Option 1. using independent contractors/freelancers/other micro-businesses
Option 2. taking on partners or if you’re a limited company or social enterprise, other directors.

OK so I know that my two preferred options fly in the face of government advice, guru advice and business school advice which urges you to grow your business by taking on employees, particularly qualified business managers and leaders, but to me it is all a question of risk. My two options are risky but I believe, if negotiated and managed carefully, are not as risky as taking on a senior employee.

As my businesses have always been B2B service businesses my main worry and focus has always been winning and keeping customers. In over 26 years of starting and running my own businesses I’ve got a better track record of winning and keeping customers using my two alternative options than I have with employees, as executives and managers, however well trained. Most are fine but it’s the ones that are not fine that have proved deadly to our customers, our income, our profitability and most of all our own morale.

The main advantage of option 1 – independent contractors is that you retain total control of your business, it is flexible, it is a service agreement which is easier to manage in time and money than an employment contract with the associated regulations and it is a tap of skilled resource that you can turn on and off dependant on your workload and you don’t have all the associated on costs of employees including purchasing equipment.

Because most contractors/micro businesses want to continue being contracted in the future I find they become like partners of our business and we grow our businesses together. For example I have worked with the same contract trainers and the same designers and developers of learning media for over 20 years. We all pay each other on time too – as soon as we possibly can.

The main disadvantage of this option is that it can play havoc with your margin. However if you go for a very high quality and unique service you may be able to ensure the price you charge covers using contractors and remains competitive.

The main advantage of option 2 – taking on partners/directors – is that it is bootstrapping par excellence. Let me explain; I recently entered a business ‘to what do you owe the secret of your success?’ competition. My answer was ‘my business partner of 26 years, Clare Francis’.

We both invested time and money in our business, we’ll work whatever hours, whenever, in order to succeed. When times were hard we didn’t take money out of the business. We never needed status perks like employees ask for.

We are equally passionate about our customers and our offer to these customers, so much so than many are now friends too. We have complementary but different skills and most of all we trust each other – so implicitly that we don’t have to waste time overseeing each other.

I just love successful business partnerships and believe they are responsible for more successful start ups growing into substantial micro businesses than any other single factor.

My business partner Clare and her husband, Charles, also managed a very successful family business. Indeed, many of my successful micro business owner friends, who say they are going it alone aren’t really. They often, have a spouse or partner, beavering away in the background supporting the business and often holding down a job in the early stages of the start up in order to bring in family income.

Partnerships are my preferred option but it is as tough and careful a decision as deciding to live with someone.

Trust and passion is everything, in my opinion, to success in your own enterprise. This total trust and passion is there with my co-founder of the Enterprise Rockers, Tina Boden, and all the wonderful band leaders of our movement.

We trust each other so much and share the same passion that we’re all putting our own biz money and time, for no return yet, into making it all work.

So, before you do as the gurus recommend and take on a senior employee, do consider whether you’d be better using independent contractors or taking on a partner.

There is a better way of getting help than from Government and Big Company funded start up and micro business support programmes. That’s not to say we don’t want their help and a lot of these free offers of help are good and needed.

Many of my friends and colleagues that are excellent micro business advisers and mentors give their time free to help on many of these programmes. However, whether you get one of these excellent advisers and mentors is a lottery.

Not all help is good for you and your business.

It shouldn’t be pot luck as to whether you get good help or not. In fact some of the help on offer, sadly, should carry a health and wealth warning.

UK examples of stuff that may be ‘Hot or Not’

For example, in the UK we’ve got a plethora of government backed initiatives, often with Big Company offers, designed to help start-ups and small businesses, such as ‘There’s a Business in You’; ‘Start Up Britain’; ‘LEPs’; ‘College start up courses ’; ‘Business Link’; ‘Mentorsme’ and ‘Self-employment programmes through A4e and other major welfare to work providers’.

On top of this there are lots of awards and business pitch competitions sponsored by Big Companies where the winner will get money plus help from a corporate executive or TV celebrity entrepreneur as part of the ‘prize’.

Beware The Know It All Executive

For 26 years now, along with hundreds of other business owners, I’ve warned against the many advisers that think because they’ve been in a senior management job and had some training in coaching, advising, consulting or mentoring that they possess the know how to support start-ups and micro-business owners.

