MARKETING SOLUTIONS: Entrepreneurs

FOR ENTREPRENEURS: RESOURCES

These are all credible, reliable, high-end sites with solid information from experts in the field.

from the Garage Technology Ventures web site

Useful links for entrepreneurs.

Kauffman eVenturing: The Entrepreneur's Trusted Guide to High Growth

Geared to those who are building companies that innovate and create jobs and wealth, Kauffman eVenturing is the trusted guide for entrepreneurs on the path to high growth. The site provides original articles, written by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, and aggregates "the best of the best" content on the Web related to starting and running high-impact companies.

Entrepreneurs will find eVenturing to be an interactive, vibrant, and vital place to make important connections, access help and advice, and find relevant, practical "just-in-time" information and tools.

The Entrepreneurs' Help Page

From the site: "This site is designed, created, and published by a group of young professionals. We put together our skills and knowledge to publish this site to help out other young people or inexperienced business people with good ideas and the desire to start their own business. This web site distributes basic information on legal, financial, and management issues that commonly affect (or afflict!) people who are just starting up their businesses."

StartUp Journal by The Wall Street Journal

Collection of articles and How-To on financing, franchising, ecommerce and running a business. Site also includes Businesses for Sale and Franchises for Sale.

Forbes.com Entrepreneurs

Articles on finance; human resources; law & taxation; sales & marketing; management; and technology.

Entrepreneur.com

Everything you want to know about how to be and entrepreneur. Also includes business and franchise opportunities.

Harvard Business School Entrepreneurs

A video archive that captures insights from leading members of the School's entrepreneurial community. Entrepreneurs speak on a common set of themes including their development as entrepreneurs, strategies for identifying opportunity and leadership.

e Small Office

A source of information and articles on many topics. eSmallOffice was designed for the small business owner to help in starting and running a business. They provide content, news, weekly articles, and special offers from leading brands and a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date on what is happening.

Harvard Business School Working Knowledge ... for business leaders

This high-quality newsletter consistently has relevant information for entrepreneurs.

NEWSLETTERS & MORE: Business Week Online

Another great resource for entrepreneurs!! I love their newsletters, especially the Small Biz edition.

Once you register and sign-in you will get access to the following features:
Portfolio Manager
Magazine Archives
Free Newsletters
Forums & Message Boards
Online Courses

Business Resource Center

Business Resource Center

Regions offers personal and small business banking ... they also offer interactive workshops, planning guides and calculators - all these tools are available at no charge.

Finding the right information on running a small business is not always easy. However, Regions Small Business Resource Center provides you with interactive workshops, planning guides, calculators, worksheets, business plans and more. You'll have all the tools you need to manage your successful business.

TIPS FOR BUILDING YOUR BUSINESS

Building a Company (Garage Technology Ventures web site)

This links to presentations and MP3 files with information that will help you to build your company with tips ranging from bootstrapping and business development to recruiting and rainmaking. (SEE ONE OF OUR FEATURED BOOKS BELOW "ART OF THE START" BY GUY KAWASAKI)

BUSINESS WEEK ONLINE ARTICLE: The Art of Doing it Yourself

You don't have to wait for venture capitalists or angel investors to lend a hand. Follow these tips to get the ball rolling on your own.

7 Ways to Join the Billion Dollar Club

From Fortune Small Business:
Small companies that grow to chalk up huge sales share seven key traits.

Exit Planning

As a privately owned company, an exit plan is just as important as the business plan required to start your business.

Startup Journal (Wall Street Journal) Business Planning Tools

Create a mini business plan free online. Test your assumptions and start documenting your ideas for your new business. The MiniPlan guides you through creating the basics of a business plan including:

* Break-Even Analysis
* Market Analysis
* Executive Summary
* Company Objectives
* Mission Statement
* Start your MiniPlan

FINDING FUNDS

Garage Technology Ventures

Garage Technology Ventures is a seed-stage and early-stage venture capital fund. They're looking to invest in special entrepreneurs who have big ideas and who need seed capital to turn their ideas into action. (SEE ONE OF OUR FEATURED BOOKS BELOW "ART OF THE START" BY GUY KAWASAKI)

Springboard Enterprises

SPRINGBOARD ENTERPRISES is a national not-for-profit organization dedicated to accelerating women's access to the equity markets. The organization produces programs that educate, showcase and support entrepreneurs as they seek equity capital and grow their companies.

PPT: Presenting Your Company as an Investment Opportunity

This document, provided by the San Diego-based Tech Coast Angels, offers a slide-by-slide set of guidelines on how to maximize your company's presentation to potential angel investors.

Angel Capital Education Foundation

" ... a listing of all the angel groups that we are aware of in the U.S. and Canada, as well as other resources that may be helpful to entrepreneurs, investors, policy makers, students, and entrepreneurial support organizations."

Nothing Ventured

Suggestions for ways to develop your product when you haven't received the venture capital financing you had hoped for. At times, this attention to development will bring venture capital in at a later stage in your product development.

Genesis Exchange: The Private Equity Exchange

Genesis Exchange is a marketplace where private companies find Angel Investors and Investors find interesting high return opportunities across North America.

Women's Entrepreneur Venture Conference

The Women's Technology Cluster's Entrepreneur Venture Conference (EVC) is the premier event for women-led companies seeking investment from VCs. Qualifying applicants are mentored through the complete fundraising effort - from financials to presentation to closing the deal. Presenting companies pitch to over 200 venture capitalists, providing a valuable opportunity to secure funding and supporting the WTC's mission to increase the number of women-led companies who raise investment.

