This Google Entrepreneur-in-Residence Inspires Others on International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day is the time to honor women and place the spotlight on inspiring women leaders. Jewel Burks is one such woman.

[Related: #CodedWithLove, From Google]

Burks is a full-time “Entrepreneur-in-Residence” at Google. In her role, she helps small businesses thrive and flourish by leveraging various Web tools. She also offers advice to small businesses.

One of her suggestions for small business owners to take their businesses to the

next level is, “Your competitors are leveraging the Internet to grow their businesses and you should too. Get knowledgeable about the best ways to market your business online. A great place to start is our 12-week online boot camp, Accelerate with Google Academy.”

Burks is a suitable fit as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence because she is also the CEO of Partpic, a mobile app that allows you to identify and purchase replacement parts using visual recognition technology.

She got the idea for the app when helping her grandfather look for a replacement part for his tractor. The frustrating search resulted in Partpic and Burks has since raised $1.5 million for her company.

She also has a savvy team, which includes CTO Nashlie H. Sephus, another black woman, and one with a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering. Sephus specializes in writing the visual recognition algorithms for Partpic.

For Burks, the single most important trait for her success is “perseverance.”

“You are going to get knocked down all the time, so it’s incredibly important to be diligent and determined to persevere through the hard times of entrepreneurship.

Burks also offers some other helpful tips about the benefits of Google for small business owners:

-         Google has over 1 million advertisers and the majority of them are small businesses.

-         According to Google My Business (GMB), businesses with complete listings are twice as likely to be considered “reputable.” Two in 3 consumers looked for local business information on map sites/apps.

-         Also, as per GMB, complete business information can help generate economic value to individual communities. In small communities, this could be worth up to $+300k per year; in large cities, it can be up +$7 million.