New York SBDC Research Network

Allyn Hirsch, Certified Senior Business Advisor, at Stony Brook, has retired after 10 years of service. Allyn’s background was in the defense industry and expertise in engineering and technology, which had enabled him to offer clients a wide variety of assistance, especially manufacturing companies and inventors of technical products. He had assisted clients in obtaining venture capital as well as traditional bank financing. Allyn is a graduate of Polytechnic University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. His last day was November 30. He was one of the top five counselors in 1998. We in the Research Network will miss him, not only because he asked really well defined questions, but also because he always showed a personal interest in our well-being.

Ever come across information on the web and wondered about its accuracy? Here in the Research Network we try to evaluate web content by checking for: credibility authority reliability relevance date sources behind the text, and scope and purpose. For example, a recent article in USA Today found a false Wikipedia 'biography' for John Seigenthaler, Robert Kennedy's administrative assistant in the early 1960s. Seigenthaler himself found the inaccurate text on Wikipedia and his son located the same inaccurate information on Reference.com and Answers.com. "Representatives of the other two websites said their computers are programmed to copy data verbatim from Wikipedia, never checking whether it is false or factual." So, how do you know if the Wikipedia entry you found or anything else on the web is true? Use the web with caution, verify facts and try to find cooberating evidence from articles or books by experts in the field. Keep in mind that just because it's i

Federal yellow book: Fall 2005 New York State government directory 2005-2006 New York State Farm fresh guide 2002-2003 Central Region Western Region Metro Region Eastern Region Clinkinbeard, Curtis J. Hypergrow your business -- double, triple or quadruple any business by harnessing the natural laws of growth. Aiken, Richard The Relationship between wildlife watchers, hunters, and anglers Report 2001 Private and public land use by hunters Report 2001 We also get a number of special issues and supplements from journals in our collection that we don't always get to share. A few on my desk are: Advertising Age's Hispanic Fact Pack: An Annual Guide to Hispanic Advertising and Marketing, 2004 and 2005 Fact Pack: An Annual Guide to Advertising & Marketing, 2004 and 2005 Agency Preview Guide 2004 Point: Marketing at C-Level, March 2005 American Demographics Marketing Tools Sourcebook 2003 Diversity in America

Purloined verbatem from an e-mail. For all except the first article, tou will have to register with BNET, but it's free. BusinessWeek has a great interview/book review on the importance of details to customer service. Author Michael Levine says that operational details, such as limited hours and dirty bathrooms send a message to customers about the general quality of a business. These details have a more significant effect on customers than you might think: "The consumer mind has a logical and emotional part, and if you don't speak to both, you will lose them, especially when they're hungry, tired, angry, or lonely. "We're living in an age of anxiety. When people are not hungry, tired, angry, or lonely, the emotional side will win the debate with the logical part of the brain 80% of the time. When they're hungry, tired, angry, or lonely, emotion wins 100% of time. We are often hungry, tired, angry, or lonely, so it's exceedingly dangerous if you'

The Web site for Private Label Buyer magazine has a searchable database of their 2005 Supplier Source Book: http://www.privatelabelbuyer.com/guide/ This magazine describes itself as being geared towards supermarkets and other retail chains selling store-brand products. This section of their Web site is aimed at buyers for supermarket or grocery stores. Every supermarket has a line of products that they sell as their own, but, in actuality, are obtained from one of these manufacturers. Clients who've manufactured a product typically sold in such a place have this site, then, as a possible marketing tool. The site allows for three ways to search - by a specific company name, by a location, or by a product category. If you have a client who's interested in getting placed on this database, contact information for the staff at Private Label Buyer can be found here: http://www.privatelabelbuyer.com/contact.php

I was very excited to go to a session at the State Data Center affiliates meeting in late October. It was designated with the title listed above. We often get requests for regional tourism data. I was less excited at the end of the session. I assumed that the folks who bring us I Love NY would have great statistics that would show the success for ther campaign. Unfortunately, most of these statistics are for sale, if they are available at all. The state Department of Economic Development receives merely a summary of the data compiled by D.K. Shiffet & Associates . For your clients to buy them would be extremely expensive (five figures). As for the hotel occupancy numbers, they are tallied by Smith Travel Research , which will cost at least a few hundred dollars. Fortunately, many newspapers subscribe, so we CAN often provide data based on articles. Other sources cited but not discussed: Travel Industry Association of America Decent state level data. U.S. Department of Commerce .

This post covers two distinct situations: 1) There've been questions asked recently at certain Regional Centers regarding what constitutes clerical time in the Counselor Hours section for WebMQS case records. Some advisors feel that they're doing clerical work (such as doing data entry on WebMQS), while others feel that clerical work is exclusive only to office managers or other support staff. To clarify, time spent by the advisor to prepare for a client meeting, to review documents, to follow-up after a meeting, and in completing other tasks relating to the case (including data entry for WebMQS) should be counted as Prep Time. Conversely, time spent by the office manager or other support staff to prepare for a client meeting - such as making copies, assembling information packets, and so on - should be counted as Clerical Time. 2) To reiterate from my 6/20 blog posting, some advisors are in the habit of adding the time spent in communicating a request to the Research Network