Using online tools can help strengthen a business’s presence and make it more efficient. They also can be part of the core system that helps to create new businesses. Our speakers explained how, from farming and logging operations to tourism-based industry, digital tools are key to business success.

1. Building Effective OrganizationsBusiness Digital Champions

2. Business Digital Champions (A4)
Matt Dune, Google (Moderator)
Suzy Hodgson, YourFarmStand.com
Carl Russell, EarthwiseFarm & Forest
Adam Grinold, Wilmington Works

3. Matt Dunne
Head of Community Affairs at Google.
Director of AmeriCorps VISTA during Clinton Administration
Associate Director of the Rockefeller Center at Dartmouth College
Served seven years in the Vermont House and two terms in the Vermont Senate
Head of Community Affairs, Google

4. 4
Internet today
Organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.
Sources: comScore qSearch, February 2008, divided over 29 days; Radicati Group, October 2007; Internetworldstats.com; eMarketer 2008.
6B
Photos uploaded to Facebook per Month
2.5B
people online (up from 500M in 2003)
5B
Google searches worldwide per day
3M
emails sent
per second
100 Hours
of video uploaded to YT per minutehttp://pennystocks.la/internet-in-real-time/

5. Carl Russell
Horse-logger, forestry consultant, and timberland owner from Bethel, Vermont
Operates Russell Forestry Services
With his wife, co-owns EarthwiseFarm & Forest
Co-Owners, EarthwiseFarm & Forest

8. August 26, 2011 30 MbfHwd& SwdSawlogs

27. Adam Grinold
Executive Director Wilmington Works
Former executive director of the Mount Snow Valley Chamber of Commerce
Executive Director, Wilmington Works

28. Our Digital Plan 15 Years Ago

29. Our Digital Plan Today

31. Some tools are a flash in the pan. Some stick around, keeping current means early adoption of future hits, and…flops.

32. Ouch !

33. Ouch-But Got’emBack!

34. DO NOT TRY THIS AT WORK !

37. One Great Tool That You Can Grow With

39. Evaluating your Small Business Digital Tool Belt
Know what you want from your use
Develop Budget based on goals
Do research-check out competition-find one business out of area to emulate
Start engagement and follow through consistently & APPROPRIATELY-develop a tone and tenor
Realize you must continue to learn-this is a young professionals domain-and that segment will ALWAYS stay young…… as you age

40. Suzy Hodgson
Co-Founder of YourFarmStand.com
UVM Extension’s Center for Sustainable Agriculture
Carbon Clear and the Center for Environmental Strategy at the University of Surrey
Graduate of the Yale School of Forestry and Smith College
Co-Founder, YourFarmStand.com

43. How It Works
Farmers
list produce
for sale
Customers
buy on-line
whenever
they like
Farmers deliver
produce once
a week
Customers
pick up
produce in
one bag
Local
coordinator
promotes the market.
Yourfarmstand
manages the website
and all
transactions.

44. Local Examples
Charlotte Farmers market – yourfarmstand
Fairfield Farmers Market online
Farm Fresh Connect

45. Lessons Learned
Cash is not king.
Value is more than price.
Websites don’t grow on their own.
Local input rules.
Organic growth is good.