MIT ENTERPRISE FORUM OF NEW YORK CITY, INC.

presents

A Business Builders Series Event:

"What Ever Happened To Sales?"

The Business Builder Series is a new quarterly panel series intended to instruct entrepreneurs in critical business skills and processes. Most MITEF panels offer cutting-edge insight on the forces shaping specific industry sub-verticals; the Biz Builder panels, by contrast, will offer cutting-edge insight on the practical tools practitioners should use to prevail in any entrepreneurial vertical.

Like all MITEF panels, BBS panels will feature experienced practitioners answering specific questions from a moderator, and then open questions from the audience. The difference is that these panelists will speak more about specific techniques and less about specific industry forces.

This panel is about growing revenue, on the street... Bringing in business, the old fashioned way... Money in your pocket now, not later.

Entrepreneurial companies face a tight economy, increasing sales costs, aggressive competition and more demanding customers. As a result, managing a sales process and motivating a sales force has never been more difficult - or more important. Yet few managers have ever actually overseen an entrepreneurial sales effort before - and many of the sales lessons learned in the great Old Economy sales companies do not necessarily hold true in entrepreneurial companies.

Exactly what are you selling? Who are you selling to? Why should they buy from you? How long should it take? What should you charge? What are your competitors charging? Who does your selling for you, and how do you compensate them? How can you leverage technology to make more sales and keep more of the proceeds?

During the .com craze, organizations, venture capitalists, and the media placed so much emphasis upon attracting eyeballs, creating partnerships, and rolling out cool business models that many of them forgot all about the function that actually pays the bills. Selling, plain and simple.

The art of selling is not dead. In fact, it's more important than ever, especially in today's tough economy. During the affluent times of recent years, many companies forgot how to sell, then a whole generation of .com's came along that never even tried.

This panel addresses the topic of selling in today's marketplace. Selling, not marketing. Our panel will hash through the techniques and technologies that are essential and available.

Panelists:

• Mark Gatanas, President and CEO, Impowerment, LLC
• Dan Meltzer, Managing Director, Thoroughbred Partners LLC
• Michael R. Miller, Northeast Region Manager, The Alexander Group
• David Govan Senior Vice President of Sales and Professional Services, Juice Software Inc.