Using Social Media for Businesses - Part 2

Social media has grown tremendously popular over the decade. Its reach is enormous that almost every single man of the world’s population has an account on Facebook, Twitter, Flicker, and MySpace. And why not? The advantages of having such accounts cannot be underestimated. People are able to reach old friends from several years back and friends who are at the other end of the globe. Individuals are able to connect with families and relatives that they have not even met. People, in fact, use the social media to start up their small online business. And with this last statement, why not business owners acknowledge the fact that the social media can also be used for their transactions?


Here are important tips to consider when using social media for one’s small business.

1. Before anyone signs up their business for a social media account, it is important for the owner to assess the type of product that is being sold or promoted. And chances are, there will be a greater market that can be targeted since there are millions who have such accounts.

2. Now is the time to sign up for an account. Facebook is the site that allows the business owner to create a business page. In fact, this can be done through the personal account of the owner. And when this is the case, the owner can more conveniently manage the account and not miss out on notifications and other updates.

3. Engage a social media manager. When one signs up for a number of social media sites, keeping up with all the notifications can be a daunting task. So before inviting friends and “likers”, it would be better to sign up for free to HootSuite and Ping.fm as these allow the user to manage all accounts in a single site. Messages are scheduled for deployment so that the user can still do other things while still getting advertised. And when the page has already reached greater transactions, then SproutSocial.com, which charges $49, may be contacted.

4. Next thing to do is to post updates. No user will follow a site that is empty and has nothing to show or sell. Updates would have to include profile of the company, situation of the industry, and some pictures and blogs for the guests to see and read.

5. Finding friends and followers comes next. Friends can be found by simply typing in some keywords. For example, if the target followers are pilots, then “pilot” has to be entered. The word “flying” can also be searched.

6. Engage followers and friends. It is important to remember to make friends and connections a primary priority. When inviting friends and followers, establishing rapport is very important. For example, when requesting to be a friend or follower, write a simple message introducing oneself.

7. Provide support. When client has a complaint or some comment, it is best and proper to answer that issue. This would make the customer or follower feel comfortable and valued.

8. Notice feedbacks. The customers are the owner’s patrons so value each feedback they have and base improvements on these.

Every business will grow when engaged in social media sites. And when this happens, there would now be the need for bookkeeping accounting. And when thinking about accounting software, think Shoebooks, Australia’s leading provider of accounting and invoicing software.

Business Conditions Continue Worsen Ever Since 1990's

The trading conditions have already been at their worst levels for about 14 years now. And this has led the business owners in believing that the economy is desperately in need of more interest rate reductions.

An appalling result in the latest survey of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) on investor confidence showed that most businesses are stabilizing at low levels while some others are “sinking to contractionary territory”.

According to the ACCI Director of Economics and Industry Policy, Greg Evans, "Overall the survey shows that mainstream Australian business is under significant pressure."


It was during the December quarter that the sales and profitability sank. To add to that, employment and investment intentions proved poor especially in the coming months.

"Businesses' view of their own conditions are at their lowest level since the survey began some 14 years ago, in 1998. Clearly this economy needs the benefit from further reductions in interest rates, and we would expect to see that in the first half of this year," added Mr. Evans.

The next meeting of the board of the Reserve Bank of Australia has been set on February 7 wherein the financial markets are expecting them to cut rates. However, the increasing “tug of war” between businesses and Australian banks remain a major concern of businesses. This war is over the two entities’ willingness to pass on the rate reduction’s full impacts.

"It underlines the lack of real competitive pressures in the Australian banking system," continued Mr. Evans.

The same survey also revealed that the largest constraint on investment remains to be taxes and government charges. This is followed by insufficient demand in Australia.

With these difficulties being experienced by businesses in Australia, there is a need for them to utilize accounting software for businesses and engage the services of online accounting to ensure that the processes and transactions are accurate. And in today’s time, there is no more place for assumptions in the business world.

Using Social Media for Businesses - Part 1

Do you have a small bookkeeping accounting business online?

With social media sites reporting users in billions of numbers, one cannot be wrong to presume that social media sites have gone viral.

Nowadays, with these billions of social media users, having no social media presence could now mean a slow death to your site. If you have a small business accounting software and you haven’t brought it into the social media craze, this would not do anymore.

Now, having no online social media presence even for those big accounting on line businesses is no longer an option as having a website and online presence is not anymore enough in this competitive world of internet marketing.


So here are some tips or ways on how to use social media for businesses:

1. Review and Identify Your Assets. Before engaging in online marketing or social media marketing and engagement, the first thing you should do is try to identify and assess what is your asset. What are you trying to promote? In this way, you can determine who your target audience would be.

