Small Business
Meta's Muse AI Agent Adds Small-Business Tools: What Owners Get
Meta's AI agent now connects to Shopify, QuickBooks, Stripe and more — here is what it does, what it costs, and where the guardrails sit.
Tanya Brooks · October 2, 2026
Small Business: Owners and Operations
Decisions that land on an owner's desk with no department to hand them to: pricing, hiring, leases, insurance, credit terms, and the cost cuts that do lasting damage. Each piece works from real figures at small-company scale. Written for owners, managers and advisers of firms under fifty staff.
Small Business
How to Find and Vet Small Businesses Near You
Reviews, red flags and a short checklist for choosing local vendors you can trust with your money.
Tanya Brooks · September 29, 2026
Operations
The Real Cost of a First Hire, Itemized
A $52,000 salary is not the cost of a $52,000 employee: employer payroll taxes alone add 7.65%, and the fully loaded total typically lands between 1.25 and 1.4 times base pay, per BLS employer-cost data.
Tanya Brooks · August 26, 2026
Small Business
SBA 7(a) Fees Are Back: What Borrowers Pay After the Relief Expired
The SBA's pandemic-era fee relief on 7(a) loans expired September 30, 2023, and the upfront guarantee fee returned at up to 3.75% of the guaranteed portion — several thousand dollars on a typical $500,000 loan.
Tanya Brooks · August 24, 2026
Small Business
Prime Rate Holds at 6.75%: What It Costs Your Business Loan
The Fed held rates on July 29, 2026, keeping the prime rate that prices many small-business loans at 6.75% — here is how that number actually reaches a line of credit or an SBA 7(a) loan.
Tanya Brooks · August 21, 2026