Your EnterQuest Bulletin - Issue 172
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| Thought for the week: "Buying is based on perceived needs and wants. The most successful sellers supply both." Jack Franklin |
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In this week's issue:
If
you have any questions about your business idea or target market, or need help tracking down a grant, subsidy or business support
in your local area, then send an e-mail with your query to the EnterQuest
information team and we'll do our best to help.
Send
your question to enterquest@cobwebinfo.com.
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To
access over 800 factsheets, guides and small business reports, go
to www.scavenger.net. |
Where to find a small business idea
Dragons' Den is back on our screens, showcasing business ideas ranging from the weird (furry toilet seat covers) to the wonderful (single egg cookers).
One of the most common things the EnterQuest team encounters when we visit business start up shows is the sheer volume of people who are keen to start a business, but don't have a clue where to find an idea.
So if you could see yourself pitching to the panel of dragons, but haven't the foggiest where to start looking for an idea, here's a rundown of the most useful ideas sites, tools and generators on the web for finding and researching new business ideas:
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Find Articles lists news articles and features on just about any topic - use it to learn what's hot and what's not.
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The Trends Portal has information and news about a range of global trends, categorised by sector.
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The Global Ideas Bank profiles a randomly selected idea each day, and also features lists of the most popular, most recent and most humorous ideas submitted to the site.
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Idea A Day is an inspiration service showcasing one idea each day - it also publishes The Big Idea Book, which is an excellent read.
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The UnLtd Ideas Bank lists emerging social enterprise ideas and opportunities with a community slant.
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For business ideas you can run from home, check out the Jobs & Moms career centre.
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The Idea Café features a range of ideas and concepts for different types of ventures.
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Finally, if franchising is your thing, this alphabetical franchise directory is a good place to start.
Understanding self-assessment for tax
When you start up a new venture, there's one key organisation you'll definitely need to deal with that is extremely strict when it comes to getting what it is owed by business owners.
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC).
The rules and types of tax are slightly different depending on the legal structure of your business, but the principle is the same: you have to register with HMRC, and you have to pay your tax on time. If you don't, you'll face financial penalties, can be forced to cease trading, and in extreme cases may face imprisonment.
Here's a summary of the main rules for income tax self-assessment:
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If you want HMRC to calculate tax on your behalf, the form must be returned by 30 September. If you are happy to calculate the tax yourself, the form must be returned by 31 January to avoid incurring an automatic £100 penalty.
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It is compulsory for self-employed people to maintain tax-related records throughout the tax year, and to keep them for five years after the latest date by which your tax return is to be filed. These records include bank or building society statements, receipts, expenses and any other item that is necessary to prove your income and expenditure figures in your tax return. A penalty of up to £3,000 may be imposed for failure to retain adequate records.
For more guidance, check out our guide to self-assessment for tax, along with our practical summary of how to meet tax deadlines in 2006.
There's also plenty of assistance and advice available to help you get it right from HMRC itself - check out its guidance for self-employed people completing tax returns, as well as its downloadable booklet for start up businesses.
More new information about the age discrimination law
With just under eight weeks to go before the introduction of the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006, there's even more guidance and information being published for business owners struggling to prepare for the new rules.
Firms are being warned that they should organise their employment contracts and revise their recruitment processes well ahead of the new law coming into force, or risk facing tribunal claims if they are found to be discriminating against staff on the grounds of age. It has been reported that the new rules represent one of the most important pieces of legislation in the history of UK employment law.
For a useful factsheet about all the anti-discrimination regulations currently in force in the UK, you can also check out our guide to equal opportunity regulations.
Setting up your own podcast
Increasing numbers of ventures have been bitten by the blog bug - but have you taken the plunge into the world of podcasting yet?
An excellent example of a small business that has used podcasting to great effect is Wiggly Wigglers, which is a mail order business supplying goods for wildlife gardening. The firm says its podcast, which has attracted national media attention, is "like the Archers, but real". Rather than a shopfront, it uses the weekly broadcast to talk about what's happening on the farm where the firm is based.
Known in some circles as 'audioblogging', podcasting needn't be too complex or expensive to put together, and there is plenty of information available online which will guide you through the process.
The basic steps are:
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Decide what your podcast will be about - if you're using music, ensure you are aware of the copyright issues (see our guide to musical copyright for more information) - then prepare your presentation.
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Record it - Audacity is a free sound editor you can download to your PC.
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Save your podcast into MP3 format and add ID3 tags - see Cast Wiki to learn how to do this. These tags help people to find the podcast.
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Decide where you want to put your podcast - sites such as MyPodcasts.net will host it for you if you agree to advertise its service on your website.