2. Proactively Post and Tweet. Proactively post or tweet questions that ask for customers’ thoughts on specific product ideas, marketing strategies, or anything else that is relevant. And when you get a response, dig deeper. Make any initial feedback when you get into a conversation and try to create something real from the dialogue. In this way you will get conversation that may go on for some time which will make your conversation active and be noticed not only by other users but also by search engine crawlers.

3. Proactively Post Updates. Provide valuable relevant information about your business or people enjoying your business. This can be in the form of pictures or videos. On YouTube, you can post videos of your business, customer experiences, and encourage customers to make their own. You can also ‘favorite’ other YouTube users’ videos and they will end up on your page. Remember to keep your updates relevant, interesting and attractive. In this way, other people will like and follow your page.

4. Post Fun Contests, Polls, And Questions. You should try to post interesting and fun contests, polls of questions that would let your customers know you value their opinion, and that they have a personality.

5. Leverage your Website’s Content. In order to draw more traffic to your website, put your website's content to work. Spread the word by encouraging visitors to share content they enjoy. Install a widget, such as AddThis, that automates linking to popular sites, in order to promote the sharing of your site's content.

6. Look for Friends And Followers. Search keywords to find followers and friends. Search your town and surrounding areas as well to find key influencers, news outlets, bloggers, and city officials. Also, search for large players in your market. Join in their conversation. If they share your posts, you have the potential to reach thousands. On Google+, post a comment on one of their posts immediately. On Twitter, mention them in a post immediately. You can also make a comment on one of their posts or simply say that you look forward to following their great content. Try to make them trust you.

7. Post relevantly. If you want a more useful feedback, you should post and tweet questions that are relevant to specific areas the business explores. Feedback in response to the question “What new online accounting should we offer?” will be more valuable than compliments on how nice your bookkeeping accounting is already are.

8. Provide Discounts. Offer discounts. In this way, people will follow you then and they also will buy.

9. Build Brand Loyalty. By providing quality and dependable goods and services or provide something for free, be it information or community, you can enable people to like your brand and then buy from it in the future again.

10. Offer Support. Provide customer support. Immediately answer questions that are posted on your Twitter or Facebook accounts.

11. Engage Friends and Followers. Build a relationship with people, not pitching your service or product. Provide them with story ideas and leads that have nothing to do with your business. Engage them in conversations and if possible give them a personal comment or responses. In this way, you can gather more friends and followers.

12. Interact With Visitors. Have a conversation with your visitors. Even though they are not your customers and just posting comments or questions, engage them and have a real conversation. Maybe in the future they will become your customers.

13. Monitor Trends. Find out more on social media. Use tools that allow you to watch trends unfold. In this way, you can determine what’s cool and where the demand is almost instantly by scanning Facebook and Twitter with simple tools like Topsy.

14. Reach Out.Reach out to people who you know that like you. Contact them, simply express your gratitude, invite them to your next product presentation or send them your products for testing purposes.

15. Harness your expertise. Share the knowledge you've gathered through your trade. This could go a long way toward boosting your brand.

Cloud Computing Users Should Ensure Good Relationship with Provider

With many companies now using cloud computing solutions, companies using these latest cloud computing solutions have been urged to make sure that they have a good relationship with the manufacturer that is providing them.

According to Seth Robinson, one of the authors of the CompTIA second annual Trends in Cloud Computing report, the so-called Service Level Agreements, or SLA, is a key factor in any deal to purchase and secure a cloud computing contract.

Robinson further said that a SLA is "very important" and an agreement must be reached prior to any investment in technology taking place. This is so because there are so many companies that go directly to the internet and just pick up services and sign off on things and begin using them.

Likewise, with the cloud, many companies are trusting a significant portion of their IT to third party provider which increases security risks if not done properly. So it is at times like these that it is a must that companies focus on having a healthy relationship with the cloud computing provider.

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility (like the electricity grid) over a network (typically the Internet).

Cloud computing provides computation, software, data access, and storage services that do not require end-user knowledge of the physical location and configuration of the system that delivers the services. So it can store information derived from software for accounting like information input into invoicing software or any other accounting software for business.

Robinson’s comments emerged as James Peel, the product manager at Opsview – an open source platform, stated that in order to ensure that the cloud computing service is being deployed in an efficient manner, companies in the UK must monitor the way staff use these services.

UK vice-chairman of EuroCloud, Phil Wainewright, had recently praised cloud computing for its offer of high levels of security and how difficult it makes it for outsiders to access stored information.

5 Key Cloud Computing Ways Revolutionizing the Business World

What initially started as a simple tool is now becoming a very popular accounting software for businesses as it offers businesses a way to save money. Companies are already doing their working practices in ways that suit the cloud computing technology.

Eighty percent of the 900 organizations surveyed by KPMG are saying that they have plans of adopting the cloud computing technology. Ten percent of them are already using the accounting software at present.

Basically, cloud computing is “the process of sharing IT resources to achieve more power and productivity with fewer costs and roadblocks”.



