So you've got a Facebook fan page for your business. Now what?

Your Facebook page can send people to your website, help you interact with your customers, and give you more front page rankings at Google. 

How can you get maximum effectiveness for that page?

• Get some good content there. Onsharp sends blog posts to our Facebook page automatically. You can, too. Depending where you house your blog, you might find it easier to do this from your dashboard, or you might prefer to set it up at Facebook. You can also automate the process by following the step-by-step instructions at Twitterfeed. If we take care of your  website and your blog for you, just contact us if you need help. You can also add content directly at Facebook. Uploading photos and videos is easy at Twitter, and it lets you make a personal, behind-the-scenes connection with your customers. You know how many people tune in to watch someone working in a bakery, tattoo parlor, or auto shop on TV -- they'd like to see what you do, too.
  
• Get some fans. Start by having all your staff suggest the business page to all their Facebook friends. That's just one post on your friend's walls, in amid the Farmville and Mafia requests -- it's not too intrusive. Some will accept the suggestion and become fans, and your interesting content will show up on their walls. Things can just naturally grow from there.
  
• Post some ads. Facebook has an astonishing reach -- hundreds of millions of users. If your product has broad appeal, you can pick up quite a few fans -- and new customers -- by diverting some of your advertising budget in that direction.
• Interact with your fans. Have some conversations, visit your fans, send out some virtual cheeseburgers. Even the most intense job has some downtime during the day, or moments when people might need to take a break. Let your staff know that you'll value their taking a couple of minutes from time to time to represent the company. Many busineses worry about timewasting and hesitate to make this suggestion, but we're betting that some of your staff visit their Facebook pages on coffee break anyway -- why not make that productive time for the company by asking them to drop by your company page when they get back to work?
• Keep track. Use Facebook Insight and your analytics to see how much interest Facebook is creating in your company and how much traffic Facebook is driving to your website. If it's minimal, then you may want to maintain a minimal presence at Facebook. If it's impressive, then you know you need to increase your investment. 

Rep. Pomeroy recently spoke here on the importance of small businesses in job growth. Small businesses have created over 22 million new jobs in the past 15 years, so it's no surprise that experts on both sides of the aisle agree that small business is the growth engine for jobs.

There's also widespread agreement that the web is the growth engine for small business.

How can the internet help you grow your small business?

First, you can open your doors  online for much less than what it costs in the physical world. Even if you plan to grow someday to the point where you need a big building downtown, a business can get started with a good website. As you grow, your website allows you to communicate with customers, get the most for your marketing dollar, and maintain a 24/7 presence where your customers are.

 Second, you can save time and money with web applications. Onsharp offers electronic billing with SmartPay, customer relationship management with SugarCRM, and a myriad of services with the Onsharp Core,including email, calendar management, geocoding, content management, e-commerce integration, and much more. Beyond these basics, Onsharp's crack development team can create solutions just for your company. 

This robust functionality lets a small company look and feel like a bigger company to clients and prospective clients. With the savings in time and money that result from having so many of the basic business functions take place on the web, your company can concentrate on growth.

Call Onsharp today to begin the conversation about what our business can do for your business. 

When you need your computer or your website to do something new for you, there's one essential decision you have to make first. It's not how much room you're willing to give to the new software or which software company you should support or even how much to spend. It's this: do you want an off-the-shelf solution, or something designed for you?

Many businesspeople don't even consider this. After all, when you need a chair, you don't begin by contacting carpenters and upholsterers. You go to the store and buy a chair. Just so, when you need new software or a new application, you may go to the store and stand in the software aisle. You read the packages, ask the clerks for advice, or perhaps call friends to see what they think. Eventually, you pick the thing that seems best and install it.

This is not the only way. And it isn't necessarily the best way. Off the shelf solutions can have drawbacks:

• They may not do what you want. You may have a list of characteristics and functionalities you want in a solution, and you may not find anything that has all those characteristics. You may just have to choose the closest thing, or put together several different packages in order to get everything you want. Often, you'll find that the exact functionalities you want don't seem to come in your price range, or that you have to have other software in order to do what you want with one package.
  
• They may do more than you want. This may not sound like a bad thing. Often, we buy a software package for one thing, and we think of the other stuff it does as free add-ons that we might use someday. However, we're paying for all those added things. If we want an invoicing package, should we have to pay for the calendar that comes with it, which we'll never use? It isn't only the cost of the solution, either. A software package with lots of options can mean a steeper learning curve for your staff and use of more resources in your computer.
• They may not suit you or your company. A solution designed for lots of people to use may not work quite right for you. A solution designed for you will mesh with your workflow, not require workarounds. It won't look as though you've patched it in. Onsharp's SmartPay, for example, is an electronic invoicing solution with a customizable portal. That means that your customers see something recognizable when they go online to pay their bills. This makes them feel secure and makes you look good. "Customizable" means that you save, compared with a system completely built for you, but you still get the benefits of a solution designed with you in mind.

The Research and Technology Park and the College of Business at North Dakota State University hosted the inaugural Innovation Week January 25-29 at the campus. The vision for the meeting, which is to take place annually, was to bring together entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and other innovators with NDSU students to increase awareness of and dialogue about new technologies, business start-ups, and innovative approaches to business.

Sandin conducted one of the break out sessions with "Bootstrapping a New Venture While in College: You Can Succeed!" Sandin drew on his own experience with Onsharp for this presentation.

Sharing this information with the campus fits perfectly with Onsharp's mission: from its clients to its employees to its community, Onsharp strives to create success in the lives of all people, businesses and communities that it serves.