New Biz Resource Center

Online, April 6, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Small Biz Resource Center Open House and Introduction to BusinessDecision

Adrian, MI - 4/5/10 -

Starting or growing a business? Thinking about becoming an entrepreneur? If so, please visit Adrian Public Library's new Biz Resource Center on Saturday April 10 from 10 am - 2 pm to learn about the print and electronic resources available to support your business. The library will also be introducing a new electronic database called BusinessDecision. This product is a web-based service that combines extensive consumer household, business, and demographic data with GIS (geographic information systems), a powerful mapping technology.
With this new service, Adrian Public Library will offer local businesses the same consumer and demographic data used by the nation's top companies to help with such tasks as finding prospective customers, analyzing trade areas, evaluating competitors, identifying new store locations, targeting media buys, and direct mail campaigns. By using BusinessDecision, local businesses can reduce costs, improve services to existing customers, and attract new customers.

Any local business person can access BusinessDecision at the library or soon from any remote desktop computer, with their Adrian Public Library card, through the library's website at www.adrian.lib.mi.us . A host of business-oriented reports and maps that visually show relationships and scenarios of data can instantly be created and emailed to users or stored on-line.

The powerful mapping capability will reveal to business owners trends, patterns, and opportunities which are often hidden in tabular data.

BusinessDecision is a service provided by CIVICTechnologies, Inc. of Pasadena, California, a national leader in providing of geographic information systems (GIS) for public libraries. According to Marc Futterman, president & CEO of CIVICTechnologies, "Local businesses are the backbone of our communities providing jobs, tax revenue, services, and more. With BusinessDecision Adrian Public Library will provide essential information that local businesses need to succeed - from finding new customers to analyzing market opportunities. We are very excited about providing access to BusinessDecision to the business patrons of Adrian Public Library." More information about BusinessDecision is available at www.businessdecision.info.

Along with our Biz Resource Center Open House Adrian Public Library will be hosting several Conducting Market Research workshops in collaboration with Cathie Abad from the Michigan Small Business & Technology Development Center beginning on April 10 from 2 - 4 pm. Future classes will be held on July 17 and September 11 using a computer lab in the library's meeting room. The classes are free, however seating is limited. Please call the library at 265-2265 to reserve your seat.

Please visit our Biz Resource Center during regular library hours:
Monday, Tuesday, Thursday 10 am - 9pm
Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday 10 am - 5:30 pm
Sunday Closed

The Adrian Public Library is located at 143 E. Maumee Street in downtown Adrian. Parking is available along Maumee Street and in the Toledo Street parking lot.