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Project Hometown is a challenge to local businesses: Get your products and services online

 

Welcome to the Being Found Show, if your company and your products aren’t being found, whose is? The answer to that question is Amazon.

Joe : Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos just became not only the richest man in the world again, but he’s the richest man that ever existed. On the news the other night they came out with some statistics about holiday shopping. News anchor Lester Holt stated a staggering 82 percent of the online purchases from this past holiday shopping season were at Amazon.

Well, this is a good segue to Project Hometown. A year ago or so I was asked how can local companies compete with Amazon. As one company you probably can’t but a whole community could. So imagine if Project Hometown came to fruition which is the idea that everyone and every business in Shasta County have their products online being sold the way people want to buy.

Let’s imagine local websites with not just a “contact us” page, telephone number and address and how cool would it be if all of Shasta County businesses had their products online and even show if they have them in stock. As a customer I could see your inventory, I could see your price, I can compare them, and I can see if it’s something I could come pick up at your store.

The goal of Project Hometown is to get all 17,000 registered businesses in Shasta County to have their products online, and I think if we could do that we’d become pretty competitive against Amazon as a community.

How cool would that be if Lester Holt says a year from now that Amazon sold 72 percent, and Shasta County sold the other 10 percent? That amount of money would probably change most lives in Redding. I don’t know that we all see as a company how much business we don’t get because frankly, we’re not living up to our customers’ expectations.

The other day I was shopping and wanted to find a knife sharpening stone, couldn’t find one locally online and wasn’t able to find them in local stores. Those businesses didn’t live up to very basic expectations and lost my purchase. Had just one business put up their inventory online, I wouldn’t have wasted the hours I did searching locally only to resort to buying off of Amazon. I wanted to buy locally.

Chauncey: Happens to me quite often with my creative pursuits and hobbies which is kind of what you’re doing there. I wanted to buy a silk screen for my home, and I just couldn’t manage to track one down locally.

For whatever reason, I don’t shop very much, or if I do, I must go straight to Amazon, and I think I don’t shop very much because it’s too frustrating and takes too long.

Joe:  Project Hometown is a challenge to local businesses: To get the products or services of every business in our community online, being found the way customers want to shop. We want to invite high school students to take part in Project Hometown. We’ve got a class coming out which is FREE for high school students in Shasta County.

It’s already paid for and it’s an initiative we’re working on with Reach Higher Shasta. The idea is that we’re going to take high school kids through the process of building a website in this class.

The goal is to come together as a community, to shift the impact the Internet has on our community. Customers are going online at an incredible rate. We have never seen anything like this. The “find X near me” phenomenon, just for starters, is an unprecedented opportunity.

So if you’ve got a teen and you’re in Shasta County and you think that he or she would like to learn how to website or would like to learn real-world tech skills, you can reach us here at our contact page on www.cloudwiseacademy.com.

Thank you for listening to this segment of the Being Found Show, to hear the full show listen here:  Being Found Show Episode#44  or subscribe to our podcast.

 

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JOHNSON CITY & KINGSPORT – Cloud Wise Academy announced today a new local marketing and e-commence workshop, Amplify Our City, to teach local business owners how to best use the internet’s capabilities. The workshops will be taught in partnership with the Kingsport and Johnson City chambers of commerce. Amplify Our City is a three-step workshop to attract more customers online and in store. In this workshop, business owners will learn where to start and how to use online tools, free local marketing tactics, when to spend money and what savvy marketing peers are doing. Participants will learn how the internet favors local companies, how to market on a small budget, and how to avoid costly mistakes. “In today’s post-pandemic world, social media has become a key means of retail purchasing,” said Bob Cantler, President and CEO of the Johnson City Chamber of Commerce. “Learning tricks of the trade to maximize your business’ exposure will certainly enhance sales across the board.” “I don’t care what kind of business you have; one of the most important assets to your business is your web presence,” said Aundrea Salyer, senior business counselor for the Tennessee Small Business Development Center at ETSU Kingsport Affiliate Office. “That means making it easy for your customers to find you online and to shop online. I get asked all the time whether a business should invest in a web site or leverage existing social media platforms. I’m very interested to hear how Joe addresses this.” The two workshop sessions will be held in partnership with local chambers of commerce this month. You do not have to be member of the Chamber(s) to participate. Kingsport Chamber of Commerce: April 21 from 8-10:30 is an online webinar available to the public regardless of geographic location. Attendees must register in advance: https://clients.tsbdc.org/workshop.aspx?ekey=10420014 . Johnson City Chamber of Commerce: April 22 from 8-10:30 a.m., at the 602 Sevier St., Suite 101, in Johnson City. Attendees must register in advance: https://cca.johnsoncitytnchamber.com/EvtListing.aspx?dbid2=TNJC&evtid=105727&class=E The course is taught by Joe McKenna, founder of Cloud Wise Academy , which specializes in e-commerce training. “Many companies are surprised to discover that the internet favors local companies. In this workshop, you’ll learn how to put the internet to work for your company instead of against it,” said McKenna. By providing the workshop through the chambers of commerce, McKenna hopes this will broaden the education of citizens of Kingsport and Johnson City and help local businesses grow. For more information, email McKenna at joe@cloudwiseacademy.com or call 530-515-9851.
By Joe Mckenna 14 Apr, 2022
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. – (April 4, 2022) Grow your career or business by learning valuable search engine marketing skills. According to 99 Firms, 46% of all Google searches are linked to something local, so it is crucial to learn these valuable skills for yourself, your business and our community. This spring, Cloud Wise Academy, an East Tennessee State University Innovation Lab affiliate member, is hosting a "Local Search Engine Marketing" course aimed at local companies that want to rank better on Google and marketing professionals who want to learn valuable skills. "Students will learn the pros' skills and tools in search engine marketing," said Joe Mckenna, founder of Cloud Wise Academy. “Many companies are surprised to discover that the internet favors local companies. Around 93% of all web traffic is via search engines. Search engine marketing is the lifeblood of every company. We'll demystify it and teach you the valuable skill you need.” The workshop begins May 16 and runs through June 22, with classes on Monday and Wednesday nights from 6-8 p.m. In-person participants meet at the ETSU Innovation Lab, located at 2109 W. Market St. in Johnson City. The class may also be taken synchronously online. Registration fees are $350 per participant, and participants may use the code "early50" through May 1 to save $50. “This class will teach aspiring SEO professionals the ins and outs of local search engine optimization,” said Chauncy Haworth, course instructor. “With hands-on support, you will learn how to alter an existing website and properly create online profiles that will get search engines and local customers attention.” "We are pleased to have Cloud Wise Academy bring search engine marketing opportunities like this to the Appalachian Highlands," said Liz Bennett, assistant director of the Innovation Lab. "We've heard great feedback from previous students and are excited to see more classes like this offered in the area. We hope that students, community members and entrepreneurs will take advantage of these types of classes that help bring new business opportunities to this area." Learn more and register at www.cloudwiseacademy.com/seo-course . For more information about Cloud Wise Academy and future courses, visit cloudwiseacademy.com , or reach Mckenna at joe@cloudwiseacademy.com or at 530-515-9851. The ETSU Innovation Lab is a high-tech business incubator that assists aspiring entrepreneurs from concept through commercialization. For more information, visit etsu.edu/ilab or contact Dr. Audrey Depelteau, director of the Innovation Lab, at depelteau@etsu.edu .
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