resources
Budget to increase profit.
How to be a room shifter.
Compelling stories sell.
One-size-fits-all—except when it doesn’t.
Choose your words carefully!
Where did the curiosity of our youth go?
There are plenty of tools at our disposal at any given time, and we have to know when and how to use them to fix our clients’ problems. You’re running your business and it’s not necessary for you to understand how to apply those five critical tools we use in our business . . . you just have to know who to call.
What is happening in the sports world that applies to those of us in business and industry?
Through the years, I’ve shared my professional background in television advertising sales. As a salesperson, I kept a close eye on the annual Emmy Awards. The more awards our shows won, the easier it was to sell commercials to advertisers – plus it was more fun to brag when you represented a network affiliate that won a big haul.
It’s one of the most powerful sources of information in the world. One could make the argument that Google is the most influential resource known. Its impact is hard to measure, but the company remains omnipresent.
Some of us have thrived for years in the environment of the face-to-face meeting. It’s meant we’ve been able to read a room, notice body language, and maybe build rapport with someone based on the photos in their office or by identifying with...
Everyone there was in attendance to see Branford Marsalis. The famed musician was the main attraction for...
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Little things can make a big difference though – especially in commerce. One of the first questions I ask a new client is...
Sometimes you come across a person who just rubs you the wrong way. It happens to all of us in business (or education or healthcare or not-for-profit foundation work). That’s because those people are everywhere.
Money is a great motivator. Generally we can all agree on that concept and, as the holidays and the end-of-year bonus season approaches, it’s worth noting that most everyone is motivated by mo’ money, mo’ money, mo’ money. (That’s a 90’s comedy sketch reference for those not as old as I am.)
If you are a human being in a typical office work space, you're probably one who uses email. More likely than not, Yahoo, Gmail, or even AOL email rules your world. I
As many of you know, not only do I handle marketing and advertising at B2C Enterprises, I also work as a career firefighter/engineer in Chattanooga, Tennessee. One of the things we do is plan for emergency incidents before they happen, or, in firefighter shorthand, pre-plan.
Immediately I have to decide….Is this a “not sure what to ask you so I’ll just ask the simple how is business question”, or are they genuinely interested in the affairs of the marketing and advertising agency I run?
They were great trips, but as Mom so rightly pointed out, they came at the very end of the summer. Before the trip there was wiffle ball to play, swimming to dive into, friends to ride bikes with, girls to meet, smaller family trips to take, and movies to watch.
Except it's not - it's really quite simple. Naturally, I like to write - hopefully you can tell that from the energy that goes into delivering some value to you with these monthly pieces.
How to be a room shifter.
Where did the curiosity of our youth go?
“We’re actively recruiting for…..”
This is a phrase, or even a buzzword, that c-levelers and human resources management types often toss around without a lot of thought.
Remember the old saying, “curiosity killed the cat”? Well, the lack of curiosity has done-in more than a few businesses and leadership teams. Strong questions make a big impact.
Mister Starr was my 10th grade geometry teacher. I didn’t do so well in his class. I do, however, remember him clearly reminding our class to “check your work”.
We enjoy giving it as a gift to our clients at the holidays. I also love to meet with clients, and prospects, and potential employees as they drink it. While I feel like I should enjoy a cuppa joe, the reality is: “I do not drink coffee!”
About twenty years ago, in a city far from where my agency is located, I learned a valuable life lesson.
Gathered with me in an old room with dated furniture on a cloudy fall day were 12 people who I’d never met prior to that week. A few days before, we went through a tryout of sorts, and that was also a strange experience. I always wanted to...
People want to improve. Well, most people do anyway. They’ll talk the improvement game. They’ll go to conferences. They’ll read those books. Most will target a...
On the first night of November (which did seem weird), the Houston Astros captured their first-ever baseball World Series Championship. Just four years ago they were the laughingstock of the baseball world and had lost over 100 games – a near record for futility.
In the marketing world, we tend to be heavily focused on the next month, quarter, or year.
I will often judge how much we’ll enjoy an act at The Spot based on one natural interaction: I watch how the artist treats our magical, kind, and helpful sound engineer, Travis. If they care for him and treat him well, their performances are almost always extra enjoyable.
B2C Enterprises invests over a million dollars in media most years, while at the same time, interacting with salespeople from at least seven states. That’s a lot of business transactions and a lot of sales appointments.
Use someone else’s informative and entertaining story until you create your own to share. I did this when I was younger and I also did it seven years ago when I started my advertising agency.
They’ve ruined the process for many. Certainly they’ve made a lot of work for those who genuinely do put their prospects' best interests first. Typically when a salesperson walks through the door, the potential client leans to the position of distrust. It may be unfortunate, but it’s generally the case.
You get in and settle into your job and before you know it, the realization hits there are lots of other things that need to get done.
Recently I was watching the movie “Inception”. I had seen it before and understood most of the plot, but this time something else caught my attention.
