Successful Blog

Making a Healthy Choice When It Comes to Insurance Plans

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ahealthcheckSmall business owners wrestling with the decision of whether to offer group health coverage to their employees have several more months before Obamacare’s small business insurance marketplace is fully operational.

Under the provisions of the Affordable Care Act, businesses with 50 or fewer full-time equivalent employees, or FTEs, are not obligated to provide such coverage for their workers.

However, many companies, both large and small, find they can better attract — and keep — top-quality employees if they offer health coverage as a benefit.

SHOP Postponed

The multiple problems following last fall’s launch of open enrollment for individual health coverage prompted the federal government to postpone for a year the opening of SHOP, known officially as the Small Business Health Options Program.

In the meantime, small businesses that want to move ahead with group health coverage can continue to purchase health plans that meet Obamacare standards from insurance brokers.

Also, businesses in states that have their own Obamacare exchanges can buy coverage in those marketplaces.

Guidelines for Eligibility

If you’re among the small business owners who are opting to wait until SHOP is fully operational, here’s what you need to know about the qualifications necessary for participation in the marketplace:

  • You must have a principal business address within the state where you’re seeking to buy coverage or have an eligible employee with a primary worksite within the state where you’re buying coverage;
  • You must have at least one common-law employee on your payroll other than the business owner, sole proprietor, or their spouses. A common-law employee is defined as anyone who performs services for you wherein you can control what will be done and how it will be done;
  • Your business must have 50 or fewer FTEs, including part-time employees, in order to be eligible to purchase health plans within the small business marketplace. Two part-time employees are equal to one FTE. A couple of years down the road, SHOP eligibility will be expanded to include businesses with 100 or fewer FTEs.

Pay o to 100% of Premium

Interestingly, small businesses that purchase health insurance plans through SHOP are not required to pay any of the premiums for such coverage, according to a Forbes analysis of small business options under Obamacare.

Employers can pay anywhere from 0 to 100 percent of the plan’s premium, and employees must pay the rest. This rule applies only to health insurance plans purchased through SHOP, which is the federal marketplace for small businesses, and is not necessarily applicable to coverage purchased through state-operated exchanges.

For example, employers purchasing coverage through California’s state-operated exchange must pay at least 50 percent of the premiums for such coverage.

No matter whether you plan to pay 100 percent, 50 percent, or none of the premiums for health coverage offered to your employees, there’s a significant tax benefit to buying through SHOP.

Premiums for all such plans are paid with pre-tax dollars. This means that whoever pays the premium — employer, employees, or both — gets a nice tax break.

Control the Coverage

Choosing a health insurance plan from SHOP allows the small business owner to control the coverage that is offered to employees and, as we’ve already seen, to decide how much, if any, to pay toward employee premiums.

If your small business has 25 or fewer FTEs and you decide to pay 50 percent or more of the premiums for health plans purchased from SHOP, you may be eligible for a small business tax credit for the premiums paid.

In order to be eligible for this tax credit, your employees must average less than $50,000 per year in annual wages. Forbes reports that many employers that are eligible for this tax credit are forgoing it because the calculations involved are “slightly cumbersome.”

4 Levels of Coverage

As a small business owner, you can select the level of coverage that will be available to your employees.

As for individual health plans, the four main levels of coverage are Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum.

According to HealthCare.gov, these categories have nothing to do with quality of care but rather describe “the way your employees and the plan can expect to share costs for health care.” In other words, bronze plan coverage would require a higher copay for health services than would be charged under the other metal categories.

HealthCare.gov points out, however, that all plans available through SHOP must provide a set of essential health benefits.

Such benefits include ambulatory patient services, emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health and substance use disorder services, prescription drugs, rehabilitative services, laboratory services, preventive and wellness services, and pediatric services.

When evaluating health insurance plans in SHOP, you can compare side by side what services are available under the four levels of coverage.

As noted above, all must provide for the essential health benefits, but higher level plans are likely to have additional benefits.

And, of course, higher level plans cover more of the costs of services and thus have lower copays, if any.

