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Small Business Success Index 5

Index Score*   Grade
SBSI INDEX 73 C- marginal
Capital Access 67 D+
Marketing & Innovation 65 D
Workforce 76 C
Customer Service 88 B+
Computer Technology 75 C
Compliance 92 A-
*Index score is calculated on a 1-100 scale.
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Archive for October, 2009

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Seven Key Reasons Your Business Should Have a LinkedIn Company Page

October 30th, 2009 ::

Your small business has lots of competition out there and you have very little time to stay on top of all the ways to promote and gain awareness. For a small business there is the struggle with the promotion of the personal brand vs the company brand and determining how they come together. You have probably heard of LinkedIn and might have a personal profile there but did you know you could create one for your business?

Seven Key Reasons Your Business Should Have a LinkedIn Company Page

Creating a company page on LinkedIn supports the company brand and we have come up with Seven Key Reasons Your Business Should Have a LinkedIn Company Page:

  1. Branding and Awareness – At its most basic level, the company page is way to promote your brand and create awareness of your business. When you set the page up, don’t forget a good version of your logo.
  2. Search Engines Love and TRUST LinkedIn – Google has some trusted places it gets information and places it at the top of the rankings. Places like Wikipedia, IMDB and LinkedIn are sources for a search engine to index and put that reference on page 1 of the results.
  3. Your Employees Can Connect to It – On your company page it lets you list all the people who work for your business so it becomes a sort of company directory. If you are doing sales research this can be a powerful way to find out who to contact at a particular organization.
  4. Advertise without advertising – When someone searches for companies they might be searching on keywords so if your description is written well people could find your company and become a client of yours
  5. Promotion of Your Knowledge – If you have created any groups, your company page also displays that so if someone finds you they can particpate in the communities you have built.
  6. Up-to-Date Company Information - While the company page is about the company and not about the you or employees it does let you put the key information about your business up there so people can locate you via the web, phone or physical address
  7. Promote Your Other Social Media Channels – Have a blog? Put the RSS feed up there. Have a twitter page? Post the link.

What Are You Waiting For?

With these seven great reasons your business should have a company page on LinkedIn, you should be opening up a new browser tab or window and going to LinkedIn after you finish reading this. If there are any other reasons we missed, please leave a comment. Other than that, get started.

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Posted in Business Development, Entrepreneurs, small business, social media, Technology | 3 Comments »

#GrowSmartBiz Video: Effective Use of the WashBizJournal – Alex Orfinger

October 30th, 2009 ::

This was originally posted on GrowSmartBusiness.com and is from the GrowSmartBiz Conference held September 29, 2009:

Alex Orfinger, Publisher of the Washington Business Journal was our MC for the event and was very entertaining. He kept the audience going throughout the day and on top of that gave a great 10 minute overview of using the WBJ. Check out the video below:

Posted in Uncategorized, UnintentionalEntrepreneur | No Comments »

BlogWordExpo 2009: CNN’s Don Lemon Gets SmallBizCool!

October 29th, 2009 ::

It’s time for another awesome installment of #SmallBizCool from the sunny floors of BlogWorldExpo 2009. If you haven’t had a chance to, check out Jill Foster’s #SmallBizCool interviews over at WomenGrowBusiess.

BlogWorldExpo 2009 was filled with so many awesome exibitors, speakers and panels. One of the best moments, for me at least, was CNN’s Don Lemon as part of the opening keynote for Friday on “The Death and Rebirth of Journalism”. His insight into the evolution, not the death, of traditional media gave a lot of us a reason to think. Don was kind enough to take a few minutes, after that keynote, to explain why social media is cool to him.

Learn more about Don on CNN or you can follow Don on Twitter @donlemoncnn.

You can also reach me on Twitter by sending a message to @wickedjava, or on Facebook at facebook.com/mcdougherty.

As all ways if you have been reading, and this time watching, thank you and stay wicked.

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Posted in BlogWorldExpo 2009, Events, Interviews, Marketing, Resources, small business | 3 Comments »

#GrowSmartBiz Video: SmallBiz Quick Tip: Adding Personality to your Business by Rohit Bhargava

October 29th, 2009 ::

This was originally posted on GrowSmartBusiness.com and is from the GrowSmartBiz Conference held September 29, 2009:

Rohit is a founding member of the 360 Digital Influence group at Ogilvy and author of the best selling new book Personality Not Included, an actually useful (gasp!) guide on how to use personality to reinvent your marketing. He writes the top rated Influential Marketing blog. Below is his presentation at the GrowSmartBiz conference.

