Small Business matters. This month we’ve reached out to various Canadian small businesses to share their experiences and insight and offer practical advice to the other businesses that make up the TELUS Talks Business community.

Today we talk to Shanda Jerrett owner of GumDrops Wet Weather Boutique, North America’s first store specializing in stylish, playful yet practical rainwear.

As a business owner, what are the business challenges that keep you up at night?

The main insomnia inducing challenges are definitely cash flow, product supply & demand.

How are you incorporating social media into your business communication?  What are you hoping to achieve with your social media initiatives?

We use most aspects of social media for our business.....Facebook FanPage, Twitter and Blogging.  As these are all intertwined it’s an effective and cost conscious way to speak with our GumDrops community. Our goal with Social media isn’t so much to make a sale but to create our community.

Quite a few businesses struggle with building their customer base and attracting new customers with limited funds and resources.  What is your advice to these businesses?

Social media for sure.  It also helps having your current team knowledgeable and excited about it (that’s how I’m using it and it’s brilliant!  They love it, and I am not much of a tweeter or blogger, so it’s great for me to have my team engaged).

How have you used technology to grow your business?

I have used the power of our website and internet to be able to source non-local (but still Canadian) manufacturers of our coats.  Also customers from a global perspective are now shopping online. I would say that the ease of use of the internet and mobile phone allows us the ability to connect anywhere any time to grow our business.

What is your greatest success as a business in 2010?  How did you make it happen?

Starting from a team of one over the summer to the fantastic team of 8 for our peak season.  I kept to my vision, never wavering on quality and expectations.

Pretend you’re considering starting a new business next year. If you could talk to yourself before embarking on this new business given today’s environment and what you know from experience, what are the two things you’d advise?

Start a skeletal team for the right positions.  Right business, right people, right seats. Plan for everything and hope it doesn’t all happen. In my 3 years of being open...I have been vandalized with graffiti, flooded, renovated (from the flood) robbed from 3 separate locations 3 times.

Fired everyone who didn't have the same vision (needless to say I was the last man standing!) won many awards, made a coat for Prince Charles & Camilla…NEVER in my wildest dreams would I have known to plan what I have undertaken in the past 3 years.  If I have learned anything it would be plan for the un-planable.  Also, have a back up for technological breakdowns.  This is a critical factor between having a hobbling company or a total breakdown.

Many small businesses struggle to maintain work/life balance.  Is this a priority for your company and if so, how are you managing it?

It is a struggle.  A business is like a baby.  If it cries you need to sooth and pacify it, if its hungry you need to feed it.  If it aches you need to apply first aid. You are ultimately responsible for how the business grows and as a baby it can be consuming.  I think for me personally because there is such a seasonal flux with our business, supply and demand, my balance is more like a 6 month on 6 month off sort of situation.  It’s not a daily balance, rather an annual ebb and flow. I think realizing this is a huge tipping point in the balance of it all.  Everyone’s work/life balance is defined differently.  You need to find your personal balance and what your limits are.

What are the things you do to motivate your team and keep them focused on the business goals?

I think firstly they need to be interested – not "just a job" mentality but a "possibility" outlook they may be starting as retail associates, but have their eye on the future.  This begins right at the interview process.  From there, once they are onboard and in the team, I embrace them as people not just "employees" (I actually detest that word). They are my team, my business family.

Simple things go along way; cards for birthdays, graduation etc., rewards and acknowledgement for going the extra mile, disciplining when necessary too.  One of the biggest things I would say is following through on promised rewards for goals obtained.  All too often companies promise incentives for goals and then don’t fulfill.  This is really damaging for morale.

What are your goals for your business for the coming year?

Solidify our retail foundation with our core team - happy team!  Consistently have our rain coats in stock. Complete franchise agreement - the manual is complete.  Take a HOLIDAY!!!

Small Business matters. This month we’ve reached out to various Canadian small businesses to share their experiences and insight and offer practical advice to the other businesses that make up the TELUS Talks Business community.

Today we talk to Marie Wiese, founder of Marketing CoPilot Inc. and Chair of the York Technology Alliance.

As a business owner, what are the business challenges that keep you up at night?

