MBE Capital Call Conference Propels Minority Business Creation, Development, and Funding

On September 15-17, 2011, the Virginia Housing and Community Development Corporation (VHCDC) will host its annual 2011 MBE Capital Call Conference and Venture Forum in Hampton, Virginia at the Crowne Plaza Hotel - Hampton Marina.

Over 100 small, women, and minority business owners will convene to design, create, and launch several innovative, game-changing ventures - in slightly less than 3 days!

Reformatted from previous events, the 2011 MBE Capital Call is an intense, 53 hour long event designed to put entrepreneurs on the fast-track to developing their idea for a new product or service - which could form the basis of a credible business.

Comcast Launches Minority Entrepreneur Accelerator Program

Comcast Interactive Capital, the venture capital affiliate of Comcast Corporation, one of the world's leading media, entertainment and communications companies, announced that is has partnered with DreamIt Ventures, the technology accelerator for entrepreneurs, to provide seed funding, training, mentoring and other benefits to five minority-led startups through DreamIt's accelerator program.

The partnership with DreamIt, called the Minority Entrepreneur Accelerator Program (MEAP), is Comcast Interactive Capital's first investment initiative from the $20 million fund created by Comcast as part of the NBCUniversal transaction that is committed to expanding opportunities for minority entrepreneurs.

It's Official: I've Opened An Office in The Philippines

I'm proud to announce that I have officially gone global! I have opened an office in downtown Manila, Philippines - the country's capital - for my newly formed subsidiary, Dante Lee International (DLI), which will house my newly acquired web property - Tagalog.com. I'm planning to re-launch the site as an online dictionary, thesaurus, encyclopedia, and resource guide.

There are many dialects in the Philippines, but Tagalog is the official language spoken by over 100 million Filipinos worldwide. My goal is for the site to be the ultimate resource for everything pertaining to the Philippines - how to speak the national language, how to travel there, what attractions to see, where to stay, where to shop, how to interact with the people, etc.

Black Enterprise Interviews Matthew Knowles

Black Enterprise Magazine recently did a great one-on-one interview with Matthew Knowles - the CEO and President of Music World Entertainment. Knowles is best known for spearheading the successful careers of Destiny's Child and Beyonce (his daughter) - the best selling R&B group of all time and the world's most recognized female pop superstar.

Although often exalted for his accomplishments with his daughter’s superstar career, Knowles has a proven track record of more than 200 million worldwide records sales.

Minority Business Development Agency Announces Grant Competition

If you ever wanted to open an entrepreneurship center for minority business owners, here's your chance. The Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), a bureau at the U.S. Department of Commerce, has recently announced a major grant competition for candidates who want to open a business center in the Upper Midwest, Northeast, and West Coast (specifically Southern California) areas of the United States.

Awards range from $225,000 to $355,000 annually, and the primary objective of your center must be to provide strategic business consulting services to minority firms that will result in increased public and private sector contracting opportunities and capital investments, ultimately leading to the creation of new U.S. jobs.

Book Review: "Doing Business In China For Dummies"

If you're interested in an authoritative guide to understanding how to do business overseas, this book is a great start. Whether you plan to do business in China or another country, this guide offers a lot of valuable information.

Written by Robert Collins and Carson Block, it covers all the basics, from the nuts and bolts of Chinese business and bureaucracy to negotiating with your Chinese partners. It teaches how to understand Chinese markets, develop a strong business plan, find the right employees, work with currency controls and the Chinese banking system, and sell and source. It also provides the much-needed know-how on how to manage day to day, from travel tips and advice on converting money to getting past language barriers.

Business Owners: Pay Attention To President Obama's New Law

In September 2010, President Obama approved the Small Business Jobs Act - a new law that has become a very significant piece of small business legislation. The law extends the successful SBA enhanced loan provisions while offering billions more in lending support, tax cuts, and other opportunities for entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Now in 2011, those provisions have become to manifest themselves. Just recently, the U.S. Treasury Department approved more than $50 million to support lending to small businesses in the states of Connecticut, Missouri and Vermont. This might sound small, but that translates into $534 million in loans.

2011 National Black Book Festival In Houston

Are you an existing or aspiring African American author? Do you want to learn how to sell more books, get a major book deal, and network with other authors and publishers? Then you may want to plan to attend the upcoming National Black Book Festival in Houston, Texas on June 10-12, 2011.

More than 100 African-American authors and thousands of book club members and readers will converge during the largest indoor gathering of African-American authors in the world. Participating authors from more than 30 states and the Caribbean will showcase, sign and sell their books during the weekend event.

The Worst Press Release Mistake Ever

There are many ways to make mistakes when writing or distributing a press release, but the worse mistake ever is to only send a press release out once a year - during Black History month.

This is a common mistake amongst many African American entrepreneurs, authors, speakers, and others who are looking to target Black consumers through the media.

Well, guess what? February is not the only month when Black people are relevant. As a consumer group that spends nearly $1 trillion a year, African Americans should be relevant to your business all year long.

Wal-Mart To Expand To South Africa

In a bold but smart move to stay ahead of competitors, Wal-Mart, the world's bigger department store chain, is seeking to buy Massmart - a major retailer with 263 stores in South Africa and 25 stores in other sub-Saharan African countries including Mozambique, Swaziland and Namibia. Massmart owns chain stores such as Game and Macro.

