By Debbie Gregory.

Starting out in social media for any business seems difficult but it really doesn’t have to be so intimidating. Building a large following takes time and effort but it should be fun. There are a few things that you can do to help increase your followers and below are some tips to obtain first 1,000 followers a bit more quickly.

• Hashtags

Using popular hashtags is a great way to gain followers but the catch is the hashtag must be relevant to your business. Additionally, be sure to mix a variety of popular hashtags with some less popular hashtags so that you don’t simply get lost if there is a high level of competition for the tags.

• Eye Candy

If your content is not interesting or visually appealing, people are not going to follow you. Invest some time and effort into the content that you post.  Take time and spend the money to have a professional photo shoot to build a library of high-quality photos to promote yourself on social media. Spur-of-the-moment smartphone photos are great occasionally but followers will be more willing to stay engaged if your content provides high-quality eye candy.

• Engagement

Set aside a small amount of time everyday to engage with your followers such as liking their content, responding to comments, mentions, and private messages. This is also a good time to search for other accounts that you would like to follow. Simply liking a post is not going to cut it. Your like will get lost in the hundreds of other likes and will go unnoticed. Comments force interaction and tend to stay more visible.

• Giveaways!

To build your following, consider a giveaway promotion. Many giveaways have multiple rules that help boost your account, reach, and engagement. Ask your followers to “Follow our account and tag two friends in the comments below.” By having people tag two friends, you will gain more attention and, hopefully, a lot of new followers.  Don’t add too many rules, make your rules clear, make sure to add an end date to the giveaway and keep on top of the promotion to engage those playing.

• Account Setup

If are using a personal account for your business brand, we highly recommend changing it over to a business account. The business account provides you access to analytics and other benefits that are not available with personal accounts. If you are using a personal account and do not want to switch to a business account, make sure your personal account is set to public. This may sound obvious to some but you really need to make sure that your account is not private. Business accounts are automatically made public.

• Instagram Insights

If you have a business account, you have access to Instagram Insights for your account. Instagram Insights doesn’t necessarily provide super in depth analytics, but it does give you basic information that can assist you in understanding your followers, their behaviors, and the best times to post for engagement.

In summary, gaining 1,000 followers will take time.  Remember to be patient, post consistently, post quality, and engage your audience!  Remember to leverage relevant hashtags, tag other brands and individuals, and consider hosting a giveaway. Taking these steps will help your account grow and boost your business.

By Debbie Gregory.

Virtual Assistant jobs popped up in the 80’s to support moms looking to work from home. This niche didn’t take off until home internet access and use became standard worldwide. The market is steadily growing.

What is a Virtual Assistant (VA)?

A Virtual Assistant or VA is an employee who supports various business operations from a remote location. VAs assist with things such as reputation management, inbox management, social media content, online customer support, phone support, and basically any business-related task that does not require a person to be in the office physically.

Reasons to Consider a Virtual Assistant (VA):

• You Can Focus On What You Do Best: You started your business for a reason and you have a specific set of skills. Hiring a VA to take care of things that are outside of your skillset will free up time that you may have wasted trying to learn the ins and outs of or struggling through trial and error to complete. Areas include bookkeeping, social media management, marketing, etc. You can use your free time to focus on things that you’re actually good at and grow those skills further.
• Tedious Tasks Taken Care Of: Areas such as data entry, email responses, and internet research are important to your business.  They can be very time consuming. Hiring a VA to take care of these areas provides you the confidence that these tasks will be completed without you really having to think about them or spend your time working on them thus allowing you to do other things for the success of your small business.
• Better Organization of Data: Data is essential to help you make decisions about your business but most of it can be distracting and overwhelming. Some data areas include customer data, web analytics, and more. Hiring a VA to go over and organize the data allows you to quickly access the information that’s pertinent to your business at a particular moment.
• Better Communication: Your business receives tons of emails, online inquiries, comments, and calls daily. Some are important but others are not. Hiring a VA to manage your communications can allow you to really focus on the ones that are worth your personal time and effort.
• Reduce Inefficiencies with Processes: Inefficiencies cost your business time and money and most business owners do not have the time to properly setup processes for their business. Processes can include automated invoicing or auto-responders to email inquiries. Hiring an experienced VA to set these processes up and run them will make your business more efficient.

