VESTAL — Elin Barton is ready to launch her next great adventure at White Knight Productions after successfully competing in the Make Mine a Million $ Business (M3) competition over the summer.
That adventure involves taking all that she learned by competing in the contest and pairing it with the prizes she received as one of 30 winners of the July 31 event to grow her video-production business to the $1 million revenue mark.
It’s a goal she hopes to accomplish by the end of 2013.
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Barton, president and CEO at White Knight, first learned about the M3 contest when she attended a workshop for women entrepreneurs in April. While at the WISE Symposium (www.wisecenter.org/Symposium/event.asp), held in Syracuse on April 3, Barton heard Nell Merlino, founder and president of Count Me In for Women’s Economic Independence, talk about the contest, which her organization sponsors. Barton decided on the spot that she would enter the contest.
“I just really wanted to do this,” Barton says. “I wanted to make my business a million-dollar business.”
Barton traveled to Barnard College in New York City for the event, where she would give a two-minute “elevator pitch” about her business to a panel of judges. It’s a lot harder than it sounds, she says of crafting a successful pitch.
Fortunately, she says, all participants were able to give a practice pitch before a panel of business coaches. While she didn’t walk away from her pitch with glowing reviews, Barton says she did emerge with an understanding of what information is important to include and how to present it.
“It taught me that what I thought would resonate with the audience wouldn’t, and I had to have a better story,” she says.
Barton spent that evening revising her pitch and went on to give a winning pitch the next day.
“I’m very, very excited about it,” she says of winning the M3 contest. One great perk that comes with winning is six months of free coaching and business education. “It’s wonderful,” she says of the coaching, which takes place once a week. “I’m learning a lot.”
Along with the coaching, Barton also receives a one-year legislative membership to Women Impacting Public Policy (a nonpartisan public-policy organization that advocates for women and minorities in business in the legislative process), special consideration for public-relations opportunities throughout the year, and inclusion in the Make Mine a Million $ Business Yahoo group. Barton says she plans to take advantage of all of those opportunities and looks forward to networking with other women entrepreneurs.
“I think this is going to have a huge impact on my business,” she says of the entire M3 experience. In recent years, her revenue has grown about 30 percent a year, but she’s already raising her goals after participating in M3.
This year, Barton’s goal is to grow White Knight’s revenue from $388,000 in 2011 to $500,000. She plans to follow that by growing to $1 million in revenue in 2013.
That type of drive and ambition is what M3 and Count Me In is all about, Nell Merlino says.
“It is about really encouraging, inspiring, and instructing women to think bigger about their business,” Merlino says. The focus is on women, she adds, because while there are 27 million businesses in the nation, and women own about 40 percent of those businesses, only 1.8 percent of women-owned businesses reach $1 million in revenue. That translates to about 240,000 businesses at the million-dollar level, Merlino says. There are about 1 million male-owned businesses with $1 million or more in revenue.
“There’s a real need in the business community for the women to catch up and surpass the fellows,” she says. That’s where M3 and Count Me In help, by providing women entrepreneurs the training and the tools they need to reach that goal.
White Knight
For Barton, those benefits are already paying off as she makes changes that will help grow White Knight, she says. One change is the addition of new services that put her video-production company on par with a full-service advertising agency. New services include branding, strategy, and media buys.
In addition, Barton is looking to hire some new employees to expand her current staff of three. “I’m looking to add two full-time employees and one part-time employee in the near future,” she says. “I really need another person in production, and I really need a business-development person.” She also hopes to hire an administrative support employee.
Headquartered in 3,000 square feet in the WSKG building at 601 Gates Road in Vestal, White Knight Productions (www.whiteknightpro.com) offers a full line of video-production services including storyboarding and scripting, casting talent, location scouting, high-definition production and post-production services. The company recently completed a STOP DWI media campaign for the state. Other clients include Binghamton University, NBT Bank, and United Health Services.
Barton and her husband, John, founded the company in 2009 after operating a home-based video-production business for several years.
Contact DeLore at tdelore@tgbbj.com
