Posts by Melinda Phillips Zumski

Wasting time versus investing time

Posted by on Apr 28, 2009 in Business Tips | 0 comments

Wasting time versus investing time

Image via CrunchBase As small business owners, we can get completely sucked into researching various tools, plans, programs, packages etc. And typically time is the most precious resource that we have. I, for example, am currently on a Twitter kick. I am spending a whole bunch of time trying to figure out how this works and how it might benefit my business and my clients . . . so how do we know when we are wasting time versus investing time? I think the key is staying focus on creating results. Not every investigation will succeed. Maybe Twitter won’t improve my business. But if I investigate with the idea that I am trying to see how this could benefit...

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Pricing – in THIS economy?

Posted by on Feb 12, 2009 in Book Club, Business Tips | 0 comments

Pricing – in THIS economy?

Cover via Amazon As I look at my projections for 2009 I am trying to figure out how to maintain profitability in this challenging economy. And while I haven’t raised my prices in a while now, this sure doesn’t feel like the climate to raise prices . . . so how do I navigate this and make sure I stay a FIT business? For my business, I am looking long and hard about HOW I price – instead of just thinking of our services as traditional hourly rate I am starting to explore pricing that is based on the value we deliver to clients. That gives us an incentive to become more efficient for our clients without constantly eroding our own income. I want...

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Budget for Fitness

Posted by on Feb 3, 2009 in SF Business Services | 0 comments

Budget for Fitness

Image via Wikipedia FIT businesses budget. Now is the perfect time to look back on what happened in your business in 2008, and put together your best estimates about what will happen in 2009. Budgeting forces you to focus on what might happen, what might change in your business, and how all of that will impact you and your general strategy and planning. The exercise of creating a budget makes you define the relationship between the various things that impact your business – if my sales decline in this economy, what do I do about my staffing? What is my equipment purchase budget look like for this year? Should I invest more in advertising and marketing...

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Relieving 1099 stress

Posted by on Jan 19, 2009 in SF Business Services | 0 comments

Relieving 1099 stress

Image via Wikipedia Are you in the midst of trying to collect vendor information so that you can complete your 1099s? I often find that vendors are reluctant to share their tax id information and if you have already paid them, they often have little or no incentive complete your paperwork request. So my advice to you is to take care of this on the front end, so you don’t get stressed out on the back end. Before you pay a new vendor, ask them to complete a W-9 form so that you can “set them up” as a vendor. You can get a W-9 form on the IRS website at www.irs.gov. It is easy to just send this as an email attachment. If you request that a...

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Small Business California needs your help

Posted by on Jan 9, 2009 in Small Business News | 0 comments

Small Business California needs your help

Image via Wikipedia Each year Small Business California does an annual survey of small businesses around the state to determine its agenda. Last year it survey received over 600 responses and had at least one business respond from every county in the state. They would like to ask you to take a look at last years survey and forward to them any questions you think they should add as well as questions you think they should delete. You can access all of their surveys over the years by going to their website www.smallbusinesscalifornia.org. Related articles by Zemanta Despite an Improving Economy, Citibank Survey Finds that Recession Lingers for Majority of California...

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