Small Business Marketing For Dummies helps you promote your business. It is designed specifically for the busy small business owner, giving you simple but powerful ways to spread your message - all at little or no cost. It shows you how to build your company's profile, attract new customers and keep them coming back for more. Inside you will learn how to: Create an achievable marketing plan Use social media and the web to attract and keep customers Communicate with your customers through winning emails, newsletters, blogs and more Make use of affordable advertising solutions in print and other media Get great PR for your business

Small corporations are the leading forces in the development of new technologies, and patents are their most important assets. The role of patents in joint ventures, funding, marketing, and the strategic alliances that help small corporations grow and prosper is inestimable. Heines' book offers executives in small, rising corporations an in-depth, practical, useful comprehension of the patent system--the knowledge they need to understand, and work with, professional patent attorneys. With detailed examples and scenarios to illustrate legal principles, and with forms and advice to help develop a corporate patent strategy, the book provides critical information accessibly in a comprehensible manner and without dangerous, naive oversimplification. It will quickly prove useful to corporate decision makers and to academics teaching small business methods and management.

Among the book's special features is its focus on the perspective, interests, and special needs of small corporations, and its abundance of various hypothetical technology scenarios, illustrating the legal principles that Heines dissects and analyzes. Another special feature is the balance it strikes between thouroughness and clarity: it gives a lot of information but in a way that non-attorneys can easily understand. Heines explains and illustrates the principles of patent law and describes how to organize and implement an internal patent policy. He goes on to show how to accommodate patenting with ongoing research, how to maintain patent rights while working with outside vendors, how to distinguish between patenting and freedom-to-operate, and how to react and respond to the patents of competitors. Also addressed are the small corporation's need to control costs and ways to make patenting decisions in a manner that will provide maximum flexibility in deciding when and where to patent without relinquishing organizational control.

This volume fills a major gap in the literature by systematically and scientifically analyzing 500 small entrepreneurial firms and isolating the reasons for their successes and failures. The authors examine whether there are any laws of success and failure that are applicable to small and mid-size companies and identify profitable strategies in various industries and under differing industry conditions. Designed as a reference book for corporate executives, small business owners, and consultants, this book will also be extremely useful to graduate students interested in researching the application of strategic management concepts to entrepreneurial companies.

Following an introduction, the authors delineate the strategic profile of profitable small companies and examine the impact of competition on small firm profitability. Subsequent chapters assess profitable strategies in high-growth, mature, and declining industries; strategies for cyclical environments; profile start-up, buy-out, and family firms; consider the impact of organizational life-stage on small company strategy and performance; and discuss how to perpetuate the family firm. A separate chapter addresses strategies that are particularly applicable to women-owned firms. The conclusion reviews effective strategies and presents the practical implications of the research studies upon which the book was based. Two appendixes provide additional information about the research methodology.

During the 1990s, a new type of controversy began occurring across the United States: controversies over the siting of superstores, also known as big box stores. In these disputes, which often involve Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, local citizens mount organized opposition to the proposed siting of a superstore in their town or neighborhood. Opponents criticize Wal-Mart superstores for putting local independent merchants out of business, siphoning money from the local economy, providing substandard jobs, disrupting residential neighborhoods, contributing to the "McDonaldization" of society, inducing sprawl, destroying downtowns and Main Streets, and undermining local uniqueness and small town charm. More generally, these David-and-Goliath controversies represent particularly stark examples of the conflict of interests between local communities and large corporations that have become common in contemporary society. Small Towns and Big Business uses fieldwork and archival sources to comprehensively examine these controversies and the underlying issues. While Wal-Mart is usually able to site its stores at its preferred locations, in some cases local opponents have been able to thwart its plans. Using detailed case studies of anti-superstore controversies in six small cities in five states, Halebsky employs a comparative-historical approach to construct an explanation of how some of these local social movements managed to prevail against Wal-Mart. This explanation is then extended to provide the basis for a model of the general conditions under which local communities may be able to constrain unwanted corporate action. Thus, this is both a study of social movement outcomes and an investigation of community-corporate conflict. Small Towns and Big Business provides insight into the potential of the local state to control large corporations, the inherently problematic nature of corporate retailing, the possibilities for resisting McDonaldization, and the fate of local anti-corporation acti