Starting and running your own micro enterprise is not, primarily, about formal research, planning, loans and management skills. Indeed, most corporate managers are lost without a formal business plan, a budget with money to spend already there and some staff.

Worse still, many of the people that design the start-up or micro business owner support programme or competition, that these corporate executives will act as advisers or mentors for, have no experience of starting or running their own micro enterprise.

Blind Alleys

It is the blind leading the blind as no-one knows, including the prospective or existing micro business owner, whether it is useful or dangerous help being offered. Even the big company product and service discounts that are part of the support or prize package may be stuff that you don’t need and may be very unhelpful to getting on with the business of winning and keeping customers.

As Lord Alan Sugar says ‘The last thing you want is government interfering in business because they don’t know what they’re doing. What you want is for them to create a level playing field’

The Better Way

So, recognising that many start-ups may not be able to pay for micro business owner friendly, professional advice what is my better way.

Only allow yourself to be advised, coached, trained or mentored by someone that other micro business owners can vouch for.

Always ask the adviser or mentor at the very first meeting what experience they have of starting and running a micro business (0-9 employees) and if you’re not convinced ask for someone else to help you that other micro business owners can also vouch for.

The Rocking Better Way

As you may know, I’m a co-founder of what will be the biggest self-help community of micro business owners in the world – the Enterprise Rockers.

We help each other to, as Lord Sugar recommends Government should do, level the playing field. No obstacles to our opportunity to succeed. We also trade with each other and help each identify what does help us and what doesn’t.

If you’ve started and registered your business -join our movement and ask other micro business owners what and who is best to help you to survive and thrive. You’ll find that the best helpers are Enterprise Rockers too.

In addition and coming soon , if you can afford to pay for professional advice, the Enterprise Rockers are creating a directory of micro business friendly, proven, practical, professionals. They’ve all started and run their own micro businesses. Our directory will be called SpeedBizSolutions and it takes the risk out of those times you’re looking for an independent professional to help you and your business.

There’ll be free help too if you’re not sure what you’re looking for. See you in the Rockers!

I guess I don’t need to go on, these are all nightmarish terms of a long bygone time in IT history, or are they?

It isn’t if you still have your server under your desk. You probably think “Cloud Computing” is something geeks do. Nothing to do with you and your small business!

Well – think again – cloud computing is something your competitors do right now, to

1. Save over 50% of IT related costs.
2. Gain a competitive advantage over you.
3. Focus on their business and not on IT.

Isn’t it time you had a look and spoke to someone about IT?

Social media is arguably one of the greatest things to have ever happen to small businesses. In less than a decade of usage, it has managed to completely transform the way in which businesses are able to conduct their marketing activities.

In terms of what can be achieved with a great social media campaign, it puts even the smallest business on a level playing field with its larger competitors. A huge advertising budget of a multinational can be overshadowed quite easily by the simple power of a small business with a great idea.

Despite the compelling power of social media, many small businesses are simply unable to see all of the potential benefits that they could derive from it. This is a shame, because they are being left behind by big business once again.

The important thing to remember for any small business considering social media is that it cannot simply be used as a substitute for a business website. For the best results with social media you must integrate it with your own website, which should already be filled with interesting content that you can easily link back to.

Social media is important for branding purposes. Even if you are not concerned with immediately starting to use social media, you should at least secure your own business identity on the social networks as a placeholder to prevent anyone else from impersonating you.

Being a member of multiple social networks will also help your search engine rankings. Once a social media profile is indexed, it will count as a natural inbound link to your main website. Sharing links via social media will often help to improve the popularity of that link.

A social media profile can generate a large amount of high quality traffic to your website, because the people who click-through are likely to already be interested in your business or industry. Your best tactic is to select a social network that is relevant to your industry and then try to get creative. If your campaign goes viral it could be a massive success.

Interacting with customers is a key part of social media. This is a great way of drawing customer attention to new products or services that you offer. You can also use the social networks as a learning tool by finding out what other people in your industry are doing.

Small businesses that choose to ignore all of these great social media benefits are only going to be left further behind than they ever were before.

The top 5 tips weekly post is always full of hints and tips for small, home & micro business owners.

