This Week in Small Business: Leave the Building - NYTimes.com

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A weekly roundup of small-business developments.

What?s affecting me, my clients and other small-business owners this week.

The Big Story: Immigration Reform

A bipartisan group of senators reveals an immigration reform plan, and President Obama backs ?start-up visas? for foreign-born tech entrepreneurs. One blogger says it?s a good plan for small businesses. Beth Goodbaum hopes it will stimulate high-skilled manufacturing. Here are five things economists know about immigration. Ezra Klein says that to fix the economy we need to fix immigration. Kid President gives a pep talk.

The Other Big Story: G.D.P. Contracts

A decline in gross domestic product means the economy shifted into reverse in December. Joe Weisenthal says it is because of the big drop in military spending. The White House blames lower government spending over all. John Nolte disagrees. This chart sums up the decline. The Federal Reserve continues its stimulus plan, and Evan Schnidman congratulates the Fed on reaching its $3 trillion benchmark. Bob McTeer says ?it?s just a number.? Some prominent economists argue that our deficits are not the real problem. Mark Thoma urges an investment in infrastructure as a way to reduce long-term debt.

The Economy: A Five-Year High

Texas manufacturing expands, manufacturer optimism increases, and Gallup says optimism surges to a five-year weekly high. Home prices continue to rise and household debt has fallen by $833 billion since 2008. Personal income increases the most in eight years and consumer spending is up slightly. But the Conference Board?s Consumer Confidence Index is back down to 2011 levels, and some are blaming tax increases. Orders for durable goods increased, but Doug Short is more concerned about core orders. A popular index finds small-business revenue is falling but employment is rising. ADP says 192,000 private jobs were added to payrolls in January but unemployment claims jumped and the unemployment rate remained unchanged. John Elkington and Charmian Love look at the ways capitalism is changing to make a better world. And Volkswagen says everything will be all right.

Your People: Leave the Building

Erin Hatton laments the rise of the permanent temp economy. Fewer small businesses are offering employee benefits. Ken and Scott Blanchard explain how to get your team emotionally engaged. Margaret Heffernan suggests ways to make employees more creative, including: ?Leave the building.? Russ Anderson has tips for designing your home workplace. Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook says employers should ask female employees if they plan to become pregnant. This infographic shows how brilliant women make their businesses bloom.?Lebron James tackles a fan who sinks a $75,000 shot. S.N.L. says YOLO, and a surfer may have ridden a 100-foot wave.

Management: Pricing

Steve Woods explains how big businesses are fueling small-business growth. Nadia Goodman suggests four strategies to sharpen your focus. Jim Connolly summarizes what every business owner needs to know about prices and fees: ?Your prospective clients don?t care that you need to earn X every month. They care that the value they receive from you is greater than the price.? Ben Yoskovitz lists six things you need in order to pivot successfully. Seth Godin explains why small businesses fail. Intuit grants a small-business owner?s wish. Cats kill billions of creatures every year.

Starting Up: A New Incubator

Donna Harris reports on new start-up communities. A start-up that makes thermostats is worth $800 million. Taylor Soper lists 10 social media tools every start-up should have. The New York Times introduces a start-up incubator. This Web site lets you compare start-up salaries and equity, and this is how two undergraduates went from Forever Alone to thousands in sales. Get ready: mantyhose (a?k?a brosiery or guylons) is headed our way.

Marketing: Google Takes Second

Google Plus is now the No. 2 social media site for active users. This tool helps bad spellers. Facebook shows that a mobile strategy is mandatory. Chris Garrett says the secret element of successful marketing is momentum. Rohit Bhargava explains how great brands rethink their expiration dates. Bob Phibbs offers five ideas to market your services and products. Rhonda Campbell has suggestions for marketing a successful business event. Penelope Trunk explains how to ask for help. Successful sales representatives have moderate temperaments.

Retail: Mom and Pop Are Back

After being crushed by big-box stores during the 1980s and 1990s, mom-and-pop shops are enjoying something of a rebirth. Barnes & Noble learns that it pays to be small. Most retailers are not expected to charge extra when customers use their credit cards. Foursquare courts small-business owners with a new mobile app, Intuit announces new technologies small businesses will use to pay their bills, and both Angie?s List and Verizon announce collaborations with the mobile payment service Square. Meanwhile, the intrigue continues at Downton Arby?s.

