IMO: No to Franchise Bailout Plans

There was this question from Joel Libaya, expert from Small Business Trends, about granting bailout plans for franchises and I would like to quote one of Joel’s response to the comments.

My point was that if the banks and the domestic automakers can get a bailout for their blunders, why can’t the franchise industry get some cash, too?

Well, I get his point toward this bailout plans but this has an obvious downside if ever this is to be granted.

Can you imagine hundreds or maybe thousands of franchises who happens to fail and will all fall in line in the banks to ask for bailout on their franchises? I couldn’t honestly take that scenario! So definitely, it’s a NO for me.

Will Automating Your Business Helps?

Well, of course!

Who would want to keep their valuable files printed and stored in cabinet for  years? Who would want to spend days locating a certain file in piles of papers in your cabinets? Who would want to fill at least 30 to 40 floor area of space just for storage of your files? Well, it will definitely take me years (exaggeration) to completely state and share to you all the disadvantages of such situation just to convince you in automating your business.

Racial Barriers for Business?

Over at MercuryNews.Com, I found this article about racial barriers for business.  It is actually a group which discusses racial barriers to small business success.

Small businesses still face significant racial, ethnic and gender disparities. And Santa Cruz is not immune to these trends.

A group of local panelists, including Mayor Ryan Coonerty, led a discussion about these issues before an audience of students, UC Santa Cruz professors and small business owners at the University Inn and Conference Center on Thursday night.

“The future of Santa Cruz depends on small business,” Coonerty said.

UCSC professor of economics Robert Fairlie led the discussion with his study about business-ownership disparities in the United States. The other panelists included Teresa Thomae, director of the Central Coast Small Business Development Center, and Carmen Herrera-Mansir, executive director of El Pajaro Community Development Corp.

Fairlie spoke of closing the gap of success between white- and minority-owned businesses, especially given the state of the economy. His study found large differences in business performance based on race. Average sales for white-owned businesses were $440,000, compared with $292,000 for Asians, $141,000 for Latinos and $74,000 for blacks.

Two major factors contributing to the disparities, he found, were education level and startup capital.

Well, you can read more about this article over at MercuryNews.Com!

The Importance of Landing Pages

Anita Campbell of Small Business Trends is celebrating her week-long birthday by giving gifts to her loyal readers and one that she cited is about Free Landing Pages templates.  I honestly did not have any idea about it but she stated there the importance of having a landing page.

A landing page is a special page created for the express purpose of “converting” website visitors — to get those visitors to take some action such as filling out a lead form or subscribing to a newsletter.  If, for instance, you were running an ad campaign to generate leads online, you would point the ad to your landing page, rather than to your home page where the visitor might get lost or frustrated.

Anita have shared more about this landing page and you can check out and download it for free from her article –Free Landing Page Templates.

Government Managed or Free Market Capitalism?

Scott Shane shared about Managed versus Market Capitalism and his thoughts that a managed capitalism will work better than a free market.

I personally prefer a free market system but what has a government managed capitalism can do in our economy?  Let me give you a very simple comparison of both and it’s up for you decide which side you take on.

In a market capitalist system, capital and land are private property. Enterprises may be formed by individuals who can get access to land and equipment, either because they own it or can rent or borrow to get it, and who can hire labor or employ themselves. Enterprises organize and direct production, and they are operated for the private benefit of the person who organizes the enterprise. Private benefit is interpreted as profit, so we say that the enterprises maximize profits.

In ideal market capitalism, the equilibrium outputs are efficient. Efficiency is important, but there are some criticisms even of ideal capitalism. Even in ideal capitalism, the distribution of property and income could be very unequal. Ultimately, the benefits and costs reflect the subjective preferences of consumers who have money to spend. One might want to put more weight on the preferences of people who cannot spend, that is, on the welfare of the poor.

One response to these criticisms is that government can step in and correct the failure of the market to provide the desired and (in some cases) efficient outcome. Governments can subsidize the poor and can subsidize or provide the goods and services that ought to be, but are not demanded by consumers, and the government can finance this out of taxes, including taxes on those goods that consumers demand although they ought not. Monopoly can be regulated and to some extent prevented through antitrust legislation. Regulation, taxes, and subsidies can be used to promote efficient outcomes in cases of public goods and external costs and benefits. Deliberate government spending, tax reductions, and interest rate manipulation may move the market system toward market equilibrium if it falls short for the reasons Keynesian economics envisions.

But this is rather a long list of jobs for government, and if government does any large fraction of them, we no longer have market capitalism but government-managed capitalism. Free-market conservatives will point this out, and will point out that, however imperfect markets may be, government too is imperfect. Just as markets will sometimes fail to deliver the outcomes we want, government too often fails to do the jobs we set for it. What it means in this context is that some of these failings of real-world capitalism cannot be remedied without risking a greater evil in government failure, and some cannot be remedied at all. Real systems are not ideal but imperfect systems, and real capitalist systems will fall short of our hopes on at least several scores. And that has been no secret for a several hundred of years, IMO.

There’s No Golden Parachutte in Business

I found this article over PowerHomeBiz and it is really helpful I should say because  it reminded me that when you’re a small business owner there’s no “Golden Parachute”, no Massive Severance Package or Stock Options to cash in on and there are definitely no bailouts. The success or failure of your small business is all on your shoulders!

Here Are 10 Quick and Easy Strategies to Increase Sales and Profits During a Recession brought to us by Marketing and Sales Expert Ron Romano.

This is just a short list on the many things that are possible. Now the question is, do you want to recession proof your business and achieve massive results or do you want to lay down and play dead and hope things get better? It’s your choice!