SBA Seeks Your Input on Its Web Site Redesign

As a journalist covering small business issues, I visit the web site of the Small Business Administration quite often. If you're a small business owner, I hope you visit it too. It's got a lot of great information on how to grow your business, loan types and many other topics. The problem is that this awesome information is often hard to navigate.

But the SBA now plans to overhaul it's web site. The agency recently launched The NEXT SBA.gov, a transition site dedicated to sharing its redesign progress with employees, small business owners, agency partners and other agency stakeholders.

The site is www.sba.gov/NEXT and includes a link to Frequently Asked Questions about the redesign.

It's also accepting comments and suggestions using the "What Do You Think?" box at the bottom of the site. I heartily urge you to participate in helping upgrade this resource.

Sports Stars Become Attainable for the Smallest of Firms

Celebrity endorsements help sell products, but let’s face it, most celebrities don’t team up with the smallest of businesses that have the shallowest of pockets.

I was intrigued to see that Brand Affinity Technologies, a California start-up pointed out by news service Springwise, is offering advertisers of all sizes the ability to launch endorsement campaigns using its own “endorsement platform.”

I got my first whiff of sports and money when I was in kindergarten. My school was having a reading contest in which the winner of reading the most books in a month would get to go to lunch with a Washington Redskins football player. Each student asked neighbors and others to contribute money for each book that he or she read. I won the contest. I read the most books. But I didn’t get to go to the lunch. That honor was bestowed upon a fellow kindergartner who had collected the most money. I was catching on.

Sports endorsements are powerful. Most Americans follow some kind of sports team closely. BAT’s database includes more than 3,300 contract athletes. Advertisers can browse talent based on geography, branding and targeting considerations; included in the platform are detailed talent profiles with photos, videos and personal information — such as the type of cell phone they use or proprietary metrics that help compare talent by region, sport and status.

Obviously a sports endorsement isn’t for every business. But if it works for yours, BAT might be worth checking out.

Endorsement offerings include digital, radio, outdoor, print and TV advertising along with appearances and virtual memorabilia that advertisers can provide to consumers as incentives and rewards. Pricing is on a pay-for-what-you-use, CPM or flat-rate basis.

Separately, if your business is in an area that plans to host an upcoming Super Bowl - like North Texas or New Orleans, check out this story I wrote on a small business contracting program with the National Football League.

U.S. Exports Increase 18% in First Five Months of 2010

U.S. exports of goods and services increased 17.7 percent during the first five months of 2010, according to data released by the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

"This data reinforces the strong growth to date in U.S. exports in 2010," said Export-Import Bank Chairman and President Fred Hochberg. "Ex-Im Bank financing has supported an estimated 150,000 U.S. jobs in the fiscal year to date. The bank will continue to use all of its resources to support the president's goal by reaching out to even more U.S. businesses, especially small businesses, to help them export and, in the process, create more American jobs."

Data highlights include:

U.S. exports totaled $739.5 billion during the January-through-May period of 2010, up 17.7 percent from the same period of 2009;

The May export figure is the strongest year-to-date, as well as the strongest monthly performance since September 2008;

Among the major export markets, the largest percentage increases in goods exports occurred in Taiwan (68 percent), Korea (56 percent), Malaysia (51 percent), Singapore (45 percent), Philippines (45 percent), Czech Republic (44 percent), Indonesia (42 percent), Thailand (41 percent), China (39 percent) and Colombia (38 percent);

Ex-Im Bank, an independent, self-sustaining federal-government agency, provides export financing that helps strengthen U.S. exports. The bank provides financing mechanisms, including working capital guarantees to help small and medium-sized U.S. businesses, export-credit insurance to protect against nonpayment by foreign buyers, and loan guarantees and direct loans to assist foreign buyers of U.S. goods and services.

In fiscal year 2009, overall Ex-Im Bank financing totaled $21 billion, and authorizations supporting small-business exports reached a historic high of $4.4 billion, nearly 21 percent of total authorizations.

Number of Minority-Owned Firms Jumps 46% Between 2002 and 2007

The Minority Business Development Agency and the Census Bureau today announced that the number of minority-owned firms increased by 46 percent to 5.8 million between 2002 and 2007, according to data from a Census survey.

“It is encouraging that the minority business community is growing and making progress relative to all U.S. firms, but economic parity remains elusive,” MBDA National Director David Hinson said. “While the number of minority-owned businesses continues to grow, they are still smaller in size and scale compared to non-minority-owned firms.”

In 2007, average gross receipts for minority-owned firms increased to $179,000 from $167,000 in 2002, but that's still well below gross receipts for non-minority-owned firms, which had average gross receipts of $490,000.

“We must continue to close this gap,” Hinson said. “It is unacceptable, particularly during an economic crisis that disproportionately affects the minority business community, to have this ongoing disparity.”

