Biz Brief: What’s on the Minds of Small Business Owners?

What’s top of mind for the average Canadian business owner as a new decade gets underway?

Mostly, income taxes, sales taxes and specifically how to comply with regulatory obligations, especially the introduction of harmonized sales taxes in Ontario and British Columbia this July.

These specific concerns were cited by 54% of respondents to a survey conducted by Angus Reid Public Opinion for Sage North America and released on January 12.

Designed to gauge “financial literacy,” the survey probed how businesses manage compliance with government requirements; their comfort level with financial management; how their finances are managed; and where financial information is obtained.

Another recent survey examined budget plans for 2010. Conducted among 200+ small business owners, it was distributed by Bizlaunch, one of Canada's largest trainers of entrepreneurs and small business experts.

Among the survey results were these highlights:

- Overall marketing spending for 2010 is expected to increase substantially (26-50%)

as compared to 2009;

- Much of this spending will be in social media, email marketing and search

engine marketing;

- But public relations outranked both traditional advertising and social media as the most important marketing tool.

Whatever their chief concerns may be, business owners in major Canadian cities and some smaller communities are being offered the opportunity to discuss them, one on one, with Jamie Sutherland, vice president and general manager of Simply Accounting, a leading global supplier of business management software and services.

Together with Jennifer Warawa, director, and Hugo Croft-Levesque, senior manager, product management, of Sage Accountants Network North America, Sutherland is currently staging a “listening tour” to learn about recovery plans in the wake of the economic crisis and growth strategies for 2010.

The tour was prompted by the results of an earlier Angus Reid polling of 503 business owners, which revealed that two-thirds of the respondents had been negatively affected by Canada’s economic downturn during 2009. As well, nearly a quarter of respondents could not identify the key costs that they need to manage for success.

Details regarding the tour are available at www.sagenorthamerica.com.

Terry Poulton is a freelance writer.