As a small business owner, finding capital to build your business is one of your top priorities. But if you don't yet have a business credit history and your personal credit history needs some work, it can be difficult to get approved for most business financing options. You can still find a way to get a business loan with no credit check, but it will likely cost you more to do so.

Small Business Matters – Episode #11 If you're running a small business that caters to businesses and professionals, having an active presence on LinkedIn is a must. But posting the right content that resonates can be a bit of a science. To help us do LinkedIn better, we invited LinkedIn engagement expert Judi Fox to join us today. Judi is listed as a top ten LinkedIn coach for 2021 in Yahoo finance and a featured speaker at Social Media Marketing World. With over 18 years of experience in business development and sales. Judi Fox developed the LinkedIn Business Accelerator method to reach 1 million views in 90 days. Watch our interview, or follow our podcast. What follows is a lightly edited transcription of our interview. Gary Stockton: – Well hello, and welcome to another episode of Small Business Matters. I'm your host, Gary Stockton, and I'm so excited about this week's guest and topic. You know, I post on LinkedIn often, but not all of my posts do that well. If you're running a small business that caters to businesses and professionals, having an active presence on LinkedIn is a must. But posting the right content that resonates can be a bit of a science. You have to be a clever fox to figure out this small business matter. So to help us do LinkedIn better, we've invited Judi Fox to join us today. Now, Judi is listed as a top ten LinkedIn coach for 2021 in Yahoo finance and a featured speaker at Social Media Marketing World. With over 18 years of experience in business development and sales. Judi Fox developed the LinkedIn Business Accelerator method to reach 1 million views in 90 days. Judi, welcome to Small Business Matters. Judi Fox: Oh, I loved that introduction, and I like that you have to be. What did you say? Smart. Like a fox or a clever like a fox? You have to be. Gary Stockton: – Yes, to master this small business matter. So let's talk for a moment about the danger of indecision and when it comes to LinkedIn. You know, I'm a busy small business owner. I know LinkedIn can do my business good, but I don't know what to post. Do you have any advice for people stuck in indecision? Judi Fox: Yes, I would say the easiest way to start posting. I'm going to give you two strategies to go from indecision to getting it done and getting it posted. Number one is if you have any content that you've created in this world, if you've ever been on a podcast, if you've ever posted on Facebook, have you ever post on Instagram or Twitter on YouTube? If you've put any content out into the world, repurpose it for LinkedIn, find a way to pull out a business story or something about that podcast or post that you think is interesting. And then the other way to get started on LinkedIn is to comment. I tell people all the time, commenting on the platform on LinkedIn is more visible than any other social media site. So commenting and then you can turn that comment into your own post, your own original post on LinkedIn. Gary Stockton: Oh, so if you comment on a piece of content, that can then live as its own piece of content? Judi Fox: You would have to do a few steps, but I would what I would do is literally copy and paste what you wrote as the comment and then turn it into a post. Does that make sense? So it doesn't naturally live as a post. You have to actually take a few more steps to turn it into a post. Gary Stockton: Yeah. And so repurposing things that you're creating and thinking of ways to get more life out of that content. So if it's a podcast interview that you've done or like we're doing here and maybe some of this content could be sliced and diced and posted out onto LinkedIn, maybe in smaller chunks. Is that what I'm hearing you say? Judi Fox: Yes. You don't need to post the entire podcast or YouTube video. What LinkedIn is, it's a place to consume micro-moments of knowledge that could either be a round-up of something. So, for example, what we're recording right now could be summarized as a post as the top five things we covered in this interview and then list out the things we covered. Or we would take one micro piece of advice and then expand that. So those are the two ways I think of repurposing content on LinkedIn. Gary Stockton: That's awesome. So you're on LinkedIn a lot. What are some common mistakes you see small businesses make on their LinkedIn posts? Judi Fox: I would say first, without jumping right to post, that small businesses are missing out on a thriving company page. That is what we call. So we have personal profiles on LinkedIn and the company page on LinkedIn. And I think small businesses are missing out on being active on the company, page number one, because company pages are getting a lot of updates, and they just announced and rolled out a lead gen form. Judi Fox: So I know I didn't answer your question about posting on a company page or posting. Still, I can't miss out on announcing a new LinkedIn platform update, which is giving people a lead gen form button on the company page. Gary Stockton: Oh, tell me more. Judi Fox: Yeah, exactly. So when you go to company pages that have turned this on, it shows up as a button with a, again, I don't have any control over their emoji usage, but they have an emoji-looking icon like a light bulb button. So you can click the words get started. Free Demo, Contact Sales, and it gives you a button right on the landing page of your company page before you ever get to any of your posts; before you even get to anything else, it gives you a converting button. And those people then click on that button, and they give you their email so they can be on your email list, and you can start to grow your email list that way. Gary Stockton: Wow. So