SunDown RunDown Founder Paul Proffitt will host a series of six business classes at the Columbus Idea Foundry to help aspiring business owners with the ins and outs of getting started.
A fit for businesses of any industry, “The class is taught to be a practical course – in other words, you can take what you learn and directly apply it to the business,” Proffitt says. “Not a lot of theory, just about getting stuff done. We try to incorporate a lot of what the entrepreneurs are working on in the class and work through some of their specific questions as it relates to the session topic being covered that evening.”
The sessions begin this Monday, February 1 at 6:30 p.m. at the Idea Foundry, 421 W. State St. in Franklinotn. Each subsequent week through March 14 (save February 15) a different topic will be addressed during the hour-and-a-half long classes. Topics include:
Session 1 – February 1, 6:30 p.m. – Do you want to build a business? It doesn’t have to be a business.
Description: Session 1 is all about the basics. We will talk about what kinds of businesses can you form and why you would choose one type over the other, what goes into creating a business, and paths to becoming a full-time entrepreneur and small business owner.
Session 2 – February 8, 6:30 p.m. – Ideas don’t just grow on trees.
Description: Believe it or not innovation and creativity is a process. You actually have to work at it to come up with ideas. Very rarely does lightning just strike your brain. This session will walk you through some of the strategies and activities you can do to come up with ideas for your next great product or service, and evaluate that idea to see if there are actually customers willing to buy.
Session 3 – February 22, 6:30 p.m. – Your product is more than the thing you make.
Description: We are going to cover what your total product offering is, how much you should charge for it, and things to consider on branding your product and your company. Apple is a prime example of a company that has nailed it for the total product, setting the right price, and creating a brand around slick design and technology that just works. Learn what goes into making all of that happen.
Session 4 – February 29, 6:30 p.m. – If you build it and do nothing, they won’t come.
Description: Selling your product or service is hard. You have to build a marketing plan on how you can get your stuff into the hands of your customers. How do you do that? What do you need to do? This session will walk you through the marketing planning steps so you can answer the right questions.
Session 5 – March 7, 6:30 p.m. – This entrepreneur went to market.
Description: This session will cover distribution and selling channels for your product or service. There are multiple ways to get your product to market – direct selling, using syndicates, B2B, B2C, and others. This session will help you figure out the best channel for your product or service.
Session 6 – March 14, 6:30 p.m. – Accounting is fun!
Description: Well, not really, but accounting is one of those things that you just need to learn at a very basic level to be able to make sure you company is running well, has cash to pay its bills, and detect any problems or identify areas of opportunity. This session will walk you through some of the core accounting documents and how to use them in the management of your business.
Individual classes are $45 each or a series pass is available for $185. Participants do not have to attend all classes, but receive a discounted cost per session for attending all the events. Space is still available.
This is the third cohort of businesses Proffitt has coached through the classes, fulfilling a goal for the two organizations to work together.
“CIF is a great organization and we had talked early on about doing more programming with them when they moved into their space in Franklinton, we just found a good fit with meeting their needs and the community’s needs with a Business Building Series,” Proffitt says.
He draws content from an entrepreneurship course he used to teach at Columbus State, describing the CIF classes as trimmed down to the brass tax with no homework.
Click here for more information and to register for the courses.
