just one of the factors to consider when you’re buying a business.

The status of the business inventory can be tied to supply agreements. As part of your research check into:

j Material Contracts – A material contract will list penalties if a material is not delivered on time, as specified in the contract. For example, if Company A doesn’t get the white ribbon order from Company B, it can’t complete the July 4 decorations orders. And Company B will pay a penalty.

Supply Agreements – Similar to a material contract. A company has a contract to deliver materials. This can work both ways – the company that’s for sale may have contracted to either provide materials or have materials deliverer to it. Businesses like these agreements because they can create stability in the cash flow.

While you’re checking into business inventory and contracts involving materials and supplies, that’s an opportune time to expand that search. Look into the data entry system used by the company to many inventory and contracts.

Equipment for businesses are tangible assets. You can put your finger on them. You can know their purchase price and their value now (after depreciation). You can determine if they are viable to use going forward or are obsolete.

Intellectual property isn’t tangible. It includes things like inventions (which must have a patent), designs and brand names.

The company should also have a logo that’s connected to the brand. The logo is the symbol for the business, and as such it is an asset.

Are all the intellectual properties included in the sale? Will you be able to keep the business’s existing contact information, such as website, FB page, phone number, email address?

The Buying a Business due diligence checklist may seem exhausting but it’s not a step to skip, no place for taking shortcuts. By working through the due diligence checklist you’ll verify information and make sure there are no omissions in your due diligence efforts:

Reviewing the details of existing contracts is a hugely important step of the checklist in a business sale. We’ve already mentioned contracts involving inventory. There’s are other contracts and legal documents to review as part of the due diligence process:

Commercial leases

Sales representative agreements

Distribution agreements

Marketing agreements

Stock purchase agreements

Vehicle leases

Partnership agreements

Non-disclosure agreements – these can be for employees and for buyer/seller. Basically, it states no one can reveal trade secrets or customer lists, especially to competitors.

Non-compete agreements – the buyer and seller will not become competitors.

Security agreements

Employees hiring agreements and handbook, may include collective bargaining agreements.

Even if you’re buying a business that is a sole proprietorship, you may need an accountant to go over the details of financial statements and sales records. You need tax returns for the business for the past 3 years.

In addition to tax returns, you should get a copy of the business plan. Do the balance sheets match up with the information in the plan? The best advice is to hire an accountant who can verify that the accounting methods were correct.

These often involve inventory and equipment. The current owner of the business may have kept the inventory as a separate asset entity. You should be able to see by looking at business balance sheets.

Will any monies owed on inventory be paid off with the sale proceeds? Or will the debt owed on the inventory be paid off as it is sold (by the new owner)?

A business should be authorized to do business in the state, which means it is up to date on state fees, taxes and required business filings.

Remember to look further for more information. The Certificate of Good Standing is NOT proof that the business has satisfied all tax obligations.

Those costs are a business expense. The costs may have been a lot higher when the business launched.

You can calculate the net worth by subtracting the total liabilities from the total assets. This information may be included in analyst reports provided by the seller.

Make sure the method of calculating the valuation is valid. To properly calculate this information, you may need to hire a professional to do the business valuation.

You can request the tax returns. You can get credit reports from various entities such as Dun & Bradstreet, Equifax, Experian and others.

Income statements include revenues and gains, as well as expenses and losses.

Look for the business on the Better Business Bureau website by doing a “who is” search. You can also look at websites such as Yelp, and EDGAR (Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis and Retrieval).

You should learn the employees’ hire dates and employment agreements. How is the business structured for operations? Are there team/crews with leaders? Shifts? Supervisors?

Examples of insurance policies include general liability, commercial property insurance, business income insurance, umbrella policies, auto/fleet insurance, professional liability insurance, worker’s compensation insurance and data breach insurance.

A lot of time, you can transfer the existing policies from seller to new owners. But you may be able to find better rates.

This is a working draft of the final sales agreement with tax settlement documents.

After you’ve made your assessments, bring in an impartial person to review.

The seller agrees not to compete with the “former” business. The agreement can specify a time frame and/or distance for the entities to refrain from becoming competitors.

Rules and requirements can include zoning, ordinances and permits. You may have to honor indemnification obligations, which are obligations of the debtor to reimburse a debt.

Find out if the local taxing entities reassess the value of a property based on its sale price. Ouch!

Policies may cover sick leave policies, vacation time, rules about attendance/working hours, roles and salaries of employees, employees’ job duties by position.

Compare the existing plan to the results. Review and amend as needed.

