Small business owners shouldn't have to do their taxes on their own. Tax solutions provide a do-it-yourself way to easily prepare and file taxes — without all the guesswork. If you don't have an accountant, or tax services are way out of your budget, there are several tax apps, software and other tools specifically created with small business tax needs in mind. Here are 10 tax solutions to get you started.

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Take a good look at that store on the corner. There is a 10 percent to 12 percent chance it will not be there next year, according to the Office of Advocacy for the Small Business Administration.

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If your business has only a few employees, you may think you are too small to offer a 401k plan. But even entrepreneurs have to retire someday, and there's no time like the present to start planning for the future.

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Most of us are not that talented. We could use a little white space in our lives that we can fill with new ideas.

Lets talk about the 15 ways you could carve out more time to think, ideas suggested to me by some of the most successful entrepreneurs I know.

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Time to crank up sales. Thankfully, the economy is starting to heat up, and as such, it may be an ideal time to learn how to crank up your sales.

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A major trend this year among small employers is to drop group health insurance coverage to help their employees pay for individual health insurance policies. By switching their employees to the individual health insurance marketplace, the small employers are ensuring that their employees get to choose the coverage that is best for their families. In addition, by not offering a group health insurance policy, the employers are making sure their employees have access to premium tax credits to assist them with the cost of their premiums.

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What worked in 2014 may not necessarily work in 2015.

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Small businesses are driving the U.S. job recovery, according to a recent blog post by Maria Contreras-Sweet, the administrator of the Small Business Administration. In her post she points out that about 7 million of the 10.9 million jobs added since the Great Recession were created by startups and small enterprises.

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The turkey has been carved, the gifts have been purchased and business owners are ready to celebrate the holiday season reflecting on a successful 2014. While small business owners may be thinking about holiday traditions, they are also beginning to focus on priorities and potential challenges ahead. Changes in technology, growing cybersecurity concerns, and shifts in the political landscape are all top of mind as small business owners enter 2015.

As the clock strikes midnight and the champagne bottles pop to ring in the New Year, three topics will be top of mind for entrepreneurs in 2015.

New Year, New Tools

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To ensure success in the new year, most small businesses don't realize that the process begins long before January 1. Instead, a lot of work goes into setting your business up for a running start when the clock strikes 12. Do not wait; start now with this list of 10 New Year Tips For Your Small Business.

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A community of small business owners was polled to find out what they thought the top industries would be for next year. Technology, at 42%, is predicted to be the most successful industry in 2015, followed by health care 28%, retail 14%, and finance 14%.

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Here are 10 trends to keep an eye on as you develop your marketing plan.

1. Social media will continue to propel consumer spending. In 2014, both Twitter and Facebook began testing a new feature that will make it easy for users to buy products and services in just a few clicks.

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2014 was a great year for consumer tech, so we decided to take a look at the best startups that launched this year.

When looking at the best startups, we took into account factors like funding, revenue, growth, and investor interest

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What do you want to achieve in 2015 for your small business? The beginning of January is the time for New Year's resolutions, so here are my top 10 resolutions for small business owners and entrepreneurs.

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From the ever-changing technology sphere to ideas about the economy and business growth, here are 50 big ideas, predictions and trends to look out for in the small business world in 2015.

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Developing goals for the new year is always something good to do.  However, there are plenty of people out there who believe it is not a productive use of time. It is probably because they do not develop smart goals that they can actually accomplish. Below are a few helpful tips for you to consider for picking, and more importantly, achieving your 2015 small business goals!

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What do you want to achieve in 2015 for your small business? The beginning of January is the time for New Year's resolutions, so here are my top 10 resolutions for small-business owners and entrepreneurs.

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As we settle into 2015, it is the perfect time for small-business owners to reevalute old processes and implement new ideas for a happier and more productive year ahead. Here are four goals that every small business owner should set this year:

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Online marketing is an industry that is constantly changing. The search engines are constantly rolling out updates and data refreshes, pay per click advertising platforms are always revealing new features and social media marketing is always evolving.

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Following the most wonderful time of the year is a season that strikes fear in the hearts of many small business owners: tax time.