Study highlights:

Between 2002 and 2007, the number of minority firms grew by 46 percent, compared to 18 percent for all U.S. firms, and compared to 13.7 percent growth for the minority population age 18 and older, during the same period;

Minority-owned firms employed approximately 5.9 million people in 2007, up from 4.7 million in 2002;

Asian-owned firms grew 41 percent to 1.6 million from 2002. Asian-owned firms continue to generate the highest annual gross receipts at $510.1 billion in 2007, increasing 56 percent from 2002;

Hispanic-owned businesses totaled 2.3 million in 2007, up 44 percent from 2002. Receipts for Hispanic firms increased 55 percent to $343.3 billion;

Black, or African-American-owned businesses grew to 1.9 million firms in 2007, up 61 percent from 2002 - the largest increase among all minority-owned companies; and generated $135.6 billion in gross receipts, up 53 percent from 2002;

There were 237,203 American Indian and Alaska Native-owned businesses in 2007, up 18 percent from 2002, generating $34.2 billion in gross receipts, an increase of 27 percent;

Native Hawaiian- and Other Pacific Islander-owned businesses totaled 38,854 in 2007, up 34 percent from 2002. While these firms’ reported the largest increase in receipts among all minority-owned firms in 2002 (63 percent), the total amount reached only $7 billion; and

Minority-owned firms employed approximately 5.9 million people in 2007, up from 4.6 million in 2002.

IRS Taking Public Comments on New 1099 Regulations

Here's an update to my post earlier today about new 1099 requirements for goods and not just services, like those provided by independent contractors. The IRS is taking public comments "on how to most effectively carry out" that law change that takes effect in 2012. 

The IRS said in a statement that these comments will help the agency "issue guidance that implements this provision in a manner that minimizes burden and avoids duplicate reporting."

Under a proposed regulation, many business purchases made with credit or debit cards would be exempt from the new reporting requirement because they are already reported by banks and other payment processors. The IRS wants your thoughts on additional circumstances in which duplicate reporting might otherwise occur and on rules that would prevent duplicate reporting.

There are three ways to submit comments.

• E-mail to: Notice.Comments@irscounsel.treas.gov. Include “Notice 2010-51" in the subject line.

• Mail to: Internal Revenue Service, CC:PA:LPD:PR ( Notice 2010-51), Room 5203, P.O. Box 7604, Ben Franklin Station, Washington, DC 20044

• Hand deliver to: CC:PA:LPD:PR ( Notice 2010-51), Courier’s Desk, Internal Revenue Service, 1111 Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, DC, between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday.

Health Care Bill Requires 1099 for Goods, Not Just Services

A provision in the health care reform law could significantly increase tax recordkeeping requirements and costs for the  self-employed, small businesses and charities, the IRS' national taxpayer advocate said Wednesday in her annual report.

The report expresses concern that a new reporting requirement in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care says that beginning in 2012, all businesses, tax-exempt organizations and federal, state and local government entities will be required to issue Forms 1099 to vendors from whom they purchase goods totaling $600 or more during a calendar year. 

To meet this requirement, these businesses and entities will have to keep track of all purchases they make by vendor.  For example, if a self-employed individual makes numerous small purchases from an office supply store during a calendar year that total at least $600, the individual must issue a Form 1099 to the vendor and the IRS showing the exact amount of total purchases.

Businesses currently are required to provide Form 1099s for services, such as payments to independent contractors, but not for goods.

According to an analysis of 2009 IRS data, about 40 million businesses and other entities will be subject to the new requirement, including roughly 26 million non-farm sole proprietorships, 4 million S corporations, 2 million C corporations, 3 million partnerships, 2 million farming businesses, one million charities and other tax-exempt organizations, and more than 100,000 government entities. 

Are Start-Ups the True Job Generators?

I think a lot about jobs. Since I was a kid I've liked to help people find jobs and to talk about what they like to do at work. Maybe that's why I enjoy my own job so much as a journalist, which allows me to learn about new perspectives and different careers from business owners and entrepreneurs.

Lately I've been talking to a lot of start-ups and so found it fascinating that a new study by the Kauffman Foundation reveals that established firms are on a track of losing 1 million jobs annually while in their first year, new firms add an average of 3 million jobs. Of course, let's just hope those new firms stick around.

The study shows that during recessionary years, job creation at startups remains stable, while net job losses at existing firms are highly sensitive to the business cycle.

On average, one-year-old firms together create nearly one million jobs, while 10-year-old firms generate 300,000. I recently interviewed the CEO of Groupon, a 20-month-old global company that is now worth $1.35 billion and employs more than 1,000 people. Yes, I see where this study is coming from.

“These findings imply that America should be thinking differently about the standard employment policy paradigm,” said Robert Litan, vice president of research and policy at Kauffman. “Policymakers tend to focus on changes in the national or state unemployment rate, or on layoffs by existing companies, when, in fact, policy has little effect on net employment growth. Instead, job growth best would be influenced by focusing greater attention on policy that supports startup firms.”

Because startups that develop organically are almost solely the drivers of job growth, job-creation policies aimed at luring larger, established employers will inevitably fail, said study author Tim Kane, a Kauffman senior fellow. Such city and state policies are doomed not only because they are zero-sum, but because they are based in unrealistic employment growth models, he added.