Finding new business and cash flow issues keep me up at night. Many businesses struggle with how to build lead generation into their business processes and since I do this for living, helping business owners build online strategies to drive lead generation, it is always top of mind for me.  If you aren’t selling, everything else in the business becomes more complicated including cash flow. The trick is to build a marketing engine that provides a steady stream of new business to even out the peaks and valleys. I am always looking at ways to accomplish this for myself and my clients.

Are you incorporating social media into your business communication?  If so, how?

Absolutely. Any business today that does not educate itself to take advantage of social media is going to miss out. It matters to my business in two ways: I use it to create a community around best practices in marketing and I am currently tracking solutions for small business to see how they can leverage it for brand development and lead generation.

How will you measure the success of your social media initiatives?

Before you can measure anything, you need to be clear on what the outcomes are you want from various online activities. Many companies complain that their websites don’t generate leads for the business. But in looking at the website you’ll discover a poorly articulated value proposition or no clear call to action other than a “contact us” button, so driving traffic to a website from social media efforts is a lost opportunity. You need to determine who you want to engage, what you want to say and then track how they are engaging with the story you tell. There are lots of mechanisms you can add to your website to tell if it’s working or not. But don’t get caught in thinking it’s about volume. Thousands of followers on Twitter means nothing if they are not part of the community you are trying to reach. Set your goals around who, what, when and why and measure that.

Quite a few businesses struggle with building their customer base and attracting new customers with limited funds and resources.  What is your advice to these businesses?

There are three things you need to invest in as business owner: 1. A clearly defined value proposition so the market knows why to buy from you and not your competitor. 2. An active online strategy which includes more than just a website. 3. Consistent execution. Many business owners under spend on marketing because they see it as a collection of tactics that return poor ROI. If you build it as a process in your business by following the three steps I listed, you will see amazing returns, usually within three to six months.

Have you used technology to grow your business? If so, how?

Everything we do for clients starting with the upfront consulting, used to be a manual exercise. Then we sat down and defined the process and identified where and how we could use technology to make what we do more efficient and add more value for our customers. What we uncovered was amazing. Now everything can be tracked and measured in a system: we use Freshbooks to track hours and invoicing; Basecamp for project management which we can open up to clients and let them see what is happening with a project; we use Constant Contactfor email marketing, a great self service product; we use an SEO platform, gShift Labsto help track and adjust organic search engine optimization activities and Google Analytics to closely monitor website activity. There is a product for everything these days and if you aren’t harnessing technology to optimize the processes in your business, and knitting it all together, you won’t be able to grow your business.

What is your greatest success as a business in 2010? How did you make it happen?

My greatest success in 2010 was being named Chair of the York Technology Alliance(YTA). I have been a volunteer with this organization for over five years and I strongly believe that the technology sector is the key to Canada’s future. But as an industry, it is still relatively new and fragmented. Helping the tech community in Toronto rally together to create an ecosystem to foster growth has been incredibly fulfilling for me. I made it happen because I got involved and dedicated my time. The organization has grown substantially in the last five years due to all the board volunteers who share the vision of a strong tech sector for Canada. I am proud to lead that group.

Pretend you’re considering starting a new business next year. If you could talk to yourself before embarking on this new business given today’s environment and what you know from experience, what are two things you’d advise?

There are two themes I would pursue in any new business venture: scarcity and being remarkable. There are a million ways to solve a business problem today. Competition is fierce and instantaneous. Author Seth Godin puts it well when he says, “If you're creating a business, figure out what contribution you make and what you offer that your competitors can't. Scarcity creates value”. Once you figure out what creates scarcity and not just a “me too” product or service, figure out how to do it in a way that is remarkable and that no one else is doing. People will tell other people about you and you will never have a lead generation (sales) problem in your business.

Many small businesses struggle to maintain work/life balance.  Is this a priority for your company and if so, how are you managing it?

One of the decisions we made in our business was to not take formal office space. With today’s great online tools and technologies, our philosophy is to find the very best people for the job regardless of where they are located. Not having a formal office means you aren’t investing in something that does not contribute to the bottom line, it forces you to put processes in place to manage people to the work that needs to be done and it lets people be more flexible in their personal life. Having homes offices means our kids see us before they leave for school in the morning, it eliminates a lot of commuting hours and reduces our corporate carbon footprint.

What are the things you do to motivate your team and keep them focussed on the business goals?

