OPEN Forum from American Express: 12 Ways To Recharge Your Business In 2012

12 Ways To Recharge Your Business In 2012

Barry Moltz, Small Business  Speaker, Consultant, and Author, Barry Moltz
The holidays are always a good time to step back and make sure your business is on track. Here are some tips.

Read More: http://www.openforum.com/articles/12-ways-to-recharge-your-business-in-2012

This article is from OPEN Forum. Powering small business success.

I have seen more fundraising going on than I ever have in my life this fall. From popcorn for boyscouts to raffles at school, to calendars to pine bough wreaths to St. Jude products...Between all this stuff and buying locally, I should be able to find some interesting Christmas presents this year. I have it on my to do list to put together an online list of shops (in addition to art galleries) to shop locally.

Definitely worth reading.

Exploring Castle Park while Louis runs around

Strollin'

Trends

There are a number of things happening, that have been happening for at least as long as I've been paying attention, that are remaking what makes up the basics of an American life.  These trends are worth paying attention to; you can ride the waves if you see them coming, instead of just getting drowned by them.  Also, there's no use crying about it, just realize that it's the truth and make adjustments; sink or swim.

 

They're mainly related to the changing workforce and the increase in inequality/growth in poverty.  I believe these trends are the most important things happening in our country and what the future is going to look like.  I think they are the biggest challenges.  They have been on the horizing for at least a decade. 

 

There are many opportunities still out there I believe, and for me energy is one of them.  I believe for me it will be an intersection of energy, internet and startups.

 

Challenges:
Are jobs obsolete?
The Limping Middle Class
The 5 Most Astounding Facts From the Census Poverty Report

 

Opportunties: Startups, energy and the internet

Eight Bio-based Technologies for 2050

This is Brittany. She's 25, And She's Got A Start-Up Funded By The Groupon Guys

 

Class

Here's a class I'll be taking as an elective for the PSM Energy program:

 

Marketing of Forest Products, FOR 418-2, CRN: 68236, is not your ordinary class on marketing sawlogs, firewood, or maple syrup.  No, this class is designed to give you a basic understanding of marketing to be used in a variety of natural resource interest areas.  By the end of this class, you will be able to answer questions such as

·         How can I market a hunting lease, fee fishing or birding on private forestland?

·         How can I market recreation opportunities on public lands effectively?

·         How do I market standing timber for maximum returns?

·         How do I find buyers for agroforestry products, such as firewood, maple syrup, nuts, and ginsing?

·         How can I find an audience for environmental education or conservation activities?

·         How can we find and keep active members in our environmental organization?

·         How can we persuade landowners to adopt sustainable forest management?

·         How can I market my services as a consultant?

·         How can I market myself as a graduate of SIU?

 

We'll be learning a systematic approach to market these and other forest products in a two hour class, meeting once a week.  After a crash course in basic marketing principles, the instructor and invited experts will bring their real world experience in natural resource marketing to your college classroom.   This class promises to be practical, interesting, and fun—a class where you will learn techniques to use in your professional career as well as in your personal life.     

 

Instructor:  Deborah G. Gunter, Ph.D.-visiting professor.  Dr. Gunter is a former Extension Professor of Mississippi State University's Department of Forestry.    Her goal for this class is to give students a basic understanding of marketing with real world examples so that he or she will be confident, effective, and creative marketers of responsible and sustainable natural resource use.

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My day job: http://techtransfer.siuc.edu/
http://siuenergytech.blogspot.com/
My side job: http://www.Innucopia.com
My hobby: http://www.HeartlandArts.Net
Contents of this message are private.  If you are not the intended recipient, please delete immediately.

Some biofuels news

From the Worldwatch Institute again today!

 

