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How Can a Virtual Business Help Me Survive the Recession?

A question I get all the time is «How Can a Virtual Business Help Me Survive the Recession»?
Unemployment is not letting up, businesses are not hiring. The best way to survive the recession is to take advantage of the economic turmoil and start a business. Not just any business, but a virtual business.

The benefits of a virtual business are endless. To mention a few:

1. Low cost to entry
2. Speed to market
3. You can work from home
4. You can run your business remotely
5. You can hire virtual employees

Therefore the answer is, start a virtual business!

According to Entrepreneur.com, these are the 10 hottest trends to watch for 2010. Not all of them can be set up as 100% percent virtual businesses, but their entire back-office and operations can.

Here is the list:

1. Economic turmoil: Results from Challenger, Gray & Christmas’ job market index revealed that 8.7 percent of job seekers gained employment by starting their own businesses in second quarter 2009

2. Green Power: Thanks to government incentives and changing public sentiment, clean energy is the most popular kid on the green movement block. The stimulus plan poured billions into renewable energy.

3. The Senior Market: According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the aging-services industry composed of home healthcare, elderly and disabled services and community care facilities for the elderly make up three of the top 10 industries with the fastest employment growth.

4. Discount Retail: In 2009, secondhand shops increased revenue by $223.3 million, according to Ibis World.

5. Local Businesses: Demand is exploding for locally grown and made a product—which means more support for mom-and-pop stores. The dividend: For every $100 spent at a locally owned business, $68 comes back to the community. Only $43 re-circulates from national chain stores

6. Education: Huge numbers of people are going back to school—ducking the bad economy, retraining for new jobs, even reinventing themselves completely

7. Parental Outsourcing: Taking care of the kids, scrubbing the toilets, checking in on Mom, helping with homework, coaching Little League—more people than ever are paying professionals to do their domestic chores. The trend even has a name: Parental outsourcing.

8. Health and Wellness: Home care was the No. 1 growing industry from 2004 to 2009, averaging yearly increases of more than 7 percent, according to Ibis World. In-home care already employs a staggering 1.33 million people, and revenue is expected to grow beyond $72 billion by 2011.

9. Texas: Texas dominated 2009’s lists of best relocation destinations, home-building markets and job-creation cities. This very magazine also named Austin one of its own Best Cities for Small Businesses.

10. Affordable Alcohol: The alcoholic beverage industry has been growing steadily for the past three years and is expected to reach a record $455 billion in 2009.

You can see an example of a real sustainable, successful virtual business (100% virtual and paperless) at groupbenefitagency.com

Visit http://virtualbusinessdashboard.com to get the 20 insider secrets for starting your own virtual business on a shoestring and a video of the best business to start in this new economy.

I am dreaming of a tropical Christmas

Being a predominantly Christian country Christmas is a big occasion in the Philippines. It is also still a religious occasion, which of course it should be. Only a tiny percentage of people can afford gifts, so the emphasis is on family holidays, time together, and for many going to church. Very few families have anything special for Christmas lunch they just don’t have the money. They do make up for it, though, as Filipinos certainly know how to enjoy themselves.

Despite the lack of money in most families, Christmas starts early in the stores, around August. One thing they go in for in a big way here is Christmas lights. Sometimes even the poorest homes will be adorned with fairy lights, some having quite spectacular displays. Even in early November last year, as I travelled back from the jungle’s edge about 90km south, it was quite magical to see the Christmas lights as we got near the city.

My first Christmas in the country was memorable. I was invited to a girlfriend’s house Christmas Eve, a very poor but very friendly neighbourhood with mostly small timber houses cramped next to each other intimate to say the least. Outside in the garden there were lights everywhere, set up for the party that would last all evening and into the night. I remember sitting there as they got everything organised around me, how magical and special it all was. Just a few months earlier I had been a resident in England and had only experienced Christmas in England. Now, I was sitting outside on a hot Christmas Eve, the sound of tropical insects a prelude to the modern disco music that was to follow later. I loved it.

As with most occasions in the Philippines, there were lots of children. Neighbours came and went, people moved from one party to another, and there was a constant flow of people and especially children. Children’s games were followed later by adult versions of children’s games, most of which have come from Western influence, but Filipinos always put their own stamp on the foreign habits they adopt. Alcohol would not have been a part of the occasion, but the adults were delighted when I offered to buy beer and rum.

At midnight, I was advised to go inside. I soon saw why. All hell broke loose with fireworks as midnight approached, exploding from every tightly packed, confined little garden in the neighbourhood. Fireworks that would have been banned in the UK, but I have to admit they were very loud and impressive. I was amazed, as nobody had warned me of this tradition beforehand.