Our team is motivated by coming up with new ways to do something. In every new client project we take on, I give the team the opportunity to bring forward something new they have seen or a book they have read that has an interesting spin on the business problem we are solving. We don’t take the manufacturing approach to building marketing programs for clients. And although we are big on process and milestones, each project has a new twist that someone gets to try out.

What are your goals for your business in 2011?

We have three very distinct goals for 2011:

1. Building the Marketing CoPilot Community – we believe that a partnership approach to building a business is the way of the future. We are building a community of businesses, consultants, current clients, past clients, friends and colleagues to help inspire people to harness the power and simplify the process of marketing for their business.
   
2. Launch our Montreal office – we want to recreate our community in Montreal and serve clients in both French and English
   
3. Add more services to our Virtual Marketing Manager product – there are lots of new marketing tools coming out and we want to be able to offer new online products to clients to generate better results
   

Thank you. Please give our readers a quick overview of your business. (Name, location, size, services provided etc.) If you would like to provide contact information or a website address for your business that would appear with your survey answers, please do so.

Marketing CoPilot can be found online at www.marketingcopilot.comwhere you can subscribe to our blog to get practical marketing solutions for your business. Marketing CoPilot builds integrated marketing processes tied to strategic business goals and measured in their contribution to business results. Our service, Virtual Marketing Manageracts as an outsourced marketing department that designs and executes online strategies in such areas as search engine optimization, email marketing and content development. You can connect with founder, Marie Wiese on LinkedIn http://ca.linkedin.com/in/virtualmarketingmanagement

Would we be able to cope with bad news as well as good? As a small business owner, planning ahead for your success is vital but it would be impossible to predict all of the challenges you may encounter.

A few examples might be:

• Your business takes off at a pace you are unable to keep up with, you are overwhelmed with all the work involved and the only solution is delegation. Unfortunately a lot of small business owners have trust issues and find it difficult to delegate to someone fearing they might not do the work quickly enough or even to the same standards they themselves would.
• You have decided to offer a newsletter to gain more exposure for your business but fail to keep the deadline due to either personal or work challenges. This could mean all the credibility you worked hard for is lost due to not being consistent and sending out the newsletter when subscribers expect it or not at all.
• Health challenges come and go but serious health issues may mean you are not able to work, or have to work reduced hours. The emotional toll alone can cause added health issues such as stress, but getting behind with your orders, or appointments with clients can mean loss of income. Did you plan ahead and obtain health insurance that would help you survive this time?

I had no idea of my future when I founded my first business and unfortunately due to a serious operation I was not able to work for a couple of months. Luckily for me I had enough notice that I would need surgery, and the date, so I was able to book ahead into the next year to ensure I could still speak at conferences. It was during this slow time that I decided to write my first book and the experience allowed me to plan ahead for any such challenges in the future. Some ideas I implemented were hiring a part time administrative assistant who I trusted and knew could cope with the work load. Obviously all businesses are different but if you know when your slow times are that’s a good time to work on initiatives that can assist you, if you do need to take time off work for any reason. A few examples could be:

• Automating your email systems to include out of office responses – thus ensuring your clients know you are not available and will answer emails upon your return;
• Portfolio of services: cut back and only work on activities that generate the most revenue;
• Knowing to whom you can delegate, in advance;
• Working on your time management to better productivity;
• Being able to network online as well as face to face means you are still in touch with the outside world. Become familiar with such social media sites as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Sprouter. This will help you maintain a presence and also keep in touch with your connections.

Linda Ockwell-Jenner is President of Motivational Steps and Co-Founder of the Small Business Community Network (SBCN) based in Waterloo Region. Find out more about Linda at www.motivationalsteps.com and www.sbcncanada.org

In Canada and throughout the world, more and more consumers are going online to search for goods and services. As a result, search engine advertising has become incredibly valuable to businesses of all sizes.

Based on comScore, qSearch key measures, April 2010, currently more than 25.7 million Canadians use search engines to learn about a product or service in Canada.  Plus, according to eMarketer, Time Spent Online per Week by Internet Users in Canada, by Age, Q4 2009 (hour), Canada has some of the world’s most committed Internet users, who spend an average of 19 hours per week online.

Search advertising is different from other forms of online advertising that are usually priced based on the number of times an ad is shown on a web page. With search advertising, you don’t buy eyeballs, you buy clicks. So you pay only for the number of times your ad is clicked on. It’s an attractive alternative to more conventional forms of advertising.