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A media interview provides a great opportunity to generate buzz surrounding your small business. Knowing how to give a great media interview – and get the most out of it for your brand – is key to helping your business build deeper long-term relationships with new and existing customers.

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How you act defines you as a leader. That is why there are so few real leaders nowadays.

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I think many of the tools on this list have the potential to become invaluable assets for both small businesses, and individuals alike. Jump over to the bottom of the post to see these tools in action as I have gathered up a slideshow to give you a better idea of what to expect.

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For large brands with big marketing and advertising budgets, one or even several hundred dollars is just a drop in the monthly marketing budget. But for entrepreneurs and small business owners, every dollar counts – and investments need to pay off in real and immediate marketing ROI.

But could a marketing strategy be executed with as little as $100?

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If you are thinking about starting a new business in one of the states in the US, then this list of 10 best states for business taxes could be very useful to you.

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Trucking companies and building contractors dominate the fastest-growing industries for small businesses, according to new data from Sageworks, a financial information company.

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If there is one clear trend that has emerged as we compiled the 2015 Brilliant 100, it is that everyone—especially young adults—wants to keep tabs on everything.

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We all reach critical points in our lives where our mental toughness is tested. It might be because of a toxic friend or colleague, a dead-end job, or a struggling relationship.

Whatever the challenge, you have to be strong, see things through a new lens, and take decisive action if you want to move through it successfully.

It sounds easy. We all want good friends, good jobs, and good relationships.

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Owning a cell phone has come to be regarded as a necessity in modern society, and with the great advances that have been made in smart phone technology, most of us rely on our phones to help us in an array of situations. While most smart phone owners are acquainted with the helpfulness of features such as navigation apps and mobile broadband, many people have yet to discover the array of uses they may put their phones to in the event of a true emergency.

10 Things Your Phone Can Do in Emergency Situations

As a small business owner getting ready to build your first website or redesign your existing one, you might wonder what you should be considering in terms of making your web design search engine friendly.

There are lots of things to take into account, but here are the five key things that you should know about SEO friendly web design and how it can benefit your visitors, too!

1. It Needs to be Responsive
For small businesses, especially local ones, having great rankings in mobile search is incredibly important. Why? For starters, 50% of consumers who perform a local search on mobile devices visit a store within a day of their search. What’s even more exciting is that 78% of mobile searches for local business lead to offline purchases.

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Each year, I gaze into my crystal ball (which is getting a little smudged lately and needs an upgrade itself) to preview what will become available next year in the world of gadgets and technology. Fortunately, these new products are much more likely to make their debut, given the companies behind them have committed to making them happen.

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Regardless of your job title, your role can make a difference. It comes down to leadership and understanding how to champion ideas and build trust.  Read on for advice from 12 CEOs, founders, presidents and thought leaders to learn how you maximize every opportunity to make an impact at work.

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Small business owners already have a lot on their plates during this time of year, so when it comes to holiday marketing, it can all feel a bit overwhelming. Staples is here to help. Beyond being the one-stop shop for everything small businesses need to make more happen, below are some tips to help small businesses capitalize on this seasons top trends.

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Getting found online can be a tough thing to do at times. Lucky for you, I am pretty good at it and really enjoy getting my sites ranked. Traffic can mean the difference in staying in business and not. Over the years I have started several businesses and the ones that succeed are the ones that consistently grow in organic traffic. I have put together a list of things that I would do to get your business ranked in Google.

Here are 10 ways that small business owners can get their business ranked on Google:

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Take the time to understand your finances
Understanding the nitty gritty of your finances is crucial to running a successful small business, but this is especially true if you're coming from a place of bad credit. The best way to get a handle on your finances, says Brad Farris, a business advisor with Anchor Advisors, is to sit down once a month and review your income statement, balance sheet and cash flow for the prior month. Use the time to look for changes and trends, as well as to monitor your receivables and inventory.

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Social media has become a necessary business tool for companies big and small. There are now more than 2 billion active social media users around the world, according to a LinkedIn article about upcoming social media trends. More people are now regularly using social media than the populations of the United States and China combined, and the number is growing at a clip of 25 percent a year.

