Should a Small Business Go Global?

August 31, 2010

Clay

I frequently hear people say that small companies, especially entrepreneurial ventures, should not be thinking about the global market place.  After all, they’re just a local company and need to be focusing on the home market, right?

Well, maybe, but in this age of globalization not considering the opportunities of international business could very well mean the difference between growth and stagnation.

Almost half of US businesses are predicted be involved in international trade by the year 2020, and US Department of Commerce data indicates that large companies currently sell only about 4% of US exports.  That means that 96% of exports are sold by smaller companies!

International business can be an important strategic option for small businesses.  It can open many new doors for success, but the key is determining why you want to get involved in international business.

Do you want to go global to:

  • Expand customer networks?
  • Gain exposure to new ideas and technology?
  • Find new ideas for global sourcing?
  • Or, just because everyone else is doing it?

A company’s motivation for pursuing international business can be very telling and help determine the likelihood of success.  Programs that are most likely to succeed are those that are planned for the long-term, and include market research, international relationships, and logistics arrangements.

International business can contribute to long-term growth of a small business, and also can enhance competitiveness.  By buying and selling internationally, a company can gain insights on customer requirements, competitor activity, and different ways of doing business.   Companies also may acquire new technologies, ideas, and partnerships from the process.

Once a company decides to go global, commitment from the management team is the number one determining factor of success. Management can show their commitment to an international program by setting aside funding, allotting time to manage the program, and assigning personnel to perform its tasks.

Taking advantage of international opportunities now is easier then it’s ever been.  The Internet and other modern communications technologies make the buying and selling of all types of products, services, inputs, and components a viable option for many businesses of all sizes, almost anywhere in the world.

For information on how TowsonGlobal can help your business take advantage of international opportunities, check out www.towsonglobal.com.

Photo Credit: Barun Patro

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Posted by Clay Hickson

What’s in Your Food?

August 9, 2010

Clay

“Do you really know what you ate today?” Natural Check, LLC dares to answer this sometimes unnerving question by making the science of water and food testing easily accessible.

This innovative startup company, and member of the TowsonGlobal Incubator, provides fast, affordable and reliable methods to screen for unacceptable compounds in the food and water supplies. For example, the company has developed a lab-based test for the detection of artificial growth hormones in beef and offers a rapid field test for antibiotics in milk.  Additional tests are under development in partnership with labs from around the world.

NaturalCheck also supplies water testing kits and is striving to build community awareness through city-specific “What’s in my water…” Facebook fan pages created for cities like Baltimore, DC, Los Angeles, and New York.  In addition, the company offers the BRIX Meter, which helps determine the nutritional quality of fruits and vegetables.

Similarly, NaturalCheck, through its AuthentiCheck division, is on the forefront, developing and distributing new technologies to protect manufacturers, retailers and consumers from often unsafe counterfeit products. The technologies offer two important services—authenticating products and tracking and tracing the movement of products through the supply chain—and are suitable for textiles, packaging, pharmaceuticals, and many other products.

NaturalCheck was founded by Larry Bohlen, former NASA engineer, international environmental advocate and food safety entrepreneur.  His experience has taught him that testing and sharing the results can be a powerful tool for facilitating real change.


2 Comments | Business Analysis, Community Outreach, Education, Entrepreneurship, International Business Development, News, Small Business Development | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Clay Hickson

CrowdPitch: A Great Way to Support Startup Companies

July 6, 2010

Clay

On June 16, 2010, TowsonGlobal collaborated with Funding Universe to bring CrowdPitch to Towson University. The event gathered more than 70 entrepreneurs and investors in an entertaining and dynamic setting, where selected companies were given four minutes to pitch their ideas to a panel of experts and a live audience.  A brief, three-minute Q&A session followed the presentation, in which the entrepreneurs were able give more in-depth information about their business plans. Audience members also received $100 in “fun money,” which they could use to “invest” in the company of their choice at the end of the program.