Search ads appear only as a result of your prospect’s online search on your specific subject area. As a result, there is a much stronger likelihood they will click on your ad. And that means you can help build more awareness, more leads, and, ultimately, more revenue potential for your company.

Search Advertising is simple, easy, and affordable.

• You control the costs and pay only when someone clicks on your ad – clicks can start as low as $.05
  
• Microsoft Advertising adCenter makes it easy to set up, monitor, and make changes to your search campaign
  
• Dedicated search experts are available online and by phone to help with any stage of your campaign development
  

Top Tips to Getting Started

1. Target your customers: The Internet delivers greater reach but also greater segmentation of the audience. It is easy to target who you want to see your ad and you can restrict targeting by day, geography or demographics. Are you trying to reach women, 45-65 or university–aged males?
   
2. Create a high impact advertisement: You can write a compelling & relevant text ad that describes your products and services or the specific offer you have available.
   
3. Develop business specific keywords: Microsoft Advertising adCenter has tools that can help you create and manage your keywords. A successful trick is to pick a variety of keywords that your customers are likely to use when searching specifically for your product and service.
   
4. Guidelines to setting your budget: With search advertising, you pay to increase the ranking of your website when someone searches for relevant content. Set a monthly budget that reflects how much you want to spend, and when. You control whether it is spent evenly throughout a month or spent until depleted.
   

To see how others have benefited from search advertising, check out these case studies.

Melanie Martin, Microsoft Advertising.

This is the second of a series of blog posts on how to leverage the web to better market your small business.  If you have thoughts or tips on marketing your business with Microsoft Advertising, join the conversation.

Much has been written and said about enterprise sustainability. Today’s sustainable enterprise is required to balance financial performance with management of their overall environmental footprint and community level impact – something we call the triple bottom line.

Up until now, a majority of the attention and most of the industry solutions have focused on greenhouse gas (GHG) abatement programs associated with the smokestacks that generate energy and/or the factories that purchase energy (scope 1 and scope 2 emissions source in GHG Protocol parlance http://www.ghgprotocol.org/standards/corporate-standard). And with good reason - the industrial sector is the largest single source of emissions. But it is certainly not the only one.

Office buildings and work related transportation also account for a surprisingly large part of the total emissions. In fact, according to the US EPA and US Department of Energy:

• Office buildings account for almost 70% of all electrical consumption, 12% of water usage, 30% of all GHG emissions, and 65% of all landfill waste; and
  
  
• transportation sources (including employees traveling for work related business and commuting to / from their office) account for more than 25% of all GHG emissions.
  
  

By omitting these important sources, decision makers may be lulled into incorrect assumptions regarding corporate sustainability performance and overlook pursuing quick win emissions mitigation projects within their own organization and across their supply chain. One of our basic propositions at Teletrips is that organizations have been leaving a tremendous amount of opportunity on the table simply because they have been basing their efforts on a flawed assumption regarding today’s knowledge based workforce – “employees need to be in one central location everyday to effectively get their jobs done."

The reality is the 21st Century workforce is free from the traditional limits of time and location. Employees can work and collaborate from geographically dispersed locations by leveraging advances in information and telecommunications technologies. And more intelligent workplace and workforce management practices can enable employees to work seamlessly across an integrated network of places including: home, satellite offices, distributed work centers, customer/partner sites or any other workplace outside the main office. Employees today simply have the ability to work more intelligently.

Thinking differently about today’s knowledge based workforce will open a host of new enterprise sustainability opportunities focused on intelligent workspace and workforce management. These sources have the potential to unlock massive triple bottom line savings for our businesses, for our employees, for our environment, and for the communities where we live and work. After all, the most sustainable buildings are the ones you never had to build and the most environmentally responsible commute is the one you avoided completely.

We know what is possible but we need a more intelligent work infrastructure where our real estate management policies, supporting technologies and organization practices catch up to the requirements of the 21st century workforce. We need an enterprise infrastructure that will help reduce travel time and increase mobility. We need a system that will cut congestion and reduce harmful emissions. And we need a work environment that will manage costs, drive productivity and enhance employee engagement. This is no longer a “nice-to-have” it is what we must demand of today’s sustainable enterprise.