is there a cadence to posting? I mean, our sales team posts very actively on LinkedIn. If you're a small business owner, you're trying to run the business, too, right? But is there a recommended cadence for how often you should post? Judi Fox: Yeah. So I love to split up into buckets because I notice a lot of people will say, you know, I've watched Gary Vaynerchuk, and some people have come to me and told me, wow, Gary says to post three times a day. And I said, that comes from his experience on LinkedIn, which is a very hot audience with well over 5 million followers. I don't recommend that schedule if you do not have 5 million followers and a hot audience. What I do recommend is posting maybe Max once every day or every other day that here is why. The audience is still not warmed up if you are posting and getting less than ten likes and comments. They may not trust what you're writing to serve them or give them value. Judi Fox: They may be scrolling past it because you haven't come up with visually interesting hooks, content, or a visual element that catches their eye. So you have to build up trust. And the way to build that trust up is max once or every other day, like not hitting them with tons of content because instead of posting at that high level, you want to be commenting more. Gary Stockton: Excellent. You talked a little bit about post prompts on your website. What are post prompts? Judi Fox: So LinkedIn was built for reading. If we think about YouTube, it was built for video. I go on YouTube, and I expect to watch a video. I'm not expecting to read somebody's post beneath their YouTube video. So the opposite is true for LinkedIn. LinkedIn was built for reading. It has a newspaper news outlet type of energy. So if you want to get on LinkedIn and do it in what I consider an easy way, that's why I have these 20 LinkedIn post prompts. So Buzz Sumo summarized the top viral post prompts a couple of years ago. They had hundreds, and I took the top 20. Number one, I've used them myself, but also I have seen my own posts go to half a million and a million views from using these 20 LinkedIn post prompts. So now I probably have intrigued you to use. Gary Stockton: Okay, tell me, we've got to dig into that. Judi Fox: Yeah. So the very first one I used was five ways to, and then I put dot, dot, dot, you can post anything underneath the five ways to five ways to get more sales for your small business. Five Ways to close your next real estate deal. Five Ways to think about all the knowledge you have. Can you come up with five ways to insert your expertise? And so that is what I did. And that post went to half a million people. I said five ways your profile banner image can sell for you. So it's a powerful post, and it's a forum. Gary Stockton:It's a framework. Judi Fox: Yes. It is a framework. The platform soaks up that knowledge for a couple of reasons. First, because the platform is a reading-first platform, we want to know what we're giving our like to in that first line. That's why so many people have a really good strategy for creating that first-line hook statement. Gary Stockton:  Can you do that in combination with polls? So you have that question and then underneath, you will have a poll. Judi Fox: Yes. I tell people all the time, clear over clever. So LinkedIn is a space where people think about, "oh, I need to get on LinkedIn and be professional." I explain to people that professionalism really boils down to clear leadership language. We want to know what did you mean; what are we giving our like to if I'm going to vote and put my response on a poll question, I want to know what am I saying Yes or No to, or what am I voting on? And if there's any confusion, I will probably not vote. So, yes, a very clear question. The what is language or why do you think something or vote below very clear language will definitely get you a lot of poll responses. Gary Stockton:  Very good. So can you talk a little bit about the different levels of call to action that you outline in your accelerator program? Judi Fox: Yes, I think the calls to action on your content, and throughout your journey on LinkedIn, you have calls to action that can generate more awareness. We now know you exist. Anyone listening right now that's meeting you or me for the first time, they're experiencing what it's like from the sense of awareness. They now might Google your name. They might Google my name. So awareness has to exist because how can people hire you if they don't know you exist, right? Gary Stockton: Mm hmm. Yes. Judi Fox: The next one is to evaluate. That's where, for example, we talked about a call to action at the end of this recording; we would potentially have what's called that evaluation energy, check out or go visit or follow on these channels. That's why at the end of podcast episodes, that's why people have that on YouTube. They'll say, go, subscribe or go to my next video that is coming up because it's going to be X, Y, Z. Judi Fox:  You want to continue the conversation, the same thing on LinkedIn. You want to have something that says, follow my profile. Ring the bell on my profile because you'll see my next post. That's the goal for leads and conversations you want to move people to. Then what is the next conversation? Where's the next place we're hanging out? And then the final one is that kind of converge or purchase language where you might say something like, I have just opened up or I'm launching a book, I've just opened up seats in my next coaching cohort, and you want to give people language around what are your offerings? Maybe you are offering new templates in your Canva store. I mean, the sky's the limit to tell us what is possible to purchase because, especially if you have people aware of you, if you have people who have already evaluated you and they keep coming back for more, that means you have an audience. So that's why people can then convert and talk about their products. Gary Stockton: Wow. I like how you've categorized that. You know, it's so clear and simplifies