New York SBDC Research Network

By Caitlin Mullen From BizJournals [Researchers'] findings? Heavier drinking after work is more likely for those who routinely fake smiles, seem happier than they are or suppress the urge to roll their eyes — called “surface acting” — while on the job. It’s more than job stress that leads people to drink, researchers found. The more workers had to maintain control over negative emotions at work — suppressing their actual emotions in front of customers or the public — the less able they were to control their alcohol intake at the end of the day. In other words, they’ve exhausted self-control by the time they’re done with work. It was most apparent in impulsive people whose jobs involve one-time service encounters with customers — like coffee shop baristas or call center employees — rather than workers like nurses or teachers, who build relationships with patients or students, the study, published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, discovered.

From the Empire Center Tables summarizing the latest Census Bureau population estimates for towns, cities, and villages in New York State have been posted in the Data section of the Empire Center’s website. The tables are sortable by county, name of the locality, population totals, changes and rate of change. They can also be downloaded by users. The tables are: City and Village Population Change 2017-2018 City and Village Population Change 2010-2018 Town Population Change 2017-2018 Town Population Change 2010-2018

BY SUSAN WARD From The Balance: Small Business The title of this article is a bit misleading. These aren’t the absolutely worst ideas for starting businesses. They were fine ideas for starting a business in their day, as were film developing, video stores, dial-up internet services, and horse-drawn carriages. But for some, that day is gone and these are no longer necessarily good choices. Some are no longer good choices because their potential markets have been saturated. You can still start a business in a saturated market, but if you do you’ll have to find a specific niche you can target and/or have especially strong skills. For others, times have changed and no matter how talented you are or how much you love the idea are, your new business is unlikely to be profitable.

Article by Lucy Koch From eMarketer : In 2018, total worldwide app revenues grew 63% year over year, according to a March 2019 report from app commerce company Poq, based on data from the company's platform clients. Global time spent in shopping apps on Android devices grew to 18 billion hours in 2018, up 45% from two years prior, per a January 2019 report from app analytics platform App Annie. In the US, mobile shopping sessions grew 70% from 2016. Amazon's app ranked third for number of active users per month across both iPhones and Androids in 2018. The ecommerce powerhouse was the only retailer to make the top 10 apps in the US, trailing Facebook and Facebook Messenger. According to App Annie, time spent by US consumers in shopping apps and increasing digital sales had a strong positive correlation of 0.97 between Q1 2014 and Q3 2018—further exemplifying the importance of the user experience.

By Jim Moran From Bplans After spending years building your small business, it can be hard to quantify the time and energy you’ve poured into it and the sacrifices you’ve made to get where you are now. Your company probably seems priceless to you, but there inevitably will come a time when you must calculate precisely how much your business is worth. The value of your company is subjective. Buyers and sellers don’t always agree on what’s valuable and what isn’t, which is why hiring a valuation consultant or a CPA who has experience valuing businesses is a good idea. That said, it’s not overly difficult to come up with a reasonable ballpark valuation on your own—you’ll just need to avoid some of the common misconceptions first-time sellers have. In nearly every case, small businesses are bought and sold based on the cash flow they produce—with prices adjusted up or down to reflect other qualitative features. Rather than focusing only on cash flow, however, most intermediaries use

Article by Lucy Koch From eMarketing From their mailboxes to their mobile phones, shoppers look for coupons everywhere, but convenience is a must. For marketers, it’s important to provide consumers with discounts that are easy to find and use. Consumers across the board use physical and digital coupons, according to the survey, but a deeper dive into shopper behavior reveals nuances. Coupons—paper and paperless—are most popular among millennial parents (96%) and parents in general (95%). The general population of Gen Xers (93%) was close behind, followed by millennials (92%). Younger shoppers are more likely to use paperless coupons, with 88% of millennials indicating use vs. 83% of Gen Xers and 64% of baby boomers.

By Tim Berry From Bplan Picture from Pixabay Industry analysis is part of good management. That’s not just for the business planning, but rather for business survival, beginning to end. Most of the people who successfully start their own business have already had relevant business experience before they start, most often as employees. Although all business owners need to know their industry, the documented details and explanations are mainly for when you’re writing a business plan you need to show to outsiders, like bank lenders or investors. You’ll need to do some industry analysis so you’re able to explain the general state of your industry, its growth potential, and how your business model fits into the landscape. And if your business plan is more of an internal strategic roadmap, you should still be very sure—whether you have to prove it to others or not—that you know your market, even if you don’t do a formal industry analysis. Whether you’re a service business, manufactur