Today’s guest post is from Thomas Aaron.  (He is the two legged creature in the picture at left).  He shares his perspectives on social media and customer service.

There seems to be a tipping point in the growth of most companies at which policies must be strictly adhered to in order to stop profit leakage. When this happens, customers are more likely to become numbers, and they are dealt with in a more adversarial, by-the-rules manner. There is nothing a consumer hates more than to have policies quoted when they are dissatisfied with a product or service.

Consumers often grudgingly tolerate poor customer service because of limited choices or lower prices. However, companies that fail their customers typically suffer for it. In the Yellow Pages age, dissatisfied customers had limited voice and influence. While they could bemoan their dissatisfaction to friends, coworkers and family members, bad reviews usually faded away fairly quickly.

In the Internet Age, it only takes a few dissatisfied customers to severely damage a company’s reputation. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter and blogging not only have revolutionized the way people communicate, they have made it possible for consumers to communicate with hundreds or thousands of people with minimal effort. Consumers now have power, and they are not afraid to use it – and their voices hang around on the Web for a very long time.

Businesses around the world are scrambling to to figure out how to either use social media to their benefit or protect themselves against it. But those who want to protect themselves are missing the point. Satisfying customers should be their highest priority. By doing so, most of the negative reviews could be avoided in the first place, and the ones that could not be avoided would be buried under positive reviews.

Large corporations often rely on well-funded PR departments and reputation management firms to heal their wounds. However, small businesses typically do not have such options. Instead, they have to rely on preventing poor reviews in the first place by communicating with customers and fixing their problems. Frankly, that is the way it should be.

For most small businesses, finding customers, keeping them and generating referrals is life. Failure to do any of these is sudden and painful death. The trick to doing all three is exemplary customer service.
The truth is, when you peel away all the layers of goals, tactics and objectives, the essence of good customer service is distilled into a single element: caring. It is that simple.

If you sincerely care about your customers, it transforms the way you conduct yourself and your business, and it impacts the development and implementation of your policies. Customers can sense it when you truly want the best for them, and they will choose you over your competitors. If your customer feels you care about them, they will come back to you  the next time they need your offerings, and they will enthusiastically refer you to their friends.

But beware, you cannot fake caring. Sooner or later insincerity becomes evident, and your customers will not hesitate to leave you for a competitor who walks the talk. While the customer is not always right, you should always treat them them like solid gold. If the tables were turned, how would you want to be treated?

Thomas Aaron is a certified dog trainer and a Full Member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers (APDT). He is the owner of FetchMasters, LLC, a Denver-based in-your-home dog training service. Tom specializes in canine obedience training and behavior modification, and blogs regularly on issues pertaining to dog training. http://www.fetchmasters.com

One more guest post by Lindsey Paho. Today, she asks what’s next for social media

The rapid proliferation of social media sites has led to some speculation lately that we may be facing a sort of social media bubble. That’s not an unreasonable kind of conjecture to engage in, and the uncanny similarities to the tech bubble of the late 1990′s makes caution logical. Embracing the positive effects of heavy social media saturation while taking steps to ensure that it remains relevant and sustainable for the long term seems eminently sensible.

Beyond the Buzz
Social media enjoys a cool factor. That’s part of its appeal. Nearly every new social media platform garners some level of buzz just because newness equals novelty. But beyond the initial novelty-driven buzz, the reason that social media is so exciting is that it has the ability to fundamentally change human institutions and communication patterns. When the true potential of social media is tapped, it provides the ability to dramatically change longstanding, underlying, structural norms.

Skype in the Classroom
Most of us use Skype for personal and business use so frequently that it’s easy to lose sight of its potential for other applications. With the rapidly increasing popularity of online university options, Skype’s video chat and videoconferencing abilities are adding appeal to a telecommuting approach to education.