these things. You don't have a dozen or so different channels that you could go down with Call to Actions. You've got to keep it to a set group of things. I like that. Judi Fox: Yeah. And I was going to say the easiest way. So if I was going to say grab a call like a lot of people on LinkedIn and a lot of sales professionals and small businesses, their customer journey starts with a discovery call. I don't know about you, but I see that as one of the highest responses that clients tell me. They want to book potential discovery calls. They want people coming to them and booking those calls. So your call to action on LinkedIn specifically can drive traffic to your profile to be able to click and make that call happen. So if you build your LinkedIn profile to make it clear how to book that discovery call, all your posts have to say is alert them to a PS: Here's how to book a discovery call. So if you've been following me for a while and you're ready to find out what it takes to do X, Y, and Z in your business, please go book a discovery call the link is on my profile, so you don't have to bombard them with links in your posts constantly. Gary Stockton: Very simple. Judi Fox: Yeah. Yeah. Gary Stockton: So we would all like to we'd all like to have people engaging with our content. So should I be focusing on posting more content or engaging in the comments on other posts? Judi Fox: I think if I had to give formula, my background is in chemical engineering, so I naturally like formulas. If I had a, if I make one post, I tell people one post, ten comments. So if you were saying to yourself, "You know what, I have barely commented on LinkedIn", go out and make ten comments and then make your post. So if you're able to keep up that schedule, that's a really basic formula. The most simple one I can think of because I make way more than ten comments per post. But at a minimum, you should be willing to go out and make ten comments before you post. Gary Stockton: Yeah, that's a good guideline. So let's talk about connecting. And you talked about this in your Social Media Marketing World talk. I don't want to come off as spammy when reaching out on LinkedIn. Is there a right way to do this? And you've got some very clever tricks with that you do with text expander. Can you touch on that too? Judi Fox: Yeah. Clever. Like a fox. So I would say, first of all, we have the inbound messages, and then we also have the outbound messages that we want to make. Which one are which one do you want to go over first? I have a different strategy. Gary Stockton: Yeah, I'd say outbound. Judi Fox:  Yeah. Okay. So anyone listening right now that you want to do outbound messages to potentially your clients or your audience, you would come from a place of, first of all, I don't know how cold these outbound messages are? Because I don't usually recommend very cold ones. And if you do a cold outbound message, you'll want to keep it at that awareness level and try not to ask them a hard question, something that feels like, wow, that doesn't feel normal or appropriate. For example, the more you show interest outbound to them, you don't require anything back from them, and it actually serves you better in that cold messaging space. Gary Stockton: Feels more genuine, right? Judi Fox:  Yeah. I'll give you an example. Sometimes, it's easier to provide examples of what not to do and then convert them to what to do. So I got a message on LinkedIn today and paused because I haven't been good at not getting messages like this, but I think this person ended up saying, you know, they were trying to say things, but it was too generic, and they didn't show any interest in me. There was no acknowledgment of who I am or what I do, nothing. But they ended up asking me a question saying, are you working on any new, exciting projects lately? I'd love to hear about them. So it's acting like they're showing interest in me, but they're not. I don't feel very interested in I feel like they want to ask me that question because they just want me to reply so they can start getting into my direct messages. Judi Fox: Now, what they should have written is something that says, Hey, I am interested in checking out more of your content. I'm going to go out and see what you're up to. And by the way, I am excited to follow your hashtag #FoxRocks. If they actually took a micro moment to give me attention and didn't expect anything back, I might have actually replied and said, Oh my gosh, wow, thank you for following my hashtag and let me know where your hashtag is. You see where they're letting the world of me feel appreciated? And I will tell you, if people say that to me, I have a habit of turning around and saying, thank you for following the hashtag. Let me know what yours is, and I'll follow it right back. But most people don't do that, so I don't have to follow too many hashtags. Just kidding. But do you see the difference? Gary Stockton: Yes. Judi Fox: And yeah, it's exciting. Gary Stockton: The cold emails or the cold messages that you get, you know, can you touch on your method for double checking if the person is genuinely interested? Because I thought that was very clever with text expander, you've got some automation that, well, not automation, but things that help you make good use of your time. Judi Fox: Yes, I do. I use something called Text Blaze.. It's an app. I have no association with them whatsoever. I just found them online. But there's a lot of ways to create short phrases that you can type. Judi Fox:  So I'm going to read you the message, and I'm going to send it back in real-time to this person who asked me, are you working on any new, exciting projects lately? And by the way, it's a pitch. This person doesn't care if I'm working on any new exciting projects because I don't know them at all. So I'm not interested in having a one-on-one conversation. So I write back because I get to take my power and energy and my ownership of my inbox back instead of being triggered or feeling a certain way. I just say this. "Thanks for