Here are the five key ways as to how cloud computing revolutionizes the business world.

1. Breaks down barriers to entry

Cloud computing basically removed in-house implementations and large capital outlays. New technologies and innovations are no longer limited to big companies that have the resources to create such. Furthermore, companies no longer need to purchase expensive server equipment since cloud computing, as a bookkeeping software, will take care of keeping data and information and only charges a fee for the resources used.

Google, Amazon, and Microsoft also make use of cloud computing to extend their services.

2. Allows businesses to react with agility

Business operations will always include changes in situations needed to address business demands. This is where cloud computing helps businesses. Should a business need to be over specified due to peak usage or if it is underspecified in order to manage heavy load sessions, cloud computing provides the services. Businesses are able to access their IT resources using flexible and dynamic systems.

With cloud computing, the instant and unexpected cyclical demands of businesses are addressed more effectively and efficiently with cloud computing.

3. It uses pay-per-use cost model

IT functions of businesses mean the need to pay for spaces whether or not the space is needed or is too big for the demand. In most cases, companies have to buy more desktop computers, machines for internal server rooms, as well as space for offset servers. What’s worse is that, as the demand increases, so does the need to add more of these expensive materials and equipment.

Cloud computing has changed the trend. Since it operates on a need basis, businesses only need to pay for the space that it uses. They only need to pay more when the need for greater space arises. With cloud computing, no idle space is being paid for.

4. Less maintenance, more innovation

It is said that around $8 for every $10 is used by businesses for maintenance rather than innovation. With cloud computing, this maintenance cost is reduced as the maintenance operations are already shouldered by the technology which is being done offsite. The pay-per-use scheme already includes upgrades and maintenance.

5. Being able to build products that are adaptable to today’s fast-moving businesses.

Conventional methods of storing and accessing data of businesses include purchasing software in boxes and installing it on all computers in the office. With cloud computing, applications are hosted by a central server and are used by businesses via the internet. Security of data is ensured with the said accounting software.

Cloud computing is very beneficial to businesses for their accounting software needs.

"What's remarkable about the cloud is you can do this type of work on demand. We've never had information ability like this before,” said Eugene Kolker, Chief Data Officer at Seattle Children’s Hospital.

Businesses Informed to Back-up Cloud Computing Systems

While so many companies today have adopted the use of cloud computing, they are forgetting an essential thing to do—creating back-ups. Data that are sent to the clouds have to be adequately backed up.

This is according to Andrea Simmons, a writer for the BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT.

Just recently, Amazon Web Services had a huge outage after its European cloud services were knocked out by a lightning strike in Dublin, Ireland last August. As a result, Springpad, one of its products, was out of use for two days.




The consequences of the said accident were devastating to the company and served as a wake-up call for BCS and all other companies that have information in the cloud. The problem of BCS was not just the consequences but also of the lack of a back-up system.

What can be done?

Though not everything can be backed-up, a lot of things can still be backed-up. Google apps can be used for calendars, mails, and documents. Notes should also be backed-up too.

The importance of having a back-up system is that it enables a business to still have access to these data even in the absence of an internet connection. These back-up systems may be placed locally on a computer or hard drive.

Cloud computing is not an evil thing or practice. Just like other applications, it is not perfect. Though it can securely keep data and other records, unexpected accidents happen and so the business owner using it should take the responsibility of keeping its back-up system.

Just recently, cloud computing was mentioned in the report of IBTimes that it can be a great environmental option against carbon, according to the research of the Carbon Disclosure Project.

Source: Codestone.net

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Shoebooks is a premium provider of online accounting software for SME businesses in Australia. Check out Shoebooks small accounting software services and experience the advantages of our online invoicing software for your business. Shoebooks is located at Unit 12, 118 Church Street, Hawthorn Victoria 3122, Australia. Call Shoebooks at +613-9818-1515

Cloud Computing: Efficient and Ideal for Business

There has been a recent advice for those companies that intend to adopt the cloud computing technology, an online accounting software. By doing so, businesses will be doing their share for the environment.

It has been found that using this new technology is a guaranteed way to slash carbon emissions. This is according to the new research of the Carbon Disclosure Projects as reported by the IBTimes.

The report, entitled Cloud Computing: The IT Solution for the 21st Century, has stated that there can be a cutback of 85.7 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide output in the US alone.



With cloud computing, businesses can make their energy last longer, save more money, and enhance business efficiency.

By using this accounting software for small businesses, it is just like not using 200 million barrels of oil.

Cloud computing has been found be revolutionizing the way the outsourcing of IT works with the flexibility it offers companies. This is according to the findings of the K2 Advisory.

Source: Codestone.net

Accounting Software Allow Businesses to Save Money

Accounting is very important to every business. And in today’s economic instability that is brought about by the global economic crisis, adopting the use of accounting software for businesses is deemed very advantageous.