As many as 55 companies applied to participate in the free event, but only five were selected to present:  ArtiNNet Corp., MYiLIVE. Port Networks, Tots2Tweens, and WinTheTrophy.  The winner was selected based on the number of votes received from the audience and the panel of judges:  Dave Troy, Baltimore Angels; Rick Faint, Evergreen Capital; Laura Gamble, Skipjack Partners; and  Adam Suri, Maryland State Department of Economic Development.

The Pitchers

The “pitchers” were ArtiNNet with VoicePass, mobile software that uses voice recognition security; MYiLIVE, a personalized boutique shopping website; Port Networks, smart WiFi technology; Tots2Tweens, a web directory for parents; and WinTheTrophy, a legal sports betting and social gaming site.  All presenters were well prepared, eloquent and very passionate about their ideas and most received positive feedback from the panel.  In the end, ArtiNNet won and received $8800 worth of prizes, including accounting/financial services, startup support counseling, Amazon web services, and will be profiled in FundingUniverse’s newsletter that is distributed to 120,000 subscribers.

TowsonGlobal Involvement

 

TowsonGlobal’s staff also participated in the event and got the opportunity to interact with all attendees. “ This is the first time I have been to an event like this.  I was excited to be a part of it.  Now I understand how hard it is to find investors and get a business going!” says intern Lissell Paredes.  Intern Aaron Robinson adds “It was very informative; I didn’t know events like these existed and I’m glad I got to experience it.”

“Overall, CrowdPitch was a learning experience for everyone present, a convenient way to get advice from experts, and a great opportunity to build connections,” says TowsonGlobal Director Clay Hickson.

To see if a CrowdPitch event is coming to a city near you, click here!

CrowdPitch at Towson University

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Posted by Clay Hickson

Magazines….My Early Inspiration

June 15, 2010

Sharyn

I enjoyed reading about Clay and Jeremy’s early career influences and I was reminded of experiences I had during high school that set me on my path to become a graphic designer. Although my story is a bit geeky, I’m thrilled to share it. When I was a high school sophomore, a good friend who was a year above me was on the yearbook staff. I was so envious because it sounded like such a fun way to spend class time…picking out photos, making typographic choices about headlines and body copy and some writing.

She and I took our excitement for page layout to a whole new level. During the “Blizzard of ‘96” I managed to get snowed in at her house and we came up with the idea to design the cover of a magazine. We went as far as to create a bizarre name for our magazine that was the combination of our two last names.

We cut out letters from magazines, some old favorites like Seventeen and Teen, of fonts that we really liked, to create the logo for our magazine. And then we found the perfect cover image for our magazine. In the end, we managed to make it look like a real magazine cover. Over the next few months, we created a few of these covers with headlines that usually revolved around what was interesting in our life at the time.

The next year I joined the yearbook staff and as I expected, I completely fell in love with “real” page layout using a computer. My senior year I was asked to be the yearbook editor and at some point during this time frame, I knew that this was what I wanted to pursue.

I feel fortunate that I have had a passion for what I do every day for a long time. I’m inspired every time I open a magazine and quite often go back to my sophomore year thinking about my early inspiration and am thankful for those bursts of creatively that shaped my experiences today.

My Senior Yearbook Class

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Posted by Sharyn Kuczka

TowsonGlobal…in Residence

June 9, 2010

Clay

Neighborhoods, ideally, are social communities with considerable face-to-face interaction among residents. Neighbors often act as a resource or offer support when it’s needed the most.  What about in the business world?  It’d be nice to be able to walk next door and find invaluable resources at your disposal, especially for the small business owner looking to expand in this tough market.

Many business incubators provide a whole host of services for start-up ventures such as facilities, workshops, counseling, networking and organizational support, but there is more. TowsonGlobal, Towson University’s International Incubator, goes even further by providing both Resident and Associate member companies access to a variety of in-residence experts that provide creative, inexpensive, and effective counsel necessary to succeed.