Hiring a VA allows you to outsource the business items you struggle with or do not want to do.   Additionally,you can trust that the tasks will be handled competently. A VA can free up a ton of your time to focus on things that you are actually good at. It also gives you a better opportunity to work on growing your business, rather than getting stuck in the day-to-day operations.

By Debbie Gregory.

Whether you are just starting a business or thinking of changing your business structure, a common first step is comparing the types of business structures. While a Limited Liability Company, a C Corporation and an S Corporation share some characteristics, they also have distinct differences. You should spend the time getting familiar with each type before deciding which one might be right for you.

Most small businesses are usually either a sole proprietorship or simple partnership. In both of these cases, the business taxes are part of the individual’s taxes. There are three major types of business entities that classify the business as its own “person”– a C Corporation, an S Corporation, and an LLC (Limited Liability Company).

Some business and certain tax rules are unique to the type of entity that you choose for your business. Read below for more information on each and always check with your accountant.

C Corporations

A C Corporation is taxed at a flat 21% regardless of how much business they conduct or money they make. Additionally, C Corporations help create personal liability protection for the owners of the business. They are designated to the public with extensions such as inc, corp, or ltd.

This type of corporation can issue stocks that when held for more than five years, they entitle the seller to tax-free gains. Raising capital is also very easy for a C Corporation as compared to the other business types because they issue stock in exchange for the funds raised.

The major downside to a C Corporation is double taxation. All business earnings are taxed and paid for by the business however, the income received by the business owners is not deductible and they must claim and pay income taxes on the salary they take from the business on their personal taxes.

C Corporations are separate taxpaying entities and file their own very specific tax forms every year to the IRS.   These C Corporations can actually choose to be taxed as an S Corporation to help offset the double taxation by utilizing income pass-through to the owners, so they report their share on their personal taxes. This way the business and the business owners pay between 10 and 37% depending on the individual.

S Corporations

S Corporations also help create personal liability protection for the owners of the business. They are designated to the public with extensions such as inc, corp, or ltd – the same as C Corporations. An S Corporation also has the ability to allow up to 20% total business income deductions.

S Corporations are required by law to adopt and maintain certain formalities and they have extensive rules in place for how the business can be managed. They include by-laws, operating agreements, issuing stocks, membership shares, holding director and shareholder meetings, keeping meeting minutes and other extensive records.

LLC (Limited Liability Company)

An LLC has many advantages for business owners. As an LLC, you can elect to be taxed at the flat C Corporation rate, which can be very beneficial if the business owner is not qualified to use certain income deductions. This type of business entity also helps you avoid the double taxation issue of the C Corporation as the LLC is taxed a lot more like a sole proprietorship. This type of business also provides you good liability protection and some pass-through taxation, just like the C and S Corporations.

Another benefit of the LLC structure to a startup is that once you have set it up, there is not any need for continual maintenance. It is also easy to add new partners or sell interest in the entity to someone else.   An LLC can have an unlimited number of members whereas S or C Corporations can only have a maximum of 100.

The downside to an LLC is that there is a minimum tax regardless of how much business you conduct. If you make zero dollars or ten thousand dollars you still owe that minimum tax.

The choice of business entity is a complex matter and you need to take into consideration both state and federal tax matters as well as any other issues and non-tax considerations (personal liability protection, raising capital, etc.). As with any major changes to the overall structure of your business, as well as the tax implications of any changes, we highly recommend consulting a tax, financial, and/or business professional before making any changes.

By Debbie Gregory.

