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Not enough can be said about the importance of  affordable communications at your disposal as a small business owner. It is vital that your customers can contact you. If they can’t, likely they won’t become repeat customers. If you have a business office, a home office, or won’t the field, you need to be accessible to your customers. Ring Central offers multiple solutions to your communication needs. They offer toll free numbers, paperless fax services, voice message, virtual receptionist, call forwarding and more. These services come are invaluable to businesses that correspond with people in different states and countries and it *makes your company look like larger companies that have all the telephone capability, but also have to pay some one to manage all the equipment, software and firmware.

They aren’t the only company but they are very good at what they do, they offer great customer services and their services are simple to configure…

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As a small business owner, you want to build a good relationship with your customers and you want them to return. If you have a business that requires your clients / customers to spend time in your place of business, it’ s a good idea to provide a little entertainment.

DirectTV Business is a very affordable option providing your customers with something to make their wait a bit more enjoyable. I subscribe to Direct TV and have been satisfied with their technical support and programing.

Small businesses need repeat customers to be successful and people will naturally return to businesses that provide great service and a comfortable atmosphere. Barbershops, salons, bars, restaurants, auto repair shops, coffee shops, retail establishments or any kind of waiting areas are great places for Commercial DirecTV.

You provide satellite TV to the general public as an ‘extra’ to add value to your business.  Many people have not made the decision to incorporate HD programming into their home television service and they often take advantage of the high definition programming available at local establishments or find themselves amazed at the picture. Any sports bar, for example-would easily be able to lure more fans to their establishment through offering the same great sporting coverage, but in HD format. DirectTV Business offers XM Satilite radio which allows you to provide music to any area. Choose music by genre to compliment the overall atmosphere you want to create at your place of business.

People enjoy being able to watch interesting programming options that only a satellite television can offer. Show your customers some appreciation by providing then with a comfortable atmosphere and they are more likely to return.

If you’re interested in setting up a wireless network for your small business, home office or any establishment that needs wireless access, this guide will walk you through the steps to evaluate the role wireless networking technologies can possibly be integrated into  your company’s overall networking solution, and help you gain a bit more insight into implementing wireless networking solutions that meet the needs of your small business or organization.

Step 1: Understand it. Learn about the benefits of wireless and how it can help your save money and be more productive.

Wired networks give the appearance of a busy office full of the latest equipment, but wires can be an inefficient networking medium. They can limit signal strength and make it harder to expand and reorganize your network configuration. Wired networks  require running network cables. This simple and very obvious fact can add to the expense of your network setup. Network cables in and of themselves can add up to quite a bill. Depending on where your network is located, you may have to hire someone to ‘pull’ (install) your network cables. You must consider cable length as a function of your network performance and the possible need for additional network equipment to ensure proper signal strength.  Wired networks can be useful and are not obsolete but wireless networks are easier on the small business owners’ budgets!

Wireless networking is a viable and affordable alternative that offers the benefits of making your environment more flexible. A wireless infrastructure allows you to effortlessly reconfigure your office space as your company grows and changes, easily extend connectivity and also allows employees to be mobile more easily.

Even though the cost of wireless LAN hardware components and software can be slightly more expensive, this is offset by the wired LAN cabling and installation costs you can avoid. Add to that the soft-dollar saving and value-add saving benefits associated with wireless LAN and the convenience of being able to move around in a facility and stay connected, and your overall costs are lower still.

Step 2: Plan it. Conduct an assessment that includes an anticipated return on investment, and then investigate what it will take to integrate wireless technologies with your existing infrastructure. How large is the area that you want your wireless signal to cover? How many and what type of wireless devices will be implemented? How fast do you need your wireless data transmissions to be?  Do you have any of the required network equipment already in your existing network?

