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What is The Best Online Address Book? A Debate Revisited

Let’s get clear up front – we’re talking about ‘online address books’, which for the purposes of this article means an address-book, a place where you hold information on how to get in touch with people, that is online. No, I promise this will not be the most patronizing article ever written, but it is important to clear up a potentially misleading set of terms.

Online address book

Let’s also be clear on is what we’re not talking about: phone books, like those you may still receive from your landline provider. We’re not talking about those.

Now we’re all singing from the same song-sheet, let’s get down to the business of looking at the market for online address books, and where we seem to be heading, what is now about 10 years since Facebook entered the mix.…

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5 Benefits of Project Management

SMB CEOs – if you want to get things done within your company, you need to set every goal as a project, and projects need to be managed for the best results. Let’s explore project management benefits, shall we?

Project management

On a contrary to what people believe, project management is not only about new product launch or customers’ orders.

Let’s define “project”: It’s a temporary group activity designed to produce a unique product, service or result (source.)

Launching a new store is a project. Recruiting new employees is a project. Improving your IT system is a project.

As you can see, everything needs to be considered as projects.…

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What are The Key Deal Terms of a Litigation Funding Agreement?

The key document that governs the relationship between a third party litigation funder and a claimant is a litigation funding agreement (“LFA“).

Litigation Funding Agreement

LFAs are complex legal contracts, which are customised to the facts of each individual claim, but the following are the main key elements:

Termination rights

It might seem counter-intuitive to list termination rights as the first key element, but in practice this is one of the most important aspects of the LFA.

As a claimant (or the claimant’s solicitors) you need to be comfortable that once you have entered into a LFA, your funder will provide the agreed level of third party litigation funding until the conclusion of the claim and only pull out if certain objective tests are met.…

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Packaging Like a Pro: How to Streamline, Save and Stand Out

Taking the order and making the sale should not be the end of the customer experience journey. If the item that they have ordered from you arrives in poor condition due to cheap or inappropriate packaging, all that goodwill can soon disappear.

Amazon shipping packaging

This article takes a look at how you can enhance a professional image for your business by making sure your goods arrive in good condition and tell the customer that you care about them.

Think like a buyer

The first thing you should do when assessing your shipping policy is to think like a buyer. If you were ordering from your company you would want a number of key requirements to be fulfilled.…

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7 Tips to Keep Your Books Out of the Red

It’s inevitable that at some point your business is going to run into financial trouble…

Even if you’re financially secure personally, and able to cover your businesses losses; that’s your money, not the business’s cashflow.

Your business is like a sinking ship? Stay out of the red!

If you have a bank or other type of financial backer who can take care of you when you fall short; the business didn’t generate that money, and it’ll still end up costing more when it comes time to pay the money back (i.e., interest or equity payments).

Take steps to make sure you stay out of the red to begin with. As martial arts legend turned IRS fraudster Wesley Snipes said in his very first box-office movie, Passenger 57: “Always bet on black!”…

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3 Unique Tips for Growing Your Business Beyond 2014

In order to keep profits flowing and to take advantage of expansion opportunities, a business owner or CEO needs to take a big leaping step into the Information Age.

Strategizing for the future

A new era where everyone – rich, middle income, the less fortunate – all have access to way more choices than they did 10 years ago. More choices about how much they pay for a given product, choices about what sources they should trust to make buying decisions, and more access to see what other real people are saying about your product or service.

They don’t have to settle for something that’s just “so-so” or which “sort of” meets their needs because of the limited access to different markets like in the pre-Internet era.…

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How to Attract and Retain the Best Talent in 2014

Back in 1997, McKinsey wrote the ‘War on talent’. They observed and predicted that hiring and keeping the best people was the biggest challenge for business. But, since 2008 and the (almost) global recession, the war seems to have been more easily fought. The balance of power shifted. Suddenly, employers had the upper hand and they had a choice of candidates who would work under pretty much any conditions.

Attracting and retaining top talents

Six years later, in 2014, the pendulum is swinging back in favour of the employee. Suddenly employers can’t find high calibre candidates quickly enough. Wages are rising and there are murmurs of discontent amongst existing staff.…

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Don’t Give Them All the Answers: Putting Autonomy to Work

If you’re a business leader who feels more like a schoolteacher, you’re doing something wrong.

When an employee comes to you with a question, it may seem counterproductive to tell him to figure it out on his own, but sometimes that’s the best thing a leader can do.

It might be easier and make you feel more comfortable to give them all the answers, but by allowing employees to find the answers themselves, you’re empowering them to be resourceful and learn from their mistakes, which is more beneficial in the long run.

Leader assigning responsibilities

The Benefits of Withholding Answers

Having all the answers is great, but that doesn’t mean you have to share them.…

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Don’t Let Pirated Software Sink Your Business

If you download pirated software from Pirate Bay or another torrent website on a computer you use in the workplace, then you’re placing your entire business network at risk. A person downloading pirated software has a one-in-three chance of encountering malware. However, the risk isn’t just in downloading the latest version of “Modern Warfare” before it comes to the U.S. Businesses that purchase refurbished computers containing pirated software have a 61-percent chance of encountering malware.

Pirate girl

Recent research released by IDC and the National University of Singapore predicts that pirated software will costs businesses approximately $491 billion in 2014. The majority of the cost, $364 billion, comes from lost data, damage repair and identity theft expenses.…

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5 Tax Pitfalls to Avoid This Year

Most entrepreneurs shudder at the thought of dealing with their taxes. With their eye firmly on growing their business and forging ahead the idea of meticulously tracking and recording every aspect of their business is at the very back of their minds. But if anything is going to take the wind out of a business’ sails it’s not keeping everything in order.

Business taxes

Here are five of the most common things that tend to trip up entrepreneurs. Make sure you avoid them this year.

1. Claim Your Legitimate Expenses

Make sure that you claim for every item to which you are entitled.…

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