IED Home > Our Programs > SBDC South-West Texas Border Regional Office

The following classes are currently avaiable at no cost to you.

Foundations of Marketing

Advertising This workshop looks at the many options available to advertise your business and helps you decide what will work best for your business in terms of budget and reach.

Building Your Brand A brand offers your customers a promise and delivers on it, keeping them coming back for more. A successful brand strategy is the cornerstone for creating the perception that your offering is unique. This workshop shows you how to create a winning brand.

Building Your Website As the saying goes, information wants to be free. Unfortunately, many of the tools needed to publish that information are not. However, the rush to the Web has recently given rise to an avalanche of low-cost online publishing options. If you know what you are doing, You can post a professional quality site for less than a $500 investment. However, what is most important is that you commit to investing the necessary dollars to produce a high-quality, well-designed and well-written Web site.

Personalization Gear your business to provide products and services individualized to your customers' tastes and needs. The steps outlined in this discussion are designed to help you increase customer traffic and realize larger profits - whether you operate in the retail sector or in the realm of e-commerce.

Promoting Your Business This workshop looks as how several companies launched and built their businesses through grassroots marketing strategies. The workshop also addresses some traditional promotional tactics and how you can develop a successful campaign for your business.

Sales Strategy There are numerous ways to sell your products or services. This workshop looks at how you can determine the best sales strategy to gain maximum results.

Managing Your Finances

Assessing Financial Needs This workshop helps you assess your current and future financing needs and what type of financing is available in today's economic climate. The workshop also addresses how to position your company now to increase your chances of raising outside capital down the road.

Balance Sheet With a properly prepared balance sheet, you can look at a balance sheet at the end of each accounting period and know if your business has more or less value, if your debts are higher or lower, and if your working capital is higher or lower. This workshop shows you to prepare a statement and provides you with a template to prepare your own.

Cash Budget Properly preparing your cash budget will show how cash flows in and out of your business. Also, it may then be used in planning your short-term credit needs. In today's financial world, you are required by most financial institutions to prepare cash budgets before making capital expenditures for new assets as well as for expenditures associated with any planned expansion. The cash budget determines your future ability to pay debts as well as expenses.

Cash Flow This workshop provides a detailed look into the various sections of a cash flow statement. It also describes two methods used to calculate cash flow from operating activities, indirect and direct with examples that will give you an edge when it comes time to prepare a cash flow statement of your own. This workshop shows you to prepare a statement and provides you with a template to prepare your own.

Contracts This module will teach you the basics of creating a contract.

Partners and Investors This workshop will assist you in deciding how to go about selling an equity interest in your business to investors and raise the capital you seek. It discusses the essential issues that you may confront when you decide to bring in outside investors.

Pricing Price your offering too low and leave money behind? Price it too high and drive customers away? Find the right balance through creative judgment and a keen awareness of consumer motivations and increase your chances of owning your market. This workshop will show you what measures you can take to price your offering effectively.

Profit and Loss Ask yourself: Exactly how are my products and services affecting my business? How much money am I actually making because of those products and services? An income statement answers these and other financial questions. An income statement tells you and any stockholders how your net assets have increased or decreased. This workshop shows you to prepare a statement and provides you with a template to prepare your own.

Profitablilty Learn some profitability ratios and analytical procedures that help determine your company's present and future financial standing. Identify trends and compare current figures to your business's historical performance and evaluate your business in relation to industry norms.

Ratios To complete a thorough examination of your company's effectiveness, you'll want to look at more than just easily attainable numbers like sales, profits, and total assets. You'll want to be able to read between the lines of your financial statements and make the seemingly inconsequential numbers accessible and comprehensible. This workshop shows you how to analyze financial ratios and what the ratios mean.

Valuing a Business If you're thinking of purchasing or selling an existing business, going public, or taking an investor, one of the first things you'll need to determine is how much the business is worth. Valuing a business is a tricky process and achieving fair market value should always be your top priority.

Starting Your Business

Analyzing Your Competition Succeeding in business means offering something more compelling than the competition. This workshop helps you to measure your strengths against your competitors. It also offers strategies to take advantage of marketplace opportunities.

Business The importance of planning should never be overlooked. For a business to be successful and profitable, the owners and the managing directors must have a clear understanding of the firm's customers, strengths and competition. Whether yours is a new business or an existing business in the process of expanding, money is often an issue. Taking time to create an extensive business plan provides you with insight into your business. This document can serve as a powerful financing proposal. This workshop takes you through the step-by-step process of developing a business plan.

Creating a Competetive Advantage Having a competitive edge means outsmarting your competition. Assessing your competitors accurately plays a key role in helping you develop your edge. This workshop shows you how.

Identifying Your Target Market Doing business without knowing your target market prevents you from reaching your goals: increased sales, market share, and brand awareness. This workshop helps you hit the bull's eye.

Legal Structure Congratulations! You have decided to start your own business. What do you need to do besides simply opening a bank account, ordering stationery, and getting a phone number? First, you must decide your business's legal structure. You may have heard such terms as corporation, partnership, company and others, but may not be sure of their benefits or disadvantages. This workshop explains the legal structure options available to you.

Maintaining an Agile Company In today's business world, with its ever-changing marketplace, many companies recognize the need to adapt and change in order to remain competitive. This lesson will help you reinvent your company's vision to more closely match trends and customer preferences. By doing so, you will be better equipped to satisfy customers and increase profits.

Market Analysis Conducting a marketing analysis is the first step in determining if there is an audience for your idea. This workshop shows you how to gauge your market opportunities and provides you with key information essential in developing your marketing plan.

Patent Copy Trade The old maxim that possession is nine-tenths of the law has no meaning when applied to intellectual property. Unlike personal property or real property, intellectual property has no physical form. Intellectual property rights are purely a creation of the law. While every business owns and uses various forms of intellectual property, many businesses are not aware that those assets can be easily misappropriated, relinquished, damaged or devalued if not properly managed. It is the savvy business owner who recognizes the significance of the business's intellectual property - the patents, trademarks, copyrights and trade secrets - and understands what steps are necessary to ensure that those rights provide value for the company.

Strategic Plan Developing a roadmap for business enables you to gauge your company's performance, successes and weak areas over a period of time. It provides your employee's and management a roadmap to follow and work towards. A strategic plan addresses your company's marketing, sales, product development and operational and revenue goals.

This cooperative agreement is partially funded by the U. S. Small Business Administration. SBA's funding is not an endorsement of any products, opinions or services. SBA funded programs are extended to the public on a non-discriminatory basis.