It can take as long as 8-12 months. You can ask for timely status reports.

Profit and loss statements, last 3 years.

Tax returns, last 3 years

Leases

Current balance sheet

Insurance policies

Non-disclosure agreements

Non-compete agreements

Here’s some advice from the SBA:

Determine your talents and lifestyle

Figure out how much money you can spend

Review the “landscape” for that type of business

Questions to ask yourself: Why do you want to buy this business?

Questions to ask the seller: Why do you want to sell this business? Will you be available as an advisor during the transition?

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This article, "Buying a Business Checklist" was first published on Small Business Trends

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Almost a year ago I had an opportunity to talk with Craig Cuffie, EVP and Chief Procurement Officer for Salesforce.  It was just a few months after George Floyd was murdered, and about 4 months into the pandemic-induced shutdown.  It was a heavy time.  It still is a heavy time.  Which is why I was so glad to speak with Craig again to see hear how the plans Salesforce had begun in response to the social unrest inspired by the George Floyd situation.

Below is an edited transcript of a portion of our conversation.  But I encourage you to watch the video replay of our complete discussion, or to click on the embedded SoundCloud player.

Brent Leary:  It’s been a long year, but in some ways it hasn’t felt like a year.  Tell us how the things you were putting into place at Salesforce a year ago have progressed.

Craig Cuffie: Four P’s. The four pillars. People, purchasing, philanthropy, and policy. So there are four senior executives who are the chairs, three, along with myself. We have sub leads, the part of our businesses, they have to be part of our businesses, and about 50 other folks across the company maniacally focused on this and moving this forward. 

On the people front, 50% increase in VP plus Black leaders. And what is that? It has to do with focus. Now, against a 60,000 person company, it’s still a small number, but it’s  growing, so we’re really pleased about that.

Our underrepresented minority hiring is up 40% year on year. What is that? That’s focus, right, Brent, that is focusing on it. Partnering with the Executive Leadership Council. I’ve been an ELC member for 13, 14 years and we’ve over the last couple of years have begun to partner with them to help our year ends rise up in through … From middle management to senior leadership and the skillset required, and a very unique experience as minority leaders. So we’re in our second year of that and have doubled down on it.

Inclusive promotion training. Universal across all of the industry. We say, “Go get a diverse slate,” and they go to get a diverse slate, but those diverse folks don’t make it past round one, right. Forget getting past round one and round two, they don’t make it into round one. Why not? We’ve done a lot of work to understand that, and have trained our managers in inclusive hiring. What does it mean to be an inclusive leader? And those things permeate our leadership training programs. We did a quality ally training. 7,000 Salesforce employees have gone through ally training. So we put our money where our mouth is, our exploratory mouth as well.

We have established an equality recruiting team with a singular focus on minority talent. That’s huge. We have a warmline. We didn’t invent the warmline, it came from another company, the concept, but it’s so that folks can have a confidential conversation about belonging, or why they don’t feel like they belong, and what’s happening inside their space. So it’s not ER where you call the ER and say, “This is really, really bad, something’s happening,” and an investigation starts. This is I need some help. It doesn’t mean those other things couldn’t happen, but that’s a first start of, I’m not a part of the franchise. I believe I should be part of the franchise. And how do we … How do you help the company get there?

We committed $200 million and a million hours of VTO (voluntary time off) over the next five years. That’s a big commitment, and we’re moving out and very focused on high-impact organizations that focus on racial equality. And my dear friend, Ebony Beckwith runs the Salesforce Foundation and heads all our philanthropic efforts. She’s just awesome. And we want to close that gap with your institutes. And you’ve heard this when people say, “Is this a moment or is it a movement?” Right. We can turn a moment into a movement by not giving up the focus, by keeping it unbelievably present.

I did a leadership training, I was one of the faculty, and I had a whole bunch of stuff going on, right. During that week it was real. Four days of solid out faculty stuff for Zoom. On Zoom and other things going on. And I said, “You know what?” I said, “My learning this week, my personal learning, is I need to be more present. I need to stop doing a zillion things at a time because I’m not good at that many things.” We all find out we’re not built to multitask. We think we are but we don’t. But being focused, and being present, and keeping this top of mind, right, is what will help from the moment to movement. And that’s really, really important that companies like Salesforce keep that focus.

We talked about and I’ve been saying it – from counting spend, to counting impact. The folks who have my job, how much … How many billions of spend did you have under management? And that’s all well and good, but what is the impact of the dollars you spend? Who are you helping?

