Even though Mark and I are Virtual Company Spokesmodels and Abraham Harrison LLC is a Virtual Company Case Study, I still feel really compelled to never cease pimping and promoting all the sundry reasons to take your company virtual. More ammo from the Wall Street Journal, Online Tools Help Home-Based Firms.
If the Internet has been the great equalizer for small businesses, it is particularly evident right now in the home-based business realm — where new online tools from Google Inc., Yahoo! Inc., Microsoft Corp., eBay Inc. and others are making it easier and cheaper to network employees, sell goods and manage office accounting functions in ways that previously required office space, technical staff, and expensive investment in servers and software.
The goal of these companies is to make themselves the business brand of choice among entrepreneurs so they can reap the benefits as small firms grow and need more complicated, and expensive, services. Most of the companies hawking free basic editions of their products also sell costlier, advanced editions. They also rake in online advertising dollars from marketers — including banks, insurance providers and computer makers — eager to reach the pockets of small-business owners.
While businesses of any size can use the online tools, the potential appeal to small and particularly home-based businesses is ripe due to their low cost of entry and ease of use. Most of the services can be accessed from any computer or mobile device with Internet access.
A little more than half of the nation’s 26.8 million small businesses are based at home, according to the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy.
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