If you could buy only one tool for your small business marketing toolkit that single tool should be Google Alerts. The good news is – Google Alerts is free. You will need to set up a gmail account, but that is also free. On a macro level, you should have Google Alerts set up for…
An orchestra brings together a variety of instruments to create a symphony – a singular experience. It’s in the integration of the strings, horns, percussion, reeds, etc. through which the listener experiences the power of the performance. Your marketing needs to be conducted like an orchestra where a variety of marketing tactics at your disposal…
After 25 years of doing this, there is still mystery in marketing for me. The thrill isn’t gone. In fact, it rolls in unexpectedly like a fog and mystifies me. The last few days, I have seen a spike in hits to my website. While not a power user of Google Analytics, it’s like crack…
You’ve seen it all too often – cobbled together web sites that have no balance, a mish mash of disparate graphics, and an ugly mob of diverse fonts. Add an outdated or amateur logo and an assault of colors that scream decades of neglect – and you’ve got a big problem. The latest numbers show…
I am a big fan of logo’d items. Over the course of the years, I had built up a closet full of logo’d items for MIP. At the MIP Customer Conference, we used to print “MIP Money” which the customers could use at the MIP Store – stocked with all my logo’d items. We’d dole…
I want you to think back over the last 30 days, when speaking with customers, what percentage of those interactions was proactive? What percentage was reactive? These are two questions I ask business owners and senior management when I speak or consult on creating a better customer experience. Typically reactive interaction is at 70% or…
For most of my career, I have worked with consultants, VARs and software publishers. The post Y2K era saw a spike in consolidation for both the publishers and the channels of consultants and VARs representing those publishers. As a rule the consultants and VARs relied on the publisher to fill their pipeline. Ten plus years…
Nobody Talks About Boring Business – Part 3 Anticipating the ongoing needs of the customer I have been professionally associated with ERP Accounting software applications for over 23 years. I have worked with solutions like Lawson, Open System, Sage MIP Fund Accounting and Sage ERP solutions. These solutions stretch the gap between entry-level solutions like…
That title sounds pretty Zen. But ignore that, and learn from me nevertheless little grasshoppers. I would be crimson-cheeked with shame if you knew how many times a day I check Google Analytics on my site. The only redeeming aspect to this behavior and confession is that I have managed NOT to try and write…
In his new book The Referral Engine, John Jantsch writes: Highly referred businesses are good enough to make people want to talk about them, but they amplify this natural desire by making word of mouth essential to the culture. Companies create buzz with great follow-up, T-shirts and other promotional merchandise, free events, outrageous acts of…