Review the advantages and consider the benefits to your organization:

• Reduced  installation costs. It may be a lot less expensive to install wireless access points compared to wiring your office with Ethernet capabilities.
• Flexibility. If you regularly expand or reorganize your office space, or need to accommodate a variety of network configurations, the rapid transition time from one configuration to another that wireless provides can help reduce your network downtime (probably close to zero downtown). In addition, you won’t have to incur the costs associated with physically rewiring office space and inevitably the expense of replacing network cables that get damaged in the reorganization.
• Convenient information access. With wireless, you’d have the ability to extend access to key information to anyone on your staff, from anywhere in the office, even when they aren’t physically connected to your wired local area network (LAN) connection. Do members of your staff regularly work away from their desks or stations, but could benefit from anytime, anywhere access to important data? Could you improve productivity by increasing access to important company systems? Do you have business processes you could streamline by reducing the number of times employees have to go back to their wired connections?
• Wireless LANs are the way to go, especially where there’s no existing wired network. This is especially true in leased offices, where you can’t go knocking holes in walls

You should next consider what integration points you’ll need to address for the solution to work:

• Evaluate your current and future networking needs. How is your current networking infrastructure configured? How many workstations, offices and conference rooms are connected to the network? How many are not connected that you would like to connect? How many people use the computers and communications systems in your company now? Does your staff conduct business at locations away from their primary work area? What kind of equipment does your staff use? Are they mobile with notebook computers and PDAs or do the majority of your workers use desktop systems? Do those who would benefit most from wireless, mobile access already use notebooks? And if you’re in a leased building with no existing wired network, setting up a wireless network is must simpler than knocking holes in the walls to install your network cables.
• Formulate a plan. The equipment you buy and the way you configure your wireless network will be driven by your business needs and plan, so it’s important to develop a plan before you spend any money on equipment or other resources. As small business owners, budget dollars are limited, so plan twice and buy once!

Step 3: Do it. Once you have a plan in place that defines how you want to add wireless networking capabilities to your office space, you can get down to the business of actually setting up your wireless network. It’s easier than you might think. The first step involves understanding the equipment involved in a wireless network.

Wireless LAN equipment consists of two main components:

1. Wireless clients, which are any devices capable of communicating over a wireless LAN, such as a notebook computer, printer, handheld or an XBOX 360 (gotta have stress relief!!).
2. Access points,  the centers of the wireless-to-wired LAN connectivity. These points aggregate wireless radio signals and then connect the two LANs. The access point is generally about the size of a book. It contains a radio transceiver, communications and encryption software, and an Ethernet port for a cable connection to a hub or a switch on the wired LAN.

Your next step is to actually build a wireless LAN, which you’ll do just like this:

1. Identify the equipment you want to buy, such as wireless notebooks, access points, wireless LAN adapters and wireless cards.
2. Determine the number of users who need to have access to the network. This will help you determine the number of access points you’ll need.
3. Plan for the connection to your wired LAN, probably in a central location and in an open environment. Your goal is to maximize the access point’s wireless range. The average range is a maximum of 300 feet, but that’s very dependent on the existing environment–walls, doors, floors and so on, all can decrease the range. The best thing to do is complete a site survey first; if that’s not possible, assume a maximum range of 150 feet, as 300 could decrease throughput.
4. Configure your wireless devices to work with your network. This can be a bit of a challenge, but don’t fret it requires a little patience, your device documentation and another internet connection if possible. Wireless device manufacturers follow basic standards to help ensure that wireless devices from different manufacturers can easily communicate. Most of the time your devices will connect and communicate with out a problem. For the times that your devices don’t ‘play’ well together, you have to dig a bit deeper in your mental capacity and start troubleshooting. Start with your wireless devices’ documentation. Most product documentation will have a FAQ section or Troubleshooting section. If no answers are found there, try to search online to see if you find a solution there…. if all that fails … start emailing and making phone calls.
5. Test the installation before it goes live. Using link test software, you should test for the percent of data sent correctly, the time it takes to receive a response from the destination device, and the strength of the transmitted signal.
6. Establish a procedure to manage your wireless LAN. What are your procedures for potential down time? What protocols will you follow to manage your wireless network access? What are your security requirements?