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If you want people to subscribe to receive your podcast directly rather than them having to continually revisit your site, you could consider creating an RSS feed for the podcast. See this tutorial from the University of Edinburgh for details on how to do this.
If you want to be taken step-by-step through the process, there are a number of easy to follow tutorials online including:
If you have a Mac, it's worth reading up about its GarageBand music composing and recording software, which comes free with most new Macs.
Each
week we provide you with summaries of some popular or emerging business
ideas in the UK.
Here
is this week's idea:
Regularly improving your vocabulary is not just about learning a new word and its meaning. It will improve your general knowledge and make you feel and act smarter in all sorts of personal and business situations.
Do you know what 'inveigh' means?
a) to start legal proceedings against another business
b) to promote or grant additional responsibility to an employee
c) to protest against or attack
d) to infer meaning from written material
Answer at the end of the Bulletin.
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The PRIME Initiative
www.primeinitiative.org.uk
This is the organisation that provides business support and advice for entrepreneurs aged over 50 - but how user-friendly and accessible is its website? |
Navigation
and presentation - too much information is included on the homepage, which means you have to scroll down endlessly to reach the bottom. However, the various different parts of the site are clearly signposted, and contact details are listed prominently.
 
Accessibility - perhaps surprisingly, we couldn't find any accessibility options on this site. Images don't have description tags, there's no assistance with downloading PDFs and no option to view the site in text-only format, and there isn't any help for users of other browsers.
Content
and usefulness - the 'you in business' section of the site rather disappointingly focuses more on success stories about individuals PRIME has helped, rather than on practical information for olderpreneurs. However, the research section of the site is packed with useful and interesting data, and there's a great forum for entrepreneurs to exchange tips and expertise.
Relevance - the publication of news stories on the site averages at around two per month, but there is also an events calendar and a number of longer features about topical issues.
Half marks for a site that would be improved by adding some more practical how-to guidance for aspiring business owners, as well as by the inclusion of even basic accessibility options.
Our rating - 10/20
There's a crackdown on eBay crooks
Thirteen people have been arrested in a police crackdown on suspected rogue traders selling stolen goods on eBay. The online auction house has linked up with Scotland Yard to catch crooks trying to pass off stolen mobile phones. During police raids across Greater London, 45 stolen mobiles were recovered. Det Chief Insp Mick McNally, from the National Mobile Phone Crime Unit, told This Is Money: "The very large majority of sellers on eBay are legitimate businesses or individuals. However, we are after the very small number of rogue traders."
Online banking has got more secure
Using Internet banking may soon be more secure for people worried about fraudsters. Barclays Bank is looking to introduce a handheld device for customers, which will generate a different password each time after reading the chip on your bank card. Lloyds TSB is also looking at key rings which generate different passwords each time. Banks are responsible for covering much of the £23.2 million customers lose annually to fraudsters. Rebecca Fearnley from Which? told The Scotsman: "Online banking is fairly secure and customers' liability if someone does use their account is pretty limited. If someone is using your account when you are not present, you are not liable as long as you took reasonable care and didn't give out your password."
Link checking tool
The Link Harvester quickly lists virtually every other website that links to yours, providing data about how many pages of your site are indexed, and how many links go to each particular page. It can tell you about specific types of links (such as those from .gov sites) as well as indicating if a site links to yours more than five times. Best of all, Link Harvester is an open source tool, which means it's free to add it to your own site or share it with others.
Market research portal
Check out www.the-list.co.uk for a practical website pulling together market research reports on a variety of topics. Users can search by subject or browse reports by subject heading. The site offers free executive summaries of reports and has the option to buy the full report if required - although it's more useful (and cheaper) for business owners to identify the reports they need and then visit their local library to see if it can get hold of back copies.
Self-made publishing tycoon Felix Dennis, whose publishing empire includes Auto Express and Maxim magazines, says making money is a knack that anyone can acquire - as long as they are properly motivated and prepared to put the work in. His book gives step-by-step instructions to "collecting money which already has your name on it", and looks closely at start ups and why so many don't get off the ground. Check out:
Just one word answer
The answer is c).
To inveigh means to attack or protest about something. It's usually followed by 'against'.
Some pub owners are inveighing against the forthcoming smoking ban, as they are concerned the prohibition will lose them customers. |
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Good luck
The EnterQuest Team
This information is meant as a starting point only. Whilst all reasonable efforts have been made, the publisher makes no warranties that the information is accurate and up-to-date and will not be responsible for any errors or omissions in the information nor any consequences of any errors or omissions. Professional advice should be sought where appropriate. |
