Business processes are the means by which work gets done. Many businesses however, view business processes as a “this is how we do it” mentality, rather than a systematic way to understand how work gets done. Processes exist in our heads. Ask an employee how a particular process is carried out and, typically, you’ll get his or her interpretation of the process. Not surprisingly, that interpretation will vary from person to person.

By closely examining “how” work gets done, you can uncover ways to improve your business operations. In most cases, we know where our inefficiencies exist. The key is to objectively and creatively find ways to streamline these processes by combining or eliminating unnecessary, repetitive, or duplicate tasks. The best way to achieve this is by bringing together all stakeholders involved in the process to allow them to contribute their ideas and suggestions. Typically, those involved in the day-to-day business activities are in the best position to identify ways to make their jobs or tasks more efficient. By clarifying and gaining consensus on the way things are presently done, staff can then focus on ways to determine how things should be done. The following steps will help you work towards this goal:

1. Define the current the process. Bring stakeholders together to develop an accurate description of the way the current process works.

2. Deconstruct the process. Question why current tasks are performed in a particular way or why workflows follow a particular path.

3. Reconstruct the process. Focus on identifying improvements that lead to enhanced quality of service, better throughput and response times, and lower processing costs. Solicit the input of customers in this effort.

4. Take advantage of technology. When deployed effectively, technology offers opportunities to automate manual and repetitive tasks.

5. Make process improvement part of your business culture. An ongoing, continuous effort ingrained in your business culture is the key to sustaining process improvement. Encourage employees to identify other key business processes for analysis and continually seek volunteers from all parts of the company to participate in this endeavor.

Experience has shown that successful businesses understand the importance of process. Address your need to do “more with less” by taking a serious look at the way work gets done in your organization. The results can have a significant impact on your bottom line. For small businesses, it’s an essential business survival tool.

About The Guest Author: Walter T. Geer is President and CEO of the CA Group, a Boston-based consulting firm. He is the author of the recently published book “What Lucy Taught Us: A Business Fable About Improving Your Business One Process At a Time“. Free copies of the book are available from the author. He can be reached at walter.geer@thecagroup.org.

TCBY (The Country’s Best Yogurt) is giving away one of their franchise stores for free!  The Great TCBY Store Giveaway entries will be taken up until November 30, 2009.  Contest entrants must be 21 years of age and legal residents of the United States.  25 semi-finalists will be selected by January 4, 2010.

How To Enter:

Tell TCBY why you should win a free store franchise by creating a video up to 2 minutes in length.  Then submit the video along with the completed application form.  Be sure to consult the contest rules prior to entering the giveaway.

You can get more information on The Great TCBY Giveaway by following them on Twitter and Facebook too.

Good luck to anyone who enters!

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EasyTweets - Even though this is a pay service, businesses with several employees can manage multiple marketing efforts from one single login.  Many, many other features are included depending on the plan you choose.

Short.ie - Shorten and track any URL link from your business blog or website and post it to your Twitter account.  This tool provides you with stats and charts for the links you’ve shortened.

Twittercal - Add items to your Google calender directly from Twitter.  Sign up to link your Twitter account to your Google calender and simple send a direct message from your Twitter account to add it to your calender.

Twitterfeed - Easily publish your business blog updates from any RSS feed to your Twitter account.  You can customize how frequently you want Twitterfeed to check for updates.

Twitter Search - This handy tool is basically a search engine for Twitter.  Search and see what’s being said about you or your small business on Twitter.

Twittertise - This tool lets you schedule tweets about your business or products while also tracking the click throughs.  You can then narrow down your marketing tactics according to the results.

Twitzu - This tool helps you create and promote events or contests on Twitter.  Your detailed listing is posted on Twitzu along with Twitter users who elect to participate in your event.

Twistory - Have you ever gotten confused as to whether you tweeted something and when?  Twistory enables you to add your Twitter feed to your favorite calender application and easily browse through your tweet history.  This tool adds your tweets to your calender and makes is easy to see and track your tweets at a glance.

Twubs - Search and follow groups of Twitter users organized by #hashtag topics.  Conversations are easily followed in real-time live feeds.

Who’s Talkin - Search for conversations surrounding your business or topics related to your business.  This tool not only searches Twitter but also a variety of other social media sources too.

