How Big a Problem Is Hacking?

Statistics where hacking is concerned are hard to come by for a couple of reasons. First, most companies don't like to admit that they have been hacked. Such an admission can lead to public backlash and loss of trust among a company's customer base, so usually, only the very highest profile cases make the news.

Second, because oftentimes, unless the intent of the hacker was to outright destroy data, the successful incursion may never be detected at all, or if it is ultimately detected, it could be weeks, months, or even longer before anybody in the company even knows about it, much less figures out what information was viewed, copied, or taken.

Taken together, this makes gathering statistics on the number of hacking attempts worldwide a pretty daunting task, but the best information we have on the topic indicates that a successful hacking attempt occurs about every twenty seconds. By the time you finish reading this short article on the topic, half a dozen or more companies will have been hacked, and of course, that only estimates the successful incursions.

Unsuccessful attempts are vastly more common, and occur at a rate many times higher than the rate of successful breeches, which begs for the question to be asked: How safe is your system? How safe is your company's data? How confident do you feel in the network security you have in place, to ward off all but the most determined attacks?

Perhaps it is a thing you've not spent much time thinking about, and if that is the case, and if your company's web portal and your network as a whole are of some import to you, then I would urge you to have an independent evaluation done as soon as you can, and at least once a year thereafter. Once every twenty seconds. Don't let the next victim be you.

How Important Is Your Web Portal to Your Company's Business?

There are a great many companies for whom their web portal represents a significant percentage of annual sales. In fact, for some companies, their web portal represents their entire sales channel (think Amazon, and most of the eBay Power Sellers).

If you are among this number...if your website represents a significant driver of your company's total annual sales, then protecting your website is equivalent to protecting your business as a whole. Lose the website, and you've just lost your primary sales vehicle.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are a number of companies for whom the primary purpose of their website is merely to provide customer information. Dealership location, in the case of most auto companies. Specifications and particulars about your various makes and models, and for these companies, not many sales (or perhaps none at all) are derived from the presence of the website itself. For these companies, should the website go down, it would be more a matter of inconvenience and perhaps embarrassment than an actual impact to the bottom line.

In either case, some thought should certainly be given to the role your company's website plays in your overall sales picture, and the more important that portal is to your bottom line, the more care that should be taken, and the more resources that should be invested in ensuring that your business website is as safe and secure as you can make it.

Especially for smaller businesses (though as the Amazon example illustrates, not JUST for smaller businesses), a company's website can be a major component of annual sales, and should the company site be hacked, or brought down by a sustained denial of service attack, it can spell real financial trouble.

Don't allow yourself or your company to fall victim to such attacks. Take the time to implement strong security protocols and software driven solutions, then have your site audited periodically to ensure that the level of protection you've got is sufficient to the task of keeping the site safe.

How Taking Care of Business?

An alarming number of business owners believe that when they're building a business they shouldn't pay themselves a salary. They sacrifice their own income for many years to get their business up and running. Venture capitalists call this "sweat equity". I call it working for nothing and being a fool.

The inability to pay yourself a reasonable salary is a red flag that your business is not working. Making loans to the company so you can pay yourself, and not charging the company rent if you own the building, are equally foolish. If your business doesn't allow you to pay yourself a living wage, what are you doing wrong?

Of the more than 6,000 businesses I've worked with, I can't think of a single one that failed because the owner paid himself or herself a decent salary. You've got to take care of yourself first. There's a pervasive belief among small business owners that "One day I'll get mine." These are good people raised with the simple edict that you should work hard, treat people fairly, and be patient. THERE ARE NO RICH MARTYRS! When they have a bad year with no profits, they take a second mortgage on their homes so they can afford to pay their workers a holiday bonus. It's nice to treat people fairly, but not at your expense. The only thing you're going to end up with is a large amount of personal debt.

Always work to make a good salary. THEN cover the expenses. Not the other way around. And if things are tight, don't be the only one to take a pay cut, everyone should make adjustments. 5% pay cuts all around and if you fear employees will leave, let them. If they're that uncommitted to their job, why would you want them to stick around? You are not in business to be a benefactor. You started your company to make money and build wealth. Why work for free so others don't have to tighten their belts?

I have established a rough formula for how much salary business owners should pay themselves, before profit distributions.

FORMULA: Pay yourself 3 to 4 cents on each dollar of revenue for doing the job of CEO. If you have a ten million dollar business, the ownership, should be receiving $300,000 to $400,000 in total salary.

Remember, after you and the owners pay yourselves salaries, your business should still be making profits equal to the top quarter of your industry, not the bottom half. If you can't afford to pay yourself the first few cents on every dollar, there's something seriously wrong with your business model and you need to fix it.

Paying yourself is not just a way of keeping check on the health of the business. If you're sacrificing yourself and scaling back on expenses for yourself and your family, you're not in the best position to lead. Take care of yourself first so you can stay sharp and become the kind of boss you need to be to take your business to the next level. You can't lead the way if you're behind the pack. And then by all means enjoy the good life.

