Creativity
Book Marketing Lessons from a Finance Rockstar
As the President of Small Business Finance Forum, Nicole Fende, aka the Numbers Whisperer™ is a credentialed actuary with experience as a Chief Financial Officer, Investment Banker, and successful entrepreneur. She’s also the author of the new book, “How...
This Week’s Marketing Dish: Apple Nachos
Keith Pillow of Caddy Marketing submitted the first dish up for examination in my new weekly series that answers the question, “What the heck can we learn about marketing from our favorite foods?” An expert on marketing and communications, career...
Doctor Who’s Favorite (Marketing) Dish: Fish Fingers and Custard!
“New mouth, New rules!” — The Doctor Worried that your marketing sounds a lot like everyone else’s? It happens. To the best of us! Usually because we’re too insecure to throw away those sales page blueprints and email templates and create...
Biggest Business Lesson of the Year: Be (Gasp!) Human
Earlier this month, I talked about the Bears (and how to keep them from eating your business). That post sort of explains the comeback to small biz ownership I made last year. But it’s not the whole story. Nope. See, this is the anniversary of something pretty...
On the Paradox of Your (Writer’s) Devotion
It was 4 a.m. on a Monday and most of the water protectors were gathered around a bonfire near the foot of a bridge in Standing Rock, North Dakota. But not Sophia. The 21-year old woman was up on the bridge with a friend when she was hit in the forearm with what folks...
Little-Known Ways to Cook Up Great Content
This is a guest post by Adrienne Erin When writing for your blog, it isn’t always easy to come up with new ideas. Posting four to eight times a month means finding effective ways to create content that will engage and entertain readers on a regular basis. When...
Visual Marketing: A Review and Interview with the Authors
I recently spoke with Anita Campbell of SmallBizTrends.com and BizSugar.com and David Langton of Langton Cherubino Group — the co-authors of “Visual Marketing: 99 Proven Ways for Small Businesses to Market with Images and Design.” If you’d like...
Gratitude, Goals and a Turkey Day Business Tip
Gratitude is everywhere this time of year. Especially online. I’ve seen posts on Facebook every day since Nov 1st (it’s that 30 Days of Gratitude thing). Twitter is clogged with #Gratitude tweets. And today, multiple posts around the blogosphere hit my RSS...
Don’t Read the Instruction Manual: It’s Time to Improvise
Growing up in a Mormon family, I was encouraged to learn things that would develop me into the perfect wife and homemaker. How to make jam. How to sew. How to play with barbies. You know, girly things. And there were always lots of instructions for these things. A...
The PB&J Guide to Building a Tasty Brand
Peanut Butter and Jelly. Two simple, timelessly appealing ingredients. Like most of us, you probably became a fan in childhood. Of the PB&J, I mean. I know it was the only thing my little brother would eat. Period. White bread, creamy peanut butter and grape jelly...
How to be an Entrepreneurial Chef (not a Business Cook)
A few weeks ago, I finished reading Seth Godin’s Linchpin and was immediately struck by this passage: The future belongs to chefs, not to cooks or bottle washers...A cook is not an artist. A cook follows a recipe, and he’s a good cook if he follows the recipe correctly. A chef is an artist. She’s an artist when she invents a new way of cooking or a new type of dish that creates surprise or joy or pleasure for the person she created it for. I'd been mulling that over until what finally came out was my Entrepreneur's Manifesto, which starts off: Be a Chef, not a Cook.
Game-Changers Wanted: I Need Your Advice
Note: Recently, I published a post about blowing things up. That post literally got more comments than any other post I’ve ever received on this site. Clearly, I’m not the only one frustrated by the system as it exists. I’ve been getting a lot of...
Just Say No to “Fast Food” Marketing: 10 Tips for Healthy Marketing on a Budget
When you’re really hungry, it’s easy to opt for fast-food. It’s cheap and it’s quick, and it gets the job done. But a Whopper isn’t beef bourguignon. There’s about a 2-hour difference in the time it takes to create them. The Whopper...
On Rattlesnakes, Marketing and Building a Business
Rattlesnakes have a bit of a reputation. You might even call it a “brand.” Their collective brand includes stories that usually end in life and death scenarios. Very much a “handle with care” kind of item, right? So if I offered you the chance...
Brainstorming 2.0: 15 Juicy Ways to Use the Internet
When we were kids, we had no problem accessing our imaginations. We also had no Internet, barely any TV (I remember a whopping FIVE channels!), and video games? Fuhgettaboutit. When we wanted to have fun, we had to make that sh*# UP. I remember creating whole fantasy...
This Week’s Marketing Dish: Maple Pecan Chicken
Author, freelance writer and founder of The Nonfiction Zone, Cheryl Pickett, emailed this week’s suggestion. Here’s what she had to say: I can’t say this is a really a “favorite” dish because I have what I refer to as “new recipe night or new recipe lunch etc.” at...
Game-changing Dynamite: Why I Feel the Need to Blow Something Up
Ever get so frustrated with the way things are that you’d like to blow it all up and start over? Mmm, hmmm. Me, too. Especially lately. (Fair warning: This is gonna include a bit of a rant.) Why my fuse is lit: Marketing successfully — whether online or...