connecting, and the best way to get to know each other is in the comments,  looking forward to seeing you here more on LinkedIn. Here is my newsletter to subscribe so you can see my next post, and I turn it around and tell them directions for how we can get to know each other. Gary Stockton: I think that's brilliant. It's not snarky, it's not rude. It's professionally worded and it kind of lets them know where they stand. You know, you have to get a rapport going. It's almost like, you know, the analogy of walking up to someone in a cocktail reception and saying, hey, you know, I'd like to sell my widgets to you, you know? "Hi, I'm I'm Gary from from Experian. And I want to sell you credit reports, you know?" Well, hello, you know, who are you? You know, how do we know each other? Getting rapport? I think it's you know, it's kind of missing, I wish people would put more forethought into the approach. Judi Fox:  Yeah. Here's what I think has changed about the world even in the last 2 to 3 years. More people are content creators. Individual people are content creators. The company is a content creator. People are putting out more and more content than we've ever seen in this world. Therefore, if somebody is coming into your direct messages, trying to start the relationship privately without any reason, and they've never taken any time to check out your online content, that's where you put your heart and soul into your business. You're probably announcing your new projects publicly. You probably want to talk publicly to the audience about all your new, exciting projects and goals for this year, especially if you're posting publicly. Therefore, the private one on one warming up is not as powerful anymore. I would caution everyone to create a pattern of publicly adding touchpoints. And I tell people all the time public conversations, and public comments convert to private conversations much faster and better. You can make more business results with that method. Gary Stockton: So good. Judi. Thanks so much for sharing these insights with us. Any closing thoughts on LinkedIn? We've got to talk a little bit about LinkedIn audio, but I think we've run short on time. Unless you've got something that you could say on that? Judi Fox: I just want to say that you want to turn on the new LinkedIn creator mode because all that we would say about LinkedIn audio, everything hinges on the future of LinkedIn. If you want to be a content creator, you want to turn on LinkedIn creator mode. It's a toggle button on your private profile section. If you want all the steps. I walk you through every single step in a YouTube video on my profile. So. It's been really powerful to see people's reactions to creator mode, and it's changed their experience. You'll get access to all the new features like LinkedIn audio, newsletters, LinkedIn Live, and any new feature that comes out in the next couple of years. They're rolling it out using Creator Mode. Gary Stockton: Creator Mode, excellent tip. So where can our listeners find out more information about you Judi? Judi Fox:  I would say the best way and the best thing to know is it's spelled JUDI FOX. So Judi Fox and you can also type in #FoxRocks, and you'll be able to find other people posting about the conversations we've had, which is really powerful or me. Gary Stockton: Okay. And then your accelerator program, you've got what we mentioned in the discussion. If you go to judifox.com listeners, you can learn more about Judi's excellent accelerator program, be a LinkedIn power user, and be a clever fox like Judi. It's been a pleasure talking to you. Thank you so much for doing this. Judi Fox:  It's been a pleasure talking to you, too. Thank you so much.

According to Goldman Sachs' recent 10,000 Small Businesses Voices survey, Black small-business owners have a more positive outlook for the current year compared to others in their field. Despite facing increased operating expenses and greater difficulties obtaining financing, some of the Black small-business owners surveyed in late January reported feeling more confident in their ability to overcome challenges and have a better perception of growth opportunities compared to prior years. As per the survey results, 81% of Black small-business owners are optimistic about their business' financial future this year, compared to 68% of all surveyed companies. A profitable future imagined According to the survey, 78% of Black business owners anticipate an increase in profits, while 60% of all surveyed businesses hold this view. 67% of Black business owners expect to create new jobs, compared to 51% overall. Additionally, 67% of Black business owners are currently hiring either full-time or part-time employees, versus 59% among all surveyed businesses. Personal savings are starting to take a hit The survey found that 45% of Black small-business owners had to use their personal savings in the past three months to sustain their business, whereas only 33% of all small businesses surveyed faced this situation. These numbers have increased from January 2022, when 38% of Black small-business owners and 23% of all small-business owners used their personal savings to keep their business running. In addition, 37% of Black small-business owners reported difficulty in obtaining new capital and financing, compared to 23% among all small businesses. When Goldman Sachs surveyed this cohort in January 2022, 32% of Black business owners felt uncertain about their ability to obtain capital, compared to 19% among all surveyed businesses. About the survey The survey was conducted by Babson College and David Binder Research from January 23 to 26, 2023, and was based on the responses of 1,838 participants who participated in the 10,000 Small Businesses survey, including 325 Black small-business owners. The survey included small business owners from 48 states in the United States.

In a very special Inclusion-Forward episode of Small Business Matters, we focus in on people living and working with disabilities in two great interviews.

