Marketing

When you have a platform that gives you an opportunity to reach people, you would be foolish not to use it.

People ask me all the time why they should be willing to give away content for free. They wonder how can they monetize something if they give it away. For example, a record artist makes far more money performing than from royalties from a radio station yet they won’t get a lot of publicity without the radio station playing their music. (So why does a radio station have to pay to play?)

Having a blog or free content, like what I do with the tutorials at www.TributeMedia.com allows you to provide a permission based marketing platform. People can subscribe and then have given you permission to market to them. continue reading...

Creating a buzz is about doing something unique. You can’t be unique if you do the same thing as everyone else.

Sure, that sounds like an obvious statement, but I hear business leaders all the time talk about how they are differentiating by how they conduct business when all they do is change the name of a service or the title of the person offering the service.

Creating a buzz is about making people take notice. Creating a buzz is about making people talk about you for any reason at all.

A buzz is positive or negative talk. If you do something stupid that is unique, people will talk… you’ll have a buzz, but you probably won’t be as happy about the results.

The old cliché of “thinking outside the box” is really what it takes to create a buzz. You need to come up with something new or a different way to do the same old thing.

The fact is that you never know what will create a buzz. You never know why people will want to talk about you. So, you have to continue to innovate. You have to continue to find new ways to do things. Constantly improve. You’ll be amazed at how much people will start to take notice.

Are you interested in the back story of the picture?

I received it via email and, as I understand it, here is the back story. continue reading...

I have had some interesting conversations with some members of my business organization about the name of my company. We are getting ready to do some rebranding of our business and expand some of our services (I’ll announce that as soon as we are complete) and it sparked a great conversation on what the name of a company should be.

There were a few that I work with that felt that the name of a company should reflect very specifically what you do for your business. I really struggled with this concept. Although I think that a name shouldn’t distract from what you do, I think that if you build your business right, your brand will help others to see what it is that you do.

Your name, in my opinion, doesn’t define you. Your name, in my opinion, doesn’t define your brand. continue reading...

I am a pretty demanding customer. I think that there are many people out there who are willing to accept less from their vendors. In some cases, I think they are willing to accept less because they are pleased with the low cost. However, I think that most people don't expect better service because they have been conditioned to accept mediocrity.

While I don't believe in a "customer bill of rights" because I think that it is an easy thing to say and forget, I believe in good customer service policies that positively affect the customer experience. continue reading...

When I wrote my post on phone books, I didn't expect to get some passionate responses in the comments area. I didn't expect anyone to be so excited about phone books to argue passionately about the benefits of phone books.

One point really struck me as interesting by "kenc". He said, among other things, "The nearly $18 billion that companies spend on print and online YP speaks for itself."

His point, is that since people spend so much on advertising, it must be successful for them.

To that, I respond, "Huh?" continue reading...

So, I was doing a little maintenance on LinkedIn and saw this fancy little ad for Microsoft Vista Ultimate.

Of course, I had to click on the ad because I was curious to know what spin Microsoft was going to put on Windows Vista now trying to prove to public at large that Vista is a "stellar" product. Just because I use it, that doesn't mean that I think it is a great product.

Funny thing happened when I clicked through. continue reading...

I find it fascinating how often I.T. is assigned to the task of building a website.

For the uninitiated, this may seem like a logical thing to do. After all, a website is technology and requires programming and stuff, right? Wrong.

A very small part of a website is programming. A very small part of a website is technology.

Oh, it might take a lot of work. It might be a requirement for the site to function properly, but I.T. should really not have a say in what the customer sees... the face or the marketing aspect of the site.

In my opinion, here are the top five components of a website... in order of importance. continue reading...

I have a few servers hosting my client accounts. I spend a bit of time on occasion with technical support. I prefer the live chat option because I can ask a question and easily do other things while waiting for the answer instead of having to worry about listening... I get to communicate in my time.

I find it interesting on their live chat they have  "Real Photo" (look in the bottom right corner of the pictures). I decided to take a screen shot of the last four that I found... notice the names.

Either they are quadruplets or it isn't really a "Real Photo." continue reading...

Okay... so this is really a shameless plug, but I figure I have a large enough audience here that hopefully it will get some traction.

You may notice from my signature line that I maintain the news at OfficeProductNews.net. I have been maintaining this feed for a few months now... pretty tedious work because no one has standardized how this industry publishes information. My growing readership there shows that I am doing something right...

But, I need your help. continue reading...

I was looking at some cell phone plans today. What is wrong with this?

I love the line that says, "Whether you have one employee or thousands, T-Mobile as plans that suit your business needs." continue reading...