America’s #1 Small Business Expert Melinda Emerson to speak at Tennessee Small Business Development Center’s SBDC Day March 17

Emerson will address small business owners at Tennessee Small Business Development Center’s virtual public celebration of National SBDC (Small Business Development Center) Day March 17

For more information, contact: Diana Fedinec, Director of Public Relations and Media
(901) 333-4247 
dfedinec@southwest.tn.edu

(Memphis, Tenn.) – America’s #1 Small Business Expert, Melinda F. Emerson, will share tips with small business owners on how to market and sell their products and services online during the virtual National Small Business Development Day celebration March 17, 9:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m.  The SBDC Day celebration is an annual event sponsored locally by Tennessee Small Business Development Center (TSBDC) at Southwest Tennessee Community College. 
 
Affectionately known as the SmallBizLady to millions of entrepreneurs worldwide, Emerson is a small business coach, best-selling author of Become Your Own Boss in 12 months: A Month-by-Month Guide to a Business That Works and 20-year entrepreneur dedicated to helping small businesses thrive. Forbes Magazine named her #1 Woman for Entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter. 
 
Due to the unprecedented challenges of the pandemic, small businesses are having to reinvent the way they do business with a transition to marketing their services on the internet. Emerson’s small business savvy and advice will help small business owners learn how to pivot from brick and mortar-based services to online services. 
 
Emerson has lectured on small business at The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, Temple University and Rosemont College and for clients including IKEA, Verizon, GlaxoSmithKline, National Association of Women Business Owners, PA Governor's Conference for Women, U.S. Department of Labor, International Association of Business Communicators, the Small Business Administration, and the Center for Women's Business Research. She is the founder and CEO of Quintessence Multimedia with a clientele that includes Johnson & Johnson, Verizon, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Comcast and Radio-One. Her weekly Twitter podcast, TheSmallBizChat, is dedicated to helping women achieve small business success.  NBC Nightly News, The Wall Street Journal, U.S. News and World Report and Black Enterprise have featured Emerson as a small business expert. A graduate of Virginia Tech, Emerson has won numerous awards including Top 50 Women in Business in Pennsylvania, Top 30 Leaders of the future by Ebony Magazine, and the National Association of Women Business Owners' Woman of Distinction Award. 
 
During SBDC Day, TSBDC will present its annual “Rising Star Award” to Johnny Fayne, President/CEO of janitorial firm Fresh Start Facility Services and Barbara Johnson-McKinney, CEO of My Faith Inc.  Fayne has grown his firm into one of the largest black-owned businesses in Memphis, serving customers in Tennessee, Georgia, Arkansas, Texas and Washington, D.C.  Johnson-McKinney operates one of the largest home care businesses in Tennessee.
 
SBDC Day is a national, collective proclamation of the impact America’s Small Business Development Centers have on the success of our nation’s dreamers, innovators, and doers – America’s small businesses. SBDC Day will unite the nearly 1,000 SBDC centers across the country and the hundreds of thousands of clients they serve by sharing, in real time, the success stories and notable impacts SBDCs collectively have on the small business community.
 
The Tennessee Small Business Development Center (TSBDC) is located at Southwest and has become the go-to SBA Resource Partner for small business owners facing unprecedented challenges due to the pandemic.  Over 1,100 small businesses in Shelby County have received one-on-one business advising on federal relief funding, business recovery plans and strategies to reach new customers.
 
SBDC Day is a free event open to the public.  Current and aspiring small business owners are invited to attend by registering online at Eventbrite.com, keywords “America’s SBDC Day by TSBDC”. For more information, visit http://www.tsbdc.org/swtcc or call (901) 333-5085.