Among the good neighbors “residing” at TowsonGlobal are:

CFO-in-Residence
Carol L. Coughlin
CEO/Founder, BottomLine Growth Strategies, Inc.
Attorney-in-Residence
Steven Tiller
Attorney at Law, Whiteford, Taylor, Preston, LLP
Entrepreneur-in-Residence
J. Gary McDaniel
President & Board Member (former), TerraWatt Power, LLC
VP Sales-in-Residence
Scott B. Turnbaugh
President/Founder, Eagles View Consulting LLC
  • The CFO-in-Residence advises on financial and accounting questions, and assists with many strategic business issues.
  • The Attorney-in-Residence counsels on a broad range of legal topics from contractual issues to intellectual property rights protection.
  • The Entrepreneur-in-Residence assists with a variety of strategic issues, including business plan fine-tuning or strategies and contacts for those seeking investment funding.
  • The VP Sales-in-Residence helps in navigating sales challenges, ranging from exploring new sales opportunities to building and managing a sales team.

Tapping into the one-on-one support such specialists as these who have years of experience in numerous fields and industries can make a tremendous difference!

To find out how you can become a member of the TowsonGlobal neighborhood, check out www.towsonglobal.com.

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Posted by Clay Hickson

Focus Groups for Entrepreneurs

May 10, 2010

Clay

In the marketing world, focus groups are a way of reaching out to existing or potential customers for feedback.  Companies of all sizes often use focus groups to improve an existing product or service or to test new ideas.  These facilitated discussions of 6-10 people can elicit a great deal of valuable information.

For start-up companies, focus groups can be a particularly powerful tool for evaluating new ideas, products or services before they are put on the market, avoiding costly missteps.

Developing new products can be very expensive, and focus group research can remove some of the risks by saving you from wasting time and money on ideas that won’t fly and by helping you strengthen good ideas.  If conducted properly, focus groups can uncover many diverse insights from participants into how the product may potentially be viewed and can aid in development of marketing strategies that will most effectively address customer needs.

Take a look at this video describing how Domino’s Pizza used focus groups to learn what needed to be improved about their pizza.

In many cases, companies use outside resources to coordinate focus group research; the cost for which typically can be $3,000-$6,000.  This may seem expensive for a small business, but compared to other research methods, it can be relatively economical.  For those who can’t justify the expense, there may be ways to reduce the overall cost of conducting a focus group.  For example:

  • Holding the session(s) in your own meeting space can save the expense of using specialized facilities; just make sure that the space is comfortable and private.
  • Using someone from inside the company as facilitator instead of an outside consultant may be cost effective; chose a person adept at leading discussions and keeping the group focused on the objective.
  • Having an internal scribe make notes of and summarize the meeting can save money, but the person(s) must be sure to capture the numerous thoughts and ideas from the discussion that will direct the efforts to move forward on the issue.
  • Analyzing the data internally also could save a significant sum; however, the risk of biased reporting, can make having an outside source analyze the data a worthwhile investment.

While there are options for cutting corners when conducting marketing research, there also are aspects on which the firm does not want to skimp.  The most important elements of a focus group are the participants.  You do not need to pay large fees, but some small level of compensation for participants’ time and ideas is required.  Also, make sure you have the right audience (people without the proper background or interests will provide useless or distorted information).

Check out these links for more tips:

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Posted by Clay Hickson

Turning Gloom into Bloom

April 20, 2010

Clay

In these tough economic times, everyone is feeling it.  Some families are watching their budgets, eating dinner at home more, and maybe not getting that new iPad they wanted.  Individuals are not the only ones feeling the pressure, so are businesses.  While big companies may be having cutbacks and layoffs, small businesses also are struggling.  Along with everything else, marketing budgets are tight, so companies are forced to be creative.