And though this started primarily at the undergraduate and graduate level, Skype’s new initiative, “Skype in the Classroom” came out of beta in March with 4,000 teachers signed up. That has already grown to include more than 15,000 teachers who are using it to collaborate effectively. Ensuring that social media technologies continue to impact untapped segments of the population in a positive way will go a long way to making the social media boom last.

Facebook and the Feature Conundrum
Facebook has been the golden success story of social media in the last decade. Whether it can continue its success in the next decade depends on the tactical choices they make in the near future. With user satisfaction down to an all-time low of 64%, Facebook needs to get its house in order quickly—MySpace in comparison only rated one point lower than Facebook in the same survey. Facebook’s strategy to continue its dominance of the social media landscape so far has been just to continually add more features.

They’re integrating Skype into their site and Spotify as well. This seems mystifying considering that a user can already have Spotify and Skype running on their desktop while interfacing with Facebook on their already open browser. It seems likely that Facebook is merely adding features to ensure that a user spends more of their daily computer time on Facebook.

The Future of Social Media
Because the social media landscape continues to populate, users continue to have more choice about where they spend their social media time. That means that social media sites will have to continue to get better to ensure their survival. Google+ has entered the arena in a big way, and a new open source social media site called Diaspora is in the process of issuing invites. Because Diaspora is open source, the potential for an infinite number of specialized apps means that it may have huge potential for business. If the social media boom is going to be sustainable for the long haul, these are the kinds of innovations that will help it happen.

Lindsey Paho lives near Chicago. She divides her time among work, writing and family life.

She writes on behalf of Colorado Technical University and has a keen interest in small business blogging and social media.

While we don’t work with many retail companies,  I know some of our readers do.   In today’s guest post by Alan Grainger, we look at ways to create appropriate seasonal messages for B2B companies. 

With the last page of the calendar about to be turned and turkeys around the world beginning to look slightly nervous, the festive season is very much upon us. For many businesses this period provides a vital trading opportunity, with Christmas offering a huge slice of annual income to a large number of companies.
With so much attention paid to the holidays by so many companies, the public is bombarded with marketing content that is filled with mentions of Santa Claus, tinsel and presents, so how can you make your marketing literature stand out at such an important time of year?

Relevancy
It is quite easy to fall back on traditional festive imagery when writing, but is this necessarily relevant to the audience that you are targeting? While pitching the image of snowmen and fairy lights might appeal to the consumer and retail market, is this what a business wants to hear when shopping for corporate gifts for clients, for example?

In this particular scenario, content surrounding the motivational benefits of gifts might be more appropriate than just using Christmas for the sake of it, and targeting your content around what is relevant to your reader will be more appropriate than simply reverting to festive semantics.

Get Your Timings Right
When is Christmas? This seems like a fairly simple question but the peak holiday period can be at different times in different industries. If you are preparing content to promote yourself or your company to other businesses, make sure that you do your research to find out when their main holiday period is and more importantly, when they will be making their festive preparations.

Restaurants, for example, will encounter their busiest period through December, but will start their marketing activities as early as August. If your content is geared around holiday marketing and promotions, or involves products with any length of lead time, your peak  may already have been and gone.

Be Unique
For many companies this is the most profitable time of year, which also makes it the most competitive. It is the one time of year where you can guarantee that all of your competitors will be promoting themselves, so it is vital that you stand out.
As well as stellar content, this is the time of year where something that stands out from what everyone else is doing will really grab people’s attention, so think about what it is that makes your proposition different to everybody else’s. Why should they choose you? Don’t rely on Christmas for Christmas’s sake.

Be creative in your content and unique in your distribution of it. Don’t be afraid to look for new avenues to distribute your work either, with social media such as Twitter and Facebook being increasingly implemented by companies that are looking for modern ways to connect with their audience.  If this is a key period for your company then it will be for your competitors too. Go beyond the festive message with your marketing content and drill deeper into why this period is important for your target audience. Christmas won’t sell your company, it is up to you to differentiate yourself through unique content, good timing and innovative distribution.

