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Blog Category: Startups Blog

Many small businesses rely on Facebook to showcase their offerings and are expected to suffer the most from these changes unless they adopt a new strategy On January 11th, 2018 Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company is changing how it will prioritise content that is shown on people’s newsfeeds. In his post, he states that “recently we’ve gotten feedback from our community that public content — posts from businesses, brands and media — is crowding out the personal moments that lead us to connect more with each other”. This means that in the weeks to come, Facebook’s newsfeed will show less branded and marketing content and more content

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  Happy New Year from us at Startups.ie If you are planning on starting a business in 2018 then we are here to help! Many of our current audience are yet to start a business, and there are many reasons why. Whether you’re still looking for that lightbulb idea, struggling to get funding, are scared of failure, can’t find the time – the list can be endless, but when you really think about it, are any of these obstacles actually insurmountable? Make no mistake, starting and running a business is by no means easy. And, of course, there’s a big difference between daydreaming about being your own boss and actually leaving behind

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A few years ago, the Bank of America did a survey which told them that small business owners find their SME owner tasks to be the most stressful thing in their lives. They said that running a small business is three times more stressful than raising children and twice as stressful as maintaining a relationship with their partner. When you consider everything that goes into running a small business, this should come as no surprise. There are just too many factors that can sink your business before you even realize something wrong is happening. It soon becomes quite obvious that you need to do everything in your power to safeguard

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The Irish start-up scene is a rapidly growing space. Driven by entrepreneurs and supported by government organisations like Enterprise Ireland & local start-up groups around the country, the start-up community in Ireland is expanding year on year. While start-ups can have the skill, drive and the experience in their particular area to make it work, there is one area that many self-employed business owners, new and old, can find quite daunting – the complicated world of Irish tax returns. While PAYE workers usually have their tax deducted at source from their employer, if you are what is referred to as a ‘chargeable person’, you are responsible for ‘self assessing’ your

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  More than 75% of businesses believe that digital marketing is either effective or very effective at attracting new customers. If you are planning to start a new business or if you have recently launched your startup website, you need to get serious about marketing because it helps you gain customers and eventually helps generating revenue. The following is a list of some of the best marketing tips for small businesses and startups.   Clearly define marketing goals and objectives Define marketing goals and objectives. This is the first step towards a successful marketing campaign. The goals and objectives should be clear, documented, and must be communicated to every single

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It is hard to believe that the Startup Awards are now in their 6th year – how time flies when you are having fun! The Startup life can be a hard one so sometimes it is good to look back and take stock of the successes (as opposed to mulling over the inevitable failures). The Startup Awards like this site (Startups.ie) were born out of a passion for supporting and promoting entrepreneurship in Ireland. I launched Startups.ie 12 years ago (again hard to believe!!) when I first left the security of a well paid job to venture out into the unknown and set up my first Startup. Ireland in 2005

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If you have recently started your own travel business, you know that you have dived into a market that can be hard to penetrate and acquire customers. From car rental businesses to hotels and restaurants, there are hundreds of thousands of travel businesses. If that doesn’t make you realise how big your market it is, Europe alone accumulated 37,000 million euros in the tour and activity sector in 2015. The good news is that it’s become ever-easier to market to your customers online through social media. There are many ways of reaching your customers through marketing, but social media leaves an imprint on the consumers’ minds like nothing else. Create

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More often than not, when I speak with Startups, they often have a full grasp of what their product will be and their hopes for where they can take it over the next few years. They will have a clear direction and focus for the business with tonnes of aspirations, hopes and dreams. What you need is a logo, a colour palette and a style font and all 3 will combine your brand, your logo, your stationery, your business.   Name it! One thing that often gets lost in the beginning of a business is the thoughts towards a name or a logo for the business. The most important element

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In order to create a well crafted pitch, there are really only two basic principles to remember. Your content and your delivery. Each one determines just how well your audience receives your new idea. Part 1 Your Content: Pitch Decks Online software presentation companies like Prezi, Emaze and Canva have now over 100 million users of pitch deck templates from all corners of the globe. From 2009, as Prezi set out to take on Microsoft’s PowerPoint, the world of pitching and presenting changed drastically. By 2017, investors and audiences now expect that you have a well designed deck that clearly tells them the WHAT, WHY, WHO and HOW of your business.

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Many businesses consider switching service providers on a regular basis – be it electricity provider, broadband, stationery provider – it’s natural to ensure that you are getting the best value for money service in the market place. One area where people are traditionally slow to make the move is with their accountant as they feel it can be very time consuming and lead to a lot of headaches. Getting the right accountant for your business is of paramount importance and if you are not satisfied with your current accountant you need to make the move! Below we look at some of the reasons businesses give for not making the move

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