A few helpful links.

Need some information from the source? Follow these links.

Internal Revenue Service
U.S. Department of Treasury
1111 Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20224
www.irs.gov
Phone: +1(202) 622-5164 (look for local offices)

U.S. Small Business Administration
409 Third Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20416
www.sba.gov
Phone: +1(202) 205-6600
Links to Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE); Small Business Development Centers and Women's Business Centers in your area

U.S. Census Bureau
4700 Silver Hill Road
Washington, DC 20233-0001
www.census.gov

National Association for the Self-Employed (NASE)
P.O. Box 612067
DFW Airport
Dallas, TX 75261-2067
www.nase.org
Phone: +1(800) 232-6273

National Business Incubation Association
20 East Circle Drive #37198
Athens, OH 45701
www.nbia.org
Phone: +1(740) 593-4331

National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB)
53 Century Blvd, Suite 250
Nashville, TN 37221
www.nfib.org
Phone: +1(800) 634-2669

U.S. Business Advisor
The official business link to the U. S. Government
www.business.gov

Center for Women's Business Research
1411 K Street, NW Suite 1350
Washington, D.C. 20005
www.womensbusinessresearch.org
Phone: +1(202) 638-3060

National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO)
8405 Greensboro Drive, Suite 800
McLean, VA 22102
www.nawbo.org
Phone: +1(800)55-NAWBO

General information for startups:

The economy that's emerging from the recession and financial crisis is spawning startups by the bucketload. Partly that's a direct result of economic reality, as laid-off executives realize they're not going to replace that corporate job they left anytime soon. As always, people see unfilled needs in the marketplace and see the opportunity to fill them.

The Institute for Entrepreneurial Leadership
211 Warren Street
Newark, NJ 07103
Phone: +1(973) 353-0611
www.ifelnj.org

The New Century Venture Center
1390 Southside Drive
Salem, VA 24153
Phone: +1(540) 387-1555
Fax: +1(540) 387-3226
www.ncvc.com

The Small Business Advocate
C/O Small Business Network, Inc.
503 East Tuscaloosa Street
Florence, AL 35630
www.smallbusinessadvocate.com
Phone: +1(888) 823-2366

Blogs we like a lot.

How To Change the World, by venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki:
http://blog.guykawasaki.com

A liberal-arts grad from Stanford, Guy was part of Apple's original development team for the Macintosh. He popularized the term 'evangelism' as a marketing concept and has been a technology investor for close to 20 years.

The Brazen Careerist, a blog about mixing work and life:
http://blog.penelopetrunk.com

Penelope has three startups under her belt, is a 9/11 survivor and blogs about everything: Life as a CEO with kids; career advice for job-seekers aw well as the supposedly safely employed; and anything else she finds relevant.

Building 43, about the future of the web:
http://www.building43.com

Run by Robert Scoble, a blogger, online video pioneer and social-media fanatic, Building 43 is more a community than a true blog, with lots of videos, both of the how-to variety and interviews with the people developing the new tools that are shaping the contemporary web. Here the focus is helping business - especially small business - learn to use the best of the new tools to get closer to their customers.

Plus: every business needs help with branding.

If you have a business, you already have a brand. The question is, is your brand helping you succeed or hurting you?

The answer lies in the Four-Second test - that set of judgments everyone makes when we see a business card or a web site for the first time:

Our favorite branding consultant is Mary Baum at Mary Baum Dynamic Targeted Branding, at marybaum.com. Sign up for her e-course, Pro Secrets for Better Branding, right on the home page.