Okay, let me just say up front… I know this post is going to offend some people. I debated writing it for that reason, but the idea struck me as so humorous (or ironic) that I couldn’t resist. I was listening to a bit of a teleseminar the other day taught by one of the [...]
Creativity “on demand”
September 23, 2010 By 2 Comments
Yesterday, I coached a client around the question of how to keep moving forward with marketing and product/service development when the spark simply isn’t there. Now for the most part, I think that what we create is far more brilliant when the spark of passion and creativity is present. Anything less, and it runs the [...]
Taking the “Ick” Out of Marketing
August 30, 2010 By 1 Comment
There’s a growing unrest I’ve noticed taking root in the Internet marketing world. Purpose-inspired entrepreneurs are getting downright sick of the manipulative marketing techniques and tactics taught by many of today’s business and marketing gurus. Marketing in its purest essence is simply communicating you to the outside world. Which isn’t a bad thing at all! [...]
Passion vs. Profit
August 26, 2010 By Leave a Comment
There’s no question that the quickest, easiest path to big profits in your business is to help your clients make more money. It’s a simple translation… they see they can make more money working with you, so they are quicker to hand over money to you in return. I’ve been hearing an interesting theme among [...]
The Problem With Niching
August 11, 2010 By 1 Comment
Most business and marketing experts will tell you that one of the first things you need to do in your business is choose a niche. Heck, I used to teach that! The right niche can make it much easier to market your services and can dramatically speed up the growth of your business. So yes, [...]
The New Currency of Business
August 9, 2010 By Leave a Comment
It used to be that succeeding in business simply required some sort of product/service differentiation, reasonable pricing, convenient packaging, and decent customer service. All fronted by slick marketing designed to persuade the customer why they couldn’t live without you and push them into a buying decision. That was the old currency of business. To be [...]
Which Came First…
August 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Which came first… your product/service or your clients’ worldview/lifestyle? As marketers, I think it’s easy for us to believe our product or service comes first and radically changes the worldview or lifestyle of our clients. Not actually so. People typically buy into businesses, products, and services that reflect some aspect of the worldview or lifestyle [...]
A Culture of Manipulation
July 23, 2010 By Leave a Comment
I cracked open Start With Why the other day and was immediately struck (chagrined, even) by the overwhelming culture of manipulation we indulge in the Internet marketing world. The author, Simon Sinek, outlines the common categories of manipulation — those things we speak to or leverage with our marketing — as price, promotions, fear, aspirations, [...]
Marketing methods & media channels – are you too diluted?
May 27, 2010 By Leave a Comment
I have long promoted the idea that business owners should choose up to three core marketing methods–and no more!–to promote their business. Otherwise, you wind up too diluted, and you aren’t able to effectively connect with your audience through any of the channels. Which equals tons of “busy work” on your part and not a [...]
Forget Process — What Really Works In Marketing
May 3, 2010 By 1 Comment
As business owners, we tend to fall in love with our processes and the “technical” aspects of what we do. We spent hours getting trained in the procedural know-how of our craft and often many more hours carefully setting up our processes for working with clients. So it can come as a rather disconcerting shock [...]
