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Can You Generate Sales in a Down Economy?

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It’s a down economy, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t generate sales for your home business. Miller Heiman offers this helpful advice on how you can maintain your sales — even when the economy is down:

* Avoid cutbacks on your sales resources. It may seem counter-intuitive, but research shows that down times are a good time to increase your sales resources. Now is not the time to stop advertising. You need to bring in more income.

* Prioritize. Figure out where your priorities are. Hint: your existing customers should be priorities. Try to hold on to them with superior service and competitive pricing. Then focus on accounts that left, and new customers.

* Discipline. Be disciplined with your management, and with your resources — including some of your expenses. There are places to cut.

Can you think of additional ways to increase sales in a down economy?

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Small Business Loans Experience Another Blow

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Logo of the U.S. government's Small Business A...
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Getting a small business loan has been difficult for some months now, but things are likely to get even worse. Four of the biggest small business lenders, Capital One Bank, Bank of America, Temecula Valley Bancorp and Small Business Loan Source, all slowed — or stopped altogether — their acceptance of new applications.

CNN Money reports on the lost small business loans:

Their sudden absence from the lending scene has left a hole that the banks continuing to participate in the program have not filled in. If current lending trends continue, only two of the top 30 lenders are projected to increase their loan volume this year, according to Bob Coleman, the head of Coleman Publishing.

The sharp drop-off was apparent in the SBA’s loan data for the last three months of 2008: The number of loans funded through the agency’s 7(a) program fell from more than 20,000 a year earlier to fewer than 9,000. The total dollar value of all the loans funded fell 40%, from $3.2 billion at the end of 2007 to $1.9 billion last quarter.

Many home business operations are also likely to be affected by this. Are you finding it difficult to keep running your home business without financing?

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1099 Income When Self-Employed: Check the Tax ID Number

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One of the more interesting quandries that I encountered this year as the accountant was doing my taxes was this: Left over from my days as a sole proprietorship were some 1099s that still had my Social Security Number on them. Some of clients hadn’t been using the new tax ID number I’d sent when I became a LLC!

It is important to note that in these cases, your income has to be divided up according to tax ID number/Social Security Number. This means that any income that is listed on the 1099 under your Social Security Number has to be considered Schedule C income. It didn’t really change my taxes, but it made things a little more complicated for my accountant. As a result, I’m sending a W-9 to my clients to make sure they have the tax ID number associated with my LLC. It’s something you should double check as well during the course of your tax preparation.

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How Do You Set Your Freelancing Rates?

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I recently came across an interesting article on Freelance Parent at Sparkplugging. This article talked about setting freelancing rates. And I realized that this is an agonizing decision that all freelancers go through — whether you are writing, designing or consulting. You have to decide how to set your rates.

Ways to set your freelancing rates

There are a couple of ways to set your freelancing rates:

  1. Per hour: You can figure out how much you are worth per hour. You can estimate how long it might take you to complete a project and go from there.
  2. Per word/page: If you are a writer, you might set your rates according to word count or page count. Depending on the difficulty of the work involved, you might charge more for some types of work.
  3. Per project: Some just look at the project in terms of difficulty, specifications and time it is likely to take to complete and then set their freelancing rates on this basis.

When you do set freelancing rates, though, keep in mind that not everyone will pay what you charge. I’m happily to a point where, for the most part, if someone doesn’t like my rate, they can move on. There are plenty of others that know my worth. However, I did have to start out taking lower paying jobs until I got some experience. That’s just the way it is.

Do you have a method for setting your freelancing rates?

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Win Great Prizes from Inside Small Business

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Right now, the Logoworks blog Inside Small Business is offering a great contest. Some of the prizes include:

  • Silver logo package
  • Free polo shirts with your logo.
  • Free T-shirts with your logo.
  • Free logo.

This is actually a pretty cool prize list, since it includes items that you can give away to promote your home business. In order to be entered, you are supposed to use copy provided at the Web site on your blog. The copy includes a promotion for 100 free, full color business cards from MarketSplash by HP.

If you are interested in winning the prizes — or just checking out the 100 free business cards — head on over to Inside Small business. It might be worth your while.

image source: radiant guy via Flickr

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Look for More SBA Financing Soon

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If you have a small or home business, help could be on the way. Last month, the economic stimulus bill included measures designed to help small business through expanded loan guarantees via the Small Business Administration. CNN Money reports on some of the details:

The stimulus bill passed last month included $730 million for direct spending on small-business initiatives, including expanded financial support for the SBA’s two key lending initiatives, the 7(a) and 504 programs. Under those programs, the SBA guarantees loans made by banks to small-business borrowers. If the business defaults, the SBA picks up the tab for the insured portion of the loan. …

Currently, the government guarantees up to 85% of loans below $150,000, and up to 75% of larger loans. The stimulus bill allows the SBA to temporarily increase its guarantee to 90%. It also allows the SBA to waive or reduce the fees it changes banks and borrowers for participation in the program.

Unfortunately, some snags have been hit in trying to get this financing through. The SBA has been having difficulty drafting new guidelines for the loans and who qualifies. This means that there are delays for small and home business concerns that are already cash-strapped and looking for financing. In a way, this is kind of depressing, since there are no massive bailouts of the kind seen when it comes to companies like AIG and Citi.

Once the the guidelines are created, though, it means that more small and home business operations will be likely to receive what they need in terms of financning.

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Work from Home: What Do You Do When Your Spouse is Home All Day?

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This is more of a “venting” post. You notice these more when my Ph.D.-student husband is home for school vacations…

Honestly, when my husband is home — like he is home for his spring break this week — things get a little hairy. Normally, I just keep a general idea of how much I’m working. It’s pretty easy. When my son isn’t home, I’m usually working. But when my husband is here all day, I feel like I have to keep track of my work from home hours to “prove” that I’m not sitting in front of the computer all day. This week is going to shape up to be right around 20-25 hours. I work fewer hours when DH is home all day.

It’s exhausting.

The other frustrating thing? While I was paying bills yesterday I got the old whine: “I thought you were done with work. You work too much! All day in front of the computer!” At which point I waved my hand at the screen: “Does this look like work to you? Or does it look like I’m paying for the car you wanted to buy?” A comment which 1. is not particularly appropriate and 2. works on more than one level. I did feel bad after I said it, though. A little bit.

Anyway, I’m sure many of you who work from home have similar issues. Does your schedule get thrown off when your significant other is home all day?

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Recession: Beware of Work from Home Scams

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The current recession is making the idea of work from home opportunities more attractive. After all, with furloughs, layoffs and pay cuts, people are looking for ways to make more money — preferably from the convenience of home. And, while there are many legitimate work from home opportunities out there, there are also plenty of scams. Indeed, this recession is causing an uptick in work from home scams, perpetrated on the desperate.

It is important to be on the look out for these work from home scams, especially those that involve money wiring, reports WXIA in Atlanta:

Experts say mystery shopping is a popular swindle, as is rebate
processing. There are dozens of variations on the schemes but most
involve official looking paychecks that turn out to be counterfeit. The
checks clear the bank electronically but when examined by hand later
are determined to be counterfeit.

Instead of taking on jobs that sound too good to be true — and include you depositing checks or wiring money — look for legitimate work from home jobs. These jobs won't sound as glamorous, or as easy to do. And you may not make as much money. But there are companies out there that offer work from home opportunities that are legitimate and that can be reasonable moneymakers.

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