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Portland Business Fair (with a chance of rain)

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Battle_Plan
These are the Portland Business Fair Battle Plan notes I drew up while drinking coffee on Friday night.

I had some elaborate plans to promote MoHDI at the Portland Business Fair today. My main goals being.
A. Get more visitors to MoHDI
B. Make some good Contacts
C. Sell Some Products or Services
D. Find some Seed Money resources*

I feel like I did pretty well in achieving my goals although I didn’t manage to get my new business cards made or my tri-fold promotional materials with charts and things on them. I also somehow managed to skip a shower, tie, combing my hair and some other important things. I probably smelled like an ashtray that someone spilled old coffee into. Next time I’m going to go with a sales person to do my talking for me and just sit and observe and pick out people I want them to talk to for me.
I did manage to make some business cards out of my bristol board paper, my MoHDI (matchbook stamp), my scissors and corner rounderer. One lady I gave my card pointed out that my card was crooked. I told her it fits with our brand, although the part of me was kicking myself for not getting the newer cards made. The other part of my was thinking “Lady, for someone who doesn’t have a business card, you shouldn’t be criticizing.” I have no idea what type of business she might be operating, she didn’t even have a business card.

I went to two different seminars. One on advertising and one on ecommerce. Both hosted by SCORE counselors. Both very informative and despite my hesitation about going, I actually learned quite a bit. The ecommerce session was more about selling than the technical side. I will certainly be going to more SCORE and SBA events.

When the speaker Alan Zell asked the website developers to raise their hands, I was the only one to do so. Too bad I didn’t have my fancy new cards on me and I looked like I just woke up and smelled like an ashtray. I still managed to talk to some people. I think this was the first time I was in a big room filled with people who needed websites and I was the only developer. I probably missed some good opportunities to make a little extra money but, that was not a goal on my list as you can see from the above image.

I did learn a lot and got a lot of good information about running a small business. There are certainly a lot of resources out there to help people like me make things happen and this event was very informative and inspirational. I’ll be going again soon and hope that the MoHDI Idea Bomb on October 21st* will be able to offer some of the greatness of todays business fair.

*In the process of coming up with hundred dollar ideas, we have come across several million dollar ideas and even one billion dollar idea. We are looking for seed money to help us develop these ideas. If you would like to learn more about this or are interested in investing in our other creative ventures please email us and we will get back to you.

**This Idea Bomb is a social event with a focus on idea development. If you would like to attend the Idea Bomb as a featured attendee*** or would like to help wish some planning and orginization of the event please contact us.

***A featured attendee is someone who has experience or knowledge in idea development and is willing to share that experience with others. This might include inventors, IP or patent attorneys, business people, celebrities, anyone who has had an idea and followed it through.

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