Ian Gover is a pioneer in the field of distributed work. He has focused his entire career on helping organizations optimize their technology, workplace and human capital management infrastructure to provide a better match for today’s flexible workforce requirements. As President & CEO of Teletrips, Ian works with public sector organizations and Fortune 500 companies to help them improve their triple bottom line performance - improving employee effectiveness, realizing millions in operational savings, and achieving significant improvements in environmental efficiency. Prior to Teletrips, Ian held executive and senior management positions with Sun Microsystems and PricewaterhouseCoopers. He holds a Master of Science degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic in New York.

Teletrips (www.teletrips.com) is the leading provider of software as a service tools that help organizations improve their triple bottom line performance through Intelligent Workplace and Workforce Management. The Intelligent Enterprise Software as a Service Platform is helping organizations around the world realize millions in operational savings, improve employee effectiveness and achieve significant improvements in environmental efficiency. The company’s diagnostic, design, reporting and analytical software has been used by the US EPA and Environment Canada’s Commuter Challenge, as well as other government agencies and private corporations throughout the US and Canada.

Do you have a question about building a sustainable enterprise? Create a profile and join the conversation.

Every successful business starts with a great idea.  But a great idea doesn’t always equal success.

At TELUS, small business matters.  We're committed to helping small business owners navigate the complexities and “unknowns” of getting started. Learn more at: www.telus.com/startup. 

In this series, we will be highlighting excerpts of some tools and resources available in the website to help turn your great idea into a successful business.  Today’s post will focus on marketing your business.

1. Define your unique selling proposition

To get customers, you have to identify exactly what you offer and why people should come to you rather than to your competitors. In marketing terms, this is known as your "unique selling proposition". The secret is to identify the one thing about your business that's different. It could be as simple as you. With your special attention to service and the way you care for your customers, you offer something that people can't get anywhere else. Or perhaps it's the little extras you provide, like home delivery or after-hours service.

One model that may be helpful to find areas of differentiation is a SWOT analysis - where owners have an honest discussion around their business' (S)trengths, (W)eaknesses, (O)pportunities and (T)hreats.

Wikipedia defines a SWOT analysis as, specifying the objective of the business venture or project and identifying the internal and external factors that are favorable and unfavorable to achieve that objective.  With this information in hand, you will have the information you need to create an appropriate marketing strategy that will help you achieve your business objectives.

Industry Canada provides some tips and tools on how to create a targeted SWOT analysis.

2. Create a Web site

It can be easier and less expensive than you think. A good Web site makes it easy for prospective customers to find you, and then gives them enough information to buy from you.

Start by thinking about the words you would use if you were searching for a business like yours. Think of the most obvious phrases – like “auto repair, Kelowna”. Try to incorporate those words into the headline or first paragraph of your home page as this is where search engines look first. Remember also that people won’t stay on your Web site for more than a few seconds unless they find what they’re looking for. Be sure to give them as much information, with as little padding, as possible.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is key to maximizing traffic to your website.  Google’s Matt Cutts provides small businesses with some free tips on how to get better visibility on Google:

3. Stand out in the crowd

Surprisingly, being a small business actually gives you a number of advantages. You can make decisions faster, process orders quickly, get to know your customers better, offer them the benefits of your lower overhead and more. The secret is to be different and the trick is to figure out what will work best for you: a back to basics approach, innovation, or looking for new opportunities by selling to larger corporations.

PT Barnum was a master at promoting his business and differentiating himself from the competition.  In a previous blog post, Evan Carmichael provided practical advice for small businesses on how to sell, promote, and showcase your business like P.T. Barnum.

Many small businesses are ‘standing out’ by using social media to engage with their customers in new and unique ways.  Entrepreneur Magazine provides some great advice to small businesses with “the top 5 things you should know about social media”:

Ali Jafri is the Vice-President, small-medium business for Alberta, at TELUS.

Small Business matters.  This month we’ve reached out to various Canadian small businesses to share their experiences, insight and offer practical advice to the other businesses that make up the TELUS Talks Business community.

Meet David Ursino.  A Royal LePage realtor in Vaughan, Ontario with over 10 years of successful sales and marketing experience and a passion for technology, particularly social media.  David has uniquely connected his passion with his business, by being “Vaughan’s first real estate video blogger” and uses online marketing to maximize the success of his business.  We’ve captured his insights below.

