Advice and Ideas for UK Small Businesses and SMEs
This section takes you through every important aspect of how to run a successful business. It offers expert guides and advice articles on the key elements of business management such as employing staff, finding customers, marketing and sales, pricing, people management, office and home working, business technology and everything else an entrepreneur must tackle in order to succeed.
Internet advertising has rapidly come of age and is a method by which small businesses trading online can drive large numbers of customers to their sites at relatively little cost. This guide should prove useful in getting started on the pay-per-click road.
Marketing
Legal advice
From a legal perspective, the rights and obligations affecting business owners vary greatly from country-to-country, so it is essential to understand the environment you are heading into prior to departure.
Legal advice
What is the legal entitlement to breaks relating to hours worked?
Business management
For many Britons, France is the obvious choice to start a business, given its proximity, excellent transport links with the UK and the fact that many UK expatriates are located over the Channel, meaning a potential ready-made British market awaits. However, there are several things to bear in mind before you book your Eurostar ticket.
Productivity Zone
Business technology has enabled today's small businesses to do as much work in one day as their 1966 counterparts managed in two whole working weeks, according to recent research.
Business management
Ask any business owner and they'll tell you time management is absolutely key. It's a fact of business life that there are never enough hours in the day to get everything done, so it's vital to make every second count. Here are some tricks to help organise your workflow and find clever ways to save time and be more productive.
Employing & managing staff
Employees who spend a lot of their day in front of computer screens can experience eyesight problems and it is the employer's responsibility, to a certain extent, to pay for eye tests and, if necessary, the spectacles themselves. This guide will explain in more detail your obligations.
Legal advice
Holiday entitlement for sole traders and the self-employed can be a tricky business. In the intance of a self-employed decorator who has worked for the same company for nearly two years, Peter Done explains why it's such a complicated issue.
Employing & managing staff
Employees who spend a lot of their day in front of computer screens can experience eyesight problems and it is the employer's responsibility, to a certain extent, to pay for eye tests and, if necessary, the spectacles themselves. This guide will explain in more detail your obligations.
Legal advice
Holiday entitlement for sole traders and the self-employed can be a tricky business. In the intance of a self-employed decorator who has worked for the same company for nearly two years, Peter Done explains why it's such a complicated issue.
Finding and selling to customers
Online auction websites such as eBay and Amazon have spawned a generation of online entrepreneurs setting up their own ecommerce sites. These top ten tips may help you follow in their footsteps.
Employing & managing staff
What's involved in hiring self-employed sales people to work for my company?
Employing & managing staff
Some of us can't wait and some of us are dreading it, but like it or not, the World Cup is almost upon us and sensible business owners will have taken some precautions to stop it turning into a nightmare. These tips may stop it all kicking off in the office.
Finding and selling to customers
One might think that the confidence, even arrogance, of the British in the pervasive nature of our mother tongue would successfully see us through the maze of overseas expansion. In fact, in the minds of many of the UK’s exporters there are no barriers. However, because of Britain’s long-standing unwillingness to communicate in foreign languages we may be offending some clients and possibly ignoring others.
Business Technology
Landlines as we know them will be scrapped in 2027 – along with a raft of upcoming business changes. Here's how to ensure your communications set-up is fit for whatever the future brings
Business Loans
Everything you need to know on what small business loans are and what types of loan are available for your business.
Business Technology
With the landline shutdown coming fast, there’s never been a better time to switch to VoIP. Don’t let your small business be left behind!
Export & Import
Many factors can affect products’ journeys from A to B. Here are some tips for best practice for successful shipping in the modern world