• Communicate with your employees and tweet instead of emailing.
• Encourage feedback from clients out in the open, even if not all of it is positive.
• Interact with your competitors and learn from observing them.
• Organise a ‘tweet-up’ in your local area so you can get to know your followers better.
• Advertise job vancancies and request for online applicants.

If you have additional tips, please share them in the comments section.

“Empty pockets never held anyone back. Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that.” Norman Vincent Peale, progenitor of the theory of ‘positive thinking’.

The process of bootstrapping can make it possible for even those with empty pockets to fulfill their ambitions if they have the head and the heart for it.

Many small businesses struggle to find finance, especially with the financial climate being as decidedly frosty as it is at present. But this doesn’t mean that those who dream of starting a small business should forget about their ambition and turn their back on their entrepreneurial streak.

Bootstrapping is to start a business without external help or capital; I believe this is the best possible way to start a small business. If a start-up funds the development of their company through internal cash flow and are cautious with expenses, the company can grow with low-risk to all those involved.

Simple ideas on how to bootstrap your small business start up are:

- Work from home. As many of my readers will know I am passionate about working from home for many reasons; it benefits society, the family and the environment. But as a start up the main reason you should be working from home where possible, is to save money. Does your business really need an office? If the answer is no you could save thousands of pounds a year by working from home.

- Where possible avoid hiring people and outsource work instead. Hiring people comes with fixed costs. If you can outsource work to freelancers, then do. There are many professional virtual assistants out there who can work when you need them to, and if finances become tight, or work becomes scarce, you are under no obligation to keep paying them when there is no work for them to do.

- Don’t pay huge amounts for marketing or PR- Do as much of your marketing and PR as possible youself, online. The Internet makes marketing your company easy; write a Blog, join Twitter and LinkedIn, and create a facebook group. All of these actions will increase awareness of your product. And don’t forget to network, network, network!

These tips will have you well on the way to being able to bootstrap your business, but the most important advice for business start-ups is this: don’t lose your enthusiasm. Your drive and passion for your business are what will carry it forward; remaining driven is the best way to move your business forward.

Here are some things not to do when you start a new business venture:

1. Don’t spend money if you don’t have too.

Think about what you need to start your business. You’ll have many items in your house already, like a computer, ADSL/DSL broadband, desk or even an office. Get free software, like openoffice.org for your word-processing, etc. – get bundles of services, not single applications – it’s often much less expensive.

2. Don’t pay for business ideas.

There are many free business ideas online, just google for them. Don’t spend you money on paying someone else to give you an idea, that may or may not work.

3. Don’t pay big bucks on marketing or PR.

Do you own PR and marketing online, get your website and online shop setup. Join twitter, facebook, linkedin and write a blog to promote your products & services. Go to local business networking events or talk to your local paper and give an interview – it”s all free.

4. Don’t pay, barter.

Whatever it is you do, you can use bartering techniques to get things or services you need – cash is king – so keep it.

5. Don’t hire, use a virtual assistant.

Hiring people is a big responsibility, don”t burden yourself and your new business with unnecessary fixed costs – outsource and timeshare professional virtual assistants. Make sure you get value for your money, not all VAs are the same.

6. Don’t buy, rent, lease, borrow or subscribe.

Again, “Cash is King” – keeping the money for as long as possible, is the name of the game. There are good finance deals out there – people are willing to make a deal in a recession – use that to your advantage.

7. Don’t borrow from banks, get equity from friends, family or business angels.

Banks are stripped of cash, they need to show profits and reserves on their balance sheets – they will see you as a risk, and that is best case. In other words if they give you any money, it will be very expensive money – don’t do it. Find friends or family to go into business with you, get an angel investor, he/she will not only give money but experience & contacts to get your business of the ground.

Business bootstrapping, there are always alternatives, you just need to think and find them. – ST.

One of the best ways to reduce the time spent managing your business is to find an online solution, or an office online. Look online to find Virtual Assistants to act as virtual employees of your company. Outsource the essential, repetitive tasks that you can pay someone else to do. Make every penny or cent count by finding the best solutions online to suit and help your business.

To find out how, read @ winweb.com

WinWeb tells you what you can do to stay on course to achieve your small business goal(s)….

Read more @ winweb.com

A Virtual Assistant (VA) will help take the pressure off running your business by reducing some of your workload. They carry out their work from their own premises meaning you won’t need to expand on your workplace.

Find out what else they can help you with @ winweb.com