Finance: Save on Expenses

Chase tops $20 billion in 2012 small-business loans, and Bank of America?s chief tells his employees to give customers better service. Carlo Pandian has suggestions for saving on common expenses. Juan M. S?nchez and Emircan Yurdagul explain why corporations are holding so much cash. Scott Wolfe Jr. explains what a mechanics lien is and how it can help construction businesses collect. Here are five principles to follow when buying a business. Acquisitions of private tech companies are up, and Karen Klein looks into what is driving the spike in small-business acquisitions.

Red Tape Update: Being Squeezed

James Pethokoukis says not to expect tax reform anytime soon. If you?re filing your W-2s late, you may be penalized. Make sure to ask these questions before hiring a new tax preparer. The Internal Revenue Service is hiring new employees faster. Here are five reasons a small business should incorporate. These small businesses are being squeezed by local regulations. A new Web site helps small businesses track and comment on proposed regulations.

Health Care Update: Good Times

The White House reminds small businesses of what they need to know about the Affordable Care Act, and the Small Business Administration opens a health care Web site. Paul Christiansen says that to outsmart ?Obamacare,? you can ?go protean.? The Angry Bear sums up the future of your health insurance premiums. Some experts see good times ahead for small businesses under health care reform. The panel charged with helping devise solutions to the nation?s health care work force crisis is having a work force crisis of its own. Aaron Carroll believes that being a doctor is still a great gig.

Around the Country: Thank You!

A new competition from Grow America awards $35,000 to innovative small businesses. An entrepreneur introduces a campaign to thank small businesses. A well-known restaurant chain releases an entrepreneurial challenge. Colleges in Texas and Pennsylvania start entrepreneurial programs. Entrepreneurs in Washington State are looking to cash in on cannabis, and a small business in Portland, Ore., wants to reinvent the kiln. A company near Philadelphia gets into the slippery business of shipping eels, and a Startup Weekend is planned for Honolulu. A new analysis from Atlas Van Lines finds that for the seventh consecutive year, Washington, D.C., had the highest percentage of inbound moves and Wyoming had the highest percentage of people moving out. A scandal grows in higher education. North Dakota struggles to cope with its oil-boom prosperity. Noah Smith says it is going to be a whole new world for solar energy. The wind industry had a record year.

Around the World: $217 in the Bank

Iceland teaches a few lessons on how to solve a banking crisis. France?s labor minister says the country is ?totally bankrupt.? Zimbabwe has $217 left in the bank. South Korea leads the world in per capita plastic surgery. Charles and Camilla take a ride on the tube. Retail sales in Germany decline. Vladimir Putin hires Boyz II Men to promote Russian fertility. Canada?s G.D.P. increases. David Beckham pledges his salary to charity. These are the top 10 ways to tell if you?ve been hacked by the Chinese.

Technology: Seven Shows for Geeks

These three start-ups are eager for the release of the BlackBerry 10, and this is everything you need to know about the new BlackBerrys. Thorin Klosowski says that you don?t need to give up your smartphone; you just need to change how you use it. Amazon dominates the worldwide Android tablet market. Justin Kownacki explains why ?The Avengers? is actually the ultimate explanation of geek culture, and a 29-year-old game developer lists his seven favorite TV shows for geeks and nerds. Microsoft signs a huge deal with the Department of Defense and releases a new, cloud-based version of Office. Here are some tech women to watch in 2013. Here are five innovative tech solutions for common small-business problems. Here?s a guide to this year?s crop of 3-D printers. And in what was just another week in the cloud, Twitter, Amazon and Facebook all had failures.

Tweet of the Week:

@justinwolfers: Underneath the bad GDP report, we see solid growth in consumption and investment. Actually, it looks like private spending was humming along.

The Week?s Bests:

Lewis Edward explains why storytelling is so important in small-business sales: ?The best professors that I ever had were ones which engaged the class into the discussion by incorporating real examples into their teaching. By storytelling, my instructors were not only helping me learn and retain the information but also making me enjoy doing so. When explaining how your business can help new clients, engaging them with a good story will prove much more advantageous than simply lecturing them on the benefits.?

Andrea Simon offers six ideas for turning innovation into an actuality, including, ?Get out of your office, often, and go explore how people are using your products?: ?P&G requires their brand managers to get out of their offices and spend time with customers who are actually using their products. What does this do? Try spending a day in the life of your customer and see what you could learn about their pain points, challenges and opportunities where you could play a role in helping their business grow.?

This Week?s Question: Will immigration reform help your business?

Gene Marks owns the Marks Group, a Bala Cynwyd, Pa., consulting firm that helps clients with customer relationship management. You can follow him on Twitter.

Source: http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/this-week-in-small-business-leave-the-building/

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