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Focus.com Releases 2010 Fourth Quarter Business Index Report
added: 2010-11-08

Focus.com, the leading free online business professional network, released the comprehensive, nationwide Focus Index Report. The survey was issued to Focus.com members and business experts, and solicited their feedback on several issues over the past quarter and heading into 2011, ranging from hiring trends to sales forecast to business challenges, and much more.

Among the key highlights include the rise of small business hiring, despite the challenge of economic uncertainty; business owners projecting increased sales and profitability in 2011 for the first time in a long time; large businesses having higher sales increases than small businesses; and the rise of the IT, finance and telecommunications industries.

Other notable findings from the Focus Index Report are:

Hiring Trends

- Hiring on the rise heading into the final Quarter of 2010; 38% of respondents said they are increasing their workforce, whereas 17% said they plan to reduce their workforce.

- Real estate and construction industries expect to decrease their workforce.

- The Top 3 industries expected to increase hiring over Q4 and into 2011 are:

1. IT/software

2. Finance and banking

3. Telecommunications

Biggest Challenges Facing Business Owners Today

- The biggest challenge facing business owners today remains economic uncertainty, with 24% of business owners saying that it was the single biggest challenge they have faced over the past year.

- Weak demand for products was the 2nd biggest challenge facing business owners, as 22% said it was the biggest obstacle they have had to overcome in 2010.

- Breakdown of the report's top 5 biggest challenges facing business owners:

Economic Uncertainty: 24%
Weak demand: 22%
Increased competition: 13%
Government regulation/compliance: 8%
Employee recruitment/retention: 7%

Overall Business Sentiment

- Overall business health is much stronger today than it was a year ago, with 12% more business owners reporting stronger sales this year than 12 months ago.

- 54% of respondents projected a stronger business performance in 2011 than they have experienced in 2010.

- 41% of business owners increased revenue in 2010 as compared to 12 months ago.

- Only 20% reported decreased revenue since this time last year, while 39% said revenue had not changed.

- Large enterprise business owners reported greater sales increases over the past year than small and mid-sized business owners, with
- 51% of large business owners experiencing sales increases, while only 34% of small and mid-sized business owners said the same.

- However, large businesses are also experiencing more layoffs than SMB's, with 26% saying they are reducing their head count, while only 14% of small biz owners said the same.


Source: PR Newswire

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