SmallBizU Courses

Finding Money To Start A Business – 3 hrs
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.

Creating A Loan Package – 2.5 hrs
This course details the exact set of steps necessary in preparing a comprehensive loan package request. Each of the forms and requirements are explained and included. From initial readiness tests to help with advanced topics such as U.S. Small Business Administration loans, this course lays it on the line concerning what a lender is really looking for and how they evaluate loan requests.

Creating Financial Projections – 3 hrs
A comprehensive how-to look at creating projected income statements, cash flow statements, and balance sheets. An essential skill in securing outside financing and in managing a business.

Finding And Attracting Investors – 2 hrs
The course presents practical tactics on how to identify and secure different types of capital including seed capital, angel capital, and venture capital. The process used by different kinds of investors is presented and the tools for completing the fund-raising process are presented. Special focus is given to the federal and state laws that govern the capital and securities process.

Accounting 101 – 2.5 hrs
Take command of a bookstore and coffee bar and see how money moves in and out of a business learning the fundamentals of accounting at the same time. This course provides an in-depth look at each of the primary accounting transactions used in a business demonstrating how "the language of business" works. Without using any accounting jargon to begin with, the course demonstrates how to keep score in a business through a simple scorecard approach. When you are finished, you are shown that each of your scorecards represents one of the three primary financial statements used in managing a business.

Management CoursesCrafting A Business Plan – 2.5 hrs
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.

Strategic Planning And Execution – 3.5 hrs
This course presents the fundamental devices used in crafting a strategy for a business venture. The course puts forth the innovative mechanisms of internal and external strategy which are based on the findings of a new body of research into the strategy-making processes of successful growing ventures.

The Entrepreneurial Strategies – 3 hrs
This course describes the available entrepreneurial strategies and how they are applied in the marketplace. For anyone starting or growing a business venture, the knowledge and skills underlying the entrepreneurial strategies are an essential part of any entrepreneur's toolkit.

Starting A New Business – 3 hrs
This course provides the advice and strategies of the some of the leading entrepreneurs concerning what it really takes to start a new venture. This course will show you how to protect your ideas, how to hire employees, how to find out what licenses and regulations may apply, as well as, provide more than 50 resources of free information that are available to you in making your new business a reality.

Choosing A Legal Structure – 2 hrs
Every new venture has to work the complex decision of what legal structure to choose for the business. This course breaks down this decision into its essential characteristics simplifying the decision-making process.

Buying A Business – 3.5 hrs
A comprehensive course on how to buy the right business at the right price. Developed by entrepreneurs who buy businesses for a living, this course offers advice and wisdom in such areas as: the key questions to ask of any seller, the due diligence process, valuing a business and determining the offer, negotiation steps and tactics, and sample legal agreements.

Hiring And Managing Employees – 3 hrs
An overview of the essential processes of managing employees. Includes best practice on the hiring process, employee forms you must file, wage and hour regulations, taxation and privacy issues, health and safety standards, benefit and retirement plans, discrimination and termination processes, and more.

Marketing CoursesCreating Buzz: Small Business Marketing 3.5 hrs
Creating Buzz is one of the most comprehensive courses on how marketing is actually executed in a small business. The theory of creating buzz is that your primary investments should be time, energy, and imagination. Creating Buzz is packed-full of hundreds of strategies, checklists, and tips across the realms of network theory, positioning, advertising media, word-of-mouth campaigns, publicity, and public relations. From informal, easy-to-do tactics to full-fledged formal marketing plans, the lessons taught in this course are paramount to anyone growing an organization.

Market Insight And Research – 3 hrs
This course provides the process steps of conducting market research and the how the process differs for a small entrepreneurial venture as compared to a large corporation. Highlighted are the tools used to explore the external market environment, segment customers into target markets, and define the consumption chain for a customer segment. Data resources discussed include secondary market data available for researching your industry, customers, industry size, and sales potential.

Positioning Master Class – 2 hrs
This course defines what positioning is and how it works as a communications tool to reach customers in a crowded marketplace. Positioning is about perceptions not products. Market strategy is therefore planned in the mind and not the marketplace. This positioning course puts forth and describes the available positioning strategies including the positioning of a leader, the positioning of a follower, and the tactics for repositioning the competition. It also presents the easiest way of getting into the prospect's mind and helps you to prevent the most common positioning mistakes.

Pricing Strategy and Tactics – 4 hrs
This course explains what value is and why it's better to set prices on value rather than cost. An overview is presented of the 3Cs that influence price: costs, customers, and competition. Each of the available generic pricing strategies and techniques for segmented and lifecycle pricing are demonstrated, as well as, the effects of pricing psychology, and how pricing effects the other elements of your marketing mix.

Understanding Intellectual Property – 2.5 hrs
This course defines exactly what a copyright, trademark, and patent are and what kinds of protection they might afford your business. The process of establishing such protection is presented for each kind of property. Also discussed are international intellectual property protection issues, as well as, important legal documents such as non-disclosure agreements.

Understanding Advertising And Promotions – 3 hrs
In an depth look at defining your audience, objectives, and advertising platform. Discusses how to determine the advertising budget, using print media, using radio and television, direct marketing options, promoting internet websites, public relations and publicity
and evaluating your advertising plan.

Marketing 101 – 3 hrs
This course describes the fundamentals of the most important aspect of any business: marketing. Learn the concepts taught in college-level courses in just a few hours including the "5Ps"-Product, Promotion, Price, Place, and Positioning.