As a business owner, what are the business challenges that keep you up at night?

As a real estate agent in Vaughan I know there’s a lot of competition out there.  I’m constantly learning and improving my skills and figuring out ways I can stand out from the crowd.  I have a knack for technology and I’m often up late at night evaluating various technologies, especially focusing around social media to find better ways to connect with potential clients.

How are you incorporating social media into your business communication?

I really enjoy social media.  A lot of businesses use social media, but they see it as simply a way to post their profiles and products on a platform different than their website.  They are not engaging they’re users well and most importantly they are not contributing.  Social media is about connecting with the user and contributing your expertise.  I’ve been focusing on Facebook and Twitter and Youtube, although I use many more as well.   I’m the first...and currently the only realtor in Vaughan that video blogs about Vaughan real estate.  I think it’s a great way for people to see how genuine I am and how passionate I am about what I do.  It’s also a great way to educate potential clients on various issues relating to Vaughan real estate and to get a behind the scenes look at real estate.

How do you measure the success of your social media initiatives? 

Ahhh...the ever-present question.  A tough one for most businesses.  Believe it or not, it’s really easy for me since I’m a real estate agent.  I’m able to speak with all my clients personally, all I have to do is ask “how did you hear about me?”

Quite a few businesses struggle with building their customer base and attracting new customers with limited funds and resources.  What is your advice to these businesses?

Build an online presence (it’s cheap if not free) and make sure you’re genuine and transparent.  Start contributing advice, answering questions, be helpful.  Today’s consumer is smart and tech-savy.  If you come across as a pushy sales person, or someone that just cares about pushing their product and/or agenda  you will lose followers.  Today’s consumer doesn’t want sales or marketing messages shoved down their throats.  They want things customized, they want authenticity, they want things personalized.   Most importantly, if you mess up, own up to it and fix it...fast.

How have you used technology to grow your business?

Most agents tend to shy away from technology.  I embrace it.  I’ve stayed away from template websites in favour of a custom website that allows me to be nimble and quickly post relevant content.   I manage and administer everything on my site. I shoot my video blogs using my iPhone, so I don’t even have to carry around an extra camera...i love it.  My website has helped grow my business by increasing my exposure to Vaughan’s residents.  I’ve only been doing it for a few months, but I’m already generating leads that I would otherwise not have received.

What is your greatest success as a business in 2010? How did you make it happen?

My greatest success in 2010 has been the creation of my online presence.  It’s allowed me to create new relationships and I love that.  I’ve devoted a lot of time to my website and all the work I do on social media.  I create 2-4 video blogs a week.  It’s time consuming, but the pay off is worth it,  I get to meet with people I would otherwise not know.

Pretend you’re considering starting a new business next year. If you could talk to yourself before embarking on this new business given today’s environment and what you know from experience, what are two things you’d advise?

Don’t get discouraged if things don’t work out at first.  Have patience.  If you love what you’re doing keep on doing it.
Surround yourself by people that are successful.

Many small businesses struggle to maintain work/life balance.  Is this a priority for your company and if so, how are you managing it?

I’m self-employed and I’m on my own.  I need to do everything for my business by myself.  Having said that, my wife, daughter and friends are important to me.  I gauge success not only by how much money I make, but how happy I am.  The first thing that goes into my schedule is my time off.  This is the time I spend with my family and friends and it keeps me happy.  I then schedule my work events.  I think it’s a positive way to keep a work/life balance.  If I ever get to a point where I can’t manage the two, then I could hire some help, but for now, I’m happy being on my own.

What are your goals for your business in 2011?

Continue to explore ways to connect with followers online.  Stop spending money on print media.

David films his video blogs with his iPhone 4.

For more information on David, visit: www.davidursino.com.

Now that October is here – "Small Business Month," for those in the know – it's a fitting time to discuss how to stay productive and connected on the daily commute, safely, thanks to a few hands-free apps for smartphones.