Author Bio:

Alan Grainger is an in-house B2B web marketer in the business gifts sector and manages SEO for The Corporate Gifts Company. He writes articles exploring the issues faced by the B2B web marketer, giving an “in the trenches” view from an in-house SEO department. Follow him @alanjgrainger.

Guest blogger, Lindsey Paho, a writer at Professional Intern  is back for another visit.  This month her post focuses on the pros and cons of end of year hiring.

For the small business owner, timing of when to bring on new employees can have a significant impact for the bottom line. While it’s stirring to have the type of growth that necessitates hiring, bringing on a new hire at the wrong time of the year can make for a very costly error. Perhaps the worst time for hiring is at the end of the year when an accumulation of factors stack the deck against the employer who takes on additional workers.

While large companies and corporations have the luxury of paying individuals or firms to keep abreast of business legislation and tax law, the workhorse of the U.S. economy, small—businesses—have to rely on principles and senior management to share the load of keeping up to date with these practices. You may seriously think about tax and intangible benefits, of funding key employee tuition for an online MBA program to accommodate working schedules and business needs of staying current on the latest business matters.

Financial hits

Probably the most obvious, though the most financially-significant reasons to think twice before late-November or December hiring are the issues involving taxes and benefits. You don’t have to be a finance-major to learn about these tips, but a targeted course for decision makers might be a good idea.

Unemployment Taxes

Federal (6.2% of the first $7 thousand) and State (for example, Indiana collects 4.2% of the first $9,500) are collected annually. Hiring someone in November means that you not only pay that amount for that year, but at the turn of the year, you roll over and pay again. That’s a big hit at a time most companies aren’t all that flush with income, save retailers.
401k Enrollment issues
Companies that have 120 or more employees enrolled in a 401k program must be audited. If your company happens to be close but not over that number, holding off hiring that 120th employee until after the first of the year can save your company many thousands of dollars in unnecessary auditing fees.

Production efficiency

While seasonal help for retailers are the exception, most companies experience extraordinary circumstances towards the year’s end. Even bringing on college interns, though little or no costs may be involved, production issues make onboarding at this time less than ideal.

Holiday distractions

Black Friday, company parties – no small cost even at $20-40/employee – and family events can’t help but affect productivity. Waiting until the seasonal distractions pass just makes sense for holding off hiring.
Training support availability
Vacations, retirements and transfers can spike during this time and while this doesn’t mean that the work ends, employees often wear more hats than normal to make things run smoothly. What tends to suffer is the time normally used to conduct detailed onboarding activities, both formal and informal. For a new hire, be they management or someone hired at the end of a final semester, expecting them to correctly understand both the job and the culture is not only bad planning, but it’s not fair to the new employee.

Planning

Input scarcity: One final note about year-end hiring. Whether or not your fiscal year begins in October, July or January, planning for personnel issues should be avoided during the last couple of weeks in November and the whole month of December. For reasons already discussed, those who may have critical input regarding department needs, newly identified qualification concerns or production requirements may not be able to participate as fully as they would at other times of the year.

Knowing these points ahead of time can help the small business owner avoid costly pitfalls associated with end-of-the-year hiring obstacles. Being proactive by building into your business plan the means to have management stay current through education is another point that shouldn’t be lost in the immediacy of steering clear of snags.

Lindsey Paho lives near Chicago. She divides her time among work, writing and family life. She writes on behalf of Colorado Technical University and has a keen interest in small business blogging and social media.

Today’s guest post is by Vicki Bohlsen the president of Bohlsen PR.  Her topic:  The RFP and how tot participate in the process in a way which helps you determine if the project is right for you. 

Would you take a job without meeting your new boss?

