New Address: Two Embarcadero Center, 8th floor, San Francisco, CA 94111     

Up Your Negotiation Skills at WOVEN; New Credit Card Chip

  • Register for WOVEN – Women Veteran Entrepreneurs Network on November 4 in Santa Ana.
  • Clients Must Know About The Credit Card Chip
  • Member Kudos
  • The Goodies – This week’s highlight is CAMEO and Opportunity Fund’s op-ed on SB 197 in the Sacramento Bee..

Women Veteran Entrepreneurs Network

Register today for WOVEN 2015!

November 4, 2015
8:30am – 5:00pm
The Delhi Center
505 E Central Avenue
Santa Ana, CA 92707

This event is designed to help you reach and serve women vets in your region while, at the same time, providing excellent professional development opportunities. View the exciting WOVEN agenda!

What you’ll find at WOVEN:

  • Expand your program by reaching women veterans who want to start and grow their own businesses.
  • Learn how to find more power, negotiate better and create win-win results.
  • Transform your career when you use your uniqueness.
  • Find, understand, and serve your perfect customer – must know info for your clients.
  • Pick the brains of our colleagues at the Jonas Project about lessons they’ve learned from working with vets; and for them to find out what you do to further encourage referrals. (Members-only session)

Register today for WOVEN 2015!

Clients Need to Know About The Credit Card Chip

Merchants of all sizes – including microbusinesses – were required to upgrade their credit card processing technology to use the Europay – MasterCard – Visa (EMV) chip system to process credit card transactions by October 1st. Financial services providers will no longer be liable for instances of fraud if the merchant has not upgraded to the EMV chip system. Less than half of small businesses know about the changeover and liability shift. Do your clients’ businesses know about the upgrade? If not, they must!

Read an FAQ on the new EMV chip requirements.

The LA SBDC has an article “10 Considerations for Small Business Switching to EMV.”

The SBA has a good resource page on the issue: Migration to EMV Chip Card Technology and Your Small Business.

Member Kudos


Three of our microlenders deserve a big congrats!

  • As of this week, Opportunity Fund has provided over $100,000,000 in small business microloans. The loan that pushed them over the top went to Lila Owens, the owner of Cupcakin’ Bake Shop in Berkeley.
  • Accion has been highlighted as the best alternative lender for startup loans by Business News Daily.
  • On September 22nd, Working Solutions was honored to receive a Spirit of Marin Award from Bank of Marin for their work supporting local entrepreneurship in Marin.

The Goodies

New opportunities for training, conference information, funding, scholarships, and other information that have crossed our desks since the last Must Know. I have posted a running tab of current Industry Goodies on the CAMEO website that lists items that were in past emails. Check it out to make sure you’re not missing anything, like grants whose deadlines are still alive!

CAMEO in the News: Read CAMEO and Opportunity Fund’s op-ed on SB 197 in the Sacramento Bee.

For Your Clients, Webinar: Enterprising Women magazine has announced that nominations for the 2016 Enterprising Women of the Year Award are now open on the magazine’s website. Visit the magazine’s home page and click on the link to nominate your clients. The deadline is November 1, 2015 at midnight (probably ET).

2015 OFN Conference: Register for the conference, November 9-12, 2015 in Detroit. This year’s curriculum offers sessions across 14 tracks reflecting the breadth of the CDFI industry’s financing sectors and issues, including small business. Contact CAMEO to apply for a scholarship to help cover expenses.

For Your Clients, Webinar: Our friends at the SBA and Small Business Majority are helping businesses navigate the changes and opportunities in health care through the Affordable Care Act 101 webinar series this fall – What the Healthcare Law Means for your Small Business. Upcoming webinars are November 12 in English and November 17 in Spanish.

Veteran Event: Disabled Veteran Business Alliance (DVBA) 2015 Veterans Day Breakfast is on November 13, 2015 from 8:00-11:00am (PST) in Beverly Hills, CA. This celebratory event honors the service of all veterans past, present and future as well as others who have made significant contributions towards helping our veterans.

Small Business Saturday: It’s that time of year to join CAMEO and be counted among the hundreds of organizations supporting small businesses across the country on Small Business Saturday, November 28th. Join the Small Business Saturday Coalition to support the campaign. As a member of the Coalition you will have access to special communications tools and be listed on www.ShopSmall.com.