Posted in Uncategorized, UnintentionalEntrepreneur | No Comments »

#GrowSmartBiz Video: SmallBiz Quick Tips: 10 Rules for Killer Business Cards – Steven Fisher

October 28th, 2009 ::

This was originally posted on GrowSmartBusiness.com and is from the GrowSmartBiz Conference held September 29, 2009:

So I got asked a few months ago to present at the GrowSmartBiz Conference and I suggested to do something on business cards. I am sure many people were like “ok….” It can be a dry subject unless you find the examples of business cards I did and relay some solid and clever rules to create “Killer” business cards.

This is a presentation that is usually given in 30 minutes and I did it in about 10. It was rapid fire and from the Twitter stream and the high fives I got, it went over really well. For those of you that could not make it, I embedded the presentation that came on everyone’s thumb drive below and further down is the video presentation of the session. Leave a comment and tell me what you think.

10 Rules For Killer Business Cards Slideshare

Video Presentation of “10 Rules for Killer Business Cards”
SKIP TO 4:35 past the raffle to get to my smiling face and enjoy.

About Steve Fisher:

Steve currently is Managing Partner of AppSolve. In its 10th year, Appsolve specializes in user experience design, enterprise web development and online community management. Through AppSolve, he works with Network Solutions to manage its online small business community. Prior to that he was founder and CEO of Slipstream Air, a software provider to the private air travel industry. It was sold in 2008 to JIT Airline Resources, which rebranded as Slipstream Aviation Software. Steve has also held key leadership positions at Global Network Solutions, OnSite Technologies, IKON, USConnect, Ryland and Wells Fargo.

He has published several e-books on Small Business Management, User Experience, Online Marketing and Innovation. Currently, he is working on his first book, “101 Rules for Entrepreneurs” slated for a Spring 2010 release.

He holds a Bachelor of Science in Business from University of Baltimore and on a personal note he is a private pilot, musician and concert photographer. He cur¬rently resides in Columbia, MD, USA.

Posted in Uncategorized, UnintentionalEntrepreneur | 9 Comments »

The Rise of the Homepreneur and the New Report from Network Solutions

October 28th, 2009 ::

Over the last decade many entrepreneurs have turned their homes into remote offices in the early days and over time these home-based entrepreneurs or “homepreneurs” have become a force to be reckoned with. Because what many deemed a place for hobbyists or telecommuters, the home has become the affordable and sensible place to do business. With technology today, many work virtually and teams are formed from a global pool of resources, so it quickly becomes irrelevant if you have pricey office space on K Street in DC or at 30 Rock in NY but work out of your home in suburbia. Much to an entrepreneurs desire to be competitive that smart strategy can be passed on to clients in the form of lower costs and flexible teams.

This past Friday, BusinessWeek published this article on “The Rise of the Homepreneur” which discusses the findings of the report “Homepreneurs: A Vital Economic Force” which is a new report published by Emergent Research, a small research and consulting shop in Lafayette, Calif. “We’re seeing more and more home-based businesses that are real businesses,” says Steve King, who coauthored the new report with Carolyn Ockels. To prepare the report, they analyzed U.S. Census data and Small Business Administration research, along with data from our very own Small Business Success Index, a survey of 1,500 companies sponsored by Network Solutions and the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business.

Highlights of the Report and Download Link

The report is a good read and here are some highlights from the paper:

  • Home businesses employ over 13 million people.
  • Nearly 6.6 million home businesses generate at least 50% of the owner’s household income
  • 35% of home businesses generate $125,000+ in revenue; 8% more than $500,000.

Reading the summary section of the report I was not surprised by the three trends why more people are becoming homepreneurs:

  1. The lower costs and risks associated with starting a home-based business
  2. Demographic and social shifts
  3. A lack of corporate jobs

To find out more and read the whole report click this link to find out more from latest SBSI Research brief.

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Posted in Entrepreneurs, small business, Small Business Success Index, Workforce | 20 Comments »

BlogWordExpo 2009: Chris Brogan Gets SmallBizCool!

October 27th, 2009 ::

For the first of many #SmallBizCool segments, geniously thought of by Jill Foster over at WomenGrowBusiness, to come from BlogWorldExpo 2009, Chris Brogan took a moment from signing copies of his book Trust Agents to do explain why it is cool to become a Trust Agent.

As his website says, Chris Brogan advises businesses, organizations, and individuals on how to use social media and social networks to build relationships and deliver value.

If you haven’t heard of Chris Brogan before, you can visit his website chrisbrogan.com, follow him on Twitter @chrisbrogan, or learn more about Chris’ book Trust Agents

You can also reach me on Twitter by sending a message to @wickedjava, or on Facebook at facebook.com/mcdougherty.

