Raising money from investors can be a daunting task for any small business or startup. My first business ended up raising $17M in two rounds of funding, and later raised much more. It was a boatload of work each time, and it always felt raising $500,000 was just as much of a hassle as raising $5M.

From an entrepreneur’s view – especially ones with some track record – you know that you’re a domain expert and know where the market is headed, knows the customer base and the pains you can solve for $__ price, the profitable costs of customer acquisition, market growth over 5 years, etc.

Conveying all of that, and the opportunity that lies within those metrics, can often be challenging. Probably more so to less sophisticated investors (like your friends and family).

Profounder is a recently launched SaaS company that allows small business owners to raise money from their friends & family as well as other interested 3rd party angel investors registered on their site They will charge 5% of the raised fee or $1,000. In addition to the record keeping and potential introductions to new investors, they also help take care of the regulatory and compliance issues that vary from state to state, and even help distribute payments.

When Blake Lively told his college professor he wanted to start a small shoe company, he was told “you’re going to need a million dollars.” Other experts told him “retail was dead” and that “shoes are a crowded market.”

Did that stop him from pursuing his small business dream and create TOMS?

Heck no! In fact, it drove Blake even more to produce and sell his canvas slip-on shoes to the world.

By hiring interns off of Craigslist, his statement that “they didn’t know it couldn’t be done, just that it was fun to work together” underlines the spirit of small business entreprenuers who, despite all the odds, start something great. Now, with dozens of employees and millions of dollars of annual sales, Blake hasn’t rested on his laurels and has started a non-profit to donate shoes to children in impoverished countries in Africa.

Blake and company – you are an inspiration. Keep going!

Blake Lively (right) with one of his employee-partners.

* This is not investment advice, just a piece of envy from one small business owner who is both in awe of such talent and a tinge jealous success has come so relatively quickly for the founders.

The trio of investors in LinkedIn as well as the CEO Jeff Weiner and founder Reid Hoffman are holding on to their shares of LinkedIn even after the IPO set for Thursday. Does that mean the smart, insider money sees something bigger than a $4B valuation?

Check out the WSJ deal post on LinkedIn investors holding onto their shares.

One of my favorite top 10 rules of entrepreneurship are also from their founder Reid Hoffman.

Reid was also one of the founders of Paypal.

In 2008 Rose Corrick started a boutique clothing company which she decided to take from her apartment to a 4,000 square facility, signing a three year lease and buying the necessary equipment to manufacture her clothes. And while business was initially brisk, the Great Recession hit and suddenly she was running out of customers, orders and revenues – while her bills kept piling up.

She had to turn to her credit cards to make payments, cancel important events at fashion shows to promote her brand, and lay off people who worked for her.

Still, she didn’t give up.

She had a belief in the uniqueness of her clothes and vision, and instead of throwing her hands up in the air – she went for help.

Rose hired a fashion consultant to give her a fresh opinion on the “hot” new trends emerging, hired sales people on 12% commissions only, and trimmed her manufacturing costs at every corner.

Slowly but surely, sales started to go up, and up, and up. Until she could project $1.2M in sales for the year. Her’s is an inspiring story of not just a successful small business, but of the grit and determination it often takes to be an entrepreneur. For as some know, the ride is not always up, nor even steady. Congrats Rose!

Rose Corrick made her own turnaround story.

Often, useful tips and marketing methods (or even just a supportive, helpful opinion) can be found on blogs. And while Google has been good for searching for information online, many of the listings in search results are nowadays filled with ads, large brand websites, or filler content known as doorway pages.

Recently Google released a search engine just for blogs. I’m finding that the more I use it, the more helpful, targeted information I find that’s useful for small business owners. That’s because blog content is often written by other entrepreneurs and professionals that speak to other the SMB. Try it – you’ll most likely find tons of useful information you won’t find in a normal Google search!

Many don't know Google has a search engine just to find blogs.

Even during the recession, these inner city businesses found ways to grow. Topping this list is the inspiring small business success story of Ken Novotny of CSI. Selling IT services alone is hard enough, doing it in Oklahoma City and to the Federal Government must be a lot tougher. So when Ken decided to start his business in 2004, no bank would lend him the money he needed to fund his idea.

A small loan from his father and 6 years later, Ken and his company who made $14M in revenues last year tops the list from this year’s CNN Money’s list of ‘Fastest Growing Inner City Businesses in America 2011.‘ Congrats Ken, you’re an inspiration to us all.

These small businesses are turning the inner city around

An interesting article in the New York Times titled “You have voicemail. Do you care?” shows that up to 70% potential customers don’t leave voicemails anymore. Why?

The article suggests that even amongst the older population, consumers have become accustomed to ‘instant gratification’ features such as SMS text or even e-mail.

It’s even more compelling that at a couple of dollars per answered call, on demand answering services (can I plug Halloo’s Live Answering Service here?) make ROI sense. It’s not just about better customer service anymore, it’s about making sure you don’t lose your customers to voicemail.

I'll check my voicemail later...

As Mother’s Day passed this last weekend, I wanted to take a moment and give credit to the ladies who not only raise families – but create enterprises too. It can’t be easy juggling kids, a family, a household and a startup – so here’s a heartfelt kudos to the top mommy entrepreneurs who made the list this year, an annual list compiled by our friends at StartUp Nation.

The Top 10 List of Mom-as-Entrepreneurs

The WSJ recently had a guest writer pen an article which we think is so simple, yet so brilliant it makes me ashamed I hadn’t thought of it. You can read it here, but the upshot of it says -

If you really want to know what hidden opportunities to sell a potential customer are, their job ads will give you insights that can’t be found anywhere else. Elements such as – Read on…

My good readers, I’ll leave this one up to you to decide if this is a genuine reach-out to the small business owners of America, or just a PR attempt as they continue to, well, do whatever Goldman Sachs does. Which traditionally, has had very little to do with small business.

Check out their website for small business owners.

Great PR, or a great appreciation of small business owners?

I would like to ask the questions though – did Goldman ever have to ask the small business administration for a loan or worry about making payroll? Hmmmm. No disrespect to a great financial institution, but this one I’m not so sure I get.

Interesting though!