Home  ›  Must Know  ›  Customer Acquisition and Retention; AEO Conference (and more!)

Customer Acquisition and Retention; AEO Conference (and more!)

  • Customer Acquisition and Retention
  • AEO Conference
  • Early Bird Registration is open for CAMEO’s Annual Member Meeting and Advocacy Day – June 7, 2016 at the Sacramento Sheraton.
  • Faces of Entrepreneurship nominations are open.
  • Watch and share our WOVEN Video
  • The Goodies – This week’s highlight is our ‘Micro Goes To Market’ program on April 14, 2016 in Chico!

Customer Acquisition and Retention

Small Business Financing Webinar Series/Peer Calls: OFN is offering a webinar series focused on growth and innovation for small business lenders to help us understand and navigate through this new landscape. These ideas aren’t only for lenders, training programs can apply many of these ideas. CAMEO will follow each session with dynamic peer group calls to digest and apply what was learned. Our brilliant consultant, Susan Brown, will lead the calls.

Both CEOs and line staff can benefit from this rich training opportunity. We urge you to attend the series as well as the follow up calls with your fellow CAMEO members to digest the information so that you can apply it to your own organization.

The next OFN webinar is on Thursday, April 14, 2016 at 11:00am: Customer Acquisition and Retention.

Join the follow-up CAMEO peer call on Monday, April 18, 2016 at 11:00am to discuss strategies and tools for attracting, acquiring, and retaining your borrowers.

For the full schedule of OFN webinars and peer calls, visit the Small Business Financing Webinar Series post on our website.

AEO Conference

As a leader of the micro sector in California and a California representative on the AEO board, I want to invite you to this year’s AEO conference. We are celebrating 25 years on May 18-20 in Washington, D.C. The EconoCon25 agenda is taking shape as forward-looking and stimulating. I can’t wait!

EconoCon25 gathers actors in the small business space who impact America’s smallest businesses and under-served entrepreneurs – lenders, nonprofit and for-profit service providers, advocates and policy makers, entrepreneurs, funders and investors – for meaningful dialogue about how to innovate faster, partner smarter, and execute better. Early bird rates have been extended until April 15, so register today! And for an added bonus, enter the discount code “APRILFOOLS” at the end of your registration and save an additional
10% until April 15!

CAMEO will host two events at the AEO conference: a legislative briefing on responsible small business lending, tentatively scheduled for a 12:00noon lunch on May 20; and our annual dinner. Join us!

And if you register be for April 18, 2016 at midnight, you’ll be entered in a drawing to win an Apple Watch.

The Goodies

New opportunities for training, conference information, funding, scholarships, and other information that have crossed our desks since the last Must Know. I have posted a running tab of current Industry Goodies on the CAMEO website that lists items that were in past emails. Check it out to make sure you’re not missing anything, like grants whose deadlines are still alive!

Go To Market: If you work with food business or or know people interested in starting one, have them join us on April 14, 2016 in Chico! Share the ‘Micro Goes To Market’ registration link with your colleagues in the Rural North. Download a Go To Market flyer.

Take Action: CalNonprofits is spearheading a campaign to stop AB 2855 (Frazier, D-11), a bill that places duplicative and unnecessary requirements on nonprofits, and then imposes penalties that are far out of proportion. You can read their letter to Assemblymember Frazier. Please call Assemblymember Frazier’s office now with this simple message: Withdraw this bill. Call 916-319-2011 today.

For Your Client: Small Business Majority launched a weekly national webinar series (free). Access to Capital 101: Funding Options to Start and Grow Your Business is available on April 13, 2016, 11:00 AM Pacific Daylight Time; Wednesday, April 20, 2016, 11:00 AM Pacific; and Wednesday, April 27, 2016, 11:00 AM Pacific.

Online Financing Forum: Join the SBA San Francisco District Office on Monday, April 18, 2016 from 12:30 – 4:00PM at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco (101 Market Street, San Francisco). Hear directly from different online lenders about their target small business client, product and advantage/disadvantages. They will have two panels of experts: Raising Money Online: Peer to Peer Lending and Finding the Right Online Lender and have a small business case study. Please plan to arrive at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco at 12:30PM to allow time to get through security and ensure a prompt start. Feel free to bring your lunch.

Cutting Edge Professional Development: CFED is hosting a five-part virtual Listening & Learning Series Exploring Financial Capability & Access for Entrepreneurs. The first one is on April 19 – ‘Cash Flow Volatility: The Ultimate Driver of Business Financial Vulnerability.’ You can learn more about the series on our website.

Free Webinar: Please join CALED and guest speakers Toni Symonds and Kay Reynolds in a robust discussion on breaking barriers and creating a successful career in economic development. Register for Taking Charge of Your Career: Discussion with two female leaders who created their own path to success on Wednesday, April 20, 2016 at 1:00 – 2:00pm (PST).

Free Webinar: Here’s a way that CDFIs can compete with online lenders. Spark is hosting a webinar to discuss how to: 1) Drive customers to your website; 2) Provide them with a simple, customized prequalification process; 3) Capture the information you need for your loan product(s); and 4) Make it easy for your team to start the loan process. Register for CDFIs: Turn your website into a lead generation tool on April 21, 2016, 9:00-10:00 am Pacific.

PRIME Grant Opportunity: SBA has announced that it is taking applications for PRIME: Program for Investment in Microentrepreneurs Act. The deadline to apply for funding is April 29, 2016. A note from Friedman Associates about the grant: “We learned from SBA that while it is their intent to focus on MDOs that have ex-offender programs in place, they also encourage applications from MDOs that seek to develop them…. It is not a requirement that PRIME applicants propose ex-offender projects (or co-ops). Applications that include these may be eligible for bonus points.”

Grant Opportunity: The Kresge Foundation has launched a $30 million opportunity for CDFIs. The deadline is April 29, 2016.

OFN Western Regional Meeting: Save June 29, 2016. The meeting will take place in Los Angeles, CA at Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, Los Angeles Branch (950 S Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90015).

Take Action: We’re asking all of our members to hold district meetings with their California state representatives to inform California’s small business leaders and elected officials on what good capital looks like. We’ll follow up with meetings in Sacramento at our annual meeting. This is an issue they need to know about!