Your Questions About Business Online Services Group

Jere answers:

It is hard to find grants to start a business. Unlike the myths that some perpetuate, federal government and even private foundations hardly give grant money for starting a for-profit business.

One possible exception is for companies developing or exporting agricultural goods, including food and forest product. Another exception could be the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) or Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs http://www.sba.gov/aboutsba/sbaprograms/sbir/index.html , which fund the research and development of technological innovation that meets specific government needs.

Your best bet actually will be from the states if they offer grant programs for women (or any other special interest groups — minorities, women, disabled, veterans, etc). Or check with non profit organizations, particularly women organizations if they offer grants. Examples include

Iowa Women’s Foundation http://www.iawf.org/
New Mexico Women’s Foundation http://www.nmwf.org/guidelines.html

Even SBA does NOT give out grants. From the SBA website http://www.sba.gov/mostrequesteditems/CON_FAQ2.html

“The U.S. Small Business Administration does not offer grants to start or expand small businesses, although it does offer a wide variety of loan programs. (See http://www.sba.gov/financing for more information) While SBA does offer some grant programs, these are generally designed to expand and enhance organizations that provide small business management, technical, or financial assistance. These grants generally support non-profit organizations, intermediary lending institutions, and state and local governments.”

Nonetheless, you can go to the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) http://www.cfda.gov and Grants.gov http://www.grants.gov – these are two sites created by the federal government to provide transparency and information on grants. Browse through the listings and see if you can find any grant that would support a for-profit venture.

Here is a listing of federal grants for small businesses. See if there is any available for individuals for starting a business — THERE’S NONE.
Http://12.46.245.173/pls/portal30/CATALOG.BROWSE_BENEF_RPT.show

Most of the federal grants are given to specific target groups with specific requirements (e.g. Minority business owners involved in transportation related contracts emanating from DOT – Grant#20.905 Disadvantaged Business Enterprises Short Term Lending Program

Grants are also often given to non profit groups or organizations involved in training or other similar activities (grant 59.043 Women’s Business Ownership Assistance that are given to those who will create women’s business center that will train women entrepreneurs

For private grants, you may want to check the Foundation Center’s Foundation Grants for Individuals Online http://gtionline.fdncenter.org . It’s a subscription based website ($9.95 per month) but their opening blurb only says that the database is ideal for “students, artists, academic researchers, libraries and financial aid offices.” Entrepreneurs are apparently not one of them, so I take it they also don’t have listings of private foundations who give grants to would-be entrepreneurs.

Jere answers:

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Like.fm learns your music tastes from the songs you play so you can easily tell your friends what music you like, and discover new music from them.

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Microblogging has taken the world by storm. Millions of people around the world now share their thoughts with friends, family, and random strangers every day.

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Capture photos, videos, music, tweets, posts, and much more.View and share your entire life online. Create stories of your best memories together with your friends.

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Tango brings friends and family closer together by offering free mobile video calling on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Android devices.

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Yobongo is a place for people to share ideas, talk about what’s happening, and connect with interesting people nearby.

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As you click Stumble!, you’ll get high-quality pages matched to your personal preferences. These pages have been explicitly recommended (rated I like it) by friends and other members with similar interests.

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Omgili is a search engine designed to index web-based discussion forums. Omgili’s unique algorithm analyzes forums not as a simple web page, but as an active discussion with a title, topic and replies.

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Toonti is a platform that allows you to create your own custom social network,it has a rich set of tightly integrated features and it supports various privacy options.

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Your single Swimwire page can list and link all your online profiles, making it easier to stay connected. Your free profile can automatically connect with sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube to bringing all your social networks together to one place.

Www.tagworld.com/
TagWorld enables you to create your own website and share it with your friends.

Www.experienceproject.com/
www.youfig.com/
www.klostu.com/

www.yackpack.com/
www.yuniti.com/
en.netlog.com/

www.iggli.com/
iggli is a social music network. Listen, share, and mashup music and playlists.

Sixgroups.com/
Six groups enables you to start your own community, about every topic, available to everyone

bliin.com/
bliin YourLIVE! Is dedicated to creating a fluid social network for sharing personal experiences – photos, videos, sound

www.zahdoo.com/
It uses the cumulative knowledge of everyone in its network to intuitively guide each individual user with suggestions.

Www.socialgo.com/
SocialGO lets you easily create and run a feature-filled social networking website.

Www.mixtt.com/
nstead of being centered on individuals, MIXTT is centered on groups. E

www.skout.com/
SKOUT is the social tool that instantly connects you to the people and places around you.