The contribution of a good non-Executive Director can make a huge difference to a small to medium sized business. But who should fulfil the role? Someone steeped in the culture and methods of a large corporation may not be able to make a valuable contribution to the governance of a small company. If someone already has a job, will they have time to do the role justice? This book addresses the question of what the input of the non-Executive Director should be and how their strengths can best be accessed and applied. The result is a well-researched yet personal discussion of what is entailed, in theory and in practice, in the role of the non-Executive Director.

How to make change happen in business.

A practical and revealing guide for anyone dealing with transformation, whatever their business or sector. Understand how to deliver digital change at the coalface, alongside the relevant management theory. With case studies detailing the successes and challenges they have overcome, you’ll learn from the experiences from managers, academics and relevant stakeholders in each chapter, including the FT.

This powerful study of the threats to business survival draws compelling parallels between the Titanic and family firms, serving to motivate family business stakeholders into corrective action before it's too late. Family-owned businesses are the backbone of the U.S. economy, responsible for 65 percent of wages paid, adding 78 percent of all new jobs, and contributing over half of the nation's GDP. Unfortunately, less than one-third survive the transition from first to second generation of family ownership. Now more than ever, many family businesses are in danger of going under as rising health care costs, lack of access to capital, and increasing costs of doing business shrink profit margins. Sink or Swim: How Lessons from the Titanic Can Save Your Family Business provides critical strategies for identifying and managing risks-obvious and hidden-that threaten family business survival. In part 1 of the book, the authors relate the design, construction, and operation of the ill-fated Titanic to the challenges facing family-owned businesses today. Part 2 examines the five fatal flaws that contributed to Titanic's sinking and reveals how family firms can have the same vulnerabilities. The final section supplies guidance that will help family-run businesses avoid unanticipated tragedy. Contributions from leading researchers, advisors, and family business owners, providing personal, professional, and academic insights A chronology of events originating from the early periods of the industrial revolution to the modern era Diagrams, tables, and charts related to family business Photographs of Titanic in various stages of development, as well as of Titanic's owners, builders, passengers, and crew Bibliography of sources citing leading researchers, advisors, and family business owners; and of primary and secondary sources relating to Titanic

In 1980, only 10 business incubators existed in the United States. By 1995 there were nearly 500, and a new incubator is opening every week. Despite the rapid growth, the success of business incubators has been mixed at best. "Growing New Ventures, Creating New Jobs" provides sponsors, boards, and the management teams of business incubation programs with proven strategies for enhancing the creation and development of new ventures and ensuring the success of programs that support business growth and development.

Business creation experts Jana B. Matthews and Mark P. Rice explain the three key principles of successful business incubation; the 10 best practices for starting, developing, and managing a business incubation program; ways to attract high-quality entrepreneurs; the litmus test to determine an incubator's feasibility; and many hands-on examples from the directors of some of the country's top business incubators. Incubators have helped to create more than 82,000 new jobs in communities throughout the United States, and they foster the entrepreneurial spirit that is the lifeblood of the economy. "Growing New Ventures, Creating New Jobs" gives business, university, and government leaders a blueprint incubator program for invigorating the regional economy.