Attracting customers to your online stores should be your main focus through the next two months.  This same survey also revealed that 47.1% of these surveyed retailers will utilize social media sites more during this holiday sales season.  And consumers will start shopping earlier this year.  So, don’t drag your feet any further.

Susan Oakes of M4B Marketing has shared some smart marketing tactics that you should adopt before it’s too late.  6 Ways to Get Your Customers to Buy More will get you on the right track as you forge ahead into the holidays.  Are you prepared?

Small business owners have to make the most of every minute to be successful. Blackberry says their smartphones allow you to reclaim an additional 60 minutes of downtime every day (that’s 250 hours each year!) and with these 5 apps on your iPhone you may be able to do even better.

QuickOffice Mobile Office Suite

Quickoffice Mobile Office Suite takes the iPhone to a whole new level, approaching the functionality of a personal computer. Quickoffice includes Word, Excel, PDF viewers and image viewing. The foundational programs essential on every desktop, are offered to iPhone users. The app offers pristine features, and easy access to the files saved on the phone. No iPhone is complete without it.

Personal Assistant

A Personal Assistant keeps track of financial, travel and email accounts, and accumulates all of the important data from these accounts into one app. It is one of the only apps available that can collect such a large variety of information into one easy to read window. This app is directed toward anyone who has many accounts and information to keep track of. It makes keeping track of these accounts very easy.

Pocket Informant

Pocket Informant is everything and more than one would expect from a tasks app. It includes the perfect calendar feature, a versatile “to do” tab which links to the calendar, four different types of reminder systems, and so much more. Any iPhone or iPod Touch user tired of sub-par calendars and task apps should go buy this app right now.

AT&T Virtual Receptionist

AT&T Virtual Receptionist is the perfect tool for small business owners. This small app allows users to set-up a toll-free number that goes directly to their iPhone or other number of their choosing. The app does not need to be open in order for this call forwarding to work. Also users can make outbound calls while blocking their number. Users are given 60 free minutes each month and can purchase more for a small fee.

Evernote

Evernote is an app that can be used to take notes in three different ways: text, picture, and audio. It’s best features include: saving the GPS location of any note taken and desktop-internet access to the notes. This notes app includes all of the features one would need from an app in its category.

About The Guest Author: Nathan Tirrell is the chief reviewer at AppReview.com. With over 35,000 reviews they can help you find the best apps for your iPhone.

Free Shipping Day is a one day online shopping event that takes place every year just before Christmas. On this day participating merchants offer free shipping to their customers with guaranteed delivery by Christmas Eve.

After a full year of planning, the 2009 Free Shipping Day is expected to be bigger and better.  Participating merchants will be offering free shipping on December 17, 2009.

Don’t worry, there is still time to sign your small business up to participate and boost your holiday sales.  Participants for the 2009 Free Shipping Day will be announced on December 1, 2009.  Complete a merchant sign up form to have your business included in this now annual event.  You can also read more information on their FAQ page.  Here’s to a successful and generous 2009 holiday sales season!

Like the iPhone app, Kindle for PC turns your PC into another reading device that can be linked to a Kindle account (you don’t have to own a Kindle to set up a Kindle account). You can then choose to send Kindle e-books and periodicals to your PC via a wired or wireless network connection. Also, you can read an e-book on your PC while at home (or elsewhere), then send that same e-book to your iPhone or Kindle and pick up reading where you left off.

This offers so many possibilities for so many people.  I’ll definitely take advantage of this app when it becomes available, especially on my laptop while traveling.  The app will be compatible with Windows 7 as well as Windows Vista and Windows XP.

Sign up if you would like to be notified when Kindle For PC becomes available.

2. At the bottom left of your screen - click on Applications (blue arrow pointing).

3. Click on Browse More Application.

4. Type in FBML in the search box.

5. Add the app to your Page.

6. A window will open up to select the Page you want the application to install to.

7. Go back to your Page and select Edit Page.

8. Scroll down to the FBML settings and click on Edit.

And then on this.

9. Name your box. I named mine ” Download Report” . You can change it whenever you want.

Cut and paste your HTML code that points to your images, PDF files etc.

Click Save Changes.

10. Last step - change your Page settings so your non-fans land up on this page instead of your Wall.

11. Go to your page and admire your new custom tab.

12. Logout of your Facebook account and go back to your Page. You should land on your new custom tab displaying the report download page.

