small business

This is a guest post by Danny Roberts.

Becoming a small business owner is both challenging and exhilarating. It often represents the coming to fruition of what started as an idea and is now a reality. You now have offices, a legitimate business, letterhead, staff, etc. But with great power comes great responsibility, and so the entrepreneur is also in need of making decisions regarding services, applications and infrastructure needed to support the business.

A trend that is continuing to gain momentum among small business owners and entrepreneurs is the incorporation of B2B SaaS applications into one’s startup or growing enterprise. SaaS entails the hosting of software on the cloud that is accessible to anyone (with the proper credentials) from anywhere around the globe (provided they have an internet connection). Mostly handled through subscriptions and memberships, SaaS has gained in popularity because of its flexibility and affordability for many small entrepreneurs. There are many advantages to using SaaS apps for small business, a handful of which are outlined below.

Before SaaS came into the picture, deploying a new system in an organization could be extremely costly in terms of time and resources required to manage a full-fledged implementation. Customizing a software product to a business was normally not within reach for smaller businesses, and even larger ones struggled with the cost of consultants, IT resources, and upkeep. Now, with the advent of SaaS, these barriers-to-entry have been all but eradicated. Smaller companies are able to pay a subscription and have access to software solutions that would have been previously out of reach. Providers take care of updates, patches, and other technical maintenance needed for the software, which frees up resources that were once designated for costly IT departments. Additionally, unlike the implementation of a proprietary application which requires a significant commitment of company funds and resources, SaaS solutions can be terminated or shifted as the business requires. By capitalizing on the advantages of cloud hosting, the business owner can explore new products with far less restrictions than a proprietary product would allow.

SaaS solutions afford business owners a greater flexibility to grow. The way usage is structured, SaaS is able to meet a company’s needs in the now, in terms of size and number of users; but should the business grow, cloud-based solutions are inherently scalable and can thus relatively easily serve the needs of the organization in the future. Knowing that the incremental cost of growing an IT infrastructure that supports the business is manageable, the entrepreneur can spend more time on the organization’s core business rather than being held back by the cost of expanding. What’s more, because SaaS solutions are able to handle the needs of a growing workforce, more customers, increased inventory, etc. the marginal cost of hiring one more worker, or adding additional clients becomes more economical.

The multi-tenant model in which SaaS applications are offered is another way these solutions are stimulating entrepreneurial and small business growth. By engaging clients from several industries and organizations, these solutions promote a constant two-way flow of feedback. This allows the user to enjoy a state-of-the-art SaaS application that is continuously updated by like-minded business owners, making it a better and more up-to-date product. Because SaaS applications are being constructed and renovated based off of crowd-sourced wisdom, this essentially makes them tailored solutions for specific types of business problems.

Business owners looking for SaaS solutions should take advantage of online marketplaces to research and compare SaaS apps that can suit their needs. An extremely flexible and affordable alternative to proprietary applications, SaaS allows the entrepreneur to devote more time to core business functions while being assured that support systems are safely in place. The future for small business owners is looking bright indeed!

This is a guest post by Jess Wagner

The new Facebook Timeline is drawing all sorts of privacy concerns with users. When the social media network begins to make all users switch over to the new design no one will have as much privacy as they want. People will be able to see photos, status updates, videos, and oddball posts that you might have made as far back as 2004. While privacy concerns might hinder the website’s use for the average user, brands and businesses are salivating at the new possibilities the Timeline will afford them.

Customized Design

Facebook is the second most visited website on the Internet after Google. With people spending so much time on the social media network, it is almost as important to build an incredibly designed Facebook page as it acts as a secondary home page. If a brand hires an interactive agency for web design, they will want to carry elements of their site over to the new cover photo that sits on top of the new Timeline layout which is 840 x 310 pixels. This photo can contain important information or just be consistent with the overall marketing strategy.

The Big Picture

With photo blog websites like Tumblr and Instagram becoming more popular, people are getting most of their information from photos instead of the written word. The Facebook Timeline design lets photos stand out much better in profiles than the old layout did. Instead of brands relying on having conversations with their customers, they can post pictures and view the comments that are coming in. Instead of writing a detailed status update, brands can create an infographic which will rest beautifully in the Timeline profile.

Brand History

Because it is so much easier to access information previously posted, Facebook Timeline will take the pressure off brands to get featured in the News Feed. According to Zeny Huang of Mashable, the new Facebook design will rely more on content than on immediately grabbing the viewer’s attention. Brands can stick to their story instead of relying on shock tactics in order to get more people to view their profile.

Subscription Features

Users who have had a Facebook account for a long time probably have a bloated friend list filled with college acquaintances, forgettable encounters, and even some old enemies. People are beginning to filter out their profiles and delete people they do not know. With the subscribe feature, brands can get featured in the News Feed without cluttering up any friend counts, groups, or interests users might be worried about.

While the average user might be complaining about the constant changes and privacy abuse Facebook deals to its users, there is no doubt brands are going to be able to adapt to the new layout with ease. Small businesses will also be able to document the history they have with the community with the easily accessible Timeline feature. Whatever opinions users might have of the changes, Facebook has adapted to compete with other social media websites.