PRESS RELEASE Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Contact: Supriya Kumar, skumar@worldwatch.org, (+1) 202-452-1999, ext: 510 Biofuels Make a Comeback Despite Tough Economy Washington, D.C. - Global production of biofuels increased 17 percent in 2010 to reach an all-time high of 105 billion liters, up from 90 billion liters in 2009. High oil prices, a global economic rebound, and new laws and mandates in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, China, and the United States, among other countries, are all factors behind the surge in production, according to research conducted by the Worldwatch Institute's Climate and Energy Program for the website Vital Signs Online.   The United States and Brazil remain the two largest producers of ethanol. In 2010, the United States generated 49 billion liters, or 57 percent of global output, and Brazil produced 28 billion liters, or 33 percent of the total. Corn is the primary feedstock for U.S. ethanol, and sugarcane is the dominant source of ethanol in Brazil.   "In the United States, the record production of biofuels is attributed in part to high oil prices, which encouraged several large fuel companies, including Sunoco, Valero, Flint Hills, and Murphy Oil, to enter the ethanol industry," said Alexander Ochs, Director of Worldwatch's Climate and Energy Program. High oil prices were also a factor in Brazil, where every third car-owner drives a "flex-fuel" vehicle that can run on either fossil or bio-based fuels. Many Brazilian drivers have switched to sugarcane ethanol because it is cheaper than gasoline.   "Although the U.S. and Brazil are the world leaders in ethanol, the largest producer of biodiesel is the European Union, which generated 53 percent of all biodiesel in 2010," said Ochs. "However, we may see some European countries switch from biodiesel to ethanol because a recent report from the European Commission states that ethanol crops have a higher energy content than biodiesel crops, making them more efficient sources of fuel."   Vital Signs authors Sam Shrank, a Worldwatch MAP Sustainable Energy Fellow, and Farhad Farahmand, a Climate and Energy research intern, also explored how new mandates in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, and China have altered the biofuel industries in these countries. "In Argentina, the biodiesel industry grew not only because of favorable conditions for growing soybeans, but also in response to a new B7 blending mandate, which requires the fuel to be 7 percent biodiesel and 93 percent diesel." Accordingly, biodiesel producers in Argentina are investing heavily in facilities to increase production.   In the United States, however, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) made the decision to dramatically lower the country's production target for cellulosic ethanol, a biofuel that is made from woody plants or crop waste and that can be converted to ethanol much more efficiently than conventional ethanol, resulting in lower associated greenhouse gas emissions. "The EPA's target reduction reflects the technical challenges and high costs of commercializing so-called 'second-generation' biofuels," said Shrank. "Instead of the 950 million liters required initially under the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, the final target will be a much smaller 25 million liters."     Proposed legislation in the U.S. Senate would cut current ethanol production subsidies while maintaining tax credits for related infrastructure such as refilling stations. If supports like subsidies and tariffs are removed in the United States, sugarcane ethanol from Brazil will likely become more prevalent. Although sugarcane ethanol has the benefit of being cheaper and more efficient to produce, there are concerns that increased production will speed deforestation in Brazil as more land is cleared for feedstock cultivation.   The new Vital Signs Online article highlights both the increases in global production of biofuels and the factors behind this growth. It presents the latest facts and figures on the major biofuels producers and outlines new laws and mandates that will affect production of the fuels.   Further highlights from the study:  Due to unsteady ethanol production in Brazil in 2010, the United States became a net exporter of the fuel for the first time, sending a record 1.3 billion liters abroad, a 300-percent increase over 2009. Sugarcane ethanol supplies 41.5 percent of the energy (48 percent of the volume) for light-duty transportation fuels in Brazil. Asia produced 12 percent of the world's biodiesel in 2010, a 20-percent increase from 2009, mostly using palm oil feedstock in Indonesia and Thailand. Virtually all of the 1.5 billion liters of Argentina's biodiesel exports, representing 71 percent of total production, went to Europe. Canada has national mandates for the production of E5 (5 percent ethanol and 95 percent gasoline) and B2 (2 percent ethanol and 98 percent gasoline), and four Canadian provinces have individual mandates up to E8.5. In the United States, eliminating the $0.54 per gallon import tariff and $0.45 per gallon blenders' credit would reduce the ethanol industry's profits by 7 percent and its margins by 20 percent, according to the University of Missouri's Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute. Brazil plans to build 103 new sugarcane mills by 2019, increasing production capacity by 66 percent. # # # Notes to Journalists: To obtain a free copy of this article, please contact Supriya Kumar at skumar@worldwatch.org.   About the Worldwatch Institute: Worldwatch is an independent research organization based in Washington, D.C. that works on energy, resource, and environmental issues. The Institute's State of the World report is published annually in more than 20 languages. For more information, visit www.worldwatch.org. # # #

Nowadays, you have to be talking about sustainability.  You have to be looking at what you've got and how you're going to give back and not just take.  My friend Josh Brown gets it, I'm glad to be good friends with him and his family.  I'll paste in his video below about their organic farming gig.  I'm working on this website: LoveYourForest.com, to get the region going on biomass for energy.  You have to start somewhere!  Look around and see what you can find. Help to make connections that lead to growth.  Feed the web (thank you Kevin Kelly).