Seeing her employees build successful careers is something Lynn Wehrmann of Minneapolis-based WeCo takes great pride in. We sat down with Lynn for a special episode of Small Business Matters to talk about disability inclusion and the profound impact it can have when people with disabilities are doing work with purpose and meaning. WeCo specializes in providing high quality user experience testing focused on how individuals living with disabilities interact with electronic formats and the internet. Many of their employees are people living with visible and hidden disabilities. As you will hear in our interview, they provide their employees with career opportunities and work that offers purpose and meaning.   What follows is a lightly edited transcript of our interview. Gary Stockton: Experian wants to shine a light on diversity, equity and inclusion. So in today's Inclusion-Forward interview, we focus on inclusion for people with disabilities. We're going to speak with a founder of a company that specializes in improving accessibility in the products we use. The company is WeCo. For Weco's founder, living with a disability is something Lynn Wehrman recognizes as expertise. She was born with and raised alongside four sisters who lived with cognitive disabilities. Being different and competing in a world that didn't recognize invisible disabilities, she grew up to be keenly aware that being different abled doesn't make a person incapable, and that people living with disabilities don't have a level playing field in academics and employment. Lynn, can you share how your early career in this field evolved? Lynn Wehrman: I have a degree in communications, English Liberal Arts, a minor in professional writing. And I'm one of the rare people that actually got to use my writing skills in my career. But I also, I had a very strong sales background, that was how I got through college.And I kind of found myself on this sales treadmill in my early twenties. But, I was ill for a large part of my thirties where I was not able to work because of my disability. And when I went back to work, I landed a job selling transportation programs in downtown Minneapolis as part of a quazi at government group. Gary Stockton: They say that, if you are pursuing work that you're really passionate about it doesn't feel like work, it doesn't feel like a job. I'm sure you would agree with that working in this field now? Lynn Wehrman: That is correct. In fact, when we have new people come on our team, we warn them that they are going to want to work all the time.And we, we say, if you get a taste of the WeCo Kool-aid, you're going to wanna work all the time and you can't. So we have to work on work/life balance because the mission is intoxicating. There's no other way to say it because it, and it even still surprises me, there is a lot of immediate gratification in this job where you can see someone that you hire is all of a sudden being listened to by clients, being asked for by clients. And you can see the impact that that has on their self-esteem and their confidence. Gary Stockton: With so many unfilled jobs in the employment market. Do you think people with disabilities are being overlooked? Lynn Wehrman: Absolutely. Without a doubt; and the why is something that I think could be debated until the end of time. Hopefully it won't have to be, but from what I've experienced as being a professional who lives with a disability, even though mine is invisible. I have had to reveal my disability at work and know how that limited my ability to move up. But also encountering people that work with us that have advanced degrees that go to schools simply because they cannot find employment. Gary Stockton: So why is accessibility and usability important in products that we use? Lynn Wehrman: Accessibility as it's been applied most recently to the digital world has to do with a set of legal standards that products need to include in order for there to be measurable accessibility. So for instance, the web content accessibility guidelines, or WCAG, a lot of people think that those are laws, but they're not, they are simply a set of guidelines that were set forth by a group called the World Wide Web Consortium or W three C. And this is a group that got together to kind of solidify what web accessibility means. But WCAG has been applied to laws all over the world. So for instance, it has been aligned, applied to section 508 of the rehabilitation act of 1973. Which is the US law that says that everything that the government buys has to be accessible to people living with disabilities. So, understanding how the laws and the guidelines work together is an important part of understanding what measurable accessibility is. So when we talk about digital accessibility, we're usually talking about WCAG web content accessibility guidelines. Lynn Wehrman: Now you can have something meet all those guidelines, and have it not be very usable to someone who lives with a disability. So WCAG is like a checklist. It can make sure that you have alt tags on your images. Your headings are cleared, your links are labeled, but how the entire picture fits together is what usability is. So can someone who is blind find a doctor on this medical website by using a search engine? Or can someone with a cognitive disability, are they able to sign up for a newsletter? And so that's why we have a team of testers who do disability focused usability testing. So that, we've got our accessibility specialists who work on the standards with the clients, and then we have more usability testers that (ask) does it actually work when the rubber meets the road? So it needs to be something that individuals can actually understand. And put to use. So the web content, accessibility guidelines touch on this, and it is something that we also vet out in our usability testing. Lynn Wehrman: But for instance, some basic guidance that we give people is don't use a lot of jargon in your website. Think about who your audience is. Will they understand that jargon? Does it mean something to them?  