Then sign up for tomorrow's webinar at: https://www.gotomeeting.com/register/716540032. We'll go over how Angels and entrepreneurs can connect via this tool.

The webinar is being hosted by the groovy staff at eROI. (A side note about eROI - they made the #15 spot on the 100 Fastest Growing Private Growing Companies list (from the Portland Business Journal). Congratulations eROI!)

The webinar will take place at 11 AM, tomorrow (Tuesday the 26th). Hope to see you there!

Among the many reasons to be grateful for my internship with OEN is access to OEN's Executive series. Last night was part two of the four part series called "Create Your Go-To-Market Strategy". My previous exposure to marketing has been limited to several classes that include practical application through various projects. Through those experiences I have been able to glean a basic understanding of terminology and some application. Having no professional experience with marketing outside of class I enter the series lacking "real world" application.

The market strategy executive series is a great opportunity to continue learning about marketing. I am being exposed to everything from the benefits of creating partnerships to detailed marketing techniques. If you are able to identify your company’s weakness you can partner with an appropriate organization to be mutually beneficial to each other. Each person in attendance was given a practical framework for analyzing a prospective partner. Indeed you must be selective with partnering; forming alliances with the wrong company could prove fatal to your business.

The one thing that I keep thinking while attending the workshops is that this is the perfect way to develop a deeper understanding of marketing and its practical application. Startup businesses that need to hone their company’s focus could really benefit from attending this series. Starting from a “big picture” overview the instructors deftly link marketing theory with real world application. One of the greatest things that I feel is emphasized in the series is that marketing isn’t just a function of business that takes up a line item on an annual report. Marketing is the driving force of a business and without marketing a business struggles to realize who they are and who their customer really is.

I am indeed fortunate to be a part of the series. I cannot help but wonder how many other students in different internships are able to have this type of opportunity? Each day that I return to the OEN office I look forward to applying a little more marketing theory in my current position. Readers wishing they could have taken the series shouldn’t be dismayed. As I understand it there is a new series each year. Not to mention it is not too late to get in on the Leadership & Human Capital series coming up in September or even the Mastering Finance series in October. With all of the great opportunities available through OEN, everyone is able to be fortunate just like I am.

On my wikipedia how-to alerts I often get funny topics. I get tips on everything from How to play Texas Hold'em to How to solve the mysteries of marketing . Today's alert included http://www.wikihow.com/Have-a-Green-Wedding How to have a green wedding . Sustainability news stories are popping up like flowers in spring. This new "green wedding concept" is a burgeoning market that seems a bit ironic since weddings in the U.S. have typically become so big that they are more aptly described as the epitome of consumption. Nonetheless, weddings are not the only thing going green. Just recently I saw in the news that Earth Advantage is offering a successful Sustainability Training for Accredited Realtors (STAR) to help real estate professionals communicate with their clients about green home issues in ways that are meaningful and useful.
Being a resident of Oregon, this new "green" focus should not be a surprise to me since the concept of being concerned about the impact we have as humans on the earth is an ideal that Oregonians have supported before it became the catchy term of the day.

Now sustainability is the buzzword du jour and it's mainstream enough that it is turning into a business opportunity and a new marketing tool for companies to differentiate their products. Take two recent articles in the Portland Business Journal where Alpenrose gets green with milk by going completely organic. In the case of Alima Cosmetics the Portland-based cosmetic company recently paid $10,000 to have the Certified Natural Cosmetics seal given by Association of German Industries and Trading Firms that certifies that products are completely natural.

Part the fascination for organic, sustainable and natural products and processes is likely due to the publicity about pesticides and chemicals, as well as the increasing fear of global warming. Realistically our motivation to find the green within has everything to do with the real pain we all face due to the high cost of energy. Regardless of why businesses are focusing on folding in better ecological practices into their business models, I think it is good for the earth and good for business. I for one am happy to see that the market factors have evolved to the point where we care about our what we put in the products we consume and we care about our carbon footprint. The concept of sustainability being a requirement of business just seems logical. After all, isn't the goal for successful business to ultimately make a sustainable company, to create sustainable employment,and of course to earn a sustainable profit.

To see more about how other companies are making this strategy work check out the June 13th Oregon Entrepreneurs Network Pubtalk held at Bridgeport Brewpub + Bakery that features a sustainability focused company, END Outside Gear a new Portland, Oregon-based brand that employs environmentally neutral design and manufacturing processes to the production of outdoor footwear, apparel and equipment.

In my role as marketing director of Oregon Entrepreneurs Network I am discovering that I face many marketing challenges that entrepreneurs of start up organizations face too. How do you get the message out when you suffer from a lack of bandwidth and a lack of budget? The web for me represents the best way to get out our message out to our target audience. Recently we rebranded our organization from Oregon Entrepreneurs Forum to Oregon Entrepreneurs Network. We also have a new url and I realized we needed to make sure that we learned what we were doing right and wrong so that we can maximize our reach with this tool. I contacted Kent Lewis at Anvil Media, a search engine marketing agency, who was recently featured in the Portland Business Journal in an article regarding search engine marketing for help.

Fast forward a few weeks and I am impressed. Our website has been subjected to an initial benchmarking and evaluation called the SEM Audit Lite which seems to be a misnomer since the report yields a plethora of data that you would not realize was even possible to get. We have received the initial search engine optimization report and are currently in the process of doing keyword testing to further test how best to optimize certain elements of the site. Then the work will begin for us in earnest. We will have to address their recommendations. Thankfully, they have also prioritized them so we have a starting point and a bit of a roadmap which is handy when you are embarking on something new.

My hope is this will yield more site traffic but also that we will be able to incorporate some functionality and organization that will make the site better for our visitors. Stay tuned for incremental changes as we progress through our search engine marketing adventure.