Devoted to small businesses and those who run them

* Please tell us about the resources you’ve used thus far and would recommend to others (or steer them away from). Take a moment to share your educational background (both academic and work-based) and point out things that have helped or hindered you along the way from that education.

I highly recommend that anyone starting out write down their business plan, marketing plan, and networking plan. The exercise of committing ideas to paper is a powerful one that helps organize one's thinking: plus, there's a higher probability you'll achieve your goals if you write them down and review them regularly.

Resources that we highly recommend and use in our business:

The best computer, printer and overall software setup you can get within your budget.
We use Mac G4s as they're reliable, easy to use, intuitive, and Office/Windows friendly.
You have to have the best tools for your particular line of work!

Financial advisor, Legal advisor, Tax advisor: essential to figure out how you will structure your business and how you will manage your different requirements. Accounting software (we use QuickBooks)

BNI. One of our first steps was to join a BNI group, and that has made a tremendous amount of difference in how we run our business and the level of access we have to other professionals. This is a group that meets weekly for information, advice, and referrals; more at www.bni.com


* What do you enjoy the most about operating your business? What tasks would you perform even if it had nothing to do with the successful operation of your company?

I enjoy talking with customers, vendors, partners, suppliers, and finding out what types of issues they really face. There's a real source of satisfaction when you know that your talent is being put to use in a way that truly helps someone else: in our case, our websites help our clients spread their message, or sell products online, or brand their business. Because of the feedback we've received, we constantly try and refine our product offerings so we can exceed expectations.