Investors Seeing in Technicolor

This article addresses the issue of some ethnic and racial groups remain virtually invisible in angel investor circles.

Life Sciences Venture Summit

The 2006 Life Sciences Venture Summit presented by youngStartup Ventures is the premier bioscience industry gathering, connecting senior executives of early stage biotech, pharmaceutical, healthcare, medical device and diagnostic companies with venture capitalists, angel investors, corporate VCs and professional service firms.

Whether you're seeking funding, partnerships or new investment opportunities, The Life Sciences Venture Summit is one event you won't want to miss.

Not-So-Adventurous Venture Capital

According to the Center for Women's Business Research, the number of firms run by women grew at nearly twice the rate of all U.S. firms from 1997 to 2004. But a new study released this month by VentureOne, a unit of Dow Jones, shows that the number of women-owned or women-run businesses backed by venture capitalists has been on a slippery decline since 2002. READ MORE...

FINDING ENTREPRENEURIAL OPPORTUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER

Microsoft IP Ventures

IP Ventures licenses and spins out leading-edge technologies to both entrepreneurs and rapidly-growing companies as a way to drive innovation and recoup some of our R & D investment.

Thumbs Up Or Down? Microsoft Licenses Out Technology That Detects Hand Gestures

A California company that specializes in visual display plans to use Microsoft's research to create interactive marketing for trade shows and retailers.

Women's Technology Cluster

The Women's Technology Cluster is the pre-eminent business incubator dedicated to women leaders building technology-driven businesses. Our mission is to increase the number of successful companies and to leverage their influence. Through our dedicated community of proven CEOs, investors, and industry experts, we provide extensive advisory services, coaching, and access to business and capital networks.

Technology Transfer & the Life Sciences

"Claragen, a College Park, MD company, collaborated with NIH scientists to develop a drug based on a naturally occuring protein lacking in premature infants. Claragen obtained an exclusive license for the replacement protein and used that license to attract the bulk of nearly $3million in venture capital. A technology transfer (TT)license can be a powerful attractor for venture capitalists and other investors in a new company, given that much of the basic science has already been proved and vetted."

UCLA Office of Intellectual Property

Check out their page on Technologies Available for Licensing!!

The scope their activities include:
* Commercially evaluating new technologies;
* Determining patentability and commercial value;
* Prosecuting patents;
* Marketing and licensing inventions;
* Facilitating UCLA faculty startups;
* Negotiating license agreements and Material Transfer Agreements; and
* Receiving and distributing royalties and other income to the inventors, UCLA Campus and its Departments

ABOUT ENTREPRENEURS: articles, blogs

BLOG: Guy Kawasaki

Guy Kawasaki is a managing director of Garage Technology Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm and a columnist for Forbes.com.
Guy is the author of eight books including The Art of the Start, Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way.

THE WORLD OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Patently Problematic

An interesting read on patents ... "As noted earlier this week, next month's Collection is on how entrepreneurs can protect their companies' intellectual property. To be sure, this is a more than well-covered topic in media and in research. Much of this stuff (and rightly so) tends to focus on the "how to" aspect of winning a patent. Alongside this track is an important on-going debate around the growing recognition that the U.S. patent system, run by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), is in disarray."

Protecting Your Company's Intellectual Property

Intellectual property (IP) protection is a fundamental part of our nation's founding. The U.S. Constitution, establishing the only "right" in its text, states that "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their Respective Writings and Discoveries." Even Abraham Lincoln stated our patent system adds "the fuel of interest to the fire of genius." This Collection covers the range of issues around how entrepreneurs can protect their company's IP. Upcoming Collections will cover related emerging issues surrounding IP protection, including open source IP and its impact on entrepreneurship.

THE WORLD OF FRANCHISES

StartUp Journal (Wall Street Journal) Franchising

Collection of articles about franchises and franchising.

StartUp Journal (Wall Street Journal) Franchises for Sale

Selection of franchises for sale.

Entrepreneur.com Franchise Listings

Compiled by the editors of Entrepreneur magazine

THE WORLD OF EXPORTING

A Small Business Guide to Exporting

BREAKING INTO THE TRADE GAME
A Small Business Guide to Exporting
3rd Edition

ENTREPRENEURIAL ORGANIZATIONS

Access Executive Network

ACCESS Executive Network is dedicated to bringing together leaders and senior executives to enhance professional connections and give back to our community.

Women Presidents' Organization

It is a forum for CEOs who are often isolated and would like to develop relationships with peers who can serve as sounding boards and sources of ideas and strategies for growing their business (not unlike a board of directors). The group also expects members to take an active role in discussing other members businesses, and to share their expertise and experience.

Vistage

San Diego, CA (Nov 15, 2005) Vistage International, the world's largest CEO membership organization, announced the appearance of 14 member companies on this year's Inc. 500 list of the fastest growing private companies in the U.S. The 2005 rankings mark the fifth consecutive year that more than a dozen Vistage-member companies have been named to this prestigious list.

THE ISSUE OF HEALTH CARE

ARTICLE: The Health Insurance Crunch

The Health-Insurance Crunch
Many microbusinesses can't afford coverage, but that hurts their growth. While the policy debate continues, one nonprofit offers help

IN OVER YOUR HEAD AND CAN'T PAY YOUR DEBTS??

Article FORBES.com: When You Can't Pay Your Debts

If your business is in distress--you owe a lot of money but you can't pay--your creditors will probably threaten legal action against you personally. How much they can collect, and how they can go about collecting it, will depend on how your business is organized, whether you personally guaranteed repayment of the debts and whether you decide to file for bankruptcy.