One company that is working to turn a challenging situation into an opportunity is Transcending Cosmetics, a TowsonGlobal incubator member company,  through the launch of its new marketing campaign “Turning Gloom into Bloom.” The initiative strives to use every opportunity to stretch marketing dollars and incorporate a variety of tools to help build awareness of the company’s revolutionary all-in-one foundation/concealer Natural Cover and the services of Linda Seidel—Pioneer, Makeup Artist, Author, Educator and Aesthetic Rehabilitation Specialist.

The campaign includes:

  • Partnerships with health professionals and special interest groups like Vascular Birthmarks Foundation
  • Radio talk show appearances such as “Woman Talk Live” and “Your Prescription for Health”, both on WCBM
  • Presentations to groups such as the Lupus Foundation Mid-Atlantic
  • Exploration of new media tools by engaging a consultant to help set up an easy-to-manage social media initiative that will include a corporate Facebook profile
  • Limited targeted advertisements such as in the program book of St. Joseph Medical Center’s gala event A Night with the Stars where Linda also did makeovers on cancer survivors

The campaign is also geared to giving back to customers and the community.  Transcending wants every man, woman and child to have an opportunity to feel confident about the way they look, so they are donating consultations, gift certificates, and time.  The company looks for a variety of avenues through which to share information on how to accentuate one’s best features, and how to deal with some of the common complaints that people have, such as dark under-eye circles, uneven skin tone, and rosacea.

Even in these rough times, companies can prevail and turn a very gloomy situation into a blooming success.

Read more about Transcending Cosmetics and the “Turning Gloom into Bloom” marketing campaign here.

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Posted by Clay Hickson

Do I Need a Business Mentor?

April 6, 2010

Clay

Starting and running a business can be daunting, but you don’t have to go through it all alone.  Even before you launch your business, it probably is a good idea to find a mentor or two, someone more experienced who can serve as a trusted advisor over an extended period of time and who can provide guidance and input that will help minimize the likelihood of making many common mistakes.

The mentor can help brainstorm and strategize, can provide an important third-party perspective, can challenge deep-rooted but perhaps misplaced views, can offer support and motivation through difficult periods, and can give constructive feedback.

The mentor should be someone who suits you and your circumstances.  The right mentor can make all the difference, so how do you find that person?  Here are some suggestions:

  1. Look at your network of contacts:  friends, family, former colleagues, college professors, SCORE, business associations, chambers of commerce, or other sources.  A business incubator like TowsonGlobal also has may have an advisory board or entrepreneur-in-residence who can provide in-house mentoring.
  2. Choose a mentor in the same field as you who or someone who is aware of many of the specific issues that might arise in your field and can uncover hidden challenges.
  3. Choose a mentor who can talk to you about their mistakes (and successes) and will share what they have learned.  This can help advance you more quickly along the learning curve.
  4. Choose a mentor who has a network that will expand important contacts in your industry.  Having access to the right people early on can help make things happen more rapidly.
  5. Choose a mentor who has no ulterior motive, no service or product to sell you.  You need someone you can trust, with whom you are comfortable sharing your hopes and fears.
  6. Don’t view it as only a one-way relationship; be willing to reciprocate and share your own insights, contacts and opportunities.

Once you have found your mentor, be willing and prepared to listen and seriously consider their advice; otherwise they won’t be sticking with you for long.  Ultimately, their counsel could make all the difference in the world.

Jill Blashack Strahan was a small business owner with a struggling gift basket company in Minnesota.  She counseled with her mentor as she was trying to figure out how to be more successful.  Jill said her goal was to make $30,000 a year but was advised that not only had she set her sights too low, but she was focusing on the wrong thing.  She should focus on her passion not the money.  During many of the rough times, Jill thought of giving up, but then she remembered her mentor’s advice to focus on her dream.  She did that, and today Jill’s company, Tastefully Simple, is a direct-sales business with $120 million in sales.

