Global Marketing Plus

I just got back from 3 days of SCORE Leadership Conference.  (SCORE stands for Service Corps of Retired Executives and is a resource of the Small Business Administration).  SCORE is a nationwide volunteer organization of 12,000 mostly retired executives who want to give back to the business community by providing FREE coaching to small businesses or new start-ups.

Some of the comments at the conference:

• “Many businesses are started on a hope and a prayer.  Smart businesses use the resources available”.  SCORE is one of those resources and is FREE!
• “We are never going back to normal as far as the business environment.  However, change is opportunity, and the opportunities are tremendous at this time. ”
• “SCORE is in the business to help clients (small business owners) get what they want out of life.”
• “Trust is earned by consistent action.  Trust cuts the sales cycle in half or by a fourth!”
• “What are you providing to make me move from my current supplier to come to you”?
• “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll end up somewhere else.”

From our new Small Business Administration Administrator appointed by President Obama, Karen Mills:

• “Small business needs to improve their information technology to be successful.”  (Wow! I have been telling you that!  Let me get you up-to-date and update your website!)
• The SBA has helped stimulate the economy because they are again lending to small businesses.
• The SBA has 2,000 employees nationwide.  But when you add the 12,000 SCORE volunteers, there is a small army in the SBA of 14,000!
• We need to help small businesses prepare for disaster by making sure that critical records are backup up or copies made off site.  This is in case of flood, earthquake, fire or other natural disaster.

If you would like to take care of the free coaching available from SCORE, email me or go to www.score.org.  there you can find your local SCORE office and get free coaching.