Someone once said an entrepreneur is the only person willing to work an eighty hour week in order to avoid having to work forty. If you are a small business owner, you are likely often faced with multiple demands on your time and a severe shortage of hours in the day. Before you jump on a new solution to your time management woes, consider what is actually behind your time shortage. There are three “syndromes” I’ve come to recognize in the small business owners I offer legal advice to – if any of these sounds familiar, read on! There are tips and suggestions for what to do if you are suffering from Super Hero Syndrome, Growth Guru Syndrome, or Busy Body Business Syndrome!

Small Business Super Hero Syndrome

Some clients I meet with are so amazingly productive that I think of them as super heroes with unbelievable strength and endurance. But the truth is, none of us is a super hero. We have limitations. Sometimes we need help getting things done. If it is hard for you to let others be responsible for portions of your business,you may be suffering from Small Business Super Hero Syndrome. Your motto is, “I can do it (all)!” And most of the time you can.

If you have started to notice missed deadlines, work that is not your best, and good opportunities you have had to pass up, it might be time to look for a trusty side kick. If you are a small business owner, you probably sought legal advice from an attorney when you first formed your business, or before you signed your first big contract. So, why not look for a good bookkeeper to help with your books, or other tasks you do not have to do? If you need advice about who to connect with, and what services would benefit your small business, I am happy to refer you to the people and organizations I find do the most good for the small business super heroes my firm serves.

Business Growth Guru Syndrome

Some of the most brilliant people I know are those who are able to see opportunity in everything. Rather than seeing the glass-half-full, they see the glass spilling over with ways to create more revenue, and grow, grow, grow their business. Most of the time, this is a great way to see the world. However, if you are a Business Growth Guru, you may struggle with staying focused on the opportunity in front of you. Your motto is, “I AM focu… oh, look! Another opportunity!”

If you have noticed a dip in revenue from a once promising revenue source, it might be time to slow down and ask yourself if the most important things are getting most of your attention. If your core business is getting less attention than that new idea you just had, it might be time to step back and consider your priorities. You may need someone to help you complete a forecast, or provide advice on the best uses of your time. If you need a referral, and help determining the best course of action for your current business, I can refer you to some of the most gifted business advisers in Colorado.

Busy Body Business Syndrome

This syndrome is related to the Business Growth Guru Syndrome, but is not caused by abundant opportunity. Its root cause is an unmanageable task list. If you are suffering from the Busy Body Business Syndrome, you can remember writing your motto down (and it was a good one!), you just can’t remember where you wrote it.

If it seems like you are constantly dealing with a new emergency and you feel like working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week wouldn’t begin to help you dig out of the work you need to get done, you may have Busy Body Business Syndrome. You can study up on good advice from your peers, or hire a professional to help you organize your work space, create an environment where you can work without interruption when needed, and stay ahead of your tasks in order to reduce the number of emergencies you experience in a week.

The good news is, all 3 time shortage syndromes are curable! If you need legal help, or a referral to my network of small business support professionals who can help you organize, grow, or maintain your business, contact me, Elizabeth Lewis, at the Law Office of E.C. Lewis, P.C., home of your Denver Small Business Attorney. Phone: 720-258-6647. Email: elizabeth.lewis@eclewis.com.

Real Estate Services for Business Owners

Elizabeth Lewis provides the following real estate law services to small and medium sized business owners in Denver and throughout Colorado:

• Commercial real estate purchases
• Legal review of commercial real estate leases
• Protecting your assets

If you are not familiar with the term omnichannel marketing, you are not alone, but there is still a good chance you have experience with it. Remember the last time you searched for something on your phone and later had it pop up on your desktop computer at work? Or looked at an ad on one website and then noticed it in the sidebar of every website you visited for a week afterward? If yes, you’ve been the victim (or beneficiary?) of omnichannel marketing. While the business that made multiple offers to you may have been an industry giant, that doesn’t mean omnichannel marketing is out of the question for Colorado small business owners. Because it is becoming a component of staying competitive, it is important to understand what it is and how it can work for you.

Omnichannel is a cross-channel business model that companies use to increase customer experience. The approach has verticals in healthcare, government, financial services, retail and telecommunications industries, including channels such as physical locations, FAQ webpages, social media, live web chats, mobile applications and telephone communication. Companies that use omnichannel contend that a customer values the ability to be in constant contact with a company through multiple avenues at the same time.
~Wikipedia

Can a Small Business Participate in Omnichannel Marketing?

The answer is yes, and no. You may not be able to participate as broadly as Amazon or the Home Depot, but that does not mean you cannot broaden the channels you use to reach customers who currently search for your products or services and shop online and in-store for the items you offer.

