Martha Villarreal’s Blog

As I was visiting my favorite blog- I ran into the video you see above, featuring commentary from Seth Godin (Best Selling Author and Entrepreneur), Sean Parker (Founder; FaceBook, Napster, Plaxo) , and Jimmy Wales. It was an open forum being held by American Express for businesses which talks about how the nature of marketing is changing. No longer can businesses expect that they have a right to people’s attention, but in fact must come to respect blogging and social networking as a new media form. Businesses that have come to respect this new form of media and engage bloggers directly are thriving. Check out the video and tell me what you think?

This summer you can sit in your lawn chair with your laptop, sip lemonade and take summer school classes. You never have to miss one minute of sunshine ! You can earn units toward your certificates or degree while traveling. As long as you have an Internet connection you can take business courses from San Joaquin Delta College.

This summer I will be teaching the following courses:

BUS 22 Professional Selling (3 units)

BUS 60 Small Business Management (3 units)

BUS 94 A, B, C, D,E, F. (Small Business series, 1 unit each.)

If you really feel you need some face-to-face contact, I’ll be teaching BUS 23, Advertising, as a hybrid class, one day a week, (6 weeks only) from our Tracy Center.

My colleagues, Roger Waller and Dean Danielson , will also be teaching a variety of business classes., including Introduction to Business and Management.

Summer registration begins in April/May so make sure you register for these classes early. They fill up very soon!

A blog? What a great idea! Business is all about connections and your blog gives your former students a place to stay in touch with you and each other. As always, I am very grateful for your generosity in the sharing of your knowledge, resources and of yourself. This blog goes way beyond your classroom obligations and we all benefit as a result. I plan to check in on a regular basis to see what’s up and what’s new in your small business education world.

On that note, here’s something new that may be of interest to your readers - a series of free small business oriented webinars. Yesterday, I participated in my first one. If you don’t know, a webinar is an online training seminar - I didn’t know that until yesterday! It was called “Avoid the Top 10 Fatal Mistakes; Marketing Success for Your Small Business”. It was REALLY informative and fit perfectly with Martha’s current BUS95e Marketing and Advertising for Small Business class (which I am in).

The webinar hosting company is Vista Print, the free business cards people (www.vistaprint.com). Their webinars are free, not loaded with too much self-promotion and are very useful. Here are a few upcoming titles: Mar 4 - It’s All About Results; Postcard Marketing for Small Businesses
Mar 11 - Avoid the Top 10 Fatal Mistakes; Enable Success for Your Small Business
Mar 13 - Logo Design: How to Build Your Brand in Five MinutesYou can see the full schedule at:
http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/about/list_events.aspx?GP=2%2F28%2F2008+11%3A55%3A00+AMI recommend checking it out!

BTW, you may remember from past class discussions that I’m a photographer (as a hobby). Well, I am currently taking pictures of the Edison High School band practices to document their efforts to compete in the Delta Band Fest in mid-March. The final product (I hope!) will be a photo documentary. You can check out some of the photos on MY blog at www.photoblog.com/bchat. Any comments would be greatly appreciated.So, cheers to you Martha and blog ya later!

On Friday I had lunch with my dear friend and colleague, Gillian Murphy, Director of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC). There are a lot of exciting things happening at the SBDC. She and I will be attending an Entrepreneurship conference together in April. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the SBDC, visit their website at http://sbdc.deltacollege.edu/.

The SBDC provides FREE business consulting, training programs at minimal costs, and have a wide range of resources available to business owners.

I highly recommend the SBDC and feel very confident that you will get great advice from some of the most knowledgeable people in the field!