5 Ways to Simplify Your Life As a Small Business Owner

Most small business owners decided to start their own business because they believed it would allow them the freedom and flexibility to set their own schedule, make their own decisions, and only work as much as they wanted to. They might have thought that running a small business would give them more personal time and the opportunity to explore other activities outside of work. However, the nature of running a small business is such that most small business owners quickly discover that their business is controlling their entire life, and that they are working much harder than they ever did at any previous job. This is why it is always crucial for business owners take a step back and consider ways in which they can simplify their lives, practice better time management, and be more focused on the issues that are truly pressing at their business.

Here are five tips that will help you if you find yourself in this predicament:

1. Quit Sweating the Small Stuff

Don't let the minutia of owning and operating a business get in the way of you working effectively to achieve larger goals. While the small details of your business are certainly important, you can't let them hold you back from the more large-scale projects and tasks that you must accomplish. The lesson applies to perfectionists too: you will either have to let the small details and problems wait, or you will need to expand your staff to take care of them for you.

2. Set Concrete Goals

One way to deal with the issue of having too many projects to deal with at the same time is to set concrete goals and follow timetables. Once a week on Monday mornings, or every day - if necessary - write down a list of the goals you hope to accomplish that week or day. Keep your goals realistic. Remember how much time you have and who is helping. No matter what issues may arise, ask yourself a few times every day, "Am I doing what I need to to accomplish my goals for the week?"

3. Stop Planning, Start Doing

There is at least one new study, blog entry, book, or Podcast published every week to help small business owners achieve success. Especially when it comes to small business marketing - a rapidly evolving and expanding field - it seems like there is way more information out there than any small business owner could feasibly comprehend and follow. This is why it is more important to take a look at what has actually worked to produce money for your business, and to use this knowledge as your own framework for success. You know your own business better than any author does, no matter how reputable they may be.

4. Allocate a Certain Amount of Time To Your Personal Life Every Week

No matter how pressing the issues confronting your business may be, there is nothing more important than your own health and happiness when it comes to running a business well. Balance is extremely important. If you are feeling overworked, exhausted, or overly stressed out, your emotions might begin to affect the way you work and the people with whom you work. There is nothing worse than snapping at a staff member or a customer because you aren't tending to your own well being. Give yourself a certain amount of time every week to spend with people you love, or doing the things you love, to help clear your head from all the work-related stress.

5. Make Your Workplace Your Happy Place

Regardless of how much you choose to follow the preceding four tips, the fact remains that, as a business owner, you will be spending a very large portion of your daily life in your workplace. This is why it is crucial to make sure that you enjoy your surroundings as much as possible. Hang up pictures of the people you love, bring some of your favorite or most sentimental pieces of art from home, or decorate in whatever other way makes you feel comfortable and at peace. Buy yourself a comfortable chair or invest in a nice sound system to play your favorite album (if the nature of your business permits it). Personalizing your work space and making it somewhere you like to spend your time will reflect in your work ethic and attitude more than you may realize.

Five Must Follow Trends for Your 2012 Events

Individuals have become digitized now-a-days with the emergence of various social media websites, interactive online games, and smart mobile devices. The present age of information and technology has provided them with new ways of connecting, interacting, and sharing their thoughts and ideas with other like-minded people. The emergence of the internet has, therefore, made organizations use the above-mentioned online channels to promote their events and activities to reach out to even more audience.

In this article, I have discussed the 5 must-follow trends for organizing events this year as well as for the upcoming ones.

Registration Software

The registration software lets you easily create and publish event registration forms online. You don't need to buy, install, or download any software or hardware to use this solution. All it needs is a PC and an internet connection to get started with the sign-up process. Since the solution is Cloud-based, anyone, sitting at any corner of the world, can access your event registration portal to complete registering their names. Moreover, this web-based registration software comes with an integrated payment option to let you easily pay the registration fees using credit cards, PayPal, and similar other standard payment gateways.

Webinars

Webinars refer to meetings and seminars hosted over the internet. You no longer have to be physically present to attend these programs. Several social media tools (Skype and so on) have made it possible for organizations to set-up an important conference from a remote location. You can even conduct multiple webinars simultaneously via the video conferencing facility. You will get to see all the participants as well as carry on live discussions and file transfers without any problem.

Social Media Networking

Organizations can use a range of highly popular social media websites to promote their products and programs online. Social media websites, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and others have millions of account holders. You can make use of these sites in your marketing ploy to make the event or product details visible to numerous people from various geographical boundaries.

Create an Application for Mobile Phones

Large to small businesses can use applications for mobile phones to market an event and keep the potential attendees engaged. Organizations can start using these mobile phone applications to send updates of their present and upcoming events to their attendees' handset.

Introduce Online Games

As an event planner, you can introduce some online interactive games for your attendees to play during an event. Through these online video games, you can create an environment where your guests will get a chance to interact with each other. It can also lead to exchange of business cards as well as have some fun and relaxation after a relevant meeting or seminar.