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Posted by Clay Hickson

Defending Your Blindside: Part 2

April 5, 2010

Marcia

Establish Direction: Set Your Sail with WHAT, WHICH and MIX factors

Securing capital and maintaining a fiscally buoyant organization are obviously important roles of a CEO. But determining the direction of where and how funding will be spent ultimately determines a CEO’s success.  And direction is based on strategy.

Given that strategy is the WHAT and tactics are the HOW, the CEO’s primary focus should be on the WHAT.  What initiatives will be implemented to accomplish the overriding goals of the organization? In what markets are you (or should you be) competing, with which product and services lines, and against what competitors?

The “WHICH strategy” is what makes your organization best, better different or unique.  It’s what helps make customers choose which product or service over the competition.   Backed by your value proposition, this strategy is affected by what is known as a USP- that is -you’re Unique Strategic Position.  If you don’t have one, you will want to get one.  Although CEOs can hire someone to develop a “which strategy”, they should ensure that its implementation is pervasive throughout the organization.

And don’t forget the MIX factor.

A MIX factor evaluation analyzes what products and services are offered, the focus you place on them, the ROI and the market penetration yielded.  If more than 60% of your revenues are coming from one source in one market niche, you could seriously have a problem when competition steals your market share, consumer purchasing patterns shift, or the economy goes south.

Addressing some of the following questions will help put you back on course.  Are your offerings broad enough to withstand change in demand and resilient against various types of economic conditions? Can they withstand the test of impending inflation? Are you totally dependent on one kind of buyer?  Do you have any catalyst strategies which focus on high profit margin items, or multiple or repeat purchases?  Further, how large is your market niche? And, how many companies are competing for it?  These are just a few of the questions which your executive team should address.

Remember, when charting your corporate course, it is not the wind, but the set of the sail that will direct your organization into safe harbor.

This blog is the second in a series of articles relating to a CEO’s job description.  It is posted monthly in Towson University’s e-connection newsletter and will soon be available on the MD SBDC Central Region website:  www.centralmdsbdc.org

Marketing MIX factors will be addressed as a specific topic in the upcoming CEO Accelerator Executive Education Series. Starting in April, there will be 16 topics presented over a two year period, which will address strategic approaches to every aspect of your business. If you would like to receive notifications of this and other executive education events, please include your contact information below, or email us directly at sbdcr@towson.edu, or call 410-296-5613.

For more details and to register for CEO Accelerator seminars, visit the MD Small Business Development Center website (www.centralmdsbdc.org) and click on Training.

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Posted by Guest Blogger

University Incubators: A Resource for Students and Entrepreneurs

March 22, 2010

Clay

University-based business incubators such as TowsonGlobal not only support start-up businesses from the surrounding region, but also offer students a plethora of hands-on experience and practical knowledge before joining the workforce (see story from The Baltimore Sun special education section).

While the model may vary from one incubator to another, area entrepreneurs, students and others can tap into the incubator’s resources by paying affordable membership fees as either resident or associate members.  The incubator offers a wide variety of resources, including office space, mentoring, and networking assistance.  For instance, TowsonGlobal’s advisory board, brimming with advice from seasoned executives, is a great asset for member companies.

Affiliation with a university provides incubator companies ready access to faculty and staff for collaboration on research and development, for commercialization of university generated technologies, or other types of academic-business partnerships.  This also can provide an ideal avenue for finding enthusiastic and hardworking student interns.

At TowsonGlobal, for instance, over the last several years as many as 30 students have benefited from internships with participating companies as part of their academic programs. They have been assigned to companies where they have conducted market research, produced feasibility studies, and developed real business contacts for the incubator clients (see the TowsonGlobal YouTube video).

Encouraging entrepreneurship through incubators allows universities to provide great collaborative, educational experiences that benefit all… students, faculty/staff, entrepreneurs, and student entrepreneurs, too.

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Posted by Clay Hickson

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