I was with a team of folks who do what I do, and we were talking… They talk about addressable spend and non-addressable spend, right, because of the goals. What happens if we spend through our daily and quarterly yearly spend. And there are things that are sacrosanct in the business like oh, what happens in the financial side. The bankers, the treasury people, and so on. And in some cases, very high-end consults, we do M&A, those are all specialties. And it’s all addressable. It’s all addressable.

You do what my dear friend Robin Washington says is when someone comes there when she was still CFO, she’s retired now, and pick a bank. When a big bank comes in and says, “You want to do business?” And she says, “Well, tell me, what does your portfolio look like of diverse companies that do business with you? And I want to see when you call on me, I want to see some diversity because I know there’s some Black bankers out there.” Right. So having those conversations are really, really important, right.

And so I’ve said to my head of supplier diversity and sustainability, fantastic executive named Madison Gunter, I said, “I want to be a member of the Billion Dollar Roundtable,” right. So if you go find that, and my dear friend, Shelley Steward is the chair of that, the Billion Dollar Roundtable is a number of companies that spend collectively $83 billion with diverse suppliers. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. And I said, “I want to be in”. And trust me, there’s no vacation, there’s no jet, there’s no pride with it. There’s nothing but bragging rights, right, to be in the Billion Dollar Roundtable. But what it says is that you’re doing your job right, and that you’re being unbelievably inclusive, when it comes to the focus on diverse suppliers. And I take that a step forward from counting spend to truly counting impact. So lots of good work.

I have to mention the policy work we’re doing. Advocating for police reform. We’re out front, in the halls of legislatures advocating for police reform, advocating for civic engagement, advocating for policies that drive empowerment, looking at laws and regulations that protect against racism. I mean, right now all of the conversation around voter rights, right, it’s huge. So again, working aggressively on all those things.

Brent Leary: Right.

Craig Cuffie: We said, “All this stuff is going to cost,” right. And then so making sure that these multi-year programs could get funded and have people to do it right so it’s not just lip service and it gets plugged into the chief diversity officer’s office or somewhere inside of human resources or somewhere inside … Pick a department. It doesn’t matter what it’s linked to, it matters that it is funded, right, in the right way so it’s effective. And so those are the things that we’ve done, right, over time, right in this last year.

Brent Leary: Give me some of the things that have been the most surprising challenges you’ve faced and this team has gone through this last year?

Craig Cuffie: I don’t know if I had any surprises, right. I don’t sleep so I don’t scream in the middle of the night. This is a long format problem and a long format solution, right. So if any of us thinks that through any one action, including up through the President of the United States, right, and executive orders and potential legislation, that this is going to change overnight, it’s not. It will not change in my life.

And I don’t know if you’re familiar with this study that McKinsey did. It came on a couple of months ago and they talked about economic parity, in that Black America it will take, left to its own devices with the current forces at play, 95 years before the Black community would see economic parity. And this study you find it, It breaks it down by industry, by geography, it gives you a little history lesson most Black folks lived down. They still live down south. They don’t live necessarily where all the most money is made. I mean … It made me sad. And our CEO sent it out. He sent it out to me and a handful of others to take a look at and I just said, “This makes me sad.”

And if I think about it as if I put this in terms of my life and the life of my family, I said, “95 years,” my granddaughter is four. So I said, “If you think about 95 years from now when she is almost 100 when she’s 99, her great-grandchildren will have the opportunity that we have dreamed about.” So we take in some 500 years for Blacks in this country, on this continent to see economic parity.

Brent Leary: I like how you’ve talked about  “going from empathy to action” because I think I’ve seen a lot of emphasis on being empathetic … I guess that is the start of where hopefully that bleeds right into some action. I’m thinking about just this past year, actually this past month, we had the 100-year acknowledgment, or memorial, or however you want to phrase it, for what happened in Tulsa. And we also had Juneteenth become a Federal Holiday. Are these signs of action from a whole bunch of empathy that took place after seeing what happened a little over a year ago?

Craig Cuffie: I’ve known about Tulsa for a long, long time, right. And the head of commercial legal, who handles my team from a legal standpoint, asked a question. He said, “Craig, I didn’t learn about any of this,”. He said, “I didn’t learn about any of this in college or high school.” And I said, “History is written by the victors,  right, because you wipe out the vanquished. So then you get to write the history. History is written by the victors number one.”

Brent Leary: Right.