Use a lot of white space on your page. Don't have it be lots and lots of dense text. Chances are someone without a disability isn't going to read it anyway. And someone with a cognitive disability may be very frustrated and unable to get through it. Meaningful headings so that people understand what they're going to read in the next paragraph. It's very common sense editing, but it is an accessibility tool that's very helpful, particularly for users who live with cognitive disabilities. Gary Stockton: So in your work, do you hear people paying lip service to inclusion without necessarily walking the talk? Lynn Wehrman: I think it's really kind of an interesting dichotomy, because you'll have people in one breath say "we absolutely wanna be employing people with disabilities, we wanna bring you to the table." And then they will express discomfort about me talking about, for instance, my mental illness and how I deal with that in the workplace.I've heard you should be keeping that to yourself. Gary Stockton: Employees that have disabilities. How are they different? What, what are some of their characteristics? Lynn Wehrman: So how are your employees different? What are their characteristics? It's the same thing. Gary Stockton: Same thing. Lynn Wehrman: People who live with disabilities have to pick up kids from daycare. They're really frustrated over the cost of their dry cleaning. They forget to bring the milk home. And they, I Sue Ann Rodriguez, the Director of Accessibility Services, who is blind is the biggest Minnesota Viking(s) fan you will ever find. It is football season, you will not be able to talk to Sue Ann on a Sunday. She is gone. Lynn Wehrman: So they're not really that different , it's, you know, I have managed employees who, without the distinction of being disabled. And I think that the biggest difference that I find is that not true of all people who live with disabilities, but many people who live with disabilities have had to work so hard to prove themselves that they are squared away and professional. And it's, it's rare that I have to tell anyone twice it's, you know, are they perfect employees? No. Have we, have I worked with people who live with disabilities who have not worked out? Absolutely. They have had things come up in their lives? Absolutely. But as a group, they've had so few options, we try really hard to make the employment experience at WeCo be very normal. And, you know, you live with a disability, guess what we all do. You're not getting special treatment here, and most of our employees tell us that that's what they love about the company is that I'm just another employee here. Gary Stockton: I'd love to know some stories about employees that came to you, that made some personal progress in their lives working for WeCo. Lynn Wehrman: Sure, probably my favorite one to tell is,  about our brand new Principal Test Consultant, Nina. Nina is actually was on our beta test team. She tested our product, so she's been with us the full 10 years and she has progressed up our. Our career path to a senior lead. And now she is one of our first principal testers, which is the top of the career.But in addition to that, when I met Nina. When she interviewed for her certified test consultant position with us, it was really clear to see that she was phenomenally brilliant. She, she just is. She has what, what I would call practically a photographic memory. Nina is blind.  I know she's told her story publicly, so she won't mind me sharing this, that she is, she is a young Asian woman, first generation American, and she went blind when she was 14. The coolest thing about, what happened in Nina's story, we were working alongside a creative firm. It was, I often call this office space, the adult study hall, because we were all in an open space together. Lynn Wehrman: And so we got to know this creative firm called Nika Creative. It is a inclusivity marketing firm and, the founder and I became friends. And she said, you know, I really need a project manager. And I said, you know, Nina needs something and she's a trained administrator. She was one of our early administrators. But at that time we weren't able to give her enough work. And so the owner of this company said, "well, you know, I'm really not sure if a blind person can do this work because it involves, you know, using project management, software, tracking several different projects that are going at once." And, and I said, "I am telling you that Nina will let you know what she needs. I really think you should interview her and give, give her a chance." And you know, the hesitation was there and I said look, you're an inclusivity marketing firm. You really need to try to employ someone who lives with a disability. And it wasn't two weeks in that the owner came back to me and said, I don't know what we did without her. Lynn Wehrman: And you were absolutely right. She knew what she needed. She had the software, we experimented with a couple of different project management systems, found one that worked with her screen reader. And now I cannot wrestle Nina back from this person if I wanted to. But she and I, the owner and I have been on a couple of different podcasts talking about what that journey was like for her, and last week I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Nina for advancement to her principal tester role. And she talked about how advancing on the WeCo career path, working with us as an administrator was the realization of a lifelong dream, and then to be connected with Nika, to be able to move to them and find permanent employment. Lynn Wehrman: And it, I mean, it really touched my heart because I knew that we had. I knew we had created opportunities for Nina, but I didn't know that it was that impactful on her. Gary Stockton: How can people find out more about WeCo? Lynn Wehrman: Just go to our website – theweco.com and we have a careers page. We've got information about our testing career. We have information about our services. You'll see that we've always got some sort of event going. We also have a free accessibility library under our resource tab. Because we are a mission based for profit, we have a number of things that are available to people at no cost. So it's a great way to be able to start learning about digital accessibility and accessibility employment. Gary Stockton: Well, Lynn, I want to thank you very much for taking time out of your busy schedule to come on the Small Business Matters podcast and share about the great work that WeCo is doing. Lynn Wehrman: It was a pleasure. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

On December 3rd, the World will celebrate International Persons with Disabilities Day. To celebrate, Experian has a special episode of the Small Business Matters podcast this week featuring a discussion with Zack and Cambry Nelson. The Nelsons are the creators of the "Not a Wheelchair," an off-road, bicycle-based apparatus that is now being used all over North America to help people with disabilities get off the pavement and deeper into nature. We dive into the challenges they faced starting a business during the pandemic, and hear their plans to help even more wheelchair users in the future. What follows is a lightly edited transcript of the interview. Emily Garman: We're excited to welcome Zack and Cambry Nelson to our podcast today. They are the creators of the "Not a Wheelchair," which is being used all over North America by people with disabilities to get off the pavement and deeper into nature. So I'm really happy to have you both here to talk to me. Can you give us kind of an overview of what the rig is and what inspired you to create this device? And I'll show some pictures too. Zack Nelson: So, I met Cambry what, like four years ago? We met on a dating app actually. And we started dating and I realized pretty quickly that, you know, if we ever wanted to go on a hike or something like that, a manual wheelchair is not good on gravel. Cambry Nelson: Not really going to cut