Step 4: Use it. Because wireless communications are transmitted through the air rather than over a closed cable, you’ll need to implement some wireless-specific security measures to ensure that your wireless communications are secure. Wireless solutions use three primary tactics:

1. MAC (media access control) addressing. This ensures the network access point you purchase supports MAC which restricts network access by unauthorized devices by assigning each network card a unique hardware identification number.
2. WEP encryption. It’s essentially a complicated software algorithm that scrambles data as it’s sent and unscrambles it as soon as it’s received, keeping it safe in transit. It also ensures that you can easily upgrade your access cards as new wireless access standards emerge.
3. Traditional VPN (Virtual Private Network) securities controls. This allows users outside of your system to have access to it. Businesses that use remote access almost always use VPN and combined with the other tactics makes your wireless network extremely secure.

VPNs work by encrypting data before it’s sent over a wireless (or wired) link, so even if someone intercepts the transmission, the data is secure. Many larger companies use VPNs, but smaller companies may also just rely on standard wireless encryption. This will be okay if the wireless LAN is only used internally, but if you plan to use public ‘hot spots’, you will need to use a Virtual Private Network.

Step 5: Support it. If you find you need additional help or support, or are planning a larger-scale implementation, there are numerous suppliers and consultants that can offer additional information and support.  These suppliers and consultants can help you understand your options, configure your network, set up your systems, and get you up and running quickly and efficiently. Visions Business Services can provide wireless network services, including network planning, network implementation, network security and support.

by Kevin Potts

If you’re like thousands of other designers, programmers and other creative professionals out there, at one point in time you’ve considered starting your own business. Unlike most, you’ve gone against common sense and decided to open shop for yourself. And not just freelance full-time, mind you, but file for the company name, get some stationery, and wade through the legal mumbo-jumbo. Maybe even get a real office with a water cooler.

This article offers real-world advice from the trenches of a small start-up, and is applicable to designers, web developers, copywriters, usability experts and all manner of service providers. Freelancers take heed: there are several items that are just as pertinent to your profession.

Write a Business Plan

The most important thing you can do to prepare for starting and operating your own business. Developing a business plan requires a lot of time and energy, but it’s invaluable for one primary reason — it forces you to come to terms with your business idea. You must decide how you will generate income, what your expenses will be, who your competitors are, and most important, WHAT YOUR BUSINESS DOES. This may seem obvious to you now, but write it down. Think about it. What sets your business apart? What service do you offer that is superior or unique? What’s going to put you ahead of the competition?

Beyond the mental exercises, a good business plan will give you a much better chance of getting a small business loan from a bank than walking in and saying, “I like Photoshop and maybe a can do some websites or something. Gimme money.”

A few years ago, new age business rhetoric said forget the business plan and just run with it. Obviously, that didn’t work out so well, so if you go that route, God bless you. The business plan exists for a reason. There are libraries of books written on them and huge websites devoted to developing good ones. Some resources:

• SBA
• Scott Kramer’s articles on A List Apart
• Businessplans.org
• Business Plan Archive

Take a few weeks and develop a strong and thought-out plan. Give it to friends, co-workers, even family to read. Your business will be immeasurably stronger because you took the time for this step.

File for a Fictitious Name

A fictitious name (called a doing-business-as or DBA in some states) is the government’s term for your company name. If you choose HyperGlobalMegaSoft as the start-up’s name, it has to be registered with the state to ensure no one else is using it. This will cost about $100, but prevents you from accidentally using someone else’s registered name, or from someone else using YOUR name. Also note that two companies can usually register the same name for different industries. For instance, Luigi’s (design studio) and Luigi’s (pizza joint).

Note the fictitious name is not the same thing as a registered trademark. A trademark involves a whole separate process, more paperwork and additional fees. Unlike a fictitious name, however, a trademark is not required.

