SLSBMG in the News!

The St. Louis Small Business Meetup was featured by Steve Giegerich of the St. Louis Post Dispatch. The article “Small Businesses slow to hire” is about the provision in the latest jobs bill that would give small business owners a break on the employer’s side of social security and medicare contributions for hiring an unemployed worker.

Jordan Kimberg of LetsGet.net and John Beidle of 1040 Wealth Designs, LLC received substantive quotes as to the benefit and impact on hiring desisions of this latest piece of economic stimulus. This piece of legislation passed the US Senate today.

Details of how to qualify as an eligible small business, how to qualify a potential employee and how to implement this for your payroll if you do hire an employee will be coming after the President signs this latest spending bill into law.

The Kirkwood restaurant mentioned as the place for the Feb. 16th meeting was Amici’s. Will Aschinger of Hilliker Corporation was featured in the photo with John Beidle of 1040 Wealth Designs, LLC taken during a tax planning session.

October 20 Meetup – Trust Relationship Building

Ron Lares of Gift Incentive Programs will be presenting. The focus of his presentation will be-

1. How do Gifts establish trust relationships to further you business.
2. How do you increase your 2009 business volume between now and Dec 31.
3. Stats on why gifts work in business.
4. Why are family and friends important to all of us.

Ron will have a drawing for a $32.00 gift card, to be donated to someone in the group at lunch.

ITEN will present September 15th

The August meetup was one of the best so far with Phyllis Ellison from Innovate VMS presenting on how their organization helps startups launch in St. Louis. Our September meetup will have Jim Brasunas from ITEN – IT Entrepreneur Network a sister organization of Innovate VMS present how they help IT ventures getto up and running. It is sure to be full of some great info and I hope you can make it.

Are Green shoots for real?

Green shoots seem to be getting a lot of press in the mainstream media. Unemployment is still rising. Has anyone seen or know of anyone who has gotten hired because of the economic stimulus? Does anyone know of any business that is somehow connected to stimulus spending or a green shoot?

I’m thinking green shoots are just a manufactured story to keep citizens quite and squelch movements such as the Tea Parties with very little basis in reality.

Next Meetup: May 19, 2009

Our next Meetup is scheduled for noon 5/19 at Amici’s in Kirkwood. We had a strong turnout for our last meeting and look forward to meeting even more small business owners.

This month’s meeting with feature a short presentation from Wendy Hilt Thessen of  To the Hilt Online Solutions. The topic is Web 2.0 and how advertising has changed dramatically in the last decade. Wendy will share simple ideas for improving your business presence and will take questions regarding internet or traditional advertising as she has an extensive background in both. Come with your questions and an open mind.

About  To the Hilt Online Solutions:  We work with small businesses to help them understant participatory media and how to reach today’s consumers. Participatory Media is all about reaching consumers in areas that they are already participatory consumers. (Fish where the fish are.)
Interacting with people with a two way discussion is what Web 2.0 is all about. This is why you have heard of Google, Facebook, My Space, Craig’s List and Twitter on the news. People drive all of these sites with their participation. The consumers are out there participating. The challenge is to get them to participate with your website and ultimately your business.

We show businesses how to build a loyal consumer base online and do everything from basic new public relations to appearing on National websites to your geo-targeted customers. It’s amazing what can be done once you start walking through the right online doors.

You can reach Wendy Hilt Thessen @ 314.604-6804 or visit website at www.tothehiltonline.com