Food

Excerpt from "Back to school and back to good food," Worldwatch Institute, 8/32/11 

With children preparing to begin the school year, Nourishing the Planet offers the following solutions for schools to encourage healthy eating:

   

·     Connect Local Farmers to Schools: Providing locally sourced foods in school cafeterias improves diets and strengthens local economies. The U.S. state of Vermont is a leader in the nationwide Farm to School movement, which integrates food and nutrition education into classroom curricula and serves local foods in school cafeterias. Over the past decade, 60 percent of Vermont schools have joined the effort, forming a statewide network aided by the state's Agency of Agriculture, Department of Health, and Department of Education. Children benefit from farm-fresh foods for breakfast and lunch, and local farmers expand their business into a market worth over $40 million. Urban areas across the United States, from New York to Los Angeles, are also participating in this growing movement.

    

·       Savor Mealtimes: Emphasizing the importance of mealtimes teaches children to appreciate the value and taste of good food. France, which has one of the lowest rates of childhood obesity in Europe, takes lunch very seriously. School lunches are well funded, and every part of the meal is prepared on school grounds in professional-grade kitchens-a stark contrast to the heat-and-serve kitchens in U.S. schools. Kids from preschool to high school are served four- to five-course meals and are encouraged to take time eating and socializing with friends. At some schools, detailed menus even suggest what parents should serve their children for dinner. Soft drink and snack machines are banned from school premises.

  

·       Implement School Gardens: School gardens provide hands-on opportunities for children to cultivate and prepare organic produce. In the United States, REAL School Gardens creates learning gardens in elementary schools in high-poverty areas of north Texas. The organization has found that the school gardens not only nurture healthy lifestyles and environmental stewardship, but can also improve academic achievement through active participation. REAL School Gardens supports 81 schools, providing daily access to nature for more than 45,000 children and 2,700 educators.

  

·   Nutrition Education: The city of Chicago's public school district doesn't offer mandatory nutrition education as part of its curriculum. To fill this void, the nonprofit Communities in Schools of Chicago (CISC) connects 170 schools to volunteer professionals who run a broad range of programs that address the social, emotional, health, and enrichment needs of students. Demand for nutrition classes has almost tripled in the past four years. This is due in part to the results of a Personal Health Inventory administered by CISC to more than 5,000 students, which showed that nutrition was the lowest scoring area.

  

  ·  Equal Access to Healthy Foods: Childhood obesity disproportionately affects low-income families that may not be able to afford healthy foods. Schools in Greeley, Colorado, are taking a giant leap forward by cooking every meal from scratch. This is a much healthier alternative to the processed factory-food items that dominate school cafeterias today, and can be more cost effective for poorer school systems that take advantage of U.S. federal reimbursement rules. With 60 percent of the city's students qualifying for free or reduced-price meals, Greeley is proving that it isn't only rich school districts that can provide their children with healthy meals.

 

OK this weblog has been moderately useful in the past. I'm going to try and do better.

Happy 2010! I have a very good feeling about this year.

Looking back on 2009...

I am horrified that it's almost been a year since I posted on my own weblog!

I am also guilty of another sin: Some of the information on my website was (horribly) out of date.

I did have a busy (insane) 2009, but that's no excuse. It's important to keep your website and weblogs up to date. For your website, it's a reflection on your business. For your weblog, it's the only way to keep people coming back to read it, for whatever reason you want them to read it.

I've only done 2 new websites since my last post (I'm not including all the SIU work), because I've been busy working at SIU, among other things. But hopefully this year will be a bit better. I'll be back soon!

O my how the time flies!

I've been busy with some websites, www.topshelfkitchens.net and www.illinidraftinganddesign.com. They're not quite done yet but we got them ready in time for a home show that the boys were involved with last weekend. Those boys are my brothers! Finally I got to do websites for them.:)

I'm working with Dorothy on Easywebsitesandbrochures.com, we've done some websites together.

And I'm thinking about canceling all my hosting and redirecting my domain to free blogs until the economy pics up! You can do the internet cheap if you want to. However a lot of people are taking advantage of the downturn to prepare for the upturn that will surely come. Now is the time to take a few steps to prepare the foundations for that business you have always dreamed of, or to get more people aware of the business you've already got. Use the time wisely! You don't have to spend an arm and the leg for this. I have some helpful links on this page to get you thinking about the groundwork. Get started today! And kudos to my brothers who did just that!

MarketingSherpa article summing upnew CAN-SPAM rules, coming into effect July 7. Yes, I read all this boring stuff!

Just say No!

As I run out of space on the page of my to do list to add more items, I see the wisdom of this article about saying no with grace. It's written by the ArtBizCoach, Alyson Standfield.

