• To discuss the three fundamental "scorecards" for keeping track of money in a business and to show you how each operates.
• To present the basic transactions that any business encounters including: money coming in, money going out, money owed to you, and money you owe.
• To present ways to manage cash and its flow through your business, as well as, dealing with large costs.
• To show you how to create and understand the balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statements.

• To help you understand the pros and cons of buying a business.
• To review the key questions you need to ask when buying any business.
• To demonstrate the best ways to negotiate the sale of a business to get the best price.
• To checklist those items you need to collect when performing your research and due diligence.
• To present the factors involved in structuring the deal and obtaining financing.

• To help you understand the different legal structures that are available when starting a business. 
• To help you understand the advantages and disadvantages between the different legal structures.
• To help you choose what legal structure is most appropriate for your business.
• To provide you with the forms that you need for the formation of your selected structure.
• To inform you about employee issues and provide you with the forms that every employer needs.

Objectives:

• To help you understand exactly what a business plan is.
• To help you decide if you need a formal, written business plan and how to cater it toward different audiences.
• To give you an understanding of what questions a business plan must address.
• To illustrate the content and structure of a well-developed plan.
• To help you avoid the common mistakes most business plans make.

This course is about the craft of creating a plan for your business. The business plan is the essential document used to raise money for a business and communicate your business vision and strategy to your management team, suppliers, customers, and other stakeholders.

Course is approximately 2 hours to 2.5 hours in length and provides over 135 animated slides complete with voiceover narration.

• To help you understand the role a loan package plays in the lending process.
• To help up you self-assess your readiness to obtain a commercial loan.
• To teach you how much you should ask for when preparing your loan request.
• To help you understand what personal and business documents need to go into a loan package and how to properly complete them.
• To demonstrate how lenders evaluate loan packages so your request will best meet the criteria.

• To help you understand how marketing activities are actually conducted in a small business.
• To convince you that buzz and word-of-mouth don’t just happen, instead it must be carefully cultivated and strategically crafted with an underlying architecture.
• To help you become a master of self-organized customer networks by leveraging hubs and connectors.
• To help you choose and maximize the right marketing weapons for your message.
• To help you achieve a high return on imagination as opposed to return on investment.
   

• To understand what financial projections are and to describe what comprises a good set of projections.
• To discuss the need for assumptions and the different kinds of assumptions you need to address.
• To create a projected fixed and variable expense budget.
• To learn how to create a projected income statement, cash flow statement, balance sheet, and breakeven point analysis.
• To learn what the dos and don’ts are for creating such financial projections.
  

• To define exactly what entrepreneurship is about and to define the purposeful, systematic practices that it embodies.
• To present the available entrepreneurial strategies.
• To help you understand the sources of innovation.
• To describe how entrepreneurs craft strategy and the implications of the different kinds of decisions they must make.

• To define what an investor is and how they operate.
• To examine the different kinds of investors and what they look for in a deal.
• To provide a detailed look at what the investment process usually entails.
• To coach you on presenting your company to prospective investors.
• To help in the process of finding and locating investors.

• To give you an understanding of the sources of capital for starting a new business.
• To help you develop a capital strategy for your business and then give you the tools to implement it.
• To mentally prepare you for the pros and cons of the different kinds of funding sources.
• To help you rule out those sources that may not apply to your business so you can concentrate on those sources that offer the most promise.
  

A comprehensive ten-part course on the tactics of how money is really raised for small business formation. The course examines the sources of available capital and an overview concerning the difference between debt and equity. The course walks you through the maze of financial terms and tactics necessary to successfully identify and secure money for a new business venture.

• To help you understand the process of hiring and managing employees.
• To raise awareness on regulations involving wage minimums, age laws, health and safety issues, and other workplace standards.
• To guide you through the initial hiring and tax forms you will need to file when you have employees.
• To make sure you meet federal and state requirements regarding employees.

• To provide the process steps of conducting market research and the how the process differs for a small entrepreneurial venture as compared to a large corporation.
• To provide the tools used to explore the external market environment, segment customers into target markets, and define the consumption chain for a customer segment.
• To provide the secondary market data available for researching your industry, customers, industry size, and sales potential.
• To provide the primary market research techniques used to answer specific marketing questions.

• To help you understand what marketing is.
• To help you learn how to conduct market research.
• To help you understand how to analyze your market environment and determine your target market.
• To help you determine how to position your product.
• To educate you on the 4 P’s (product, price, place & promotion) and how to apply them to marketing.
• To show you the basics on how to create a marketing plan.

• To define what positioning is and how it works as a communications tool in marketing.
• To put forth and describe the available positioning strategies including the positioning of a leader, the positioning of a follower, and the tactics for repositioning the competition.
• To present the easiest way of getting into the prospect’s mind.
• To help you prevent the most common positioning mistakes including the line extension trap.

• To explain what value is and why its better to set prices on value rather than cost.
• To discuss the 3Cs that influence price: Costs, Customers, and Competition.
• To present the generic pricing strategies and techniques for segmented and lifecycle pricing.
• To study the effects of pricing psychology and the elements of your marketing mix.
• To present specific industry pricing tactics from the best entrepreneurs.

• To assist in the development of a mission, vision and set of goals for starting a new venture.
• To present the necessary tasks you must accomplish and what aspects of risk you need to consider.
• To understand the management trinity: money, marketing, and management.
• To present the legal aspects of obtaining licenses and permits and how to hire employees.
• To show how to protect your business ideas.
• To demonstrate how successful entrepreneurs grow their businesses by adaptation and experimentation.