World Trading Need a global network? Give this veteran a try.

Business owners are constantly bombarded by pitches for tradegroups and hot new Web sites that promise to improve theirinternational sales. But if you need a resource that has withstoodthe test of time, you should take a gander at the World TradeCenters Association (WTCA).

Jen O'Conner, director of Brooklyn Goes Global (BGG), theinternational division of the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce in NewYork City, says the WTCA has been the most valuable network BGG hasworked with. "The WTCA has given us a phenomenal number ofoverseas buyers interested in what Brooklyn businesses have tosell," she says.

O'Conner says the vast majority of the 1,200 sales proposalsBGG sent out last year on behalf of Brooklyn manufacturers (90 to95 percent of whom are entrepreneurs) came from leads generated bythe WTCA. The nonprofit, nonpolitical association, which focuses onglobal trade, provides services in 337 cities in 101 countriesworldwide. Among its dazzling array of tools: facilities that canbe used to host meetings, and a gamut of business services such asvideoconferencing, an active trade-lead operation, market researchand group trade missions. Herbert Ouida, WTCA's executive vicepresident, describes the organization as one-stop shopping for thenearly 500,000 companies affiliated with it worldwide.