Funding

This is a pretty involved topic, and enough books and articles have been written about it to make for years of boring bathroom reading. Advice in a nutshell: start the business with your own savings or borrow from a bank. I highly recommend the former or a combination that includes it, since it makes you pinch your pennies a little more. If you go the bank route, make sure the business plan is polished to a high shine. This may be a good time to hire a professional business plan writer/editor.

There is one Golden Rule: Don’t borrow money from family or friends. 99% of the time, you won’t be able to pay them back, and on the off-chance you are, it won’t be for months or years. The amount is irrelevant; $1,000 or $100,000 can quickly create bad blood.

Get an Accountant

In starting your business and maintaining its future financial health, there is no greater ally than an accountant. He or she (or they if you go with a firm) will be able to give advice on innumerable aspects of your new venture. They can advise on what type of business entity to start with, setting up bank accounts, a means of invoicing and collecting, and more. Most importantly, they also guide you on paying taxes properly and punctually.

Brief advice on accountants:

• Go with an accountant or a firm in your state. Each state has different laws.
• Make sure the accountant knows business taxes. Do not hire a family-oriented accountant.
• Unless, you are really, really strapped for cash, hire an accountant who is not a family member. While it may be tempting to get a family discount, it is better to have an unbiased viewpoint about your finances, and also better to keep your family’s nose out of your funds in general.
• Try to trade services! Maybe your accountant wants a new logo, website, or brochure.

Start with a Partner

If you can, start the business with a partner. This person should be another designer or programmer with a level of experience equal to or greater than your own, but with a different skill set. If you’re the God of Annual Reports, your partner can be the Overlord of Identity Design. Having two Annual Report Gods will make for some lacking identity work when the client requests it. And for the record, once again, it will be better if this person isn’t family.

“But why a partner?” you ask. “I’m a darn good designer, and I’m really really gonna do this right.”

A partner will keep you on your toes. When you want to buy that $2,000 scanner, he or she should question why. If you want to design a promotional piece, it should be a group effort to get the best results. If you start to slack off, he or she will be there to remind you of business priorities. No one can do everything, and two complementary skill sets create an asset that cannot be reproduced when flying solo.

About Your New Office

When you start a business, the option of setting up an office outside your home has dramatic pros and cons that must be weighed carefully.

Good:

• You have a place for clients to visit if they are local.
• Reinforces good image (see below). Proper presentation goes a long way, and making your office appear as if you’ve been in business for years (you didn’t tell them you were a start-up, did you?) helps build client trust.
• You can write off all office expenses (rent, repairs, phone, etc). This will affect your bottom line drastically.
• Gets you out of the house. Having a real place to go to work makes the business more real, and forces you to take it that more seriously.

Not-So-Good:

• Money out the window. Renting an office costs $250-$10,000 a month, not including the initial deposit. This is a lot of money if you have a thin or inconsistent client base.
• Requires additional expense. You will need to get a fire inspection and a certificate of occupancy, not to mention additional phone lines, Internet connection, furniture, etc.

Setting up an outside office for a new business is a case-by-case situation, and depends almost entirely on start-up money and cash flow. Some businesses truly require a place to host clients (ad agencies),and for others it’s not as important (web development). Weigh the advantages carefully against capital, because being locked into a lease without a means to pay is no fun.

Retain a Good Paper Trail

Make sure to keep a solid paper trail with clients, and that means a real, physical file with hardcopies of proposals, contracts, invoices, time sheets and anything else you can think of that relates to the project. This also includes all financial records, bank statements, receipts, deposit slips, etc.

Before beginning your business, establish several important things. First, design a consistent and scalable filing system for all the forms. Whether you organize by client or project is irrelevant, but make sure you can find the information when you need it. Second, make sure to have airtight contracts. I advise against writing them yourself. There are many places on the net where you can get generic forms, such as www.creativepro.com. You will also need to look for NDAs (non-disclosure agreements, for contracting work out to other freelancers), RFP (request for proposal) templates for clients to fill out, expense reports, invoices, and time sheets. Every project is different, so be prepared to make changes on these forms.