it. Zack Nelson: And it's not good on dirt, it's not good on grass, fields even are really hard. So I started looking into off-road wheelchairs and they're all like 20 grand, which is a little expensive when you're dating. And so I realized that I could take two electric bikes and weld them together and make my own off-road wheelchair for like $3,000. And it worked pretty well. it needed a few adjustments, and then we made those and mass produced them and that's where we're at. Emily Garman: So let's take a look at it. This is the product, what it actually looks like in its current form. I'm sure there were many versions ahead of this. Zack Nelson: Yeah, so this is made mostly out of bike parts. So it has a hub motor, mounted between the bike wheels. And the nice thing about having it made out of bike parts is that like everything is super inexpensive if you need to replace it. Like new tires are 30 bucks. Which if you're familiar with the wheelchair industry at all, you know. It gets really expensive, really quick. Emily Garman: You can find the parts locally, too. Zack Nelson: Yeah. Amazon has most of them. So we try to make it as cheap as possible so people can get out as much as possible. Emily Garman: So what have people been saying about it? What's the reception been in the community? What impact is it making? What are people able to do that they couldn't do before? Zack Nelson: I like seeing our Instagram, I mean. It's just fun seeing the pictures of places people can now go that they probably wouldn't have been able to get to otherwise. I don't know, what you think? Cambry Nelson: Yeah, I would say Instagram has been the best route that we get to see everyone's experiences; and I know the first time I hopped on it, it really felt liberating to be able to go into areas of nature that I hadn't in years. And so it's just really rewarding to see other people go on trails and see just gorgeous scenery from the NotAWheelchair instead of hanging out on pavement, like you said earlier. Emily Garman: Cambry, I wanted to ask you something; when I looked at your Instagram, something that struck me, as a mom myself, is pictures of you with your baby riding in the rig. You have a strap that you–I think he was younger at the time–but you would strap him to your body so he could face out.Wzhat was that like, to be able to do something that so many parents just take for granted, to take your baby out, out for a stroll? Was that emotional? Cambry Nelson: You know, I, it's been really interesting because I have had a lot of questions from friends that are also wheelchair users that became pregnant and they would say, "I'm sad that I'm gonna miss out on some of the things that other parents can do with their kids." And I just don't, I guess I'm not really aware of that anymore. We just find a way to do it. And I love that the rig is another way that I can ride a bike with my kid. Obviously my kid's not riding a bike on his own yet, but like, we're almost tandem riding a bike together, and we go on walks almost daily, and I don't know, you just find a way. When you want it bad enough, you figure it out. Emily Garman: Absolutely. So shifting over to kind of the business aspect of this. You all launched in June of 2020, so right around the beginning of the pandemic. Do you think that everybody being cooped up inside and, having all the challenges that we all faced during that time affected the launch or success of the product and business at all? Zack Nelson: Quite a bit actually. So, kind of inadvertently, because everyone was staying at home, everyone was going outside more often and buying bikes. And so there was a massive bike shortage as well as bike part shortage. And so that made our launch fairly difficult because it's made mostly from bike parts. And so we've been sold out basically, you know, probably like six to 12 weeks of wait time for these machines until just barely recently, like a couple weeks ago, where we finally caught up with all of the orders. So yeah, it did definitely affect the launch. Emily Garman: Now are you still making them all yourself or do you have a factory operation with folks putting them together there? Zack Nelson: Good question. Utah Trikes is our manufacturer, and they probably have 30 or 40 people here in Utah that are manufacturing these alongside other trikes and, and bikes, that they make themselves. And then we also have our own building, also here in Orem, Utah, where we are manufacturing other products, that we plan on launching later this year. Emily Garman: I'm looking forward to seeing about that. What would you say are some of the challenges that you face? So you mentioned the shortage of bike parts around the beginning of the pandemic, because everybody was getting outside. Any other lessons learned as a business owner? Cambry Nelson: So I tested the first version out and I feel like we tried to take it over a lot of different terrain, and we went through a lot of different versions. I am an occupational therapist, and so I had some needs that I wanted to be met. I think the first real obstacle was, how do we make something as inexpensive as possible to fit a large group of people that all have very specific needs? And so we had to kind of come up with something that could help as many people as we could. And then with the idea of down the road, we would try and adapt more things and make it more friendly to other disabilities down the road. And so that's what we're kind of working on, at the moment. But I think that was really hard for me because I just wanted everyone to enjoy it and that's really hard to do, to fit every body type. So that was a struggle I think. And then also, when we were getting ready to launch it, we had a friend tested out that he's like a good foot and a half, maybe taller than me. Zack Nelson: Yeah, he was like six four. He's a really big client. Cambry Nelson: He's gotta be taller than that! He is a big, tall guy, and so he took it out and found some weaknesses. Zack Nelson: He broke two of them for us that we had to fix, but it's good that we did that testing beforehand. Emily Garman: Yeah, that's what testing is for. Those difficult and expensive lessons. Well, tell me a little bit about where people can find you. I know you have a big Instagram presence, but tell us where we can learn more about this off road wheelchair. Zack Nelson: So our website is where we have most of the stuff, which is notawheelchair.com. And then we have some videos on YouTube of everything in action, and then later, either really late this year or early next year, we have a kids version of the rig that we're really excited about that we'll be launching as well. Emily Garman: Oh that's gonna be great. I can't wait to see that. Well, Zack, Cambry, thank you so much for joining us today on the Experian Small Business Matters podcast. It was really good to talk to you. I look forward to following all your adventures with your beautiful photos on Instagram and wish you the greatest success. Zack Nelson: Thank you.

