SMALL BUSINESS WEEK: ‘Building a Community around your business'

This is the week that small is big.

National Small Business Week begins Monday May 18, and the New Iowa Entrepreneurs’ Coalition will note the occasion with a series of education and networking events throughout Central Iowa. The Coalition's theme for the week is "Building a Community around your business".

The week will kickoff with two featured events on Monday. The first is a 'Lunch N Learn' titled 'Building Business Intelligence and managing reputation through social media'. The event will begin at 11;30 am at the The Des Moines Social Cub—1408 Locust in the Western Gateway.

What are your customers saying about you online? This workshop teaches you and your team how to harness listening and monitoring technology (Google Reader, Technorati, Twitter Search, etc.) for the purpose of scanning conversations in blogs, social networks, user forums, message boards and online communities for mentions of your business, competitors and other relevant topics. You'll also learn how to effectively engage your online audience on their own turf with honest, human-to-human discourse, as well as how to deal with detractors.

This session is conducted by Nathan T. Wright and Hillary Brown of Lava Row, a Des Moines-based social media education, consulting and strategy firm.

Register through the New Iowa Entrepreneurs' Coalition web site or through a hot link from the New Iowa Group web page. Tickets are $25/person. You may want to arrive at 11:30 for conversation and casual networking. Bring your own lunch…

Small Business Week Events continues at 5:30 PM with a second featured event —'Personally Powerful Presentations: Two-Minute Make-Over Moments.'

Our featured presenter is James Sandin of Dynamications, LLC who will explain how to present yourself and your business with power in "making over" your prospect's impressions and interests in you and what you are offering. It's the two-minute commercial approach supersized.

This meeting will be held at the RDG Offices at 301 Grand Avenue in downtown Des Moines. Register through the New Iowa Entrepreneurs' Coalition web site or through a hot link from the New Iowa Group web page.

You can download a complete listing of the Coalition's Small Business Week events from the 'FILES' section in the New Iowa Entrepreneurs’ Coalition web site. Visit the Calendar page for mote networking and education events.