And please, when you sign a contract with a client, make sure you have a copy with BOTH signatures. Seems like an obvious thing, but you’d be surprised. Don’t do any work without one, because legally, you will have a very hard time forcing a delinquent client to pay without one.

Part of maintaining a solid paper trail is having a good invoice system ready to launch at a moment’s notice. Make sure your invoices arrive in the client’s mailbox while the project is still fresh. Every invoice should clearly mark the amount to be paid and terms of payment (30 days, etc.), and clearly indicate any additional fees resulting from delinquent recompense.

If payment is late, don’t be afraid to call the client. Sometimes they just misplaced the invoice. Other times they don’t have the money and are trying to slink away. Sometimes, “the check is in the mail.” Regardless, the business that does not call to get paid won’t get paid!

Start Small, Conserve Loot

Consider working from your house/apartment to start, especially if you have clients that will never visit you, or if you live in an expensive metropolis (NYC, LA, Chicago, San Francisco, etc). Keep your expenses down! Don’t buy a new quad Xeon workstation if your current machine can cut it, or a truckload of networking equipment for two computers. Be cheap! Look for sales at OfficeMax, clip coupons, and just shop smart. You’re going to need the start-up capital down the road, so don’t drain it on frivolous expenditures. (And yes, the folded die-cut business card with the metallic ink counts as a frivolous expenditure.)

Don’t Undercharge, but Be Flexible

If there’s one thing to remember from this article, it should be this point. Proper pricing is the one thing that keeps the business alive, on multiple levels. When you charge appropriate amounts for the work, the client will feel like they hired the right people; when you undercharge, the client will know this and take advantage of you by demanding similar rates in the future.

If you give every client a discount just to get the job (and this will be tempting, especially in the beginning), you’ll find yourself working twelve-hour days and not being able to pay the bills. Undercharging hurts the industry in general as well; undercharged clients come to expect and request absurdly low prices.

Legal Software

Make sure all the copies of your software are retail versions. Do not use “educational” or pirated software. This is very important, and should be part of the start-up budget.

Separate Personal and Business Finances

Nothing much else to say about this. It will save you innumerable headaches come tax season.

Marketing

Even the most reliable clients have dry spells, so make sure you are constantly putting your company’s name in the marketplace. Word of mouth is the best, but getting truly fresh work usually requires spending money.

The Importance of Image

The importance of maintaining a positive image in the eyes of your clients and potential clients cannot be overstated. Know your firm’s identity so you can project that identity to the customer.

The visual identity is critical. Get business cards, letterhead, and envelopes. Design a good logo or pay someone to do it if you’re not a design firm.

Dress the part. When meeting with a client, look like someone who’s come to do business, not some clichéd black-turtleneck half-shaven graphic designer who’s gracing them with your presence half an hour late. It sounds exaggerated, but it happens all too often.

Make the office welcoming. If you entertain clients, keep the office clean, organized and hospitable. Make good coffee. Purchase comfortable chairs. Make sure they have a place to park.

Use Outside Resources

Running a business takes long hours and a willingness to learn. However, there are many services that exist to help businesses succeed and get work. For instance:

• Your local Chamber of Commerce
• SCORE
• Attend business seminars. You can learn a lot and do some powerful networking. Many are free.
• Creativepro.com. Full of valuable resources like stock photos, business contracts, freebies and more. $29.99 / year.
• Elance.com. A cause of dissention among many designers for the ridiculously low rates you have to work for, but a good place to find work when the rest of the world has shut its doors.

If you still decide to start a business, there’s nothing more I can say except good luck.

You’ve got to have the “fire in your belly,” or you will fail. There are long hours, hard work, and incredibly frustrating and stressful times ahead. But the rewards — being your own boss, being able to work on a variety of projects, feeling that proverbial sense of accomplishment — these are all very real results.

Kevin Potts is the creator and author of graphicPUSH, a resource site for web and print designers.