Photo credit: Image courtesy of Vichaya Kiatying-Angsulee / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

About the Author: Don Amerman is a freelance author who writes extensively about a wide array of business and personal finance topics.

Having Inconsistent Contact with Customers?

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acontact

You have a fantastic website that gives customers all of the information they need about your product or service. You may even have a blog to go with your website to provide further information or to answer questions.

However, many businesses often overlook the importance of one page: the Contact Us form.

Even if they include it on the site, they fail to maximize its potential.

Call to Action

Businesses often lack the knowledge on how to use call to actions to convert more customers by making the contact form a bigger part of the website.

It’s commonly added to the menu along with the other pages on the site. However, a link to the form should be included with all of your calls to action.

At the point where you invite customers to contact you, there should be a link that makes it easy for them to do just that. If they have to navigate from somewhere else, they may get distracted and forget to complete the action.

What Makes a Good Contact Page

After viewing your website, the Contact form is the next “first impression” that you make.

If someone is taking the time to contact you for any reason, you want to make it a positive experience for them. It should be easy to access and have personality, but it should not be cluttered. You don’t want your visitors to get bogged down with what is on the page and forget to actually make contact with you.

The problem with many standard Contact pages is that they are designed solely for functionality without thought about the people that will be using them.

As Howard Yeh, founder, investor and president of ContactUs.com says about the process of designing a contact form, “We approach the problems that websites face not just as web developers, but as online marketers, experienced lead-generators and sales account managers. And with that mindset, we’ve built both features and data solutions to make those jobs easier.”

You want to look at your Contact page as a marketer.

Does it provide a warm welcome and then a call to action that visitors will understand?

It should also be short and efficient.

Collect the necessary information to provide an accurate and thorough reply but don’t waste your visitors’ time filling out unnecessary fields.

Multiple Avenues to Reach You

While some customers will feel more comfortable with the idea of sending out a message or email, others still prefer a phone call.

A contact link should be visible on all pages right in the area where it does the most good.

On some pages, this may be as a sidebar while on others; you might want it right below a product or list of services you provide.

An effective Contact Us form is one that converts your visitors into customers. It is included as a way to help you establish new relationships and continue to grow current ones.

Make sure your contact page is working for you.

Photo credit: Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

About the Author: Joyce Morse is an author who writes on a variety of topics, including content marketing and small business.

Is Your Home Office What You Want It to Be?

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aofficeMore and more people are working from home.

Maybe it’s telecommuting for an international multi-billion dollar company, or it could be running your own small business from home where you are your only employee. Maybe sometimes you’re in a company’s office, other days you’re at home.

Whatever the case may be, it’s becoming more the norm for people to be working at home.

According to a Forbes piece, at least 30 million Americans work from home at least one day a week. This number is growing and is expected to continue to do so over the next few years.

One of the main reasons people do opt to work from home, and why companies are supportive, is because work productivity is shown to increase for those who work from home.

Not only do home officers save time (which means money) by skipping the commute, they also can be more productive at home by working in more personalized comfort.

When it comes to that personalized comfort, which is conducive to productivity, how do you get the optimal home office for an affordable price?

Take a look at some of these tips to find what works for you and enhances your own space:

• A designated space – It’s important to have a designated work space aside from your home life. Keep the doctor bills and PTA forms somewhere else. Make sure this space stays all business and your productivity will increase. It’s not cost prohibitive to do this, you just might need to do some organizing.

• A comfortable space – If you are at your desk for any extended time, you need to be comfortable. Major retailers, including Walmart, offer great specials on affordable and comfortable office desks to make working from home a positive, comfortable and productive experience. Along with the desk, you need a comfortable chair to keep your posture and back healthy.

• A well-lit space – You will be happier working in a space with good lighting. If you can’t have natural lighting, find some lamps that offer good light. Even the paint color on the wall adds to the lighting feel; choose a color that works well for you, makes you happy and that you find positive energy from. Paint is an affordable way to make a big change in a space.

• A clutter free space – Even if you’ve banished all your home clutter from your work space, make sure you continue to keep it clutter free. Toss or file old documents, organize material on a regular basis and keep what you can electronically, toss the hard copies.

