Posts filed under ‘Business Opportunity’
The Role of Accountants & Your Small Business
PRUDENT ACCOUNTANTS
By Getachew Teklu
In the American business landscape and more powerful and accessible information technology has changed the role and importance of the small business accountant.
Why do you need an accountant? Some small businesses deal with a bookkeeper – someone to do the tedious task of recording financial information and cranking that data into the necessary formats, like Profit and Loss statements and tax forms.
But a good small business accountant does much more than just record transactions and passively generates documents-they actively analyze, interpret and convert that data into actionable business intelligence.
Based on where you want to do with your business, they should able to tell you how to get there. If your accountant is just showing you the financial tracks of where you have been, you’ve made a bad choice and you’re missing out on a great opportunity to receive good business advice.
To be sure, today’s small business accountant offers more than crunched numbers. They will be your primary resource for:
- Tax Planning. Beyond simply preparing tax forms, an accountants involved in business planning throughout the year. They should be able to regularly tell the business so it functions with peak tax efficiency.
- Business Consulting. A good accountant should be able to help your business grow. Talented small business accountants function as a trusted general business consultant, assessing business problems and offering specific solutions. They offer advice on internal controls, risk management, lease versus buy decisions, inventory strategy, pricing, and even marketing. In short, an accounting professional who really understands your business from the inside out should be a trusted business advisor who is highly motivated to see you succeed.
- Personal Finance Advice. A good small business accountant understands that your personal finances are integrable linked to your business finances. They view the two holistically and offer advice on both fronts. For example, while serving as your small business accountant, they might offer retirement planning advice and estate planning advice that is ancillary to your small business activities but that will ultimately leave you in a stronger financial position.
- Technology Know-How. Computing technology has dramatically improved small business capabilities as powerful business software is no longer only for corporations and the Internet provides a level of access to knowledge, customers and suppliers hardly dreamed of even ten years ago. A good accountant must — must! — Absolutely be proficient in applying the fantastic and inexpensive information technology that turns business data into strategic intelligence. They need to be very familiar with leading small business management software packages from leading vendors like MYOB, Intuit and Peachtree.
- Networking. While the strength of an accountant is still what they know, a mark of a successful pro is also who they know. Your accountant should be a good source of referrals as they should now precisely each of their clients’ strengths and needs. Need to get a loan for your small business? Your accountant maybe able to introduce you to the right banker.
Questions to Ask Your Prospective Accountant in Twin cities area visit: Prudent Accountants, Inc. 1935 County road B2 West, Suite 50, Roseville, MN 55113 or visit www.prudentaccountants.com or Call Rai M. Mahboob at 612-605-3178
Marketing: Lesson 1
If you want to make money, make me money. 
Benjamin Chiu just earned his master’s in mechanical engineering, but he hasn’t bothered looking for a job yet. He doesn’t need to. The 24-year-old runs a website from his San Francisco condo that nets him upwards of $20,000 a month. Chiu is an affiliate for Amazon and dozens of other online stores. The best part? He doesn’t actually sell anything; instead, his website, bensbargains.net, hawks laptops, backpacks, and karaoke machines and refers all buyers to the merchants’ websites. Every click on a product and every sale that results is cash in Chiu’s pocket—and the seller’s. Everyone makes money off the deal, and that’s why it works so well. Amazon, eBay, Google, and Yahoo sit atop the Web’s food chain partly because they make everybody a salesperson. There are hundreds of thousands of affiliates like Chiu, who promote online auctions for eBay, flog products for Amazon and Yahoo, provide eyeballs for Google’s AdSense, and collect for each sale or click they bring in. The millions the big boys pay out for these services are just a fraction of what they make from them. The beauty of the model isn’t lost on the rest of the world: Hundreds of companies—from Macy’s to Best Buy to Marriott to Citigroup—have now formed affiliate networks of their own. To start your own on-line business click here: http://www.ebiz-u.com/28c73d3
Company Affiliate Sales Affiliate Commission
Amazon.com $460 M $100M
Ebay $300M $140M
Google $1.4B $$1.1B
Yahoo! $1.1B $910M
*Estimates for 2004 based on financial reports and business 2.0 research **gross profit after cost of sales.
Source Business 2.0 December 2004.
