Business Plan 101

Turn your business ideas into a solid plan for both financing and success. Committing your idea to paper in the form of a business plan not only increases your chances of obtaining financing, but also in keeping your business strategically focused. With the support of your business coach and a network of like-minded students, you'll work through all of the major components of writing a business plan and emerge with a working business plan in hand. And most importantly, you will have completed the first--and most difficult--step on the path to small business success.

Making the Most of Linkedin

You may be on LinkedIn.com, but have you taken advantage of all it has to offer? Linked-In can help with reputation management, branding, lead generation, search engine optimization and networking IF you are an active participant or just starting out. Discover the power of the world's largest professional networking site. Whether you’re looking to connect with new business clients, build brand awareness or just trying to expand your personal network, Linkedin is an excellent tool. In this easygoing workshop, you will easily learn how to get started with LinkedIn through a step-by-step illustration using a liv LinkedIn account with demonstrations of many powerful features.

Financing Your Business:
Do You Qualify?

Learn from a banker and a Certified Financial Planner on how a lender will evaluate your loan request. Credit quality, cash flow, and collateral are all key, but what do they all mean? In this workshop, we will explain how entrepreneurs can use their financial statements as a decision making tool in running their company. The workshop is best suited for those business owners who already possess a basic understanding of financial statements and their composition.

Pricing Your Products and Services

Learn about pricing concepts, the role of pricing in a company’s strategy, and an easy four-step process to determine pricing for your services or products on the basis of costs, customer goals, trends, and competition. Often business owners price their products simply by marking up their cost. Understandable, but there are also other elements to consider!

While margin is important, it doesn’t have any bearing on a customer’s perceived value and what they are willing to pay. We help you develop a better understanding your ideal clients perceived value and pricing appropriately is as crucial to success as understanding your cost and breakeven.

Marketing: Knowing Your Niche

Effective marketing is the process of identifying, reaching, capturing, and retaining your ideal clients and customers. We believe that it is essential to your success to know how to leverage this knowledge in the marketplace. This workshop will provide simple, cost effective, and perhaps, most importantly, you’ll have presented to you real-world approaches to marketing your business. Our experienced guest presenters will explore and discuss a wide range of marketing resources, tools and tips.