Archive for November 2009

Unemployment drops in Phillips County

October unemployment rates for Kansas counties were received in our office today.  Phillips county unemployment drops to 4.6% which falls under the state average of 6.4%.   September unemployment rates for Phillips County were are 6.0%.  In March, county unemployment rates were at 8.3% which was above the state average of 6.5%.

Kansas Marketplace Update

On November 9 & 10, the first ever Kansas marketplace event was held in Hays, Kansas.  This event was spearheaded by the Center of Rural Affairs (based in Nebraska) and Kansas Commerce.  There was an advisory group of twenty some representatives from across the state working for about a year on developing and advising on ideas to make this one of the best avenues of educational and real world networking assistance for small business development. 

There was just over 250 registrants to attend the marketplace event.  Over the course of two days, there was 42 breakout sessions for business owner and community organizers to acquire new information on events, activities, programs, projects, and ideas to improve their own situations in this time of economic challenges.  Networking seemed to continually come up as a key question and information point.  The new generation’s way of marketing was incredibly interesting.  Although old school marketing was not “kicked out the door” by any means, the new tactics and avenues was a means by which to promote community, product, and services.  Working in conjunction with traditional marketing, these new social networks (Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Blogging, and others) are becoming the premier way the youner generation communicates and is educated about services/products/communities. 

There were two special event speakers whose emphasis was on setting the right environment for business development.  Although, this aspect of business atmosphere or environment has been mentioned many times in history, it is an essential part (basis rule) of a business and communities which seems to be undeveloped and often the easiest forgotten in the long run.  It may be started in the short term, but often never grows to the peak level of marketing it should. 

Plans for next year’s second Kansas Marketplace are already on the drawing board,  For our Phillips County and regional businesses who were able to attend, I would ask that you share the information acquired with those businesses and community leaders that were not able to attend.  This will help the entire environment for the area.  I encourage all businesses not in attendance this year, and even those that were in attendance, to make plans for attending next year’s marketplace, if possible. 

Many say “Knowledge is power”, but “Knowledge is only acquired through active pursuit of education, and only education applied (acted on) benefits”.   Always strive to improve your businesses edge, through applying new proven (real world) information/education that works.  Networking is very important to marketing as well.  

PCED has some of the information acquired through the breakout sessions, but the majority of great information came from networking (questions and answers) during sessions  and between sessions.  Let us know if there is anything we can do to help with your business.  We may not know all the answers, but we will definately use our networking to try to find someone or group that can help find an answer. 

Endure, Grow, & Prosper