Most would argue that everysmall business is made up of mobile workers. Small business owners are always in motion and join the millions of mobile workers who drive to and from the office each day. Everybody can take advantage of a number of inexpensive apps that use text-to-speech technology to read messages in a human-like voice. In some cases, these apps also allow you to reply using your voice.

iSpeech.Org's DriveSafe.ly, for example, can read your incoming emails and text messages to those running BlackBerry, iPhone, Android or Windows Mobile devices. The sender also gets an automated reply to confirm the message has been received, though this feature can be disabled, if desired. The free version reads the first 25 words of each new incoming message, but upgrading to the Pro version ($30) gives you the first 500 words of a message, the choice of female or male voice, and other benefits.

Similarly, the free Text'nDriveapp for BlackBerry or iPhone (and soon, Android) also allows you to listen to your incoming messages, but the Pro version ($10) also gives you the option to reply to messages by speaking into the phone or paired Bluetooth device. Hands Free Software's app can automatically configure Gmail, Hotmail and MobileMe user accounts, while those with other email accounts might need to first input some info, such as POP or IMAP and SMTP settings.

Critics speak up

But using these apps could still serve as a distraction while behind the wheel, cautions Carmi Levy, an independent technology analyst based in London, Ontario.

"While these new apps hold the promise of maintaining productivity while on the go, they ignore the basic fact that even hands-free communication at the wheel can be a dangerous proposition," says Levy. "Even if these apps free drivers from the illegal tyranny of texting with one hand and driving with the other, they nevertheless serve as a distraction by splitting the driver's focus between the road and his or her work."

Scott Steinberg, CEO and lead technology analyst for TechSavvy Global in Seattle, agrees with Levy: "Anydistraction while on the road takes away from your concentration, but this is better than holding the phone up to your ear, which also may be illegal in your province, and is certainly safer than texting or emailing while driving," says Steinberg.

Levy says these apps work as advertised for the most part, but as with many mobile solutions, some devices are better than others at supporting interactive voice sessions in a noisy vehicle. "If your particular phone's speakerphone capability is limited to begin with, these apps won't magically fix it," cautions Levy. "In many cases, Bluetooth headsets or in-car speakerphone solutions might improve the back-and-forth speech capability."

"Network support is another issue, as services which work flawlessly in an area with strong wireless coverage may fail miserably if you drive into a rural 3G dead zone," adds Levy.

Security, privacy concerns

Unlike DriveSafe.ly, Text'nDriverequires users to divulge their email password, which might concern some. Levy, however, says there isn't much to worry about as long as they're trustworthy software makers. "The security risk from sharing your email password with a third party is no greater with these apps than with any other," believes Levy.

"It's common for us to share email addresses for our web-based accounts with a range of third-party apps and services -- this is no different, and as long as the company is legitimately trustworthy, users can proceed without concern that their passwords will be stolen and their accounts hacked," adds Levy.

Small Business matters.  This month we’ve reached out to various Canadian small businesses to share  their experiences, insight and offer practical advice to the other businesses that make up the TELUS Talks Business community.     I had the pleasure of speaking with Nicole Beauvais-Holt, Creative Director and Co-owner at The Life & Times News Magazine Group, producing event and lifestyle based publications in the Simcoe County region for 6 years.  And while most business owners are still struggling with getting into social media, Nicole and her team have jumped right in.  This is the first post of a two-part blog. Today we'll explore what keeps Nicole up at night as a small business owner and how she leverages relationships, social media and technology to grow her business.

As a small business owner, what are the things that keep you up at night?

Our revenue model has been - up until recently - strictly advertising based. Surprisingly when the world was falling to pieces over the recession, we experienced higher than expected sales in advertising. It was as if businesses of all sizes were going to push through the doom and gloom.

First and second quarters this year are definitely in a different state compared with last year though. We are seeing what you would have thought would have been the response to news of a recession. Cash flow therefore is probably one of the biggest things that keep you up. It doesn’t matter how many sales you have on the books or in the pipeline, if you can’t collect on those sales it stalls your business and puts you in a precarious position with your own bank, creditors, etc.

Probably the next thing that keeps you up at night is your employees. We have anywhere from 3-4 contract employees at any given time. It would appear that on all levels it is a multi-tasking society. With families mostly having two parents at work you tend to see a lot of appointments, sick days, field trips and other demands on parents. No one begrudges a person the need to look after one’s health but when these absences are coupled with vacation time, it can make it very hard to get a good flow going. The results of our employees’ efforts are always measurable at the end of the month by the numbers in sales they were able to book. You can usually put a paper trail as to why that person had a good or bad month based on the number of consistent days spent selling.