Some methods of broadening your presence include:

online and brick and mortar storefronts

social media advertising

programmatic advertising

Google Exchange Network advertising (AdWords)

telephone sales (not the same as cold calling)

satellite sales

in-bound marketing

All of these methods of broadening your marketing channels cost money, and some only make sense for certain types of businesses, so before you dive in, it is a good idea to take some time, and find someone to advise you who is not selling any of the tools or resources you could use to broaden your sales opportunities. It is also good to keep in mind that adding a second or third means of reaching your market isn’t the same as omnichannel marketing – to truly become an omnichannel marketer, you have to be able to follow your consumer from research to selection to purchase. For most Colorado small business owners, this is a bit of a stretch, but not entirely out of the question.

Omnichannel Options for Small Business Owners

In terms of scale, the only omnichannel option available to a small business owner is probably inbound marketing – which is a method used to stay in touch with and win sales from customers from the early stages of research (consideration) all the way through to purchase (and hopefully, repurchase!). You may discover your prospective customer via advertising, delight them with your witty banter as you respond to their questions and interests via email marketing, and obtain sales from them in your brick and mortar storefront – if so, you’ve participated in an omnichannel sale on three platforms: online advertising, email marketing, retail storefront. Or, you may follow up with a current customer who loves your product, get them to download a shopping app or agree to receive future emails with promotional offers from you, and improve your chances of a repeat sale.

Of course, omnichannel sales work best when there is some time involved in the decision making process. If you sell milk, and the baby wants milk, mom and dad probably are not going to sign up to receive an email about the health benefits of milk before buying a gallon from your corner market. But for retailers and service providers with non-commodity offerings where emotion and evaluation are a part of the sales cycle, as long as it remains profitable to do so, it is generally a good idea to be in more than one location in terms of access to your current and prospective customers. In the perfect, omnichannel world, those locations are linked together, providing you with sales signals along the way, and allowing you to follow the customer through all of the stages that lead up to a purchase and to remain in touch with them until the next purchase is made. If you have a marketing budget, and a product or service that consumers spend time considering or researching before making a purchase, it might make sense for you to explore omnichannel marketing opportunities.

How Can a Small Business Attorney Help?

Business coaching may not be the first thing you think of when you consider calling your local small business attorney, but in fact, your attorney may be one of your best resources for getting non-biased advice about your business decisions. One of the best things a good attorney can do for you is help you locate good resources for calculating the potential costs, pitfalls, and rewards of a particular course of action. As a long-time Denver business attorney, I have seen successes and failures in abundance, and developed a trustworthy and reliable database of advisers for my clients. If you are starting a business in Colorado, or looking to expand the ways you reach your market and think omnichannel marketing might be a good opportunity for your Colorado small business, contact me, Elizabeth Lewis, at the Law Office of E.C. Lewis, P.C., home of your Denver Small Business Attorney. Phone: 720-258-6647. Email: elizabeth.lewis@eclewis.com

Real Estate Services for Business Owners

Elizabeth Lewis provides the following real estate law services to small and medium sized business owners in Denver and throughout Colorado:

• Commercial real estate purchases
• Legal review of commercial real estate leases
• Protecting your assets

While some employees might well be rejoicing, recent changes in overtime rules have some employers concerned. When the Department of Labor’s Overtime Rule was announced in May 2016, it introduced some important changes that will surely impact employees and employers for small businesses, non-profits and universities in Colorado. Among the many provisions within the rule, it provides for several items of note for salaried employees, including:

• Establishes a mechanism for automatically adjusting employee income levels every three years
• Sets standards for salary levels of the lowest-wage regions of the U.S., based on Census data
• Allows employers to use nondiscretionary bonuses and incentive payments to satisfy up to 10% of the new salary level

The DOL has released a downloadable fact sheet that answers a great deal of the questions surrounding the new rule, but despite a plethora of information and guidance available, Colorado employers are still trying to get their heads around the many ways it will affect their businesses. While it might seem like a raise is on the horizon for some employees, it could be that only a few employees at any given company will see an increase in their own compensation, and some employers might decide their resources are spread far too thin to implement the new rule the way it’s written, so could switch some employees from salaried to hourly or other another status. The rule is intended to update overtime thresholds (which have been updated only twice in the last 40 years) for employees who are currently exempt from overtime pay, and even though the new rule is set to take effect December 1, 2016, there are some lawmakers who have presented legislation designed to roll the rule out in phases, with full thresholds being met entirely by December 1, 2019. Representatives who introduced the Overtime Reform and Enhancement Act would like to have the threshold spread over three years. This “phasing in” period, they believe would give more time to employers, so they can adjust to the new rule in increments, both financially, and in relation to staffing needs. Their position is summarized by Congressman Kurt Schrader, who states:

“Without sufficient time to plan for the increase, cuts and demotions will become inevitable, and workers will actually end up making less than they made before,” says Schrader. “It’s long past time we strengthen overtime pay protections for American workers in a meaningful and effective way.”

