Keep it Simple! Keeping it simple is the best advice that I give to micro and new, small businesses when it comes to tracking important data such as customer data, marketing costs, and telecommunications costs. Work with a spreadsheet, use one tab each for customer data, marketing costs, telecommunications costs, and other major expense relevant to your business. Thirty minutes of data entry per week and you’re sitting on a gold mine of information, that, when analyzed, help you make better business decisions. It’s that simple!