It's been said often that small businesses are the engine of our economy, and they really are. It's something we don't ever take for grant here at Experian. Because Small Business Matters! So we want to take a moment to thank all of our small business customers for choosing Experian. From the entire team here at Experian thank you small business. From our business, to your business, to new business and beyond. Happy Thanksgiving from Experian

Building a strong business credit profile can often be a determining factor in the success or failure of a business. Especially important when you consider roughly fifty percent of new businesses will fail in the first two years, according to the Small Business Administration. By establishing and building business credit early on, business owners are reducing their chances of becoming a statistic. So in this blog post we outline the top five factors that impact your business credit score. There are a number of things that could have an adverse impact on your company's business credit score. 1: The number of years your business has been operating. Establishing a strong credit profile requires time, and the longevity of your business plays a pivotal role. Lenders and credit agencies often view well-established businesses more favorably, as they demonstrate stability and reliability. A company with a longer operating history showcases its ability to navigate challenges and sustain operations. This longevity factor contributes positively to the business credit score. For newer businesses, the challenge lies in building credit over time. Implementing responsible financial practices, maintaining positive cash flow, and fulfilling financial obligations can gradually enhance your credit standing. Experian has a Blueprint for building and establishing business credit–it's a PDF step-by-step guide to establishing and improving your business credit, and it can help you whether your businessr is 5 days or 5 years old. 2: Lines of business credit applied for in the last 9 months. Credit inquiries, or the number of times your business seeks new lines of credit, can impact your credit score. Multiple credit applications within a short period may signal financial instability or desperation for funds, which can be viewed unfavorably. It's crucial to carefully assess and strategically apply for business credit. A thoughtful approach to securing credit ensures that each application is a well-considered step toward supporting business growth. Understanding the specific credit needs of your business and aligning them with suitable lenders minimizes unnecessary inquiries, positively influencing your credit score. 3: New lines of business credit opened and the number of business credit lines used in the last 6 months. The utilization of business credit lines within a specified timeframe is a key metric in determining your creditworthiness, for business and personal credit. Opening too many credit lines or utilizing them excessively may indicate financial stress or overreliance on borrowed capital. Striking a balance between accessing credit for business needs and managing credit responsibly is crucial. Keeping track of the number of credit lines opened and effectively managing their usage demonstrates fiscal prudence, fostering a positive perception among creditors and credit agencies. 4: Any collection amounts or tax liens in the last 7 years. A business's creditworthiness is also influenced by its ability to meet financial obligations and handle outstanding debts. Instances of collections or tax liens within the last seven years are red flags for creditors. These events suggest a failure to fulfill financial responsibilities, potentially leading to a lower credit score. Proactively addressing and resolving outstanding collections or tax issues is essential for maintaining a healthy credit profile. Engaging in timely communication with creditors and tax authorities to settle any outstanding amounts can mitigate the negative impact on your business credit score. 5: Payment history reflecting how often payment is made on time. Consistent and timely payment of financial obligations is a cornerstone of a positive credit history. Payment history is a significant factor influencing your business credit score. Delinquent payments, late fees, or defaults can significantly harm your credit standing. On the flip side, consistently making payments on time demonstrates financial responsibility and reliability. Business owners should prioritize meeting payment deadlines for loans, credit cards, and other financial commitments to maintain and improve their credit score over time. Regularly reviewing your payment history and addressing any discrepancies promptly is essential for sustaining a favorable credit profile.

So what are "Tradelines" anyway? Here's a hint, they're all related to your business credit score. You might have heard the term "tradelines" when it comes time for establishing new accounts with banks, but there is more than one type of line that can help build up or maintain a strong history in banking–and they each come with their benefits!