Seeking to capitalize on Africa's economic growth, Wal-Mart has reportedly made an offer of $4.1 billion to buy 51 percent of the company, which will remain listed on the country’s stock exchange. If successful, Wal-Mart would become the first major international retailer to enter the South Africa market.

How To Get Business Credit Cards, Loans, and Lines

I've blogged about this organization before, but I've decided to mention them again as their free service can be very helpful to entrepreneurs in a down economy.

The National Institute of Business Credit is a non-profit organization and virtual educational resource that is using their web site at BusinessCredit.org to educate entrepreneurs about business credit. The web site offers free valuable guidance on how to qualify and apply for business loans, business credit cards, and business lines of credit. The first of its kind, the web site acts as an indispensable guide to both aspiring and established business owners.

Dr. Dre, Ludacris, and the HD Headphone Market

Billions of people worldwide listen to music every single day, and as of the past 5 years, many are listening through their iPods or other MP3 players. This has created an entirely new mainstream market of high-quality headphones. Previously, such headphones were only sold and marketed to people who worked and recorded in studios. Now, they are being marketed to anyone who loves music - specifically hip-hop music.

Several companies have emerged to take advantage of this lucrative market, and are selling high definition, high performance, studio quality headphones. A few have even paid big bucks to get major celebrities to endorse and co-brand them.

The Black Biz Hookup: Discounted Group Buying From Black-Owned Retailers

Following in the footsteps of Groupon and LivingSocial, a new group buying web site called the Black Biz Hookup has launched with merchant offerings of "Daily Deals" from local Black-owned businesses in major cities.

Instead of using call centers to get a backlog, the company has used a grassroots approach to signing up merchants similar to what Plum District implemented working the "Soccer Mom" referral circuit. They have a group of affiliates around the country acting as advocates for the website and signing up the business owners who grasp the concept.

Is Your Business Prepared For Disaster?

Linda Hunt King

Is your company prepared for the next emergency or disaster? Whether natural or man-made, can your business survive a disruption or crisis if you were closed for a few days, a week or even a month? Most organizations believe they can - until a disaster occurs.

According to Linda Hunt King, PhD, MBA, the worst disaster is the one that threatens the viability of your organization directly. Even more, 40% of businesses struck by a disaster never reopen and 25% of those that do reopen close in two years following a disaster

Macy's Launches Workshop For Minority Fashion Designers

Macy’s, a popular retailer in the U.S., has recently launched a comprehensive retail vendor development program designed to give select high potential multicultural and/or women business owners the tools to better succeed and sustain growth in the retail industry.

Held in New York City, the workshop is essentially a 4-day training course for up to 20 participants, selected from applications submitted through the web site. It includes comprehensive lessons in strategic planning, branding, merchandising and assortment planning, sales and marketing, and access to capital.

Top 10 Black Business Resources For 2011

According to the United States Census Bureau, African Americans are 5 times more likely to fail in business than their white counterparts. Furthermore, of the 27 million businesses in this country, barely 2 million or 7% are owned by African Americans.

There are tons of resources available to business owners and entrepreneurs, but because of these devastating statistics, I've decided to compile a list of the top ten resources that are specifically designed to help African Americans be more successful in business. Here they are:

Small Business Revival: Free Seminar To Explore 11 Key Principles To Turning Your Concept into Cash

Many top financial and businesses experts agree that a recession can be the best time to start or grow a business. This proven concept is the underlying theme in Andrew Morrison's free 3-night Small Business Revival held from Jan 18-20th at the International Palms Resort in Orlando, FL.

According to Morrison, who is the founder of Small Business Camp: "There's never been a better time to grow your business."

He continues, "Sometimes it just takes just a nudge to steer us in the right direction. It's my hope that my 3-night event will be the nudge many small business owners need to help breathe life back into their passion and show them how they can grow their business even during these tough economic times."

How I Got 100,000 Facebook Fans In 10 Days

With 500 million users worldwide, Facebook has proven itself to be a very innovative online tool that allows companies to interact with and even market to their existing and prospective customers.

Even non-profit organizations, publications (newspapers, magazines, blogs, etc), speakers, authors, musicians and more can use it to build and manage a following.

This is very easy to do because Facebook enables such entities to create "fan" pages (or what I call "brand" pages) - a customized profile page that allows them to share content, dialogue, photos, and resources. They can even launch custom apps, contests, and sign up forms - all from their very own fan page.

Q&A With Russell Simmons

Music and media mogul Russell Simmons has recently released a new book entitled Super Rich: A Guide To Having It All. The book, which is a follow up to Do You!, redefines success as a combination of consciousness and compassion - qualities that can be cultivated even if you don’t have two nickels to rub together.

Due to his busy schedule, I wasn't able to get a one-on-one interview with Simmons, but his publicist did send me the following questions and answers:

Just How Big Is Amazon.com?

According to Forbes.com, on November 29th alone, customers on Amazon.com ordered more than 13.7 million items, at a rate of 158 items per second. That was just one day of sales!

That leads us to two conclusions: 1) Amazon.com is a much bigger player in the online retail industry than we all thought, and 2) if you aren't using your web site as a sales tool - now, more than ever, is the time to starting doing so.