Www.yuniti.com/
YUNiTi goal is to create a central place where you can connect with anyone in the world in every way possible.

Www.experienceproject.com/
It’s a community website that builds custom emotional support andfriendship networks for members, based on who they are, not who youknow.

Http://multiply.com/
Multiply gives you an easy way to share all kinds of digital media, including photos, blogs, videos, music and more, all in one convenient place: your own personal web site.

Www.collectivex.com/
CollectiveX is pioneering a new class of communications and social networking services designed explicitly for organized groups.

Grouper.com/
With one-click, members can add video to their personal pages on MySpace, Blogger, Friendster and WordPress or download to their desktops, iPod and Sony PSP.

Mixxt.de/
mixxt helps you create your own social network. Just as you would like it: Design, features, lots of privacy and many more options.

Www.tuenti.com/
Connect, share and communicate with your friends, co-workers and family.
Explore and engage with local businesses and brands that you really care about.

Www.zorpia.com/
Add unlimited songs to your profile from Music section

www.koinup.com/
Share your virual life: Share your avatars and skills. Tell us your best virtual moments and friends!

Www.fanpop.com/
Fanpop is a place where fans of anything and everything can share and interact with fellow fans.

Www.formspring.me/
Quickly create your own customized box and receive answers and comments. With a simple easy-to-use dashboard, you can publish your responses to Tumblr, Twitter, Facebok, or your blog.

Www.kaneva.com/
Kaneva is the first to integrate social networking, shared media, and collaborative online communities into a modern-day, immersive 3D Virtual World.

Foursquare.com/
www.peoplesound.com/
www.gypsii.com/

shoutem.com/
geomium.com/

www.pinchapp.com/
Send unlimited messages to friends with pictures, locations & unique animations.
Play social games and win prizes

Jere answers:

– Setup a Paypal Donation button for your blog (http://paypal.com ) in the name of a foundation that you should set up (see http://foundationcenter.org/getstarted/faqs/html/starting_nonprofit.html ) for details. See http://stepbystepfundraising.com/accepting-donations-online/ for other options.

– Utilize Ebay’s donation options. See http://www.ebaygivingworks.com/ns/nonprofit-info.html , http://www.ebaygivingworks.com/ns/about.html , and http://whatgives.com/ . Also, Ebay can be used in helping those needy moms to perhaps setup an online business. Perhaps you can provide tutorials on your site to get them started or setup a program that has connections to your blog & Ebay.

– Improve your blog content to inspire people to take action. See http://www.problogger.net/archives/2009/04/28/call-your-readers-to-action/ , http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/12/26/why-your-blog-should-do-community-service-work/ , http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/05/31/donations-on-blogs-do-they-work/ .

– Come up with plan for a donation drive. Something done annually maybe, primarily featuring the blog and other activities. See http://www.sproutonline.com/sprout/greattuckin/get_involved/lead.aspx for general ideas. See http://www.problogger.net/archives/2005/12/06/how-bloggers-make-money-from-blogs/ for some specifics. Particularly, you should focus on sponsorships and affiliates.

Jere answers:

Hi Jenny,

if you really want to make Twitter valuable, you’ll need to find existing and possible customers. The best way to do this is to use twitter.search.com. I work for a digital marketing group, so my business is obviously a bit different to yours but the methods I use should still be useful.

Think about what sort of things people who can use your business will be talking about -I always try to find people asking quaestions I can help with: As an example, let’s say you have a lawnmower company and want to find people you can sell to.

Go to twitter.search.com and type in a search – you’ll want to use phrases like “How do i”, ” help” ” advice” and (of course) “lawnmowers”. Twitter search understands some search terms (I’ve posted a link at the bottom that explains all this) so your search should look something like this:
Lawn, Mower “lawnmowers” help, OR anyone, OR suggest, OR need, OR how ? -http

(the -http bit will get rid of anyone else posting links to their own business)

hit ‘enter’ and you’ll find people asking for help – you might also want to enter your town name to find local business.

As well as practical things like that, try looking up your competitors and seeing who is following them, as well as local groups that might need your services. Always try to offer extra value, so for instance you might offer exclusive coupons through Twitter or customer service.

I hope that’s helpful – feel free to ask me if you need more specific help:)

Best,

Matt

Jere answers:

Perpetual income program is one i use

lots of people to talk too

linkedin is more like social network with people in business

other than that just serach for them because there are 100’s of them

also yahoo groups is good and google groups