I’m sure you’ve participated in the RFP (Request for Proposal) debate. To answer them or not, that is the question.  I know people say they would never an answer an RFP, and I know people who search them out like black jelly beans and answer any and all they can find. I’m probably somewhere in the middle. I’m of the belief that I would never hire someone from just their resume, and that a company shouldn’t hire a vendor just from a proposal.

About a year and a half ago, I had my first opportunity to write an RFP for my own company. We were trying to identify the best website developer for the creation of the BohlsenPR website. It was a lot of fun to approach it in the way I wish all RFP processes would play out – with inclusivity, two-way communication and objectivity.

1. We decided to invite a few people/companies we identified as a potential fit, but we also let it be known that we would accept other proposals from individuals/companies that wanted to participate. Our ultimate goal was to find the best fit for us.

We invited five companies, and we received 11 proposals when all was said and done

2. We gave people the opportunity to ask questions at various times throughout the submission period by offering several open-call times.

 Seven of the eleven companies submitting proposals called and asked questions during these time periods or at arranged times. Several email communications went out reminding those submitting – or wanting to submit – that we’d be happy to provide additional information and answer questions.

 3. As the proposals came in, we had an intern make them unidentifiable. No staff saw a proposal with the submitter’s name during the initial review.

 We did not want to be swayed/influenced by the company’s name or reputation; rather, we wanted to be impacted by the content in the submitter’s proposal.

 4. Two people from the company were given the task of reviewing each and every proposal with a well-defined criteria and ranking system. Each proposal was given at least an hour’s review in which detailed notes were taken. This committee narrowed the field down to three before I even saw them, and only then did we know who the finalists were.

 Then, during deep discussion, we narrowed it down to two and had a one-on-one meeting with each submitter. Ultimately, it was not a simple decision, but having met each company and the person who would act as lead on the account helped us to make a decision.

 5. We provided feedback to the 10 other people/companies who so generously took the time to answer the RFP, letting them know who we chose and why we did not choose them.

We got very positive feedback from most of the companies that did not get the job, thanking us for taking the time to provide the feedback that would be useful for them in their next RFP process.   I don’t know if there is a perfect process for hiring anyone for anything, but this RFP approach seemed as fair as possible – and we even made some new friends along the way.   Now when determining if it makes sense for our company to answer an RFP, I ask myself these questions:

 1.Are we a fit for what is being asked?

2. Can we get more information throughout the process so we can provide the best possible presentation of who we are and how we can meet the client’s needs?

3. Can we do exceptional work for this client?

4. Do they want us to submit a proposal?

5. Do they understand who we are and what we do?

6. Will we learn something from the process, even if we don’t get the gig?

 If I find myself saying, “They’d be foolish not to hire us,” I can assure you we will be submitting a proposal. Just as they need to feel strongly about who they hire, we need to be just as certain. You wouldn’t take a job without meeting your new boss, would you?

Vicki Bohlsen, the President of Bohlsen PR has more than 20 years’ experience in corporate and non-profit media relations and marketing. This includes national and local media placements and the relationships that facilitate them, and expertise in broadcast production, crisis management and media spokesperson training.

Do you remember to say thank you to your clients?  In today’s guest blog post,  Chris Wallace talks about the different ways you can say thank you. 

Down the street from where I live there’s a butcher named Frank. Everyone in the neighborhood knows him and loves him — he literally has hundreds of customers who skip the meat section at the grocery store and purchase their pork loins, sausage, and steaks direct from Frank’s Meats. He’s one of those guys who always seems to be in a good mood and knows everyone and their children by name.

When Frank announced recently that he’d be retiring after 50 years in business, it saddened more than a few families who had shopped with him for generations. On my last visit, I asked him if there had been hard times over the years, considering the difficulty small family businesses have competing with the big chains.

“Nope,” said Frank. “I always had a winning business plan. Greet every customer with a smile on their way in the door, and tell them ‘thank you’ on the way out, or their purchase is free.”

Even though Frank put an economic incentive on himself and his employees to show gratitude to customers, the ‘thank yous’ were genuine (and the product great enough) to maintain a loyal base.

