openPR Logo
Press release

What's Hot, What's Not: Top Three Trends for Small Business in 2007

A new year is upon us and with that comes new opportunities for small business owners everywhere. What new technologies will your business embrace this year? What new partnerships will you form? How will you take advantage of the changing marketplace?

In answering these questions, entrepreneurship expert Evan Carmichael suggests the importance of examining the rising trends that are promising to impact small business in the coming year. “The beginning of a new year is a good opportunity for entrepreneurs to revive their drive for success and give their business a fresh start,” says Carmichael, “but in order to move forward, they need to look ahead at what is to come.”

Top on Carmichael’s list of small business trends for 2007 is the continued rise in importance of being able to do anything and everything online. “Small businesses today can’t just have a one-page website,” he says. “The division between IT and business is shrinking. From e-marketing to selling products online to offering podcasts, small business owners need to embrace everything the Internet has to offer.”

A glimpse at the number of users on FeedBurner’s website – an online news feed management provider – is evidence of Carmichael’s point. Today, FeedBurner tracks over 1.6 million podcast subscribers, a figure that has doubled in the past six months alone. Similarly, a 2006 PEW Internet Project report states that 12 percent of Internet users have downloaded a podcast. “This year,” says Carmichael, “small business owners need to seriously explore these various types of online tools as means of better reaching their customers.”

A second trend that will affect small business this year, says Carmichael, is the focus on everything ‘green’. “Consumers are starting to demand more from those they do business with,” he says. “Whether it’s behaving in a more sustainable way, supporting environmental causes, or offering green products, small business owners can take advantage of this growing concern.”

Venture capitalists are beginning to pick up on this trend, where in the U.S. they invested over $150 million in green-focused startups in 2005, double the amount of the previous year. A study by the Organic Trade Association shows similar growth: in 2005, consumer sales of nonfood organic products in the U.S. totaled $744 million. “Instead of being encouraged by their customers to become more environmentally-friendly,” says Carmichael, “small business owners can take the lead and inspire their consumers.”

Finally, Carmichael points to the rising trend of entrepreneurs that come from all walks of life to try their hand in business. “Whether they’re students trying to pay their way through college, or seniors who are bored with retirement, more and more people are realizing that it’s never too early or too late to start a business,” says Carmichael. “A single mother who has her own company, for example, is no longer the anomaly it once was.”

A recent study by the U.S. Center for Women’s Business confirms Carmichael’s point. The research found that one in eleven adult women is an entrepreneur, the majority of who are mothers. Similarly, 30 percent of the entrepreneurs who use the services of the Center for Women & Enterprise are single mothers.

“The new year has just begun,” says Carmichael. “Now is the time to plan for the next big thing. Pay attention to the trends and ensure your small business doesn’t get left behind.”

Evan is an entrepreneur and international speaker. At the age of 19, he became an owner and Chief Operating Officer in Redasoft, a biotechnology software company. The company quickly grew to over 300 organizations as clients, including NASA and Johnson & Johnson, in 30 countries. He started Evan Carmichael & Associates with the goal to give entrepreneurs the Inspiration to follow their passion and the strategies they need to succeed. Evan has delivered over 100 keynote presentations to entrepreneurs in North America, Europe, and Asia. He has been interviewed by newspapers, radio stations, and television stations including The Globe and Mail, CHUM FM, CityTV, Global TV, OMNI TV, Enterprise, and the Toronto Sun. Evan's website, http://www.evancarmichael.com/ is the world's #1 website for small business motivation and strategies.

Evan Carmichael is available for an interview. Please contact him at evan@evancarmichael.com.

This release was published on openPR.

Permanent link to this press release:

Copy
Please set a link in the press area of your homepage to this press release on openPR. openPR disclaims liability for any content contained in this release.

You can edit or delete your press release What's Hot, What's Not: Top Three Trends for Small Business in 2007 here

News-ID: 14850 • Views:

More Releases from Evan Carmichael & Associates

GOING GLOBAL: How Entrepreneurs are Taking their Business to New Borders
TORONTO, CA – March 27, 2007 – There are 6.5 billion people living on this planet. To the environmentalist, that figure immediately conjures up fears of pollution and global warning. To the true entrepreneur, however, 6.5 billion people means 6.5 billion potential customers. As small business owners get caught up in the daily challenges of running their company, they are often unable to see the vast range of opportunities that are
THE BUSINESS OF BUYING A BUSINESS: Experts Weigh In On What It Takes To Succeed
January 16, 2007 (Toronto, CA) -- Look up the word ‘entrepreneur’ in almost any dictionary and you are bound to come across the word ‘risk’. Entrepreneurship is, by definition, a risky business. The stakes are high and the security is low. However, an increasing number of entrepreneurs are discovering one way to reduce that risk; they’re buying existing businesses that have already proven themselves out in the real world. No
Small Business Means Big Workloads: Studies Find Entrepreneurs Working More Than …
There are only 24 hours in a day, but try telling that to an entrepreneur. For small business owners, time is one of the most crucial resources at their disposal. In contrast to large corporations that have both more money and more staff, time is in fact one of the few ways for entrepreneurs to seemingly get ahead. Whereas their counterparts might only work from 9-5, small business owners have
Small Business is Big Business: How Selling to the Little Guy is Netting Large P …
They may be small, but what they lack in size they make up for in number. According to the American Small Business Administration, small businesses and entrepreneurs account for 99.9 percent of the over 25.8 million businesses in the United States. Similarly, over the past ten years, small businesses have created between 60 and 80 percent of new jobs in the country. That is why an increasing number of corporate

All 5 Releases


More Releases for Carmichael’s

First new customer installation of nFlow’s next generation digital dictation s …
nFlow, a leading developer of digital dictation software solutions for professional service firms, today announced that an installation of its widely reported next generation DDS 2.0 digital dictation system has been successfully completed for 100 users at leading top 50 accountancy firm Johnston Carmichael. nFlow DDS Version 5.0 has been deployed to users across 3 offices in Elgin, Inverurie and Huntly in just 2 weeks. A second phase will