The planned changeover, which has not been finalized, will result in the layoff of 12 staff members, said Jack Jacobs, chairman of the San Diego North Convention and Visitors Bureau. Unaffected, he said, will be the bureau’s executive director, Cami Mattson.

The move to subcontract the bureau’s marketing efforts was driven by the San Diego nonprofit that provides a large share of its funding — the Tourism Marketing District.

Formed three years ago by a coalition of hoteliers to boost tourism, the district generates funds through a 2 percent surcharge on hotel rooms within the city of San Diego.

The San Diego North Bureau, which this year is expected to receive $2.7 million from the marketing district, had been promoting tourism throughout North County, not just within northern San Diego.

“San Diego North had a number of cities represented, including Carlsbad and Escondido, some of which put some dollars into the (bureau), but so many hotels that were benefiting were not San Diego hotels,” said local hotelier Robert Rauch, who is a marketing district board member. “So the TMD wanted to make sure that our return of investment is optimized for San Diego hotels.”

Funding that goes to the San Diego North Bureau will now be transferred to the San Diego Convention and Visitors Bureau, and that money will be used to promote the roughly 40 hotels from La Jolla to Rancho Bernardo, between Highways 52 and 56, Jacobs said.

“Our area has unique attractions to offer travelers,” he said. “And we need to make sure our story gets told with the biggest bang for our buck.”

Lori Weisberg: (619) 293-2251; lori.weisberg@uniontrib.com

What’s behind me are  three decades of friends and associations I still value very much. I have great memories of people I have worked with at Jack in the Box Restaurants (corporate office), Hubbert & Associates Advertising & P.R., Sidekick Printing, Ideal Services, McMillin Communities, Project Resources, UCSD Extension, Schwartz Design Group, Design Quarter, SoCal PRINT, Communicating Arts Group, American Institute for Graphic Arts/San Diego, Performing Arts League, Bon Temps Social Club of San Diego, Hustle San Diego, Lakeside’s River Park Conservancy, the many past and current members of BNI Wealth Builders, San Diego Green Business Network, and especially my 20 years with San Diego Convention & Visitors Bureau. My associations with many of these people and organizations will continue even though I am three hours ahead and 3,000 miles away. I cannot begin to thank all of these people giving me what I need to move to the next chapter.

Some of the highlights of my professional career have included:

• Development and application of branding for all sales and marketing materials for the San Diego Convention & Visitors Bureau
• Design and production of four contract proposals for Project Resources, Inc. of San Diego which resulted in $3.75 billion in government contracts
• Redesign of Website, 50+ investment performance publications, press kit, and marketing campaign materials for Dunham & Associates Investment Counsel of San Diego
• Presentations to the San Diego City Council for funding requests
• Commendation from the Mayor of San Diego for graphics which contributed to winning Republican Convention
• Webmaster of top Website of Cajun-Zydeco events throughout Southern California

With new associations here in Tampa, I will offer even better Web solutions for my clients, and continued personal attention to promotional projects which include presentations, printed collateral, email advertising, and newsletters. I am finding people are just about as wonderful here in Florida as they are in San Diego, and I look forward to the future.

Sempra does not need Sunrise PowerLink to serve San Diego residents: There is already a network of power lines running along our U.S.-Mexico border from El Centro which could be improved to take additional loads. The new power lines will cost rate payers $2 billion. For that money we can buy a lot of rooftop solar panels. Sempra claimed it had done environmental impact studies, which in fact it had not done, and has changed its route to go through environmentally sensitive areas without disclosing those changes of plans. Several of the area’s worst fires in 2003 and 2007 were started by SDG&E arcing power lines, and we will CERTAINLY be imperiled by at least one major fire per decade by this project if built (14 people died and 2,000 homes were lost in 2007). The power lines themselves will prevent arial water drops on wildfires 1000 feet on either side during heavy winds, thus ensuring fires not started by arcing power lines will not be safely fought.

Thank you to Dianne Jacob, our stalwart County Supervisor, for leading the fight against this project which appears to be designed solely to serve Sempra investor interests, not the interests of San Diego County residents.

http://www.eventbrite.com/event/527104584

But it wouldn’t hold a candle to a “do” button, if one existed. What are you determined to do in 2010? Chances are you are going to want to tell people about it, advertise it, promote it, sell it and brag about it.

Jim Hance Graphic Communications is here to provide marketing power for whatever your endeavor happens to be this year. Design and writing for great business proposals, marketing brochures, PowerPoint presentations, Websites, press kits, a direct mail piece — everything you might need to push your business to the next level.

