Video: “Ugh, saltwater taffy is kind of gross.” That’s what Marisa Wu thought years ago, when a colleague suggested she make some of her own. But then she investigated and figured out how to cook taffy flavoured by real ingredients, not lab-created chemicals. Now Wu runs Salty Road Taffy, a popular high-end taffy brand where the banana flavour tastes like (and is made with) real bananas, where each recipe is carefully calibrated and made on antique equipment.

Wu gave us a video tour of the taffy factory, and talked about juggling production, marketing, and other aspects of her small business from a desk on the factory floor.

If you’ve ever struggled with an outdated payroll system, or slogged through a bureaucratic HR department, you can see the appeal of Justworks, which offers modernised payroll, benefits, HR and legal compliance services to small businesses and growing companies. It’s still a growing company itself, competing with legacy giants such as ADP as well as startups such as Zenefits, WageWorks and Gusto.

We talked to founder Isaac Oates about that classic startup origin story: Turning your own business’ pain points into your next business’ product.

My steady corporate job was great on paper -- it paid well and let me travel the world, but it was also incredibly taxing and limiting. I didn't want to be a cog in that system. I wanted to run my own business, but I never anticipated the challenges that came with it.

As appealing as the freedom of freelancing can be, it's also a challenge, and sometimes you find yourself wanting to stick with one of your freelance clients for good. The company culture, the ability to focus on one client, the coworker camaraderie -- there are lots of reasons to transition from freelancer to employee. But how do you convince them you should be on staff?

You can find a million articles about how to start a side business, but very few about when it's time to shut it down. People like to remain positive and shuttering a business is anything but.

Who is your most valuable client? It's not the one who brings you the most money. Nor is it the one who is most famous. You are your most important client, and that means you need to spend a little time refining your own process each week. Here are five ways to do just that.

Every week it seems like there's a new piece of advice for would-be entrepreneurs from the ones who've already made their mark on the world. Tim Cook starts sending emails at 4:30 in the morning. Steve Jobs once ate nothing but carrots. Donald Trump supposedly sleeps only four hours a night. Most recently, serial odd-advice-giver Gary Vaynerchuck has told Business Insider that he doesn't eat in the daytime. But do you really need these weird habits to be an entrepreneur?

We are living at a time of unlimited potential. Never before have we experienced such a rapid growth in the number of young entrepreneurs who've begun working for themselves. From app developers, to freelance writers, business consultants, creative producers and startup founders, there's no shortage of people willing to take large calculated risks in the name of sculpting their own self-employed dream careers.

Startups are usually founded by teams with big ambitions. They pour their money and time into a business, often spending most of their day with each other. But when you're spending so much time together, there's bound to be some disagreements. Tensions arise and, if left uncheck, can cause the failure of a startup. Here's a few ways to tackle this kind of disharmony head-on.

You can have 100 per cent faith that your start-up is a winner but not everybody may think so. A lot of these people's opinions won't matter but if there's one group out there you have to impress, it's the investors. Before you head in to a pitch to investors, here are five questions you should ask yourself about your business.

At the peak of his career, American industrialist Andrew Carnegie purportedly crossed paths with a journalist by the name of Napoleon Hill. Carnegie tasked Hill with interviewing more than 500 successful men and women, many of them millionaires, in order to discover the formula of their success. Here are the chief strategies and moneymaking secrets that turned Carnegie and his peers into the wealthiest and most successful business people of all time. (You may want to get a pen and paper.)

If you are a driver for Uber or ride-sharing platform Lyft, a host on AirBnB, or a "tasker" doing odd jobs on TaskRabbit, you may consider yourself what has been recently labelled a "micropreneur".

Are you a world changer, or a serial entrepreneur? Here's how to find out.

Dear Lifehacker, Last November I quit my old job and finally gained the courage to chase my dream and I am now a freelance cameraman. I am fortunate enough to have a friend inside the industry who gave me contacts so I could get work, and I immediately shot off emails with my resume. Unfortunately, I couldn't have done it at a worst time. November and December are when things wind down and I'm afraid with all the holidays they've already forgotten me. How do I remind people that I am available for hire without seeming like a pest?

Even if your pay is irregular, your bills usually aren't. If your work doesn't allow for steady income, fake it by setting up a separate account to pay yourself from.

Tolstoy's opening line in Anna Karenina was: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." The same can be said of most businesses -- the recipe for success is simple, but there are an unlimited number of ways to stuff things up.

Looking to expand your business? Check out these practical tips from some of Australia's most successful entrepreneurs.

If you're a designer, you might have trouble deciding how to price your work. You may take into account the type of client and project. "How Much Should I Charge" asks you five questions and then gives you the amount you should bid to the client.

Many small business experts agree that a 'chasm' exists within the early life stages of small businesses. What they mean by this is that within the first three to five years of a small business' life, it will have to undergo some significant changes to successfully develop into a medium sized business, and enter the next stage of growth. For many businesses, a major focus at this stage is raising capital. It allows them to bring on more staff, purchase equipment, reach a broader market and start turning some of those small ideas into big realities.