According to Terry Forsey, a software sales and marketing coach, the software for accounting will make other services redundant. For one, the services of an external accountant will no longer be needed as often as before. Besides that, a professional bookkeeper will also be less needed when the accounting software is used.

"If you're dealing with a company who pays your invoices on 30 days from date of receipt, you can email them, which means you can get your invoices out an awful lot quicker,” added Forsey. However, it is advised that the employees to operate the software should have to undergo rigid training.

Here are other advantages of using Accounting Software that can make businesses save money:

1. Payroll processing

Hiring a payroll master can be tough especially for a small business. But by using the accounting software for businesses, time sheet information is entered together with the rate of pay. It is the software that does all the computations. Deductions are automatically applied.

2. Easy transaction entry

The slightest mistake in entering data can be disastrous. And yes, this can happen even to employees who are being extremely careful at data entry. But with the newest accounting software, incorrect data entry can be avoided as these already have safeguards that ensure that only the correct data are entered. Debit and credit transactions are checked and made sure to be accurate.

3. Accounts payable

Paying suppliers has never been this easy. With the software for accounting, all payables and collectibles are easier to track because the software has the ability to organize data and information. Therefore, a company is able to save because all charges and fees brought about by overdue payments are avoided.

4. Tax and financial reports

Tax statements are very complicated. With the software for accounting, this can be done fast, accurately, and timely.

5. Ease of access

Accounting software are online applications. This means that anyone can work on accounting even at home, in the mall, or wherever the need arises. With just a laptop computer, internet connection, and account password, work can be completed in no time.

Source: Codestone.net

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Make Your Business Recession-Proof

The business trend will never be the same all throughout. There will be times when businesses will do well. However, there will also be times when businesses will have tough moments. Among these tough ones is the time of recession.

At present, it is the Western world that is experiencing this pinch. However, individuals have to be cautious this early as this recession will eventually flow out into the Australian economy and to individual businesses.

What is important during this time is that business owners have to make sure that not all revenue comes from one source. That is, if 80 per cent of a business’ revenue is just from one client, the risk when this client goes away is very high for the business. It may also not be very wise to diversify just yet.

Instead of expanding or growing the business, it may be wise to just prepare for the rough times that are coming. Here are among the things to do to recession-proof one’s business:

1. Build a cash flow buffer

Cash flow is very important. Eventhough a business has much cash to use, it may be wise to make a cash buffer of at least 3 months overheads. This will protect the company and spare the owner from unwanted stresses brought about by market volatility.

2. Bring forward receipts and defer payments

It is important to convince clients to prepay. This may be done by implementing discounts, credit facility, and retainer.

3. Reduce debt exposure

It is important to consolidate debts to see how much needs to be repaid. In this case, if the interest rates are higher, the debt finance will also be more expensive.

4. Migrate from fixed to variable costs

It will help to reduce overhead costs in absolute terms and to migrate from fixed to variable costs. For example, contract labor is cheaper than maintain everyone in the payroll.

5. Manage employment leave exposure

It will be necessary to convince employees with chunks of leave entitlements to just use these instead of letting the business give out a lump sum.

Decision cycles may have to be shortened. From using the monthly or bi-monthly system, a shift to weekly will be more helpful. This is also considered to be among the important and efficient moves when it comes to cash flow management.

Source: SmartCompany.com.au - How to recession-proof your business »

Bookkeeping Tips You should Not Miss

Running a business is never an easy task. Be it a small business or a large one, the skills needed to manage and control it are the same. Listening to all news about how multimillion and multinational companies fall are scary and depressing. Therefore, all aspects of the business, especially accounting and bookkeeping, have to be taken care of.

Here are a few accounting tips for your small business to flourish:

Accounting softwares are very necessary for a small business. That is why as an owner, one has to learn the ins and outs of accounting and bookkeeping to make sure the business is working. Not only that, one should also train a member of the family on different roles. Besides this, an accountant and a bookkeeper have to be hired. The risk is too high for a beginner to be experimenting on his small business.

Have a copy of all pertinent papers involving your small business. Receipts invoices, and business cards have to be scanned for safekeeping. A software called NeatReceipts can help your small business in this area.

If you have a personal account, keep this separate from the small business’ bank account. This tip can help you avoid confusion and mix-ups of your finances. Whatever money that has been earned from the business should remain in the business’ bank account.

Stick to using credit and debit cards. This is important for you in order to keep track of write offs.

Try using a software that can store all your paperwork from receipts to invoices. Since using paper in a small business will take too much space in your office, a software can help and will not only allow a clean office space but also a clean and orderly filing.

These are just a few tips. But make sure you follow them in order for that small business to grow. Hard work, patience, and an organized bookkeeping system are your keys to progress.