Throughout the years I have written a lot about your message and how to craft what you want to say in your marketing, business development and advertising. Here’s a simple B2Seed reminder for your ongoing consideration…
There was something at the front door. It was the 2012-13 Yellow Book, but it could have just as easily been the Easy to Use One, the Verizon one or some other one. Phone books.
These days there are smart phone aps that allow you to stand in one store and check a competitor’s price right then. If the other location has something cheaper – you leave, go across town, and buy the same item for less money.
While I am no expert in the area of Food & Wine, even I know good wine needs time to breathe. A steak fresh off of the grill needs a few moments to settle before being served.
Like many of you, I have been following the activity over there and watching what happens. Back in the spring Facebook was an integral part of the Egyptian revolution as we witnessed a government in place for decades crumble in days.
The concept of social media marketing, web site marketing, or even that very first and most simple step of building a web site should start with an even more basic question.
To him it wasn’t really anything against State Farm (I breathed a sigh of relief for Big Red). It was that he really liked Geico.
There seems to be a bit of a flurry lately. In the past three or four months I have had a number of companies and organizations reach out to me to ask about their web sites.
For years I have explained to clients that it isn’t necessary to put all their information and statistics in a commercial or have the staff standing in front of the business waving --- in order to get viewers to notice them.
Splinter audiences, narrowcasting, multiple channels, niche marketing…these are all relatively new terms used to describe the extreme targeting of smaller, more interested audiences.
There was an internal battle I had to work through. Last month I wrote about Nick Saban and his approach to changing a culture.
It’s usually pretty easy to come up with a mission statement, a distinguishing characteristic of your organization, or even a unique selling proposition for your company. Leaders frequently focus on these concepts.
I listened to a recent radio broadcast of a college basketball game. The teams were moving up and down the court at a fevered pace. There was lots of movement and action – not any scoring.
When you are brought in to tidy up and refocus a half dozen advertising sales departments over a few decades you’re bound to notice some consistencies. This is the best time of year to note and begin to change one such pattern in your own business.
I knew exactly what I was going to write about until I opened the Wall Street Journal one morning and saw the following headline: Cain Never Prepared for the Storm. Herman Cain. Remember him?
Most every one of my clients is in the budget preparation and planning stage…it is the season after all! Many of you are coming out of some tough times and all the expenses that can realistically be cut have been. To best make these cash flow numbers work for everyone you simply must take another look at the revenue side.
It’s important to get new customers. It’s even more important to keep those customers. Two current business partners of mine specialize in that.
As judges, we had the opportunity to ask questions as we evaluated their plans for the club. Never being one to shy away from stretching young minds -- I focused several questions on the issue of thinking ahead.
Where did the curiosity of our youth go?
You’re always marketing. There’s no rest. It doesn’t matter if you are a start-up, a tech company, a retailer, a home services expert, or anything else. Whatever you do in business or industry, you’re always marketing yourself.
It’s been well documented in past B2Seeds that I wasn’t the best math pupil. In fact, I never even made it to high school calculus. It certainly didn’t help that we weren’t allowed to use calculators on tests. I do remember wondering why I had to work out those problems by hand when my calculator could do it for me!
When I started this company 14 years ago, Public Relations wasn’t a focal point of our new firm. Back in those days, we farmed out press releases, press conferences, and even media training. My background was in the television media business, so I was more focused on the advertising side of things in our industry.
Some of the best ideas are stolen (may I more politely say borrowed).
Over 30 years ago I was a TV sales manager who called on business and ad agencies in Michigan. One agency founder had a fun title on his card, and I remembered that. Fifteen years or so later, when I started my company, I decided I wanted to have some fun with our titles, as well. Internally we all know what we do, but externally, we like to poke a little fun at the formal titles and let our experience and sunny outlook shape the language that distinguishes us.
Over the past five years we’ve built nearly 70 websites. Some have been from scratch, but many are conversions of sites that needed updating, a more modern look and feel, or to better reflect the shifting work our client is now doing.
I remember one in particular where our client insisted over and over that the information on their current (dated) website would simply transfer over to the new design we were doing. No matter how often we asked, we got the same answer. They would not need new copy. When we showed them...
A budget is a plan.
That’s all it should be.
Let’s be honest at the start of 2020 people were not calculating how to incorporate the adjustment that would come from a worldwide pandemic. No matter what type of industry in which you operate, there were far-reaching ramifications and everyone had to adjust. The budget situates you for success, growth, and should allow you to figure...
From all accounts, Zoom calls are going to remain a part of the business day.
For years companies ran WebEx, Teams, and other video conference meetings, but it wasn’t until 2020 that we all started playing in that arena on a regular (read: daily, or even hourly) basis. That shift was startling to many...
Late last year something happened in my business’ sales cycle and it got me thinking.
To support another organization, I placed a call to a friend of mine whom I had known for about a dozen years. In the course of the conversation about this other topic, he asked me about marketing and advertising. He wondered how we help clients...
The year was 2003 and sequels were all the rage – The Lord of the Rings, Matrix, and Terminator movie series were topping the box office. Speaking of Terminators, it was that year that Arnold Schwarzenegger became California’s Governor too. The government was...
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