That “undo” button I mentioned at the beginning is a great invention, but nothing compared with what you will be doing when you commit to it. What you say and how you say it is critical in determining your success in 2010, and Jim Hance can help you make your point.

One program which has been highly successful for women minority owned businesses competing for federal government projects is the MBE/WBE 8(a) program. By becoming certified through the SBA as an 8(a), businesses can compete for the thousands of federal contracts listed on the FedBizOpps.gov Website.

Certification as an 8(a) begins with a visit to the Small Business Administration office in your metropolitan area where you can get the necessary forms and receive coaching in preparing the application package and business strategy. Companies entering this program must have been in business for two years, and the certification process can take about a year. Once the forms are filled out and submitted, the application passes through a local approval process, then a regional approval process in San Francisco, and finally a federal approval process in Washington DC. When granted, 8(a) certification is a nine-year program with oversight from the SBA which gives the company certain advantages in the competitive bidding process.

However, businesses with 8(a) status do not typically win contracts alone. 8(a) companies usually begin working with a “mentor” or a company which has done contract business with the government agency before. The new 8(a) company may compete as the prime contractor or as a subcontractor, but the mentor company should have at least five past performance projects in their portfolio to include in the proposal, and the potential for winning the contract will be based on the mentor’s past completed work which is relevant to the contract being pursued.

The 8(a) will have to contact likely mentor companies which have outstanding track records completing government projects. By forming a joint-venture with a new 8(a) business, the mentor will become more competitive in getting contract work, and the 8(a) will begin to create a work history of past performance projects. The competitive advantage lasts a maximum of nine years, at which point the 8(a) will lose its status, but should have enough past performance work to compete effectively without the advantage, or may choose to become a mentor to another 8(a) firm. 8(a) firms can choose to work with different mentor companies in pursuing different government contracts.

Government agencies usually know what services are available and what they cost before they put the contract to bid, and may have an idea of what company will win the bid. Requests for Proposal (RFPs) are sent out to keep vendors competitive, and find out what new companies have to offer. As a business submitting a proposal to the federal government, regardless of whether you have 8(a) status or not, you are entitled to contact the federal agency, introduce your company, and discuss how the contract will be awarded. And if you don’t win the contract, you are also entitled to know where your proposal was weak compared to the company which won it.

When pursuing federal government contracts, it is a good idea to become familiar with the contracting agencies and your contract competitors, and maybe doing a joint-venture project with one or more which have done this work for the client before would be a way to start.

Seasons Greetings!

Word of the day: nota bene. You’re not likely to get anyone’s attention by spouting this line, unless you’re in Latin class. On the other hand, its abbreviation in writing, N.B., is pretty dependable as a way of directing readers’ attention. The original means “note well!” For the graphically inclined, ? also does the trick.

Word of the Day supplied by visualthesaurus.com.

One way to ruin your chances of getting a business referral is to approach a stranger, and hand him three or four of your business cards, and ask this person to give them to his best clients. This is the surest way  to strike out.

The reason is that you have to go through a three step process in building relationships. It is call the V-C-P process, where step one is becoming “visible,” or known. The second step is building “credibility” with other people by showing them over time that you do what you say you do. And the third step, “profitability,” will follow when the people who you have met and built credibility with feel good enough about you to refer you to their most valuable clients.

When an unknown person hands someone else his card, he hasn’t even gotten to “visibility” (V), yet. He isn’t even a known business person yet. After people have seen him around, seen his advertising, her people talk about him, then he becomes known. But he isn’t trusted yet. That comes with more time, and perhaps several transactions, before he builds “credibility” (C).

A better tact in a networking situation is to introduce yourself, tell people how you help your clients, and ask if there is anything you can do for them. This is a better step in the right direction in the V-C-P process.

I will continue to maintain this site at wowpromotions.com, but decided to purchase other domain names which have the term “graphic design” in them for search engine purposes. “Wow Promotions” was not intended to be the name of my company, but rather a way of differentiating my services as being “promotional” and “exciting.”  I chose to ignore another association: cheap promotional items. In my own mind, and I suspect in other people’s minds, promotional items is what “wow promotions” more closely represents.

My new site is only four pages long at this time, but embraces the types of projects I am looking for: copywriting, print design, Web and email design, and presentations. The text is intended to be fun and whimsical, yet very much about my work and perspective as a graphic designer.

I hope you will give me a visit, and share your opinion.