Greg Ambrosius of Fanball announced Thursday afternoon that the company has added former Mock Draft Central operations manager Geoff Stein.

While with MDC, Stein developed a working relationship with the National Fantasy Football Championship and National Fantasy Baseball Championship, which were acquired by Fanball in a deal with F+W Media last summer.

“One of my main duties at MDC was dealing with companies that licensed out our draft software, and we had no bigger client than the NFBC/NFFC,” Stein told FSB.com. “Basically, I made sure that everyone was in the software on time, and if there were any problems, I took care of them immediately. When you’re dealing with 14 or 15 people whose computer skills range from ‘expert’ to ‘knows how to turn on,’ anything can and usually does pop up.”

Stein will fill a similar role with the company as a full-time employee and will also contribute fantasy content for Fanball’s various outlets.

“Geoff has been an important part of our success as the NFBC began expanding into online pay games starting in 2006 and we believe that he will be even more important to our success as we grow our NFBC, NFFC and NFBBC satellite leagues and online Double Plays,” Ambrosius wrote in the announcement posted on the NFBC message board.

Mock Draft Central, of course, was just recently purchased by RotoWire. With Stein moving immediately into his Fanball role, MDC founder Jason Pliml remains to help transition the company to its new ownership.

Stein is a five-year veteran of the fantasy sports industry and a member of the Fantasy Sports Trade Association board of directors.

Much of the crowd at each Fantasy Sports Trade Association conference is made up of industry veterans — people who have been attending for years and have made or are making their way in the business.

When Advanced Sports Media founder Ted Kasten asked how many out in the audience were in the first two years of starting up a company, roughly half of the 60 or so people in the room raised their hands. That’s what makes a panel such as Thursday afternoon’s “Fantasy Sports Business 101″ worthwhile.

Kasten was particularly candid about his experiences through the first five years plus of ASM, from discussing the benefits (cost) and downside (just about everything else) of hiring an Indian development team in the early stages. Although he preached thrift to anyone building a new business, he cautioned against looking solely at hourly rates — saying that more cost per hour doesn’t necessarily mean greater cost overall.

Lawyer Rishi Nangia of Winson & Strawn opened things — following an intro by Geoff Stein of Mock Draft Central — by running through the various ways of setting up your company and some good and bad features of each. Many single-person startups might favor a sole proprietorship and its dearth of necessary legal paperwork, but it’s an area that new companies need to consider carefully.

Some key reasons to do so came from panelist and accountant Kipp Imel of Professional Practice Consultants. Imel pointed out that incorporating in some way can bring with it legal protection, audit protection — he said sole proprietorships are seven times more likely to be audited by the IRS — and sheer legitimization.

No matter what route a company chooses, though, Imel cautioned to keep focus on debt management, which he called “the No. 1 killer of any business.”

Tai Ward of Fantasy Coverage spoke to the tech side and warned — as Imel did about hiring an accountant — that one needs to gather as much info as possible on potential design or development companies. Seek out recommendations, ask for samples and make sure that anyone you might choose to work with understands and fits within what you’re trying to do.

The fantasy sports industry is awash in startups and small businesses. Besides presenting a good product, those that make it will be those who are smart about the choices they make when getting going.

Mock Draft Central’s Geoff Stein came in fourth in last month’s vote to fill three vacancies on the Fantasy Sports Trade Association’s board of directors, but that won’t keep him from joining the group.

Jeff Coruccini of Fantasy Football Starters has stepped away from his position to tend to outside commitments, leaving the first alternate to take his spot and serve on the conference committee.

Stein said he’s “excited” to take on that task and wants to make the events a bit more welcoming for folks who might not be as connected in the industry.

“One area, I feel where they’ve lacked in the past is creating a warm atmosphere for first-time attendees and less established members,” Stein told FSB.com. “Those conference rooms can be pretty intimidating places, and it isn’t an easy thing to just walk up to someone from an ‘established’ site and start a conversation — especially when you’re the new kid on the block.”

Stein also said that he’d like to see the conference deliver a bit more value for smaller companies just starting to make their way in fantasy.

“As a member of the board, I want to give a voice to the smaller sites,” Stein said. “Through my work at Mock Draft Central, I’ve had the chance to deal with all sites — from the guy writing a blog in his mom’s basement, to the big boys like ESPN, Yahoo and CBS.

“Whenever I’ve talked to the smaller sites about the FSTA, they’ve shown little-to-no interest, and I think that needs to change as I feel the association has the chance to offer them quite a bit — and vice versa.”

The next FSTA conference will take place in June in Chicago.

The Fantasy Sports Trade Association is holding an election for five three-year roles on its board of directors. The voting is open only to member companies, with each company only allowed a single ballot.

Members who have yet to make their selections can download the official ballot here and find the available candidate bios on the FSTA’s website. The list of options includes 17 members of the fantasy sports community, four of whom already reside on the board.

In alphabetical order, those up for election are …

Brett Baker, Fantasy Coverage (incumbent)

Craig Davis, Fantasy Planet

Bill Green, Fantasy Dispute (incumbent)

John Hartman, Pay The Fan

Scott Iverson, FLW Outdoors

Alan Karben, XML Team Solutions

Michael Mandt, Fantasy Sports Girl

Danielle MacLean, CBS Sports

Lawr Michaels, Creative Sports

Greg Robitaille, Fantasy Football Draft

Regi Simon, World of Entrepreneurship Inc.

Geoff Stein, Mock Draft Central

Scott Swanay, Swanay Sports Consulting/Fantasy Sherpa

Jeff Thomas, World Fantasy Games (current president)

Whitney Walters, The Huddle (incumbent)

Clint Webb, SportsDirect

David Wu, RotoHog