This volume presents current research on gender and culture from business, management and accounting perspectives with a multidisciplinary approach. Featuring selected contributions presented at the 4th IPAZIA Workshop on Gender Studies held at Niccolo Cusano University in Rome, Italy, this book investigates gender strategies adopted and tested by various companies and assesses the impact of their subsequent dissemination. The contents are structured into four sections each of which addressing a specific theme on gender studies as follows: I) Women in Academia and in the University contexts: A trans-disciplinary approach; II) Gender issues, Corporate Social Responsibility and reporting; III) Woman in business and female entrepreneurship; IV) Women in Family Business. The result is a book that provides an innovative and rigorous analysis of gender issues proposing new challenges and insights in gender studies. IPAZIA Scientific Observatory for Gender Studies defines an updated framework of research, services, and projects, all initiatives related to women and gender relations at the local, national and international. In order to achieve this objective, the Observatory aims to implement the literature on gender studies, to organize and promote scientific significant initiatives (workshops, seminars, conferences, studies, scientific laboratory) on these issues at the national and international level under an interdisciplinary perspective.

At this stage, it is very important to monitor and to reflect on the progress of e-commerce research in small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and to look at the e-commerce phenomenon in SMEs, at a specific time and place in different countries in the world. ""Global Electronic Business Research: Opportunities and Directions"" encourages researchers and professionals interested in SMEs and e-commerce to address the next phase in this field. This book points to some of the impending issues concerning e-commerce in SMEs, and highlights the need to do something in order to bridge the existing divide between the two. ""Global Electronic Business Research: Opportunities and Directions"" raises the importance of addressing the e-commerce phenomenon in SMEs at a global level.

"Over the past years social entrepreneurship has grown as a research field. In this third edited volume we have collected contributions studying particularly questions of values in Social Entrepreneurship as well as the identification and exploitation of Social Venturing Opportunities"--

This book deals with dynastic business families. Such families are characterized by a circle of owners comprising more than 50 family members, which typically face specific issues and challenges for which there has been little research knowledge and practical approaches until now. The book presents results and findings from a special research project on "big family management" where 7 representatives of dynastic families from Germany were studied over a 3-year period. The result was the identification of six topic areas that management in these business families has to deal with. At the same time, the study observes that dynastic business families hardly follow the logic of classic families anymore, but can rather be understood as networks with common family backgrounds. The study also reveals that a large number of business families are heading for large shareholder groups due to changed inheritance practices. The contents outlined here provide an orientation framework for the growing business family.

Undergraduate and MBA courses in Entrepreneurship, Small Business and Business Development offered as a core or elective part of a business studies degree programme.Well organised and easy to read, this exciting new book provides an authoritative introduction to the establishment, development and managerial issues confronting the smaller enterprise. It is concerned with the kinds of actions and behaviour often labelled entrepreneurial that seem to characterise the launch and growth of a successful business venture. The author examines in some detail the process of new business formation and growth, with particular emphasis on acting and thinking in a strategic framework to maximise the chances of business success and longevity.

Service-learning and social entrepreneurship connect students to communities through courses and campus-based opportunities. Each offers students active learning opportunities tied to community engagement and problem solving. Enos presents strategies for creating campus-based programs that educate students for twenty-first century citizenship.

This book should be read by all entrepreneurs desiring angel investment who need to understand what is expected of them, what they need to prepare in advance of meeting an Angel, how they should approach Angels, how Angels will evaluate their opportunity and how working with Angel groups is different from other funding sources.

This book analyzes various business exit strategies for both family-owned businesses as well as other businesses, both in the United States and throughout the world. Approximately 80% to 90% of all businesses in the world are family-owned. The book discusses, among other things, 12 common mistakes in attempting to sell a business to third parties, methods of marketing the business, negotiation of key sale terms, negotiating employment and consulting agreements, avoiding traps in sale agreements, creating a professional advisory team, and alternatives to a sale to an unrelated third party, such as ESOPs, leverage recapitalizations, selling to other family members or key employees, and going public transactions.

Stuck in a job that’s boring you to tears? Slogging away at a business that’s never quite taken off? Still can’t decide what you’d rather do? It’s time to say ‘enough’.

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Based on life-changing ideas and tools proven with tens of thousands of people over the last decade, F**k Work Let’s Play is your blueprint to create a work-life full of fun, freedom and creativity; something more like play than work.

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