Note:  This article was originally published on IJLAL.com but republished here with permission from the author.

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About The Guest Author: Mark Ijlal is the CEO of Internet Strategy Club which builds & manages online lead generation campaigns for businesses. He blogs daily at Ijlal.com.

1. Create a strong first impression on people who are not logged into Facebook but are finding me on Facebook.com/InternetStrategyClub via Google or via an email. Dropping them on my Fan Page Wall which is active and full of comments, links, and photos etc might be way too much for somebody who just found me.

2. Make my page stand apart from hundreds of thousands of Business Fan Pages to Facebook users who are not fans of the page yet but are finding me either via Facebook Ads or word of mouth mention from another fan.

3. I took some very popular blog content that I had written, assembled it by topic and put it in a free report to give away on the landing page, so no additional work and I could get it done and out on Facebook in two days.

4. I had two choices on how to do it: FBML tags with HTML to do some fancy stuff (for example I could set it up where non-fans see an image asking them to become a Fan and once they become a Fan, they see another image that thanks them) or just regular plain vanilla HTML with some images and links - I went with the second route.

5. I used Box.net app to deliver the report and not linked out to my blog for a very big reason - most of the times when I am clicking on an ad that points outside Facebook I get a nasty message about “You are about to leave Facebook - bad things might happen to you.”

I know that most folks are super smart and completely ignore all these messages BUT still why even bring this between us? So when I am using the Box.net app within Facebook to deliver my report (the Box.net service is free by the way up to 1GB storage) you and I both stay within Facebook and nobody gets to see those warnings.

6. I have regrets about things I did not do effectively with my first business blog. A big one has to do with letting good content that was not written today lie in slumber. Yeah I know I can do a Popular Posts sidebar widget in Wordpress but it a whole different game when you actually assemble the content in a free report, format it to make it more readable and give it away as a gift to people who just found you instead of asking them to dig in your archives.

It is taking some of your best stuff and putting it out in the world to spread the word about your business and brand. It is about creating a good solid first impression on people who don’t know you and just found you on Facebook.

7. I did not require you to either become a Fan or get my newsletter or opt in to anything to get this report. And this is something that I thought long and hard about before going the Click-Here-To-Download-and-No-You-Don’t-Have-To-Fan-Me-To-Get-This-Report.

WHO do you really want as your Fans?

People who care? People who are just zapping by and collecting Pages but never paying any attention to anything that you are saying? People who opt in to get the free stuff then immediately either opt out or worse stay opt in but throw all your future emails in Trash or hide your Newsfeed immediately the next time they see an update from your Business Fan Page?

WHO do you want?

I want Fans who will grow with this Page and blog. My business Fan page was started on July 8. It is still a little baby and growing. So I want Fans who stick around and see it grow. My thinking is that If I cannot convince you with the quality of the information that I am giving out here in the free report that you should be sticking around for more … well I don’t think I can win you over.

So I am giving this report for free. No signup. No becoming Fans necessary. However I will tell you that the report bought in a very nice spike in RSS readership and email newsletter signups immediately and the numbers have continue to grow. Ideas that are free spread faster than the ones that are locked behind an opt-in wall.

However test both approaches for 30 days for yourself. First require people to opt-in and then take the opt-in away and see which tactic brings you more Fans, more active and involved Fans that leave comments on your Facebook Wall and respond to your content, more personal emails regarding the content of the report and most importantly which approach converts fans into prospects and eventually buyers. Good marketers don’t guess. They test. Everything.

8. The first mini-report I give out was just a dump in MS-Word. This was laid out more in eBook format. My inspiration part came from eBooks I have read at Change This and I know content matters and its quality matters but it does not takes that much time to set up a little nicer layout that makes it easier to read for the people who are going to invest 20 minutes of their precious time reading it. I already got several compliments for making it more eye-friendly.

Note:  Tomorrow, October 20th, Mark will share his step by step guide for setting up a custom Facebook fan page landing tab for your business.  This article was originally published on IJLAL.com but republished here with permission from the author.

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About The Guest Author: Mark Ijlal is the CEO of Internet Strategy Club which builds & manages online lead generation campaigns for businesses. He blogs daily at Ijlal.com.

If you’re like me, you’ll get a little chuckle from it too. Enjoy!