All too often in today’s business world, we turn on the charm in the initial stages of courting a client or customer, eager to secure their business. Once they’re ‘hooked,’ however, the doting attention shifts to new potential clients.

That’s a dangerous tendency. The customers you already have are your most valuable ones! Don’t let them slip away because they feel unappreciated. Remember a few simple tips for saying ‘thank you’ and you’ll find your business steadily growing, with both existing customers and their referrals.

The Classic ‘Thank You’ Note

Apart from wedding gifts and the holidays, handwritten thank you notes are almost a relic of a bygone era. Why take ink to paper when you can accomplish the same thing with a quick email? Because the effect is simply not the same. An email thank you can be sufficient, but to really stand out, write it down. Keep stationary and stamps at your desk and the whole process won’t take longer than a trip to the water cooler.

Show Them a Good Time

Few things inspire stronger client loyalty than impressing them with a party or dinner. This varies by company. If you have 100 clients who each spend a modest amount each year, throw a dinner bash with an open bar. Invite clients to bring their spouses and families. Establishing friend relationships cements working partnerships that last.

If your company has a few clients whose business contributes a large portion of your firm’s income, take that a step farther. Rent a mountain or beach house for a weekend (or a block of hotel rooms), and start an annual tradition of fostering those business friendships in a casual, neutral atmosphere. Don’t spend more than you can afford, but remember that any sort of ‘thank you’ trip or event is an investment in building customer loyalty.

Dole Out the Online Shout Outs

There’s hardly a business sector out there that doesn’t utilize Facebook these days. Does a client or business partner of yours have something new to tout? Give them a plug on your page. This can even work for companies you haven’t signed with yet. If they impress you in your initial meeting, mention it online and tag them. It’s free exposure and it lets the other group know that you publicly support them.

The same principle goes on your company webpage. Set up a ‘Links’ page and use it to direct your customers to your business partner’s websites. (Make sure you set it up to open their sites in a new page, so your site remains open in the browser).

Reward Loyalty

On my key ring, I’ve got a handful of little cards for different stores around town. At the auto supply store, I get a $20 credit for every five purchases I make over $20. For every $1,000 I spend at the grocery store, I get a free tank of gas at the station in their parking lot.

Customer discount programs add up, and they’re the easiest way to say ‘thank you for choosing us.’ This can be as simple as ‘buy five sandwiches get one free.’ It can also be a willingness to ‘bend the rules’ for customers who stick with you. A marketing company may have a client with a new idea that doesn’t quite fit the existing pricing scheme. Make it work, because if you don’t, they’ll look elsewhere.

So much of building successful business relationships boils down to interpersonal connections. Even if your work is conducted by email, you can still drop a handwritten note in the mail. Connect with people. Smile when they walk in the front door, and never forget to say thank you on their way out.

What other ways do you say thank you to clients and customers?

Christopher Wallace, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Amsterdam Printing, has more than 20 years experience in sales and marketing. At Amsterdam, a leading provider of personalized pens, promotional pens, and other personalized items such as imprinted apparel and customized calendars, Christopher is focused on providing quality marketing materials to small, mid-size and large businesses.

Today’s blog post is by a good friend of Roundpeg, Robby Slaughter of Slaughter Development, LLC.

Considering that I run a productivity consulting company, it’s no surprise  that I’m excited about a new service designed to automate routine online activities. It’s called “If This Then That”, or ifttt. (I like to say it as a two syllable word “if-ta”").

How  ifttt works

If: This is the first step in the ifttt process. You have to think of a condition that might occur out in the world. Maybe somebody posts a comment on your Facebook wall, maybe it’s exactly 3:30PM on a Tuesday, maybe a new image is taken on an Instagram photo account. The whole point of of iftt is the if. A sequence (called a “task”) begins with then “if” statement.

