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The goal of The Marketing Spot blog, the reason I write all these blog articles, is to empower entrepreneurs and small business owners with the confidence and knowledge they need to be wise marketers. Meaning: your marketing actually gets you more customers, increases awareness of your business, heightens the experience of your customers, sparks word-of-mouth about, and inspires loyalty in, your business, and allows you to create memorable advertising without wasting money. That seems like quite a big goal, but with your readership, I think we’re making progress.
It’s been a great 2009 for The Marketing Spot. Subscribers numbers have increased 391% in the past year. That means nearly 75% of subscribers started reading this blog in mid-stream 2009. That also means you probably also missed several articles that you may want to read. This is your chance to catch up over the weekend.
So in my quest to help you become a wise marketer, here are the top articles from blog this year (based on what readers find interesting). They are arranged chronologically. Start at January and then you can jump out at whatever month you started reading The Marketing Spot. As always use the search box in the left-hand column to find information by keyword or topic.
Top Marketing Articles by Month
Best of January
Starting a Social Media Program – Podcast with social media expert David Berkowitz. Is social media right for you? If so, here are the important considerations of starting a social media program.
Case Study: Branding a Furniture Store – Developing a brand for Distinctive Forest Creations in Rochester, New Hampshire.
Classic Spot: The Importance of a Logo – Logos are always a hot topic. Here’s a re-cap of the role they play in branding.
Best of February
How to Be a Social Guerrilla – Apartment industry innovator Eric Brown takes guerilla marketing into the social media space.
Marketing Basics: The Customer Experience – Managing the customer’s experience is a vital component of a marketing plan. An explanation of why and how.
How to Become the Most Popular Restaurant in Town – Why people choose the restaurant they do, and what you can do to increase the popularity of your restaurant.
Best of March
Between Selfish Giving and Doing Good: 7 Tips for Authentic Cause Marketing – Marketer Judy Dunn explains what makes cause marketing work.
Classic Spot: The Importance of Taglines in Branding – Comprehensive collection of thoughts and articles on function and construction of a good tagline.
Forget What You Know, Because You’re Cursed – How the curse of knowledge can screw up your marketing message. What to say when you know too much.
Best of April
Clever? Yes. Effective? Probably not. – Trying to be clever is rarely good branding. A disection of a billboard campaign that misses the mark.
Change Your Future (and Fortune) by Reading a Business Book – The types of business books, what you get from business books, how you should read them, as well as a few suggested titles to read.
Hit the Ground Running: Jason Jennings’ Rules for Entrepreneurs – Podcast with best-selling business book author Jason Jennings. Jennings shares the top three lessons from his latest book: Hit the Ground Running
Best of May
What’s the Best Business Use of Twitter? – Concise tips on how to best use Twitter for your business.
Five Things You Should Never Tell Your Customers – The common sense stuff we sometimes forget.
Advertising Trends: Digital Billboards – Strengths, weaknesses and best uses of the hot trend in outdoor advertising.
Best of June
You’re Wasting Your Time on Facebook and Twitter – Maybe you could better spend your time building credibility and authority through blogging.
The Ideal Small Business Marketing Plan – The foundations of a small business marketing plan, what you should include and how you should implement it.
The Complete (Thumbnail) Guide to Choosing the Right Media – The basics of how you should use traditional media, social media and the Internet.
Best of July
Powercast #4 – Marketing is Work – My video briefing on the reality of marketing your own business, including managing your time and resources.
Avoiding Easy Street – Don’t avoid trials, learn from them. The lessons we get from failure.
The Dont’s and Do’s of Naming a Business – Read this before you name a business or product.
Best of August
5 Steps to A Unique Social Media Profile – Social media is not just about showing up. Here’s how to build a social media profile that rocks, by guest author Judy Dunn.
How to Write a Blog Post, Step by Step – Writing a blog post doesn’t have to be hard. Here’s a simple process to help you crank them out.
Three Predictably Irrational Pricing Strategies That Get the Sale – How to help your customers make the decision with with contextual, decoy, and anchor pricing.
Best of September
10 Best Small Business Marketing eBooks – Facebook, Twitter, creating case studies, viral marketing, email, marketing, customer experience, and advertising. All free, all can be downloaded without registering for anything!
Marketers RoundTable – A Discussion of Current Marketing Issues – Podcast of marketers talking shop: the economy, social media spam, customer service marketing, and social media blindness. Featuring Paula Pollack, Steve McKee, Esteban Kolsky and me.
Superman, Clark Kent, and Your Brand Identity – What can the most famous of all love triangles teach you about branding? Watch this video.
Best of October
Word of Mouth is Still Sexier Than Social Media – Featuring the numbers to prove why you should be courting word of mouth and not just social media.
The Uncharted Waters of Social Media Marketing – Social media is not really free. And there is not much data to prove that it’s the best way to spend your time.
Made to Stick Messaging – Three take-aways to make your marketing messages stickier.
Best of November
Conversation Starters: Differentiation, Pricing, and Presentations – Is it really all about price and the Ryanair pricing model?
Using Facebook (For Business) Right – If you are using Facebook for business, read this article to make sure you are doing it the right, and legal, way.
The Sorry State of Customer Service in America – Customer service really sucks. Some examples that represent typical bad customer experiences, and how you can take advantage of everyone else’s suckiness.
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