By Barbara Haislip If you work for a small company, it helps to enjoy playing sports.Companies of all sizes arrange for their employees to participate in office-related sports. But at small companies, those pastimes can become an obsession. When businesses have just a handful of employees, everyone is expected to get involved, instead of just select die-hards.

By Chuck Green Can you run an entire business from the palm of your hand?Some entrepreneurs are giving it a shot.For these early adopters, mobile gadgets like smartphones and tablets don't just help them do their work—they're the backbone of the business. Entrepreneurs use them to do everything from ringing up sales to creating pitches and promotional videos to coordinating far-flung employees.Of course, that kind of extensive setup won't work for every small business.

By Alina Dizik Local commercials can come across as cheap, amateurish and downright goofy.But those are their good points.Big national brands can spend a lot of money on commercials that are almost as entertaining as the shows they interrupt—big casts, continuing story lines and stellar production values.Small businesses can't afford any of that. So how do they fill 30 seconds without breaking cardinal rules of marketing, like not boring viewers and not overloading them with information?The answer, say marketing experts, is to embrace the limitations of local ads.

By Javier Espinoza It's hard enough for big companies to reassure customers that their sites are safe from hackers. So how do small companies make people feel safe?Simply having a site that's well protected against attacks isn't enough, especially when small businesses seem like much easier targets than big operators.