Build Your Own BIZ™ is a web-based resource designed to help you work smarter, stay competitive, and make more money. The Build Your Own BIZ™ site includes self-paced study modules in the areas of Business Operation, Customer Service, Finance, Sales and Marketing, and Human Resources.

What is Build Your Own BIZ™?

Build Your Own BIZ™ is a comprehensive Web site that provides small business owners with timely expert advice, actionable templates, and mission-critical insights to daily challenges in the following areas: Business Operations, Customer Service, Finance, Human Resources, Sales and Marketing.

What Does It Do?

• Provides News & Action Alerts News feeds relevant to business are communicated on the front page and updated continuously to keep you informed of the ever-changing business environment. Action alerts provide real-world examples to keep you abreast of the current business climate. We then apply sound business principles to these issues in order to help you function effectively and avoid pitfalls in your day-to-day operations.
• Provides access to a variety of business tools and topics in the form of modules, which include videos, indexed content, and downloadable templates.
• Provides expert advice - subscribers are given the opportunity to post five questions per month which are answered by our panel of business experts.

What does it look like?

Below are some screenshots of the Build Your Own BIZ™ site:

Using Build Your Own BIZ™ will help you:

• Develop a business plan
• Find answers to day-to-day business issues
• Grow your business
• Manage your workforce
• Provide excellent customer service
• Manage your money
• Promote your products or services
• Stay up to speed on current business trends

Evaluation of your performance will be based on:

• Quizzes are provided in each module for self-evaluation of your progress.

Build Your Own BIZ™ includes News and Action Alerts, Expert Advice, and topic modules that present tools, ideas, and solutions using audio, video, text, and downloads.

• News & Action Alerts News feeds relevant to business are communicated on the front page and updated continuously to keep you informed of the ever-changing business environment. Action alerts provide real-world examples to keep you abreast of the current business climate. We then apply sound business principles to these issues in order to help you function effectively and avoid pitfalls in your day-to-day operations.
• Expert Advice Small businesses often encounter issues that they are not sure how to resolve. With your subscription, you will have access to a team of business experts that can provide valuable insight into business issues and situations. You will receive five free questions per month.
• Business Tools and Topic Modules

  Business Operations Topics	Customer Service Topics	Finance Topics	Human Resource Topics	Marketing Topics
  Business Continuity This module will help you create a business continuity plan, a comprehensive written plan to maintain or resume business in the event of a disruption such as relocation, flood, fire, natural disaster, or loss of employees. You will learn the steps and best practices to create a business continuity plan, as well as having access to templates and checklists to help put your plan into action. Writing a Business Plan A business plan is a summary of how you plan to operate your business. It serves as a blueprint to tell your company's story, plan for the future, set goals, and secure investor and external support. In this module, you will examine the elements of a business plan, and you will be provided with the tools necessary to create your own unique business plan.	Customer Service Strategies Customer service is critical to the success of any business. Customer Service Strategies looks at the importance of creating a customer service plan, and provides you with the tools and resources to create and implement a customer service plan, as well as measure the effectiveness of your customer service methods. Customer Service That Sells How do you take Customer Service to new heights? Delivering outstanding customer service involves connecting your customer service plan with every aspect of your company. This module will help you weave your customer service plan into the fabric of your company.	Better Budgeting Managing a budget is often a difficult and undesirable business function. However, it is necessary to learn how to manage funds to keep a business healthy. Better Budgeting examines budgeting and will provide you with tools to help make the budgeting process less painful and time-consuming. How to Borrow Money When compared to the cost of other forms of financing such as leasing, credit cards, and investor funds, bank credit is the least expensive source of capital. However, it is often avoided because of the perceived headaches of getting a business loan. How to Borrow Money will help you navigate the financial waters and understandthe loan process. Using Financial Statements Financial statements provide a record of a company's performance, but are often difficult to interpret. Using Financial Statements will help you utilize financial statements to interpret the health of your company, and to use financial information to aid in your business decision making process.	Dynamic Workforce Management Effective personnel management is vital to your business. This module will help you understand the keys to managing a workforce, provide tools to create a management strategy, help manage stress, time, and conflicts, and develop the leadership skills necessary to maintain an effective workforce. How to Fire Termination of employees is an unpleasant and difficult task. How to Fire will help you take steps to protect yourself and your company when an employee termination becomes necessary. How to Hire Creating an effective workforce involves making strong hiring decisions. How to Hire provides tools and resources that will help you make solid hiring decisions and build a strong team. Employee Handbook The Employee Handbook will help you develop an Employee Handbook that clearly communicates your company's mission, objectives, expectations. Performance Improvement How do you improve your workforce? Setting measurable goals and objectives is necessary to help direct your workforce and help them improve their performance. Performance Improvement will help you develop a performance appraisal process, and provide you with tools to make this process successful. Teamwork Effective teams are critical to the operation of your business. With dynamic personalities and diverse backgrounds, it is often difficult to put together teams that work well together. Teamwork will look at the dynamics of teams, and help you to assemble teams that share a common vision and work together effectively.	Branding and Beyond How do you create and communicate a brand? This module will help you understand the process of branding, and help you guide consumers to your brand. Bootstrap Marketing Advertising is very expensive. How do you get the word out about your product or service without spending a fortune? Bootstrap Marketing will help you find practical and economical ways to promote your product or service by carefully targeting your market. Networking Networking is an excellent way to gain business prospects. This module will examine networking concepts and help you discover networking opportunities. Pricing Your Product How do you set pricing of your product or service? Can you charge as much as you want? Pricing is a crucial task that can determine the success of a business. Pricing Your Product will provide you with tools, techniques, and resources to help you set the appropriate price for your product or service. Selling Skills Sales are the lifeblood of your company. Developing an effective sales team will help maintain the cash flow you need to keep operating your business. This module examines how to develop an effective and profitable sales team.