If you can set up your work space when you first start your home office experience, your productivity will shine. It’s beneficial to do it the right way from the start so you don’t need use valuable time to make changes.

But if you do need to change something, do it – it will be worth it for your comfort and productivity.

Photo credit: decoist.com

About the Author: Heather Legg writes about small business, staying within a budget and making the most of what you have.

 

Should You Give Out Raises?

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araiseIn 2013, the average company gave out a 3 percent pay raise. That average is expected in 2014, as well.

As a business owner, how do you know how much to give and who to give it to? And how can you keep everyone happy in the process?

The job market is tough, and fortunately your employees are aware of your company’s overall circumstances.

New graduates learned in college that one of the challenges they would face after school would be answering how to position yourself for best paying careers, so they, too, know what it’s like to be out in the real world.

How to determine who deserves a raise

As a small business owner, giving out raises at the right time to the right candidates is an important aspect of your job.

Employees like to know they’re doing a good job and they like to be recognized for their hard work, most likely in terms of more money.

Employees that may potentially deserve a raise are those that:

  • Consistently work hard – Do you have an employee that is willing to stay late or work overtime when needed? Does this employee do so with a smile on their face? Employees that go above and beyond their normal job responsibilities are the first that should be recognized. They care about your company and want to see it succeed. Hard workers almost always deserve raises, assuming your company can afford it.
  • Offer something unique to your company – Maybe this particular employee isn’t the hardest worker, but maybe he or she does something valuable and irreplaceable for your business. For example, if you run a small construction business and have one drywall specialist who consistently gets rave reviews from customers, offering a raise to keep the employee around is worth it. It shows you value their work and know it would be hard to find a replacement.
  • Meet or exceed their goals – If an employee regularly meets or exceeds sales goals, for example, they are most likely deserving of a raise. Without good, hard-working employees who sell your product or service, you wouldn’t have a business. Reward them.

How to keep everyone happy

When it comes time to give out raises, employees may start to gossip on who did or didn’t get a raise. This can cause tension and jealousy in the workplace, and may cause some valued employees to leave if they feel underappreciated.

To keep everyone happy, hold a one-on-one meeting with each employee, if possible.

Go over their position in the company, why they are or aren’t getting a raise, their strong points and what they can do to improve. Explain your position as a business owner and what your goals are long-term.

By making the employee feel like a part of a team (which they are), employee gossip should be decreased whether or not you offered them a raise.

For those that didn’t receive a raise, you could consider offering additional incentives.

These can include a few extra paid vacation days per year, allowing them to work from home one day per week or offering a more flexible schedule in the office.

Some employees would rather work four 10-hour days, for example, than five 8-hour days.

See what would be valuable to those employees and offer it to them, especially if you wanted to give them a raise but simply could not afford it.

Photo credit: businessnewsdaily.com

About the Author: Sarah Brooks is a freelance writer living in Glendale, AZ. She writes on personal finances, small businesses and travel.

Are You Properly Managing Your Accounts?

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photo for success blog 51414You know how it is when you are running your own business.

There are a thousand things to do, many with urgent deadlines. It’s easy to let some things slide, like your accounts. Until you need money and realized you’ve failed to invoice some customers or followed up with others.

Here are some tips to help you stay on top of your accounts and keep bringing in revenue….

Utilize Technology

Many small business owners start out doing their accounts by hand.

They stick receipts in a drawer and file invoices or customer payments away until they need them. You may think you don’t need anything fancy if you are just starting out, but every business can benefit from using some type of technology. It may be an app that allows you to scan your receipts or a program where you can keep track of expenses.

The great thing about these programs and apps is that they automatically update for you.  Update – Creating and managing accounts is much easier when you use even the simplest programs.

Hire a Bookkeeper

You may not have the finances or even the need to hire a full-time accountant or bookkeeper, but you can find someone to work part-time.

It may even be someone you know who would work 5-10 hours per week on the side. Just make sure you find someone qualified to do the job. They can handle the routine tasks of sending out invoices and making payments to venders.