Craig Cuffie: And then number two, you have to be curious, right. You have to say, “Why is the world the way it is and help me understand?” So you have to become a little bit of a personal historian yourself and a researcher to go find out about these things. Juneteenth has been around since Juneteenth has been around, right. And is it happenstance that we have the acknowledgment of the 100 anniversary of what happened in Tulsa, just essentially a mass murder. 

Brent Leary: No other way to say it. Before they were calling it a riot, now I think they’re finally calling it a massacre.

Craig Cuffie: So these two events in this last month were in acknowledgment and recognition, because very few people have survived that long to tell that story. And there are very few causes that have taken up the story. And this is an unbelievable time where we are now, where things have coalesced such that the story can be told in a meaningful way and social media helps a great deal. But it’s an acknowledgment of an unbelievable wrong. 

Juneteenth. I don’t believe the whole community understands the importance of what it’s like to be an enslaved people and the lives of those individuals, and what it meant to be free. 

And in most cases, not in all cases, in most cases, if you’re a Black or an African-American, choose which term you want, we’re descendants of slaves unless you came to this country from another country. So it’s that legacy that lives with you always. And it’s great to see in society the triumphs that this community has had despite systemic racism that’s played out in this community.

This article, "Craig Cuffie of Salesforce: A Year Later Empathy Continues to Turn Action into a Movement" was first published on Small Business Trends

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The recent advisory by the U.S. Department of State warns businesses to take precautions when dealing with supply chains in Xinjiang, China. The advisory goes on to say, businesses with exposure in this region may suffer reputational, economic, and legal risks. The State Dept. Issues Supply Chain Advisory for Americans Doing Business in China’s Xinjiang Province article goes into further detail about the advisory.

Suffice it to say, it is one more issue for small businesses to keep an eye on if their supply chain is in that region. However, it is important to note it only affects the Xinjiang region for now. Make sure to monitor the U.S. Department of State and other government sites to stay informed.

This week’s roundup also looks at whether you should start your business as a Sole Proprietor or Limited Liability Company (LLC), how you can reduce shipping costs, and what to sell on Shopify.

Here is the rest of this week’s roundup:

The pandemic has had a huge impact on small businesses of almost every industry across the United States. Different businesses have been using varying ways to adjust to the disruption. To gain insight into the ways small businesses have been adapting to new ways of conducting business, DHL Express carried out a survey.

TikTok has announced it is hosting its first ever Small Biz Block Party, a 20-event workshop series where business owners gather, discuss tactics and strategies, and learn from each other. The workshop series are free to attend and are designed to help small business owners get together, learn, network and ultimately grow their business.

Square, providers of tools designed to empower small businesses, has launched a new suite of financial products designed to help small businesses manage cashflow and grow their business.

The relaunch of ExpenseOut will have new features powered by AI for small businesses. And as companies emerge from the pandemic, the goal is to help businesses cut down on indirect expenses. The company says this going to usher in the next generation of expense management.

Remote working continues to dominate many workforces, making it imperative teams have the right tools in place to streamline and optimize business operations. In response to the demand for more efficient working set-ups for modern teams, Justworks has launched Justworks Hours.

Almost two-thirds or 62% of consumers say they trust small/local businesses more than major retailers. This is compared to 36% who said they trust large, national retailers. But even though small businesses have consumer trust, they need to do more to keep it going. The data comes from Avions’ “New Habits Die Hard: How Trust Will Define Shopping in Summer 2021,” U.S. shopping report.

Online consumer purchases are increasing, and this means more shipping. And according to the latest research from ShipStation, more consumers are demanding shipping transparency from retail businesses. Consumers Demanding Shipping Transparency It is only natural for consumers to want a better shipping experience as they make more online purchases.

High shipping costs is off-putting for customers so it is crucial for ecommerce businesses to find the right balance. Reducing the initial costs as much as possible is the key to both companies and their customers benefiting the most, and this ultimate guide to reducing ecommerce shipping costs will show businesses of any size how to save lots of money.

When times get tough, the tough start new businesses. Or at least that was the case in 2020 when the Census Bureau recorded a substantial uptick in business formations. And so far, the trend hasn’t slowed. In May 2021 alone, more than  500,000 new business applications were filed across the U.S. Want to join the crowd? Here’s how to get started. Sole Proprietor vs.

Creating a Shopify store is one thing and making it a success is another. To grow your store fast, you have to start selling products that have a high purchase rate and healthy profit margin. So now comes the million-dollar question: what to sell on Shopify? We have conducted thorough research to prepare this complete guide on products to sell online.

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This article, "In the News: Beware of Your Supply Chains in China" was first published on Small Business Trends

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