This: It’s what you’re looking for. A “this” is a triggering event which occurs through one of over 30 “channels” online. I’ve played with triggers such as asking ifttt to receive an email or a voicemail. You can have ifttt watch for a specific message on Twitter or a new post from your favorite blog or even to pay attention to the weather report in your area. A “this” is what triggers the ifftt task.

Then: This is the part that links the this to the that. You don’t actually have to do anything to set up the “then”, but it’s an essential part of understanding the entire ifttt concept.

That: The final action. This is what occurs as a result of the trigger. Again, it can be any number of possible events across the thirty different channels. Ifttt can leave notes on Evernote, post messages on Facebook, send files to DropBox, or update your status on LinkedIn.

So what are some examples of how to use ifttt?

How about this one: Every time you are tagged in a photo on Facebook, send that photo to your DropBox. (link)

Here’s another cool one: Send a text to ifttt and have it respond with a phone call. (link) Great for getting out of uncomfortable situations!

I like: Note to Self – Call Ifttt and have it transcribe your voicemail into an email. (link)

All of these pre-built tasks are called recipes. You can make your own tasks into recipes and share them with others on ifttt with just the click of a button!

Advantages to Ifttt

• Of course, ifttt saves tons of time because it’s a form of automation. It’s true that lots of the of the ways people use ifttt are merely duplicating other services. (If you want to send RSS feeds to your inbox, for example, you can use www.feedmyinbox.com). But of course, ifttt lets you manage all of your automation in once place.
• More importantly: ifftt gets people thinking about automating the web. Right now, most of the channels are social media services. But what about ifttt services that watch Amazon.com prices? How about ifttt services that monitor press releases?  Thankfully, ifttt has a delightfully simple user interface. Compare it to this video of Yahoo! Pipes, which is practically computer programming.

Drawbacks to Ifttt

There are three big weaknesses to Ifttt right now that are keeping it from becoming more than just a fun little toy:

• Ifttt can’t make compound decisions.  You can setup a a task to send you an email when tomorrow’s weather is below 40 degrees. You  can also set up a task to email when the weather calls for rain. But if you want to get an email when BOTH of these happen, that can’t be done at this writing.
• Ifttt has no memory. It can’t save any information during a task. For example, I’d like a task that keeps track of all of the people who followed me on Twitter in the past week, and then includes them all in a thank you tweet at the end of the week. Right now, the best I can do is to instantly reply to any new follower (as with this recipe).
• Ifttt does not play nice with others. The system works well when reacting to real human events and triggers, but not so well when interacting with other automated services. I found that an automated service that posts links on Facebook did not awake ifttt as expected. So if you’re currently automating part of your online activities, ifttt may not play nice.

These issues, however, are minor. Congratulations to the ifttt team on a great product! Head over to ifttt.com and try it for yourself.

Robby Slaughter runs a productivity consulting firm and is active on social media. Find him on Twitter as @robbyslaughter and elsewhere.

Guest blogger, Lindsey Paho, a writer at Professional Intern  is back for another visit.  This month her post focuses on the importance of a balance life for small business owners.

Keeping your personal life in balance while ensuring your business stays in the black can be tough. And small business owners have an especially difficult time maintaining a healthy balance because the demands of a small business can easily bleed over into personal life. The line between work and relaxation can be easily crossed, especially if you tend to work from home as well as the office.

Take a Break from Technology

Spending time in front of a computer can take up so much of your day that it’s easy to lose track of time. It’s not uncommon to turn off the computer in the office, only to fire up the laptop when you get home. Before you know it, the day is gone and when you weren’t working on your computer you were still glued to the screen checking emails and social media sites. Exerting the willpower to shut off your computer and step away from work when you need to can be tough. But if you make the effort to create some technology-free time you’ll find that it can add significant enrichment to your personal life.