As all ways if you have been reading, and this time watching, thank you and stay wicked.

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Posted in small business | No Comments »

#GrowSmartBiz Video: Where do you stand on the Small Business Success Index?

October 27th, 2009 ::

This was originally posted on GrowSmartBusiness.com and is from the GrowSmartBiz Conference held September 29, 2009:

Ever wondered what the Small Business Success index is all about? Well, get it from the guy that runs it and will give you fond memories of statistics class in college.

Charles Colby is that guy and Rockbridge Associates is his firm. Check out the video below for some great content.

–

Presented by RockBridge Associates

Posted in Uncategorized, UnintentionalEntrepreneur | No Comments »

#GrowSmartBiz Video : Senator Mark Warner Speaks to Small Businesses

October 26th, 2009 ::

This was originally posted on GrowSmartBusiness.com and is from the GrowSmartBiz Conference held September 29, 2009:

Special Note: Mark R. Warner, U.S. Senator from the Commonwealth of Virginia

Mark R. Warner was elected to the U.S. Senate in November 2008, and serves on the Senate’s Banking, Budget, Commerce and Rules committees. He served as Governor of Virginia from 2002-2006 after spending 20 years as a business leader in the high-tech industry.

He gave a great speech at the GrowSmartBiz Conference. Check out the video below:


More about Senator Warner
Senator Warner was the first member of his family to graduate from college, earning a degree from The George Washington University, thanks to part-time jobs and student loans. He received a law degree from Harvard in 1980.

As a private citizen and philanthropist, Mark Warner helped create the Virginia Health Care Foundation, which has provided health care to more than 600,000 under-served Virginians, and SeniorNavigator.com, a referral network for older Virginians and their caregivers.

As Governor of Virginia, Mark Warner inherited budget shortfalls that ultimately grew to $6 billion. He left office four years later with a budget surplus that allowed Virginia to make the largest single investment in K-12 education in state history, key reinvestments in one of the nation’s best public university systems, and record investments in the clean-up of the Chesapeake Bay.

In 2004, Warner chaired the National Governors Association, and TIME Magazine named him one of “America’s Five Best Governors” a year later. Governor Warner’s bipartisan, results-oriented focus resulted in Virginia being designated as the nation’s “best managed state” and its “best state for business.”

He lives with his wife, Lisa, and three daughters in Alexandria, Virginia.http://warner.senate.gov/

Posted in Uncategorized, UnintentionalEntrepreneur | 6 Comments »

Jeff Pulver and the Twitter #140Conf Arrives in LA

October 26th, 2009 ::

Starting tomorrow, I will be attending the #140Conf in Los Angeles, CA at the famous Kodak Theater (this is where the Oscars are held).

According to the web site Jeff says “At the #140conf events, we look at twitter as a platform and as a language we speak. Over time it will neither be the only platform nor the only language. #140conf is not an event about  microblogging or the place where people share twitter “tips and techniques” but rather where we explore the effects of the emerging real-time Internet on Business.”

He shared some thoughts on the first conference in New York city.. “The first #140conf in New York City brought together people with many diverse backgrounds but the one thing which everyone had in common was twitter.”

He goes on to say “The original scope of #140conf was to explore “the effects of twitter on: Celebrity, “The Media”, Advertising and (maybe) Politics.” Over time the scope expanded to include Sports, Music, The Arts, Sciences and more. Given the location of #140conf:LA, this event will have a special focus on the use of twitter in the Entertainment Industry.”

Now I won’t be accepting a little gold statue but I will be engaging with those who are deeply involved in leveraging Twitter and the Social Web for various things.

Coverage this Week from the Conference

This week I will be providing daily recaps of the event and gathering some video interviews for publishing when I return. All of these will available on the Network Solutions blog, Solutions Are Power. So if you are not subscribed or haven’t check that blog out, you are missing a great resource for building your online business.

To get a feel of what you can expect at #140conf LA, please check out the recorded videos from the NYC event on the 140Conf site. The schedule for the upcoming event will be unique and fast paced. Jeff’s goal is to provide a platform for as many people as possible to share their thoughts and engage in conversation with the attending delegates. There will be individual talks set to: 10 minutes; “Featured talks” 15 and 20 minutes and the various panel discussions are set for 15 and 20 minutes.

Hear it directly from Jeff

Jeff was recently on Fox Business to talk about Twitter and the 140Conf. Here is the video:

FOX Business – Interview of Jeff Pulver on September 21, 2009:


Look for coverage to start tomorrow. See you then.

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Posted in small business, social media | No Comments »

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