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At this time of year business owners will be reflecting on their 2015 brand strategy to evaluate what worked and what did not, and deciding how to promote their brand in 2016. They may not have huge amounts to spend on conventional advertising and marketing campaigns, but there are other options that are effective.

Strategic partnerships
When major brands sign up to cross-promotional activities with other brands, the public sits up and takes notice. When smaller companies do it, there may be less public interest but small business tie-ups are by no means less important.

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Lose weight. Quit smoking. Floss. January’s the traditional time for making new years resolutions. But in addition to your personal goals, what do you want to achieve in 2016 for your small business? I have come up with a list of New Years Resolutions for Small Business, and since its 2016, it seems only natural that I have 16 of them:

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Fortunately, there is a better way. Here are 17 simple things to do sometime in 2016. They are all one-time events (although you can certainly repeat them as many times as you like). And each is a lot easier to accomplish than some hopefully-life-changing-but-in-the-end-never-accomplished New Years resolution.

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There is no shortage of predictions regarding where technology is headed in this bright and shiny New Year. Not all fortune tellers have the same perspective, however. Take the design and innovation consultancy Fjord (part of Accenture Interactive), for example. It tapped more than 750 of its experts in 19 studios around the world to amass its annual trends compilation.

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These rules are keys to small business success. Ignore these rules at your peril: I have seen many new entrepreneurs fail because they ignored one or more of these business basics.

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Regardless of the size of the business, ultimate responsibility for success lies with the CEO. If you’re a small business owner, thats you. And the most critical CEO tasks that result in success or failure lie in the knowledge and practice of financial management fundamentals.

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With the economy in a recession, business growth is more necessary than ever in order for businesses to survive. Since most businesses are small businesses, it is important to understand the latest small business trends and then use those trends to grow. The current projections for small business is that they will continue to grow throughout 2016.

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Generally speaking, it allows small business owners to write off up to $500,000 worth of qualified expenses in the year they are made, up to $2 million, rather than amortizing them over a period of years. In addition to spurring immediate spending, which benefits the economy, the deduction theoretically frees up cash that business owners can use to grow their businesses.

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These founders embody the reasons so many Americans are drawn to entrepreneurship: passion, purpose, fulfillment, and financial success. This year they all shared with Inc. readers the secrets to how they did it.  

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Earlier this month, Microsoft announced that more than 200 million devices (PCs, phones and tablets) were now running Windows 10. Many of those 200 million devices belong to business users, who upgraded to Windows 10 (in many cases for free).

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Small businesses are hopeful about growth this year according to the new State of Small Business Report by software solutions provider, Wasp Barcode Technologies.

The study says 71 percent of small businesses expect revenue growth, although 50 percent of small business owners said hiring new employees would be the key challenge facing them this year. And 45 percent said that challenge would be increasing profit.

An earlier survey conducted by Yelp had similarly found small business owners optimistic about growth in 2016. According to that survey, the percentage of American small business owners expecting to see revenues grow, however, is higher (85 percent).

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Imagine if you could become a millionaire. How great would it be to have the money you need to live the lifestyle you have always wanted? Now imagine if you could do this in your 20s?

Even if you think it sounds like a stretch, it is possible to become a millionaire at a young age. I became a millionaire by age 21. My second millionaire student who followed my program became a millionaire by the age of 23. The most impressive part? He did it all by trading penny stocks.

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Do you like to read good content online? I sure do. One of the key secrets to being successful in business is to be a voracious reader. I learn a great deal by reading individual and corporate blogs online. If you're like me, I bet you want to to know who provides the most valuable content at every stage of business ownership. I put together a list of 10 top small business blogs to follow to help you improve skills for running your small business. Remember, you must grow yourself to lead your business effectively.

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Small businesses have traditionally had a hard time accessing extra capital — i.e. through small business loans — from banks, big and small. And economic realities and forecasts dictate, generally, just how generous these institutions are at any given time.

Still, small businesses aren’t exactly being choked off entirely from getting approved. And the market has been improving for small businesses seeking loans. But in order to get a lender to take a flyer on your small business, it is best not to make a rookie mistake on your way to getting that loan approval.

Below are some of the top small business loan mistakes you can make.

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