Identity thieves are constantly looking for and creating new scams to utilize other people’s information to their financial advantage. Tax-related identity theft broadens the criminal’s choices for fraud. Utilizing a business’s tax identification number instead of an individual’s social security number allows the criminal to file fraudulent business taxes, claim fraudulent tax credits, or obtain any number of business-related tax benefits.

How can you tell if your business is being used in a fraudulent way?

It is essential to understand that just like personal identity theft, when anyone’s identity can be stolen at almost any time, a business is just as vulnerable. Here are a few ways to tell if your business’s identity has been stolen:

• You try to file your business taxes and they are rejected by the IRS for “duplicate filings” yet you had not previously filed
• Your extension request has been rejected for a similar reason
• You receive an unexpected tax document with incorrect information

How can you safeguard your information?

There are many ways you can safeguard your information including these tips:

• Always use reputable tax professionals if you hire someone to do your taxes for you. Make sure that your professional is also diligently keeping your information safe.
• Look for a CPA who has training or certification in cyber security.
• Never share your passwords, security number, credit card numbers, or any other sensitive information with anyone that does not absolutely need to have this information.
• Be very wary of any email asking you for personal information.
• Never click on a link in an email that seems even slightly suspicious. Remember that the IRS is not going to email you that they will conduct an audit or something of that nature.
• Keep a close eye on your credit score.
• Never write your entire account number when paying for something with a check.
• Always shred documents that you do not need, don’t just toss them out. Criminals routinely go through trash bins looking for sensitive documents.

A Huge Red Flag:

Most emails sent by scammers contain quite a lot of misspelled words and terrible English grammar. A professional company or government agency is much more careful when communicating with their clients.

Worried something is amiss?

Immediately file a fraud alert on yours or your business’s credit report by calling Equifax (888-766-0008), TransUnion (800-680-7289) or Experian (888-397-3742). After you have filed your reports, make sure that you directly call the issuers of any credit cards that you feel may have been impacted.

By Debbie Gregory.

Small businesses generally don’t think they are able the to provide their employees with a retirement plan. Business owners are financially pulled in a multitude of different directions including wages, raises, bonuses, new equipment, new locations, marketing, hiring, training, and more. Large corporations understand that an attractive benefit package helps retain employees and saves them the costs of hiring and training a new employee. It makes a great deal of  business sense to include a retirement savings plan with your other benefit offerings for your employees.

Why does My Business Need a Retirement Plan?

If you currently don’t offer retirement there are three reasons why you should:

1. As the owner you may be thinking of selling your business to fund your retirement and perhaps when the time comes to sell, the value of the business may not be as much as you anticipated and funds necessary for a robust retirement.
2. Contributions to employee retirement plans are tax-deductible for the business.
3. One of the greatest benefits for an employee is retirement savings. They will often stay with a company longer if they are offered attractive benefits and this helps you compete against companies that want to hire your valuable employees.

How To Select A Plan?

The best way to choose the appropriate retirement plan for your company is to sit down with a specialist and go review options. There is not a one-size-fits-all plan. There are so many different types of plans available including IRA-based plans, defined contribution plans (401Ks), and pensions. Some of these plans are more expensive for the company than others so it is best to consult a professional.

Once you have decided to offer retirement benefits and you have selected the right plan with a professional financial advisor, it is time to inform your employees of their eligibility to participate in the plan. Each plan has its own specific rules for informing your employees of their eligibility (the financial institution will provide the specifics based on the plan you select).

Some of the information you generally need to provide your employees includes:

• the time frame to enroll in the plan,
• any costs or salary reduction on the employee’s part,
• how much the employer will contribute on an annual basis,
• an official description of the plan from the financial institution it will be with,
• a notice about balance transfer if the employee leaves the company or chooses to move the account to a different financial institution.

As most businesses know finding and keeping good employees is expensive and time consuming. Offering good incentives, such as a retirement savings plan, helps retain good employees which can save your company money in the long run. Plus, as a business owner you need to take care of your own retirement beyond the hope that your company will sell for enough to keep you comfortable once you choose to stop working.