SMB

You might say that entrepreneur Alan E. Hall lives in two business worlds. Don't complain to him how challenging it is to grow a business in today's fragile economy. He knows those struggles firsthand as a business owner. He also knows how next-to-impossible it is for startup business owners to find...

You might say that entrepreneur Alan E. Hall lives in two business worlds. Don't complain to him how challenging it is to grow a business in today's fragile economy. He knows those struggles firsthand as a business owner. He also knows how next-to-impossible it is for startup business owners to find...

Prior to the mid-1990s, the prospect of launching a globally minded company in rural America was, in a word, remote. However, times have changed. The Web now makes it possible for anyone to do business anywhere in the world. Small towns in America's heartland that have long been dependent on agribu...

Noting that more and more businesses are using Twitter to communicate with customers, the San Francisco social networking startup has launched a new sub-site to help companies learn strategies to leverage the service to their benefit. Twitter101 provides a quick overview explaining what Twitter is, ...

The initial success and rapid growth of cloud computing is attracting a "cloud rush" of players twisting the original concept to suit their proprietary purposes and confusing IT and business decision-makers in the process. This proliferation process is also accelerating the inevitable shakeout of va...

It seemed like a logical leap: If you already provide shoppers with coupons online, what's to stop you from offering them an online source for e-gift cards? So the founders of online gift card company CashStar pooled resources with online shopping coupon mogul Coupons Inc. to create an outlet for m...

He was into cloud computing before cloud computing was cool. Before that, he'd given the world its first real Web browser. He's a board member of eBay and Facebook, and he's invested in some must-watch Web 2.0 companies: Digg, Twitter, Ning, etc. So when Marc Andreessen announced on his blog Sunday ...

Microsoft said last week that designated PCs with premium versions of Windows Vista preinstalled will qualify for upgrades to the equivalent Windows 7 product once the final version of Redmond's next-generation operating system becomes widely available in the fall. However, reports that Microsoft is...

Lacing a shoestring budget with enough green to get your startup up and running takes some finagling. Still, it can be done. If you can't find investor backing right now, then turn to alternative funding routes. You may want to start with your own hidden assets to find the cash you need. One example...

Funny thing about economic disasters: They tend to spawn a bevy of new businesses. It's not that a recession is the best time for pie-in-the-sky thinking; rather, it's when pie-in-the-mouth issues become most pressing. "The tantalizing successes of some startups, coupled perhaps with the rise in une...

The economy is still broken, and businesses are scampering to save money and entice back lost customers. Don't remind Brett Caine, though. As president of Citrix Online, he's too busy growing the company's customer base into a $100 million business that a few years ago didn't exist. As a young start...

As the business use of mobile devices such as laptops and smartphones proliferates, IT departments are scrambling to implement adequate security safeguards both inside and outside company walls. The cost of implementing security measures is problematic for many small-to-medium-sized enterprises, but...

As the frequent news reports of data breaches attest, maintaining data security is a tough row to hoe -- even for large enterprises. It's even harder for small and medium-sized businesses, which don't have the money or IT resources their larger counterparts have. The plethora of threats is daunting,...

One would think that the cost of doing business on the Web is so small that it would be almost negligible, but that's not the case with many e-tailers, which is why many of them fail. It's also why Prashant Nedungadi decided to launch IMshopping, an online company that's trying to emulate offline cu...

The report came out right before the economy nose-dived, before ad revenues started to shrink, before even online display advertising started feeling the recession's pinch. A February 2007 report from the Audit Bureau of Circulations -- the keepers of media buying/selling trends and standards for pu...