Technology plays a role in making our business as well as slowing our business down. Everyone knows that once you have logged in and checked your status, tweets and networked a little on Linked-in, you can easily eat up an hour of your day. We are finding that more and more sales people are relying on an email relationship with existing customers and to break new ground. It is a ‘throw a dart’ format in a business where nothing beats a face-to-face relationship. Emails give potential clients an easy pass on the sale. It’s a lot harder to say no to someone’s face.

You mentioned social media.  How are you implementing social media for your business?  What are you hoping to achieve with your social media initiatives? 

We use Facebook and Twitter to reach out to readers and advise them of upcoming events and press releases for our area that may not have made it into print due to deadlines. We quickly discovered that Facebook ‘spreads’ the word about our publications without us even having to try. By virtue of the sidebar that asks “would you like to be friends with Life and Times, you have X friends in common” it is a brilliant viral awareness tool.  Our friend list has been growing steadily since we joined with really very little effort in promoting.

Facebook more so than Twitter allows us to engage our readers and our friends and get a conversation going – even something as simple as “what have you got planned for the weekend?” In the media business you want to have a line of communication with your readers.

I will be honest with you here and say that we really haven’t even begun to tap into the potential for the social networking as a marketing initiative and only because there just never seems to be enough time/manpower to make it work the way it could  work. I know that simply being a part of it is important enough at the moment. It keeps us level with the big boys.

Quite a few businesses struggle with building their customer base and attracting new customers with limited funds and resources.  What is your advice to these businesses?

Face-to-face relationships first and foremost. Email maintenance as a secondary mode of keeping in touch and keeping them up-to-date on new things happening.

How have you used technology to grow your business? How has this helped you differentiate yourself from the competition?

In our line of business there is very little to differentiate between the competition. We all have web sites, we all have social networking links, we all incorporate video, flash and any other bells and whistles that come up. You have to have an online option for publications because there is an entire generation that only knows how to do things with a computer. Now it would seem not only do you have to have an online edition but you need to be ready for the army of smartphone users.

Join us tomorrow as we explore Nicole's greatest successes, advice for other small business owners and her focus for 2011.

Every successful business starts with a great idea.  But a great idea doesn’t always equal success.

At TELUS, small business matters.  That’s why we’ve put together a website to help small business owners navigate the complexities and “unknowns”, by putting it all in one place: www.telus.com/startup.  In this series, we will be highlighting excerpts of some tools and resources available in the website to help turn your great idea into a successful business.

1.       Talk to everyone you know

Without giving away any secrets you may have, try your ideas out on different people to see what they think. While you're doing this, you may also discover great connections you didn't know you had. For example, your friends and acquaintances may be able to introduce you to other businesses or people who can help you succeed, perhaps by providing information and advice, partnering with your business or simply by becoming customers.

yourBusinessChannel, put together a short video clip of well known London entrepreneurs, whose advice resonates with small business owners around the world:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEm1Xy5xgMU

2.       Write a business plan

It will probably take you two weeks or so to write and refine your business plan. Remember, this is the blueprint for how your business will work and how you plan for it to succeed. If you need to ask your bank or another third party for financing, they'll want to see your plan.  Here’s a good example of a business plan (www.office.microsoft.com).

This is an important step and not one to take lightly.  In fact, Tim Berry, president of Palo Alto Software and author of The Plan-As-You-Go Business Plan believes building a business plan is “a process, not just a plan”.

Entrepreneur offers advice on writing a business plan and ensuring it’s treated as a living document.  Additionally, The Wall Street Journal, provides a tool that offers 100+ free sample business plans for various industries including retail, restaurant or consultants.

3.       Choosing your essential technology

Today, customers and potential customers want to be able to reach you in many different ways. They may want to browse through your website, place an order online, phone for your business hours or email you with a request for more information. In many cases, they’ll also expect you to respond to them outside regular business hours. To make sure you’re always there for them, it’s vital that you have the right technology.

Below showcases a number of small business owners who demonstrate how technology has helped them grow their business:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TawNhI-pZzY

Ali Jafri is the Vice-President, small-medium business for Alberta, at TELUS.

Join the conversation.  Share your top three tips with other entrepreneurs on making your business successful.