Here are some nice articles to read on a summer Sunday morning.

Live for the Journey, not the Destination

11 Questions to Kickstart your Dream

HowTo: Make a page on MySpace!

There is no sure-fire way to increase traffic to your website, but there are a number of small, easy and inexpensive things you can do. One thing is setting up a page for your business on MySpace.com to drive traffic to your business’s website and increase the number of sites linking in to yours. There are many social networking sites out there, but MySpace.com is one of the oldest and most populous, so it can’t hurt to put your banner up there.

Having a presence on MySpace.com can help, first by brining direct traffic and second by increasing your rank in search results as you get more traffic and links in to your website. Plus, a page on MySpace.com is like a second web page, and having another web presence is basically like having a second business location in real life; it’s more likely that people will come across your business. Just make sure your MySpace.com page is a reflection of your business website and not something totally different! Finally, by getting on MySpace.com and connecting up with other southern Illinois people and businesses, we can start to develop a critical mass that will get harder and harder for people to miss in cyberspace!

Follow these steps and you’ll be up and running on MySpace.com in no time:

1. Go to http://www.myspace.com.
2. Click on “Sign Up” and fill in the required information.
3. Choose your MySpace.com URL: try to pick something that is similar to your business name or web address and is easy for people to spell and remember.
4. Confirm your email address: you will get an email in the email box you specify in order to be able to do things like add friends, post bulletins and blogs, and more.
5. Find, add and invite your friends: start with http://www.myspace.com/sispecialties.
6. Promote your MySpace.com URL: put it on your website, your business card, etc.
7. Join SITourPreneurs Group: http://groups.myspace.com/sitourpreneurs.

Setting up a page on MySpace.com is just one of the many things you can do to improve your web presence. Other options include:

• Write a weblog: Weblogs are easy to set up and update. Webpages that are frequently updated will get people coming back to your site and improve your search rankings. Also, if you write about something interesting enough, other websites will link to the articles you post and additionally increase traffic.
• Email newsletter: Sometimes it takes time to build up a relationship with potential customers before they will purchase your product or service. Plus, it’s phenomenally important to keep up relationships with existing customers. An email newsletter is an easy and inexpensive way to keep in contact with potential and existing customers. Just make sure to get permission to send people your emails!
• Cross-linking: find other sites like yours or complementary to yours and ask them to link back to your site. Make your own ‘links’ page on your website to add your ‘partner’ links to your webpage.

For more information, contact Innucopia!

Ah, life is interesting isn't it? I can't believe it's been two months since I posted to this blog. OK for today, I recommend reading this article about kick-butt viral marketing campaigns. There's got to be some good ideas in there that could be adapted to just about any business.

Google's productivity apps will outpace behemoth Microsoft Office? Everything's and everyone's moving toward free? That's what some are saying. I've gotta go, I've been meaning to set up my business email accounts on my Gmail so I can check them from anywhere instead of Outlook.

My economics teacher in high school told us the first day of class that if we could come up with something that was truly free, he would give you an automatic A in the class. No one ever got an A this way. No matter what you said he had a comeback. No one could get him.

I'm still a believer in that basic premise: nothing is free. Ever since "New Rules for the New Economy"'s "Follow the Free" rule I've been there in business as well. There's a blog post about it today that discusses the more technical side of this nothing is free issue.

However we are somewhat moving in that direction. I met with someone at a local tourism bureau this week and he was telling me about how a local web design firm wanted to charge their non-profit organization tens of thousands of dollars for a new website. All they need to be able to do is keep the content somewhat updated, get lots of content they have in printed brochures online, and list some events and coupons. Thirty GranD??? I mean I can't believe what I'm hearing. No, no no. No longer to small non-profit organizations and new businesses need to get ripped off by firms charging tens of thousands of dollars for a website, then charging again when they want to make updates to the text. There are things like Joomla, which can be combined with other things like Google's Calendars and Picasa. Voila! All "free." O except you have to get it all installed and up and running and looking the way you want it. That's where the hook is. No matter what, someone's time is going in there. But still, we're talking hours, maybe a couple days as opposed to weeks or months or months of time. Some organizations might need flashy websites for their target groups, but for most small businesses and organizations on a budget, a well organized and up-to-date website is what's important.

At any rate I would recommend to anyone building a new website or doing an update, consider something like Joomla. You can use free templates, or buy your own template (look and feel) for cheap (something like $40 I've seen), have someone spend a couple days setting it up and transferring over your existing content. Once it's up and running you'll always be able to go in and update it, as simply as going in and writing a word document. Excellent.