Personal Time Matters

When you begin to let the demands of a small business encroach upon your time, one of the first areas that tend to be impacted is your exercise routine. Time spent in the gym, jogging or walking usually ends up getting sacrificed first when work takes priority over personal time. Stepping away from work to get some good exercise can help you stay in shape and feel better. You might be surprised at the positive impact of establishing an exercise routine can have on your productivity and creativity while working as well. And since exercise boosts endorphin levels in the brain you may find that it’s easier to maintain a positive attitude.

Rediscover Reading

When your personal life has to give way to the demands of your small business, finding the time to regularly read can be difficult. But if exercise is important for keeping your body in shape, reading frequently is a good workout for your brain. Making time for regular reading—even if it’s just during your lunch break—is a good way to stay informed and engaged with new ideas. And it doesn’t have to be Tolstoy novels either. Keeping several business and entrepreneur-themed magazines handy can make for a great way to take a break and gain insights that can have a direct positive impact on your business.

Take a Class

Even if you don’t have an interest in continuing your education or pursuing a degree program, take a class in a subject that intrigues you. Personal time doesn’t mean that you have to be passive. And don’t think that it has to be a business class either. If you have a passion for history, enroll in a history class. If you’ve always been fascinated with how different societies produce distinct cultures, enroll in a cultural anthropology class. Lifelong learning is uniquely enriching and ensures that you’re a well-rounded person. But regardless of what you do with your personal time, just make sure that you don’t let the work of running a small business dominate your life.

Lindsey Paho lives near Chicago. She divides her time among work, writing and family life. She writes on behalf of Colorado Technical Universityand has a keen interest in small business blogging and social media. She also writes for www.professionalintern.com.

At Roundpeg, we love interns, so I was delighted when Lindsey Paho, a writer at Professional Intern offered to send us a guest post.

If you’re one of those brave souls at the helm of one of the United States’ more than 5.6 million small businesses with employees other than yourself, you solve problems every hour. Some of these problems have become routine, but others loom large, such as how to expand without wrecking an already tight budget. Even more daunting is figuring out a way to grow your own knowledge base to effectively manage that small business when it’s not so small anymore. One often overlooked means of approaching both challenges is through hiring an intern who’s working on their online MBA. They can bring to your company more than affordable labor; they can pave your way to being a better owner.

“Intern? Isn’t that for Fortune 500 companies?”

Good question, and the answer is “no.” While major corporations do hire plenty of college interns, for the most part, they select from the best of scores of applicants and place the intern in departments applicable for the intern’s studies and interests, but what is a small business but a very much scaled down version of a large business? Both IBM and your company have similar goals, such as making a profit and maximizing the return on investment. Interns and companies, large and small, enjoy a symbiotic relationship that is measured best by the way in which the intern is employed at work.

Why an online MBA candidate? Two reasons: One is that an intern taking distance learning courses is more than likely someone with some real-life experience he or she can bring to your work, and two, the relationship you develop with your intern can inform you of options you can take to someday pursue that MBA you’ve always wanted to add to your business card. Ask around your contacts and generate a short list of schools offering internet classes leading to an MBA, then narrow your focus on finding the right intern.

As you think about the next big step for your company, think about the resources you’ve relied on so far, and those you’ll need to expand. So far, you and perhaps a small cadre of associates have carried the business on your product know-how and judicious decision making. What you probably don’t have, though, is a couple of decades of experience in marketing, business planning, finance and other subjects whose most current best practices are being taught to – you guessed it – MBA students. Interview your candidate and find out which ones have budding knowledge in the subjects you need and you’ll have found an intern who has a good connection with subject matter experts in those topics they teach to MBA candidates.

We’ve all heard horror stories about interns not getting paid fairly, or not at all, and we’ve heard about interns “fetching” coffee for obnoxious managers. That’s not going to be you, of course. Bring your intern in as more consultant than flunky. Find out what skills or experiences your intern wants from the relationship and negotiate how best to meet those desires. Set your own expectations right at the get-go and let them know what you’d like to learn from their knowledge and access to resources. Develop for your intern projects that you’ve put off due to lack of resources and support them in achieving the goals of that project.

