>Current Marketing Conferences Schedule

> If you’re looking to learn more about marketing and develop a marketing strategy for your business, here are some marketing and industry conferences I will be at in 2010. Optimization Summits – March 23rd, Dallas, Texas. A powerful event for small businesses. Two days, 22 speakers, multiple marketing tracts, presented in a workshop format.

4 Questions About Social Media

Four Common Small Business Social Media Questions Photo Credit: walknboston   1. What social media should I do? Look at it this way: What do your customers do? There are two parts to this. First, what social networks do your customers use? Second, what do your customers like to do on the internet? Your real

>What to do About Pricing? Learn From Walmart.

> Walmart has a not-so-secret plan to crush what’s left of competition and it’s called Project Impact. But it’s not another devastating round of price reductions. What is it? Customer experience enhancement. Even Walmart understands that people don’t want the lowest price, they want the best value. Walmart’s Project Impact could be called Project Eliminate

>Gone Diving

> I’m taking a few days off from blogging (and everything else) to spend some quiet time in the Caribbean with my wife. Be back soon with more small business marketing stuff. Photo Credit: gaminrey

The Brand-Building Checklist

It was two months ago that I declared January, “Build an Awesome Brand Month.” To back it up, tagline expert Jim Morris and I teamed up for 8 blog posts and a free webinar to help you build your awesome brand. So 45 days after the webinar it’s time for a progress report. How are

Consensus is the Enemy of Branding

By consensus, I mean letting people vote; getting everyone’s approval that you are creating the right brand identity for your business. Yep, I said enemy. For these two reasons: 1. By definition, consensus is mediocrity. It’s obtaining everyone’s general agreement. It’s an agreement reached by the group as a whole. That’s not the way to

>Creating Remarkable Customer Experiences is About Two Things

> Remarkable customers experiences don’t just happen, they are carefully planned and orchestrated. A couple of years ago I developed a tool to help small businesses with this task. As of this writing the Customer Experience Map has been downloaded from this blog almost 800 times. (Revised and updated version is coming this Spring) The

How to Make Your Advertising Not Suck

Advertising that sucks is pervasive. In fact, most advertising sucks. Which is good for you, because it makes it easier for your good ad to stand out. The challenge for you is to create excellent advertising. To do that you answer the question: What makes advertising suck? The answer does not lie in the ad.