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SOHO Business Services

  BY KEN SADLER   

Entrepreneurs and small business owners are the backbone of the American economy. We found more than a thousand service providers that cater to these enterprises.We present a representative sample here.



Entrepreneurial Edge OnLine is probably the finest site for information, advice, and resources for entrepreneurs and small businesses on the Web. You'll find a discussion forum, a schedule of upcoming conferences, news, and trends. From the cover page right on through, every page is carefully and beautifully arranged for ease of use. There is a great deal of valuable material here and it will take you time to encompass it all, but it will be time well spent. A must for entrepreneurs and small businesspeople.

Intersoft Solutions has the best and most comprehensive list of resources for entrepreneurs you're likely to come across. We found the Venture Capital section especially interesting and useful. You'll also find extensive lists of links to related sites, support organizations, businesses catering to the entrepreneur, and legal resources. The site is well designed: Nothing flashy, but clear and well organized. All the listings are in large type set well apart for easy reading. An excellent place to start your quest for information and help.


The real meat of Entrepreneurs Resource Center is near the bottom of the page under Hot Links. Clicking the link here will provide you with an extensive list of resource sites covering on-line marketing. You'll find everything from low-cost advertising and home page construction to financial and business sites. The site is well-designed, colorful, and grabs your attention.


A colorful and eye-catching opening page distinguishes Vantage Services from most. This company provides support services to entrepreneurs and home-based businesses engaged in mail-order selling. These folks don't tell you the business is easy and that you'll get rich overnight. In fact, they tell you just the opposite, which is the truth. Services offered here include credit card processing, setting up a 1-800 number with an answering service, shipping, and customer service. If you're interested in going into mail order selling, be sure you check out this site.

Paul Clough, C.P.A., has a simple, unadorned, one-page site with a new wrinkle: Mr. Clough states that he brings an entrepreneur's perspective to the financial table with 25 years of experience to back it up. As an entrepreneur, he feels that you should not trust your business's financial health to yesterday's accounting practices. If this agrees with your thinking, spend a few minutes reading what else Mr. Clough has to say.


If you're interested in protecting your invention, inventions & patents is the site for you. All the information you will need to make a decision about intellectual property and legal protection is here. Fortunately, you don't have to wade through all of it to get the gist, which is that Ogram & Teplitz, Patent Attorneys, will help you get a patent on your invention at new low prices.


BizWeb is a database of businesses and services that will be of help to entrepreneurs and other small business. You can search by company name, product, or service, or drill down through the hierarchy by product name or service. The site has a nice opening screen, introduces its sponsors, and then gets right down to business presenting the list. No nonsense here.

Canadian Small Business World is off to a promising start, but needs considerable fleshing out before it can achieve its stated goal of reshaping the Canadian economy. The main page is colorful and well laid out. If you're doing business in the Great White North, check back here in the near future.

Entrepreneurs On Line is still under construction, but shows promise. A sectioned pyramid lists different areas of interest: ideas, trade shows, manufacturers, product development, and such.

DaVinci's Inventor Homepage is a rather mundane source of information and resources for inventors and entrepreneurs. The resources vary widely in quality, and exploring the site is tedious and time-consuming.

We saw a little of everything at Heavenly Bodies : small business support, services, and business opportunities. Under these headings the choices are a bit skimpy, but under construction. The site is not much more than a series of lists with the listings being links to other links and finally to some text.

MRTC Entrepreneurial Network offers assistance to Hawaiians starting new small businesses. However, a sizable part of the information would be valuable to entrepreneurs anywhere. There wasn't much imagination involved in the design of this site. It's not one that will attract much attention or hold anyone's interest for long.

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QUICK CLICK!
Entrepreneurial Edge OnLine

Intersoft Solutions

Entrepreneurs Resource Center

Vantage Services

Paul Clough, C.P.A.

inventions & patents

BizWeb

Canadian Small Business World

Entrepreneurs On Line

DaVinci's Inventor Homepage

Heavenly Bodies

MRTC Entrepreneurial Network