The Colorado Division of Labor provides extensive details on the laws surrounding employee overtime in our state, and the new rule from the DOL provides equal details on ways for employees to be in compliance, some businesses and organizations in the state might find the new rule hard to implement, due to strained resources. Organizations in Colorado like the Colorado Association of Commerce and Industry (CACI) have voiced concerns that the rule can hurt employers, particularly smaller ones, while proponents contend the rule provides the compensation that employees deserve for the hours they put into their work. If you need legal help, don’t hesitate to contact me at the Law Office of E.C. Lewis, P.C., home of your Denver Business Lawyer. Phone: 720-258-6647. Email: elizabeth.lewis@eclewis.com.

Real Estate Services for Business Owners

Elizabeth Lewis provides the following real estate law services to small and medium sized business owners in Denver and throughout Colorado:

• Commercial real estate purchases
• Legal review of commercial real estate leases
• Protecting your assets

No small business owner ever enters into a business partnership thinking about how it might go south, but it is a good idea to explore the possibility with your business law attorney before you sign agreements or cozy up to any contractual relationship, no matter how beneficial the relationship may be to both parties. Why? Because you need a clear road map for dissolving the relationship, and your Colorado business attorney can help you plan for the end, even if you never intend for that end to come.

Last week, a Colorado business found itself in the grim position of being sued by a co-founder and facing the difficult choices that come with dissolving a partnership that may be vital to the company’s existence. While the details of what went wrong are not the subject of this post, it would be wise for any small business owner to pause and think about the unthinkable. What if a vital partnership in your company ended? Are you and your partner(s) so much in sync that there is no way that could ever happen? Okay, maybe, but keep in mind, there are many reasons other than discord that can cause the end of a good business relationship; illness, death, a desire or interest in new opportunities, even decisions to pursue a different lifestyle than that of an entrepreneur. The rule is, change happens. The question is, are you prepared for it?

Business Formation and Partnership Rules

Business formation is a crucial element to being a successful business. You already know that without the correct business structure and operations, you may fail to have limited liability and be personally liable for any damages caused by your business, you, or your workers. But how do the various forms of business come into play when you are seeking legal advice for business contracts and partnerships? One of the biggest questions to ask your attorney concerns the exit strategy you and your partner(s) design when the business form is selected and/or the partnership is created. If an attorney helped you draft company documents, ask that attorney for a business planning consultation to explain the dissolution of any partnerships those documents describe. If you didn’t use an attorney, I can provide a business planning consultation and help you understand how business formation and partnership rules work for your particular form of business in the case of dissolution.

Divorcing a Business Partner

While it is a rare occurrence, some divorces are friendly – two people decide to part ways and are able to do so without animosity. But often, divorce turns ugly. Emotion, distrust, and accusation are the hallmark of many divorces because of the intimate nature of the relationship that is being dissolved. Divorcing a business partner is no different. If you are sharing a financial relationship, you are depending on and trusting one another. If either you or your business partner feel a loss of livelihood or lifestyle or even dreams and goals will result from the dissolution, things can turn ugly fast.

Plan for a Clean Exit With Business Partners

The very best time to plan for a clean exit with your business partners is before you enter into the partnership agreement. If you are thinking about taking on a partner, or entering into a partnership, contact your attorney – not only to review the agreement, but to help explain how clean exits for business partners can actually occur in Colorado. If you are already in a business relationship, ask your partner to sit down with you and discuss what would happen if one of you were no longer able to work. This is generally a less threatening way to discuss the end of a business partnership, even if it is not entirely comfortable to think about. If the discussion leads to legal questions, sit down with an attorney you both trust and talk it out. We all enter into partnerships hoping they will benefit both parties, and they often do. What happens when the partnership ends is what no one likes to think about or plan for. If you need to examine a current business partnership and do some business planning, contact me, Elizabeth Lewis, at the Law Office of E.C. Lewis, P.C., home of your Denver Small Business Attorney. Phone: 720-258-6647. Email: elizabeth.lewis@eclewis.com

Real Estate Services for Business Owners

Elizabeth Lewis provides the following real estate law services to small and medium sized business owners in Denver and throughout Colorado:

• Commercial real estate purchases
• Legal review of commercial real estate leases
• Protecting your assets