Learn the Basics

Take a class to learn about accounting procedures and bookkeeping.

Even if you do plan to hire a part-time bookkeeper, you need to understand the basics about financial accounts. It can help you recognize the best way to track expenses and understand the financial process so you can be better prepared to manage your own finances.

Schedule Time

Make a regular appointment with yourself to go over your books.

If you hate dealing with the financial aspect of your business, you will put it off. This only makes things worse when you do sit down to look it over.

Instead, schedule at least one hour every week, or more if needed, to go over your accounts and see where you stand.

Have a Business Plan

While you know the importance of a business plan to make your company grow and succeed, have you thought about it in relation to your finances?

Every time a customer pays late or you have to spend time hassling them about an overdue payment, you are hurting the growth of your business.

Figure out where you want to be in a year, five or ten years and realize that how you manage your accounts directly impacts whether or not you will reach those goals.

For many small business owners, managing the financial accounts is not their favorite activity. However, it is an essential part of business ownership and directly impacts their chance of success.

Make it a priority and follow these tips to help take your business to the next level.

Photo credit: smead.com

About the Author: Joyce Morse is an author who writes on a variety of topics, including finance and running a small business.

Quality over Quantity with Big Data

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dataBack when computers were still a new technology for businesses, there was a simple acronym going around: GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out.

Basically, if someone fed a computer system flawed or mixed up data, they probably wouldn’t like the result very much. That wisdom still holds true in the newer and fast-moving field of big data.

Big data is exciting.

Used well, it grants the ability to analyze customer trends and wants, customer interactions, lead generation, sales patterns and so much more.

The result? Better understanding of customers’ behavior and desires, a better overview of what is working well in a business, and an opportunity to hone everything from content to products for greater success.

But big data can also be overwhelming and in the rush to adopt it, businesses might find they have a lot data but not a lot of quality. Flawed, irrelevant or inaccurate big data won’t serve them as well as they hoped.

When it comes to big data quality: GIGO lives on.

Businesses can clean up their big data act and access better quality data by paying attention to five key areas:

1. Planning
When it comes to keeping garbage out of the big data stream, prevention is definitely better than cure. Businesses would do well to shun rushing at big data in favor of good solid planning. Before harvesting anything, it’s vital to know what the aim of it is. What business area is being looked at? Sales? Engagement on social media? The behavior of a certain demographic? Knowing exactly what data is needed and why will make it easier to plan out a big data strategy that is focused on collecting exactly what is needed.

2. Collection
Data can come from many different sources. The more sources, the more chance of unhelpful or irrelevant data getting in. Businesses can prevent problems at this stage by figuring out how their big data is to be collected. What are the sources? Who will collect the data from them and what will they do with it? Before including a data source in your overall plan, check out the quality of the data that you’re going to get from that source.

3. Checks
Rigorous and regular checks of data quality are vital in building up a defense against bad data. When it comes to analyzing big data, the lower the quality of data fed into any analytic tool, the less helpful the results will be. To that end, businesses need to set in place a system of checks and balances to make sure the data that goes into the system is of good quality. To make the most of big data, quality control of the incoming data needs to be standard.

4. Training
Sources and stats are important, but to really make the most of big data businesses need to remember the human touch. At some point in the data collection process, employees are going to be responsible for collecting, sending, or analyzing data. Human error can and will happen, and it can lower data quality. Businesses can reduce the risk with training and education and by fostering team work when it comes to their big data plan.

5. Collaboration
From the IT department to the person analyzing the data, to a customer service agent taking details to fill out a form, getting employees working together is good for big data. The more everyone understands about why it matters and what their part is, the better. The same is also true of technology and data channels – the more a business can match up their sources and standardize their data collection procedures, the better.

Big data is big news, no matter the business size. Good quality big data is where the really useful information lies.

For businesses looking to big data, quality really must come before quantity.

Photo credit: Forbes.com

About the Author: Tristan Anwyn is an author who writes on subjects as diverse as health, marketing, business, and SEO.