Now, all my Christmases are tropical, and very different from those in England. I sometimes wonder how much Christmas would change here if it ever became a wealthy country. The major differences between here and England are the profligate spending and materialism in England, and the normal subdued spending in the Philippines. Yet, it is the Filipinos who seem more able to enjoy it that the English.

While the body of the business plan should be 15 to 25 pages, the Appendix can be used for supplemental information. The Appendix should include a full set of financial projections, and as appropriate, technical and or operational drawings, partnership and or customer agreements, expanded competitor reviews, and lists of key customers among others.

If the Appendix is long, a divider should be used to separate it from the body of the plan, or a separate Appendix document should be prepared. These techniques ensure that the investor is not handed a thick business plan, which will make them queasy before even opening it up.

To summarize, the goal of the business plan is to create interest not to have an investor write you a check. In creating interest, the full story of your company need not be told. Rather, the plan should include the essential elements regarding why an investor should invest and spend more time examining the business opportunity. The shorter length does not mean that your business plan should take less time to prepare. Rather, it will take more time. As Mark Twain once said, If I had more time, I would write a shorter story. Likewise, condensing your business plan to a concise, compelling document is challenging and time consuming. Fortunately the rewards are significant.
When raising capital for a business venture, a company can either raise debt capital, equity capital or a combination of the two. Debt capital is money loaned to the company at an agreed interest rate for a fixed time period. Conversely, equity capital is money invested by owners shareholders for use in business operations that need not be repaid. Combinations include convertible securities which may be debt that can be converted into equity at some point in the future.

The simplest form of equity capital is common stock. Common stock has many distinguishing factors as follows:

Common stock is not convertible into another type of security
Each share enjoys one vote
Dividends are payable without limit but only when declared by the board of directors
In liquidation, common stock holders are the last priority to which to distribute assets

In venture capital transactions, there may be two types of common stock which are issued. The first is Class A common stock, which is like preferred stock without the special voting rights which some statutes require in shares labeled preferred. A second type of common stock is junior common stock. While this type of stock is not used very frequently, it allows companies to get cheap stock into the hands of key employees at minimal tax cost.

Determining what type of capital to raise and how to structure the financing transaction is of critical importance to growing ventures. As such, it is crucial to understand the key terms and consult the appropriate legal and business advisors when embarking on the capital raising process.

Know How Canadian Pardons can Get You Rid of Your Unjust Criminal Records

In Macbeth, William Shakespeare rightly says, «This even-handed justice commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice to our own lips». This quote is very much true about crime and consequence in the real life. Crimes are surely followed by bitter consequences. The past criminal record of a person may be the bane of his present life and future prospects. It follows him at the heels wherever he goes. It puts his social status and professional reputation at stake. Though you have suffered just punishment for a criminal offence, the criminal record an indelible disgrace haunts you like an unpleasant dream. Here lies the necessity of Canadian pardons to help you live a normal life keeping your criminal record aside.

Canadian pardons are like a breath of fresh air for those who have long been under trauma due to their criminal record. If you have ever been charged of a criminal offence and therefore, fingerprinted, your name remains in the list of criminal records. Even if you have been graced with discharge, a non-conviction criminal record remains behind you. The criminal record makes it difficult to have a police clearance. Canadian pardons will get you rid of such unjust blemish on your forehead.

Canadian pardons come with character reference letters. A character reference letter is utterly crucial to relieve you of your criminal record. It will purge you of your past criminal offence, wipe out your criminal record and stamp your character with mark of good conduct as well as morality. The process of acquiring character reference letters is too tortuous for a common man to undergo. The applications for character reference letters are reviewed by the National Parole Board, an independent administrative tribunal with absolute authority to grant or deny Canadian pardons according to the Criminal Records Act and the Criminal Code of Canada. You need legal guidance to undergo the process smoothly.

Canadian pardons come to fruition when they are accompanied by U.S. waivers. Without U.S. waiver, a Canadian pardon is not enough to eliminate your name from the Border Services database and the records of the U.S. Customs. May be, your name is in their database because of your previous convictions and charges in Canada. Some minor offences like trespassing, juvenile delinquency, driving under alcoholic influence, etc. are little considerable for the U.S. Customs to allow you entry to the country. You will be denied entry if you have ever been convicted with a crime of moral depravity like fraud, blackmail, trafficking, drug possession etc. the persons like you who have been the victims of non-conviction criminal records need waivers along with Canadian pardons for U.S.