EntreFest! 2009 - Still Time to register

Iowa's two-day conference for small business, will take place Thursday and Friday, March 5 and 6, at the Marriott Hotel and Convention Center in Coralville.

EntreFest! provides business owners and budding entrepreneurs an opportunity to learn, share and celebrate the entrepreneurial spirit.

Who Should Attend?

EntreFest! will offer valuable information for a wide audience. Small business owners, new business owners, community leaders, and students alike will all benefit from the knowledge shared by experienced presenters including exciting keynote speakers, entrepreneurs and some of Iowa’s premier service providers!

Why Attend?

Learn from experienced presenters about best practices and new initiatives and opportunities for small business. Find out about new sources of capital that are available. Network and share experiences with fellow business owners from across the state. Meet with an extended group of Iowa service providers all in one location. Learn, share and celebrate small business ownership in Iowa!

EntreFest! is presented by a collaborative committee of Iowa's premier service providers including the UNI Regional Business Center and UNI Business and Community Services division. The conference is $79 per person.

For more information contact Amy Kuhlers at 319-273-4328 or amy.kuhlers@uni.edu.

The New Iowa Blog is sponsored in part by American Express OPEN - and the New Iowa Group

Scare Your Kids - Friend them on Facebook!

The Graying of Social Networking Sites

Mark Marich

Facebook, MySpace, and many other social networking websites got their starts as places for college students and other youth to interact online. Today, as a new Pew Internet and American Life report shows, online social networks are regular part of the online experience for all of us.

The study, "Adults and Social Network Websites," shows that the share of adults with a profile on an online social network has quadrupled in the past four years. In 2005, only 8% of adults had such profiles compared to 35% today. Because adults make up a larger part of the population, this share means that adults are now the primary users of online social networks.
MySpace is far-and-away the leader for adults with 50% of that demographic's users. While Facebook currently sits at 22%, my non-data-supported guess (based merely on old friends popping up daily) is that it will narrow that gap before too long.

Given that 89% of all adult users joined these types of sites to stay in touch with friends, it isn't surprising that LinkedIn is in a distant third at 6%. It is, however, the site of choice for those of us fostering business or professional networks. Sixty-seven percent of LinkedIn users use it to 'Make new business or professional contacts'.

The percentage of users who use LinkedIn to flirt?

Zero. Zip. Zilch.

I suppose that isn't a big surprise either.

Check out this short video -

Seth Godin on social networking and small business

Laid Off? Do This to Run Your Own Business

Written by: Rich Sloan

You just got fired for the last time. Now you’re in charge of the hiring / firing policy. Why? Because you are starting your own business… FINALLY.

To hang the “BOSS” sign on your door, here are 5 quick tips:

1) Play to Your Passion: Figure out what turns you on – if you’re passionate about a business idea, your chances of success go way up. That passion will help you get through the tough times. See Life Planning at StartupNation, the first of 10 Steps to open a business.

2) Take Stock: No, not shares of the company. We mean take stock of what your skills are, the resources you have available, the track record you might be able to leverage from a marketing perspective.

3) Commit to Your Concept: create a short but clear statement about what your business idea is. It’s OK if this morphs into something else, but you need to force yourself to distill the idea into a brief statement that’s clear to any third party (money people, customers, partners, employees, web designers, etc.)

4) Google Like Mad: To collect some quick research, immediately start Googling for anything and everything associated with your idea. The faster you become an authority, the faster you’ll be able to come up with your business strategy, including pricing, target markets, milestone timing, operations and more.

5) Test Drive: Find someone—maybe a few people—who’ll be your sounding board for your ideas and strategies. It’s easy to buy into your own hype when working up a business opportunity. Use insiders for this, but don’t be afraid to ask people who have no relationship with you. One smart thing to do is find someone in non-competitive geographic market who runs a similar business and ask them to be a mentor.

If you take these quick steps, you’ll quickly replace confusion, fear, desperation or any of those kinds of negative thoughts with information, action items and the beginning of a path forward to get your own business off the ground.

Check out this video http://usat.gannett.a.mms.mavenapps.net/mms/rt/1/site/gannett-usatoday-206-pub01-live/current/launch.html?maven_playerId=immersiveproduction&maven_referralObject=954278504

2009 Elevator Pitch Contest

The Elevator Pitch, Your Big Shot

In the StartupNation Elevator Pitch Contest, you submit a video or audio file up to two minutes in length in which you pitch your business and your need for investment dollars.
An illustrious panel of early stage investors will choose five winners from among the 100 most voted-for recipients.

Each of the five winners will be given an opportunity to present their business to the investors in a live, private, online presentation using GoToMeeting, the industry standard online presentation service.

Each of the five winners will also receive a Toshiba Satellite Pro S300 laptop computer, the latest laptop designed to fit the on-the-go needs of entrepreneurs, plus they will receive a GoToMeeting Annual Plan with unlimited usage, free of charge.

http://www.startupnation.com/elevator-pitch-2009

Des Moines Included in Best Places to Start a Small Business

Greater Des Moines was recently named one of the best places to start a small business in the nation by Bizjournals. The metro area was the highest-rated Midwestern market at 22nd place out of 100 metros. Bizjournals used a six-part formula to analyze the nation's 100 largest metropolitan areas, searching for the places that are most conducive to the creation and development of small businesses.

See the full article online at http://www.bizjournals.com/edit_special/75.html

Views on the 2009 Economic Stimulus Plans

As Congress continues to move forward with the 2009 economic stimulus package, a number of think tanks and lobbying groups are offering their views on what makes sense both for economic stimulus, but also for building a more competitive American economy over the long term.

The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation makes the case for “stim-novation,” by investing an additional $20 billion in the nation’s research infrastructure. Their new study suggests that these Federal dollars should be invested in both research and equipment.

Meanwhile, the National Business Incubation Association suggests that Federal support for incubators should be in the mix, as these facilities help business create jobs at a fast pace.

The Urban Institute has asked its in-house roster of experts to comment on key parts of the current stimulus plans. They offer a host of insights. For example, the Institute’s Brett Theodos argues that the US Small Business Administration (SBA) needs to consider new approaches to its 7(a) loan program. As currently managed, the loan program has a very limited impact on generating new jobs. He contends that SBA should identify new ways to ensure that these loans are targeting businesses with high growth potential.

A few small business lobbying groups have already voiced their opinions. “More can and should be done,” National Small Business Association President Todd McCracken said in an email. “If Congress and President Obama are concerned about unemployment, they ought to look no further than the small-business community’s ability to create jobs and seriously consider more targeted proposals such as ending the self-employment tax on health insurance that only small businesses are forced to pay.”

The National Federation of Independent Business says the legislation “provides limited relief or incentives for small businesses and instead spends massive amounts of taxpayer dollars on programs that have little to no connection to economic growth or job creation.” They’d like to see a six-month payroll tax holiday included in the bill. That, they say, would “immediately put money back into the hands of consumers while simultaneously decreasing the cost of labor paid by employers. This is a sensible provision that will provide real help to small business owners.”

The Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council says the bill just doesn’t offer enough for small business. “The ‘economic stimulus’ measure that passed the House includes too much spending that has little to do with helping the economy, and not enough for small business owners and entrepreneurs to help them survive, create jobs and grow their firms. We fear this will do little to help the economy,” the organization says in a statement. “Small business owners are looking for tax certainty, relief and incentives,” the SBE Council adds.

Friends, do you believe the stimulus package is helpful to your business?

What kinds of tax breaks and incentives would help your business through these tough times?