I say “pseudo” because this is being written after the fact, in the comfort of my kitchen, with the baby asleep and Lani ‘n Joe on Gunstock Mountain, taking advantage of the town Parks & Rec. cheap skiing program. Ahh, the quiet.
So there we were, two married-with-biz pros among the crowd of 120-odd small business owners on hand for three sessions put on by the NH Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and the BIA (“New Hampshire’s State Chamber of Commerce”).We were there because I was included on the third and final session, “Sustaining Your Business in Challenging Times” (more on that later.
After an opening speech by NH Gov. John Lynch (that’s him up there – guess we should have sat closer!) in which he promised to veto any attempt to institute a sales tax or income tax in order to balance the budget, the opening panel featured Republican and Democratic leaders from both houses of the NH Legislature.
In all honesty, we’ve been pretty disconnected from political stuff going on in the state, and how it might affect our lives and business since we moved here. Some of the topics weren’t too suprising – health care expenses are a huge issue here, as they are everywhere. Labor issues – particularly the use of inmates in correctional facilities and the retention of young workers post-college graduation – were new to us, and absolutely fascinating.
NH Senate Republican Leader Peter Bragdon served up the first big softball of the day for us by telling the assembled group, “When things slow down, that’s the time you increase your marketing…the company that scales back in tough times finds that tough times get tougher even faster.”
Session 2 featured the tag team of Dawn Wivell, who’s the Director of a department name is longer than your arm (take a deep breath and say it with me): The NH Office of International Commerce and the NH International Trade Resource Center; and Justin Oslowski, Director of the (federal) US Department of Commerece Export Assistance Center. (And hey – the new Secretary of Commerce is Judd Gregg, former Senator from NH – go Granite State!) Apparently it’s a rare thing to see state and federal agencies working together as well as Dawn and Justin do, and even on stage they seem to have a great dynamic together.
They also brought with them John Sutton of Dartware and Kate Kaplan of ALPCO as two case studies for how small businesses can successfully export their goods and services from NH to the world.
Finally, session 3. The panel I was on also included Andrea O’Brien, Environmental Program Manager for the SBDC, and Jim Pratt, a commerical lender for First Colebrook Bank here in NH. NH SBDC State Director Mary Collins moderated the panel.
Andrea talked about the three engines that make up a sustainable business (read: one that not only survives, but thrives while being mindful of the environment as a value, and not just to appease regulators), one of which is Social – including community relations, image/PR, and reputation. Jim, in his list of the top three things to share, emphasized that you can’t stop marketing – how else will anyone know you’re still in business? 
All of which was great fodder for me to add in on the fly, as I talked about my top three for businesses looking to ramp up their marketing:
1. Getting on the big 3 social networks this year, or risk getting left behind (2009 being the year of the Great Social Divide, after all
2. Having more FUN with your marketing, whatever that looks like to you (because the only effective marketing is the marketing that actually gets done).
3. Giving of your time, knowledge, and expertise, in ways that also show clients, customers, and prospects how they can keep working with you, taking advantage of your services, and help your business grow no matter what the economy looks like.
We met a bunch of great people at the event, and I have to thank Heidi Edward Dunn, the Education Program Coordinator for the NH SBDC for having us at the event, and Kevin Skarritt at Acorn Creative, who put the bug in Heidi’s ear about us as possible speakers (albeit for a different event).