A mutually beneficial intern experience can set the groundwork for the successful growth of your company. Part of that success will no doubt include you, the business owner, updating your own skills and staying at the lead of current industry developments. More than a few hard-working small business owners have determined that their own MBA would provide the foundation for that subsequent expansion of their business, the planned growth of their scope and the major future investment that puts you into the big league after you’ve wisely managed your company through those first seven to ten years. The lessons you learn from your intern through a productive partnership, not some temporary make-work episode, can open doors you may not know exist while you’re helping build a student’s own future.

Something such as Lindsey Paho loves writing and business. She is considering her online mba and enjoys blogging in her free time. 

Today’s guest post is by Alan Grainger, based in England, his spelling may be a little different then ours, but his suggestions on social media are right on track.

Barely a day goes by without talk in the news or on the small business forums about the latest company to embrace social media. It can have the effect of leaving those on the outside scratching their heads and wondering what exactly it is they are missing. 5000 followers, re-tweets, viral marketing and Facebook pages are all well and good but when analysing the possibilities that social media can bring for a company you only need to ask yourself one question, how can it benefit my business?

In opposition to the many hyped up articles that preach why every business needs social media, it is important to sit back into your chair and mull over exactly what it is that using social networks like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn can bring to your business and evaluate how you might be able to use them to develop specific aspects of your company.  The dirty secret to social media for business is this; social media is not a one size fits all solution to helping your business to reach new heights; it is a toolbox from which it is possible to hand-pick specific tools that can help different parts of your business to achieve specific goals.

Social Toolbox
So how do you go about finding the right tool for the job? (Yes, I will be milking the toolbox analogy for at least the next few paragraphs!) Well first you need to figure out exactly which tool does what. There are four major social networks that you will need to become acquainted with, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. Each of these has their own unique quirks that you will need to become familiar with so some initial playing around is called for to see all of the features that they have to offer. Once you’re fully acquainted with your tools then you need to know where to use them. Here’s how.

Follow the Right People
This first tip can sound a bit basic but it takes a little more thinking about than you might realize. The temptation when venturing into social media can be to search for those that occupy the same niche as you, but all that will do is mean that you are connecting with your competitors, not your customers. While this can be useful, the trick is finding the places where your customers hang out if you really want social media to have an effect on your business. Search for specific companies and individuals so that you can connect with the people who will really make a difference to your company.

To Sell or Not to Sell?
One of the main reasons why business owners, especially of small companies, can be turned off by social media is that they cannot see an immediate way of selling to people and making a profit. In many cases this is true as your average social media user is not in a mind set to buy when using the networks but the key piece of advice is as above, go where your audience is. This time we are talking about customers so find out where they hang out online and build a presence in that arena.

If you’re a B2B company, see which groups your clients are hanging out in on Linked In. Search for the names of companies and individuals you want to target and see which of your contacts are linked to them, you might be surprised by the results. You can then use your contact to introduce you to your target and bingo, a potential client.

Your PR efforts can also benefit from social media. Looking to get your story seen by the media? Reach out to journalists on Twitter and get their details from Linked In. Most journalists are active on Twitter and it can be a great way to reach out and make contact with a reporter when your calls and emails may get ignored.

The key to using social media for business is to not see it as a pure sales tool. Instead, look at it as a toolbox with which to get the right results for a particular task, helping you to develop each part of your business accordingly. Learn what each social network does, see how it works and then consider how you might be able to use it in specific areas of your business whether it’s marketing, PR or sales.

Alan Grainger is an in-house B2B web marketer in the promotional gifts sector and manages SEO for The Promotional Gifts Company. He writes articles exploring the issues faced by the B2B web marketer, giving an “in the trenches” view from an in-house SEO department. Follow him @alanjgrainger.