Daily Biz Solutions

Guest written by our friend Mason Abbott

I love to watch trash TV. I especially loved to watch the “Hills” when it was still on. All of my friends did. I thought about how I never hear about any of the characters on television of gossip sites anymore. It was Heidi’s twenty fifth birthday the other day and I saw her for the first time in about six months on any rag site. She looked absolutely awful. She looked nothing like the cute, natural Colorado native that she was when she moved to LA seven years ago. Heidi has huge breast implants and was almost unrecognizable because of all the cosmetic surgery she had gotten on her face. I also thought about when she and Spencer got married in Mexico. The two together are a bad mix. They got crazier and crazier. The couple admitted to spending five hundred thousand dollars on crystals (quartz that they thought had special powers)! They outfitted their home with Total Alarm Systems to protect the crystals. It really is one of the strangest reality television star demises in the history of reality television.

Are you looking for a cost-effective Autocad alternative? If you need to find a user-friendly program that will allow you to perform a variety of drafting and 3D modeling tasks, you should definitely take a look at ZWCAD. It’s a powerful computer aided drafting application that is easy to learn how to use and that has an affordable price point. It has outstanding file sharing capabilities, making it an excellent option for workplaces and projects of all sizes.

While not as widely recognized as Autocad, this popular program is used by professionals in many countries throughout the world. You can check it out free for 30 days, so you don’t have to make up your mind just by reading about what the product can do. You can actually work with it for several weeks as a way of determining if the application meets your needs or not as an Autocad alternative. The free trial includes a fully functional version, so it really does provide you with a realistic product preview. Once you work with the program you will have a solid idea of whether or not it will work for your team.

Are you interested in learning more about prepaid credit cards? It seems that more and more companies expect their customers to use credit or debit cards to make financial transactions. However, it’s not always a good idea to charge merchandise on traditional credit cards. It can, after all, be a bit too easy to run up more of a bill than you can really afford, resulting in significant interest expenses. However, using a debit card that’s tied to your primary bank account – the one that all of your bill payments come out of – may also not be a good option for incidental purchases. That’s where prepaid credit card payments come into the personal finance product mix.

What is a Prepaid Credit Card?

A prepaid credit card is not the same thing as a traditional credit card, nor is it identical to a debit card. Instead prepaid credit cards, are almost like a cross between the two. A prepaid account, such as a , for example, allows you to make purchases up to the total dollar amount that you have added to the card account. The “credit limit” is set based on the amount of money you use to fund the account, making prepaid credit cards a great way to have access to an electronic means of payment without going overboard on your spending.

Why Use A Prepaid Credit Card

There are many reasons that a prepaid credit card can be beneficial – and preferable to traditional debit or credit cards. When you use a debit card, the card could literally be used to spend up to the maximum amount in your bank account. If you use a traditional credit card, you could use the card to spend up to a total of the maximum of your credit limit.

While sometimes having access to your whole bank account or credit limit might be desirable, that is not always the case. If you’re on vacation or if you want to provide your teenage child with spending money, for example, allowing access to a debit card or a true credit card could be quite dangerous.  With a prepaid card, however, you can fund the account with the exact amount of money you are budgeting for the occasion – whether it’s a trip, a shopping spree, a visit to the college bookstore, or for any other reason.

Prepaid credit cards are also a good alternative for individuals who are not eligible to open checking accounts or credit card accounts due to problems in their credit history. With a prepaid card, individuals who have credit problems aren’t limited to having to keep track of cash for all of their financial needs.

Is a Prepaid Credit Card Right for You?

These are just a few reasons that opening a prepaid credit card account might be beneficial to an individual. Only you can decide if this personal finance option is one that meets your own needs.

As a small business owner, it’s natural to focus your energy and effort on growing and developing your company. However, it’s just as important to have a personal finance plan is for yourself as it is to focus on revenue, cash flow and retained earnings for your business. You won’t be able to enjoy the benefits of building a successful business if your personal financial matters are not in order.

Three Important Personal Finance Tips for Entrepreneurs

Here are three personal financial tips for small business owners that you may find to be helpful.

1. Build an Emergency Fund

It’s important to set aside money in an emergency fund that you don’t use to cover regular expenses. Try to work toward creating a bank account that has sufficient funds for six months worth of expenses in it. This money can help you get through tough times in your business, injuries, illnesses, the period of time following natural disasters and other problems that may arise. When you have this type of fund set up, you can rest easy knowing that you’ll be okay for a while if things don’t go as planned all the time.

2. Save for Retirement

When you work for someone else, it seems to be easier to save for retirement than when you are out on your own. When you have access to a company-sponsored 401(k) plan that the business contributes to in proportion to the amount that you contribute, it’s easy to make the decision to set aside money for retirement in this manner. However, it’s just as important to plan for the future when you are a small business owner as it is when you work for someone else. Consider open your own Individual Retirement Account (IRA) through a reputable online brokerage.

3. Work with a Tax Professional

It’s wise to building a relationship and work closely with a qualified tax professional who can help you establish a wise tax plan for your small business as well as for yourself. It’s advisable to be proactive throughout the year with your tax plan so that you can make sound decisions that help minimize your Internal Revenue Service (IRS) liability. If you wait until it’s time to file taxes, there’s nothing to do but pay the bill. When that time rolls around, it’s too late to start trying to consider the tax implications of the investment and expense decisions that you make for yourself and on behalf of your small business.

Are you looking for a customer relationship management (CRM) solution for your small business? If managing customer relationships is important to you – from the first point of contact throughout the sales and service period and beyond – it’s impossible to overestimate just how important it is for you to have a quality, user-friendly CRM system that each employee in your organization who interacts with customers or who participates in order fulfillment or service after the sale can access, is fully trained to use and does in fact use on a regular basis.

Three Tips to Use When Choosing a CRM Solution

Here are some tips to consider when searching for a customer relationship management customer solution.

Accessible Customer Support

There’s always a chance that you’re customers will need answers and assistance at times that all of your phone lines are busy or after hours. These days, it’s also likely that some customers prefer to interact via a chat interface rather than calling your company or sending an email and waiting for a reply. That’s why it’s important to be certain that your CRM solution includes a variety of customer support solutions. After all, today’s customers want responsive service available any time they need it, in the format of their choice.

Ease of Use

Be sure that the CRM solution that you select is one that is simple to operate and that your employees are thoroughly trained to use it. Systems that are complicated or that take too long to update are ones that people aren’t likely to actually take the time to utilize the system. Having a CRM solution in place – it actually has to become a part of your business operations in order to have a positive impact on your company and the experiences that your customers have when interacting with your organization.

Scalable Solution

Select a CRM solution that is scalable based on the size of your organization, in terms of number of employees, products and services offered and size of your customer base. You don’t want to have to buy a new software application or completely change how you do things once you have procedures in place if your business size or model changes. Instead, select a solution that will expand or can be reduced in accordance with what is going on with your company and in your industry.

Company Commitment Also Matters

The CRM system that you select alone isn’t enough to result on long-term change in your organization. When you implement your CRM system, be sure that upper management voices commitment to the organization’s new customer focus and that goals and expectations are clearly communicated to each member of your workforce. Put policies and procedures in place that provide employees with the information they need to do what is expected of them and hold them accountable for doing so.