The Attivo Blog

We can all remember when we were little kids and the nightmares we had.  The Boogeyman, vampires, ghosts and goblins are all monsters that made us not want to turn the lights off and go to sleep.  Let's fast forward to our adult lives.  We all can admit that we still have fears but the types of fears can be very different. Leading the charge for one of the things that makes adults and especially small business owners shake in their boots is the California State Board of Equalization or other state sales tax authority and the chance of being audited.  And with good reason when the average audit penalty is $35k per company, especially if you have online ecommerce sales from your website. When dealing with monsters you protect yourself with garlic, crosses, silver bullets and holy water just to name a few. When dealing with an audit, your best defense is a good offense, which is the transaction-checking protection of AvaTax. The Attivo Group can arm you with AvaTax which is an automated sales tax solution that streamlines error prone sales tax compliance processes and reduces the risk of loss or penalty in case of an audit.  Simply put, by using AvaTax, the State Board of Equalization will walk in your front door and out the back faster than you can say Avatax! So small business owners, no need to be afraid anymore... Avatax will solve your audit worries and let you sleep easy at night!

Affordability and price is something that is important to all of us.  Whether we are shopping for new clothes or looking to buy a car, cost is always a factor.  But to what extent does price matter?  I think the old saying; “you get what you pay for” has a lot of merit to it.  Buying an inexpensive product that doesn’t work well does not make sense to me.  That is why I believe the main goal to purchasing anything is getting a lot of value for the money you spend. This is especially true when it comes to purchasing a manufacturing, distribution, or accounting software application for to run your company.  Business software can be expensive but we certainly don’t want to put something “cheap” in place when it is going to handle the way our business is running day to day.  When you find an application that works well and is affordable to boot, you have a platform to grow your business successfully. That is what you get with Sage’s MAS90 Extended Enterprise Suite.  Along with being very affordable for the value you receive, Sage will offer 0% interest on 3-5 year financing.  And don't forget that there are other affordable applications that The Attivo Group can offer at 0% interest for 3-5 year financing.  The Attivo Group will also work with you on the payment for the implementation services.  How great is that for a small to mid-sized company looking to grow their business! Purchasing Sage’s EES is like buying a car that is pretty, gets good gas mileage and is reliable every day of the week.  And doesn’t buying something like that make it even sweeter when purchasing that product won't put us in a financial bind!

I am the type of person that likes having control over the situation that I am in.  Does that make me a control freak?  I would say no, but it is very possible my friends and family might have  a different answer for that question.  That being said, it stands to reason that if I owned a business I would want to have control over the data, security, confidentiality, and the location of where my business information is stored. Control is what you have with a client server application.  Access, resources, and data security are controlled in your own environment.  Upgrades are done when appropriate and are not forced upon you like they can be with SAAS applications.  Some even make you upgrade every 6 months! (cough Netsuite!) Less control is what you have with a Software As A Service model, also referred to as "cloud computing".  With SAAS you have little to no control when it comes to handling your data and information.  This alone makes it a bad fit for certain businesses out there because you may not have access to the tables in which the data is stored.  You are also depending on a third party to ensure your security and confidentiality.  And as I mentioned above, upgrades are often forced upon you. (cough Netsuite!) Another myth regarding SAAS is its low cost of ownership.  What people don't realize is with its frequent upgrades, which commit time, money and resources, along with reccurring costs, it may end up costing you more money than a client server application and will cause you a huge headache! If you are a person with your head in the clouds, (no pun intended) and don't need to have full control over your business information, then by all means choose a SAAS model for your company.  However, if you are like me and freak out when you have little control over things, then it is not wise to trust the "cloud" or SAAS model!

Growing up as a child, I think everybody can agree that there are a handful of words we are not allowed to say.  At the risk of offending my small audience of readers or angering my employer I will not print this list of "dirty" words.  That being said, we all know the words I am talking about! I would like to introduce another word onto this list and it becomes much more relevant as we grow from children to adults.  This word has been contested and disliked since the birth of our country and political elections are often won and lost because of it.  I am speaking of "taxes."  Perhaps the mention of this word isn't as offensive as the infamous "dirty" words, but at the start of 2011, it will become a lot more painful for many small businesses. At the beginning of 2011, all companies will be required to capture vendor payment information in order to be prepared to provide the required 1099 tax reporting for individuals or corporations from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a tax year.  What this means is that if a company or independent contractor purchases a $700 computer or $650 in printer ink, they will have to issue a tax form for it.  The administrative burden for this is daunting to say the least, not to mention the 1099 trail will expose payments to small operators that might be going unreported. For small businesses without large in-house accounting staffs, this can become a nightmare!  That is why it is going to be essential to have a software application or process in place to manage this.  At The Attivo Group, we can help you achieve this. If the U.S. has been taxed since 1776, then it is safe to say that taxes are not going away.  That is why each business needs to tackle these new laws head on instead of ignoring them.  2011 is right around the corner and we all can agree that nobody wants the IRS breathing down their necks!

When I first heard of the term “cloud computing” I wasn’t really sure what to think?  At the risk of sounding ignorant the first thing that came to my mind was sitting on a puffy cloud while using your PC or Mac.  I know, I know, completely idiotic, but I am just being honest.  I soon found out that “cloud computing” can be a pretty efficient and cost effective way to manage the IT infrastructure of your business. So what on Earth is “cloud computing?”  Simply put it is moving software applications which would typically be on the user’s network infrastructure out onto the internet by having control remote servers to maintain data and applications.  Did I say simply put?  I know, confusing! So basically you are having your IT hardware being shared amongst many companies.  By sharing costs including electricity, internet bandwidth, data storage, security and IT management, cloud computing can provide higher quality resources at a lower cost than most companies can provide with their own resources. Another example to explain this would be if you want milk, do you need to have a cow living in your backyard?  No, let the grocery store handle that for you!  Another advantage to “Cloud” environments is that they are generally managed in a secure, disaster-ready environment.  So if a major flood, tornado, or earthquake takes place, your equipment will remain safe. Now that you know that “cloud computing” isn’t working with your computer up in the sky, it is up to you to decide whether or not it is right for your business.   A lot of business’s today use a combination of “cloud” and “on-site” technology to handle their needs.  Whatever your choice is, it is nice to have an option of having your own in house infrastructure or sharing it with other companies.