As the bank to Canada continues to fret about Canada’s competitiveness and the impact of a strong currency, the divergence between Canada and the U.S. remains staggering when it comes to small business confidence. And contrary to what many might think, the “optimism gap” remains to Canada’s advantage. According to just-released  data by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB), small and mid-sized business optimism edged up to 69.4% in February.

As today’s Hot Chart shows, confidence is back to its pre-recession peak and well above the comparable index produced for the U.S. Even more encouraging for Canada is that despite the strong dollar, optimism among manufacturers improved in February as to remain above the national average (diffusion index of 72.3 vs. 69.4). In our opinion, the high degree of caution that continues to characterize the Bank of Canada’s assessment about the strength of the recovery on this side of the border is no longer warranted. 

This week I’m pleased to be able to have a post from PR Web’s Jiyan Wei, here on the SME-Blog. As my regular readers will know I’m a huge advocate of small business bootstrapping, and PR and news exposure is a great way for small businesses to get new customers, and it doesn’t have to cost a fortune!

Savvy small business owners are always searching for ways to increase the amount of visibility they have locally and ultimately increase sales.

With smaller budgets and smaller resources to generate exposure, one way that’s relatively inexpensive, and often produces a high return, is media exposure from local news channels.

Here are 4 reasons why media exposure is essential to kick-start or help you expand your small business:

1. More Eyes

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Real GDP at basic prices:

Latest: +0.5% Last month: -0.1% Previous: -0.2%

FACTS: According to the Institut de la statistique du Québec, the province’s real GDP at basic prices grew 0.5 % in November (0.4% in Canada), regaining more than all of the ground lost in September and October. Output remained stable in goods-producing industries, with a second straight monthly decline in residential construction (-5.0%) and mining (-2.3%) offsetting a rebound in the other primary industries (+0.9%), electricity (+2.0%) and manufacturing (+0.3%).
Regarding this last sector, output was up in 10 out of 20 industry groups, accounting for 40% of manufacturing production. In fact, had it not been for a drop in transportation equipment output (-2.7%), the manufacturing sector would have expanded 0.7%.Hence, service output provided all of the economic growth on the month with a 0.6% advance. Ha Read more…

Embarking on a new business venture or project can often be a difficult and stressful period for a business owner. This can often be made even worse due to a lack of sufficient planning to guide them through the turbulence. In my many years in business I’ve learnt than nothing is more important than planning for success (and failure, see this post here).

Businesses of all sizes can benefit from careful planning. Don’t think that just because you own a small business that you shouldn’t set aside time to plan. There are times when planning becomes essential, especially if you need to prove to a lender that your business makes financial sense from an investment point of view.

This brings us to the first aspect of successful planning which is writing specifically for the audience it was intended. If yo

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Over the last month, five S&P 500 issues have declared their intention to break off part of their ongoing business operating and distribute the shares to existing holders, leaving them with separate companies, and eleven separate stocks. Unlike the typical buy, merge and grow through acquisitions philosophy, this approach speaks to a more centralized product line, with future M&A concentrating on closely related product lines. The separation also leaves investors with the decision of keeping or selling the issues, since the new entities need to be evaluated separately. Historically speaking, there are no rules, and there are no clear winners or losers; there is however an old saying to follow senior management – that’s where the money is (or is going). Over the next month or so, each company will distribute information regarding the separation, along with proforma income and balance sheet information. S&P will also evaluate the issues, to determine their proper industry classification and membership. < Read more…

Social media is arguably one of the greatest things to have ever happen to small businesses. In less than a decade of usage, it has managed to completely transform the way in which businesses are able to conduct their marketing activities.

In terms of what can be achieved with a great social media campaign, it puts even the smallest business on a level playing field with its larger competitors. A huge advertising budget of a multinational can be overshadowed quite easily by the simple power of a small business with a great idea.

Despite the compelling power of social media, many small businesses are simply unable to see all of the potential benefits that they could derive from it. This is a shame, because they are being left behind by big business once again.

The important thing to remember for any small business considering social media is that it cannot simply be used as a substitute for a business website.

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