Guide to Getting the Most Out of Work.com

You started your own business because you really loved and excelled at doing something: catering, plumbing, marketing, deal-making. But now that you are running your own business, much of your time goes to what you may not love or know at all: office leases, legal contracts, employee issues, raising money. Your time is limited, you want the best solutions to your problems and you want them now. The answer is often out there on the Web, but finding it can be tough, and knowing who to trust is tougher.

We built Work.com for people like you. Our 2,000-plus How-to Guides are...

1. Built for action: We get you to the best sites on the web
   
2. Quick reads: A one-page answer to your business problems.
3. Step-by-step directions: We break down your business problems into the essential steps
4. Trustworthy: Our guides are created by business experts and independent journalists whose mission is to find the best solutions available. The sites we'll refer you to DO NOT PAY to be included.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Use Work.com to build an action plan

Our guides show you how to work through the most common business problems. The guide topics cover very specific, real-life business situations - no textbook chapter or recycled articles. The "Action Steps" in the guides tell you exactly what to do and where to go on the Web to solve your problems.

I recommend: Take a test drive with these popular guides: Guide to Finding a Payroll Processing Service, Guide to Spam Prevention, Guide to Health Savings Accounts.

Use Work.com to get your business done

The Web has created all kinds of new services to get your business done faster and cheaper than ever before.

I recommend: Among the actionable sites you'll find on Work.com: Xactly delivers on-demand sales compensation solutions that help a small business correctly compensate a sales force...RegisterLocal takes the hassle out of registering your small business in all the right online business directories...Logoworks gets your business a professionally designed, custom logo fast and cheap, two words that normally don't go together when it comes to creative services.

Use Work.com to get more strategic

We organized the guides on Work.com by the basic challenges you face as a small-business owner: Employees, Operations, Sales and Marketing, and so on. But underneath these broad categories we have guides dealing with the common business tasks you face, and geared toward your level of experience. Use our lists to map out your strategy for handling the growth and operations of your business.

I recommend: As an example, take a look at our Money and Finance section: You'll see your entire range of needs from Accounting through Loans, Taxes, Collections, Lease Financing.  But click on one of those topics, like Accounting and you'll find everything from the basics - like How to Hire a Bookkeeper - to higher math, like our guide to auditing your freight bill or complying with Sarbanes-Oxley.

Tips & Tactics
Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• Don't miss the "Related Guides" and "Related Topics" boxes on the right of the guide pages. They will alert you to issues you may face next.
• Check the "comments" section at the bottom of the guide pages for helpful tips from entrepreneurs and experts like you. Add your comments and start a discussion. Suggest providers or issues the author might have missed.
• If you find a guide particularly useful, or particularly useless, rate it. In the upper right of the guide page, you will find each guide's rating. Add your own vote and let the author and the rest of the community know what you think.
• Finally, and most importantly, share what you know. You can write your own how-to guide and get it listed on the site. If other business owners find it useful, you will get a high rating and your guide will receive high visibility and traffic. To get started, click the "write a guide" link at the upper right of a guide page and follow the simple instructions.