July 8, 2010

Running a small business is filled with unknowns and crash course lessons. You're always going to have questions about hiring, acquiring customers, raising money, and building viable products. 

When I started my first business, it was crucial that I learn about accounting and income statements. As the nature of building startups goes, teaching myself the basics lead to more and more questions. My experience in finding the right places to ask particular types of questions has influenced the way I learn and seek information.

Nobody expects you to know everything that's going in. In fact, that's why you should always find the right advisors for your startup, so that you can benefit from their experience. 

But they won't know everything, either.

Luckily, there are several powerful and convenient tools that can help small business owners get their questions answered. While you may not find the silver bullet that shoots your company to the stratosphere, there are thousands of people with the knowledge and experience to help you solve your small business problems.

Here are a few online tools for connecting with experts who may have answers to your small business questions:

1. Quora: This crowd sourcing and collaboration Q&A tool allows users to ask the Quora community questions, most of them technology or startup-related. 

Not only can you ask questions of its knowledgeable community (it includes some prominent VCs and CEOs), but you can follow topics such as "leadership," "venture capital," or "Google" to stay up-to-date on conversation occurring in those areas.

2. OnStartups Answers: This site, powered by the same platform that runs StackOverflow, is focused on answering the burning questions of startup founders. Everything from product pricing to sleep schedules is addressed by this community.

3. Hacker News: This programming and startup-centric community is very open to answering questions from entrepreneurs. Just go to the submit page and start with "Ask HN:" in your title.

4. Twitter: If you've been active with other small business owners on Twitter and built up those relationships, there may not be a better place to get your questions answered faster than on this micro-blogging phenomenon.

5. Open Forum: Yes, I know what you're thinking, but guess what: OPEN Forum has active discussion forums where members can ask their small business questions and get them answered. It can't hurt to ask.

This list is a jump start for getting on the track to having all of your small business questions (or at least some of them) answered. Are there any online tools that you continuously reference for solving problems and getting advice as a small business owner?

Related Topics

• Technology

Related keywords

Ben Parr, Article, startups, Quora, Mashable, Twitter

Join the conversation ( 3 )

• Christopher Andrada 1 year 7 months and 14 days ago

  

  http://www.toolbox.com has been the most effective tool for me. They have specific communities depending on your needs. I usually go to http://c.ittoolbox.com. They have plenty of experts that are more than willing to answer your questions.

• Devesh Dwivedi 1 year 10 months and 12 days ago

  

  Linkedin Q&A has an ocean full of answers and references to all your questions. There are number of entrepreneurs, experts, and executives ready to answer your questions and if you're the shy one or do not want to wait for answers or ask a question for any reason, simply search the 'Answers' section by category and keywords...Good luck!Devesh

• Dawn Fotopulos 1 year 10 months and 15 days ago

  

  www.bestsmallbizhelp.com/learn/ has the most effective training video library for small business owners and wannabes online.If business owners understood they can show a profit and still be going bankrupt, and how to avoid this, many more businesses would succeed. We show them how. Ours is a condensed curriculum on accounting basics, reading financial statements, guerrilla marketing, sales secrets. In the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee, you can watch a video. They're no more than 10 min. long each. The cost is $25 for full access and hundreds of dollars of value. The videos are designed that once you've watched them, you can apply this to your business. Easy and fun too. Lots of examples and case studies within the videos. FYI, CommuniquePR just named Best Small Biz Help.com as one of their favorite top 10 small business websites. We're right up there with Mashable. Very cool. Thanks, Ben, for recognizing this need. We're on a mission to reach all 20 million small business owners in the U.S. Thanks for helping to get the word out. All the best,Dawn Fotopuloswww.bestsmallbizhelp.com