Happy 4th to everyone! Hope you’re enjoying time spent with family and friends on this holiday. For fun, here’s a great apple pie recipe for your dinner today, who doesn’t love a good slice of apple pie with icecream? Grand Ole American Pie Ingredients: 1/3 cup butter, melted 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 pound Golden Delicious apples, cored, cut into 1/2 inch slices (6 cups) 1 pound Granny Smith apples, cored, cut into 1/2 inch slices (6 cups) 1 (15 ounce 2 crust) package refrigerator piecrust 1/2 cup packed brown sugar 2 tablespoons all purpose flour 1 egg, lightly beaten 1…

In today’s challenging economic environment you might be noticing that companies are cutting prices and offering additional benefits and bonuses so that they retain market share. It’s also likely that you might be finding it a longer lead time to closing the sale. It’s at times like this that if you have a strategy of creating great content – in other words educational marketing – that provides real value for your clients and customers really starts to pay off. Let’s take for example having as part of your marketing strategy a business blog with frequently published articles covering the subjects…

If your brand is your reputation (and it is), then it’s important to keep it on track. Everything that you do and say will reflect on that brand. How you say it is one of the toughest tasks when trying to keep your brand image compelling over all media. I regularly drop into blogs and business consultant’s websites to check out some tip or suggestion that I may find of use. I can’t tell you how many times, I’m confronted with a brand image that absolutely contradicts the message they’re sending. As consultants, they are by nature a people business.…

Today’s Guest Post is by Mark Nagurski from Really Practical Marketing The 2008 Olympics are fast approaching and buried amidst the flag-waving, medal-winning and money-spending you might just find a host of, not exactly inconspicuous, Official Sponsors, Partners and Suppliers. Of course, some of these associations make good sense, but, there are also dozens of Official Suppliers whose sporting links are tenuous at best. For example, McDonald’s, not best known for its healthy menu, is the official restaurant of Beijing 2008. And while Mao is no doubt spinning in his grave, it’s a perfect example of why sponsorships appeal to…

I’m back from a wonderful Canada Day Celebration we took in Vancouver, we had lunch with a beautiful view of English Bay and our youngest enjoyed some face painting. The streets were quiet in the morning but by the time we left, celebrations were in full swing and we were ready to go home to watch the fireworks. So Happy Canada Day to all of our fellow Canadian readers! This is why I choose to run my business completely online, so I can take in the wonder and memories of this beautiful life we have. Now I’m off to plan…

Have you ever had the experience of driving along, paying attention to something off in the horizon and next thing you know, you’ve driven to that spot? And it wasn’t where you meant to go? The same phenomenon can happen in your business. Most business owners I met pay a lot of attention to what their competition is doing. We definitely need to keep an eye on the competitive landscape. But there’s a very fine line. The danger in keeping track of the other guys is that you lose track of your own path. We tend to move towards what…

Even if you’re a friendly individual who has good relationships with people, you might still be an introvert who has trouble networking. In today’s business world, communicating and making contacts is everything, and just about everybody has to do it. Below are five tips on how to get connected to the right people: Networking Tip #1: Make a List of Everybody You Know Everyone you know who is relevant to your professional life, that is. Keep an alphabetical record of their names, addresses, phone numbers, and emails. Every few weeks, randomly select one of these names and make contact with…

So you’ve decided to to start taking a serious look at your corporate brand and you are left with the task of assembling your branding team. Your branding team is a group of individuals pulled from your brand’s stakeholders. They would be gleamed from the three essential groups: employees, suppliers and customers. One of the issues you will have at the end of your branding process is buy-in among employees. Stand back and take a visual on your employee group. Most are your garden-variety employee, but a few, while good workers are out-spoken and quick to judge. Other employees look…

This guest post today is by Tom Marquardt, The Profit Repairman. Stop The “What Ifs” For Your Small Business Today! Start taking responsibility for your own actions in all situations, even the ones that you cannot totally control. Do you think Tiger at the US Open blamed anybody for his mistakes (missed swings) to win on Sunday? No, he took responsibility about his business of playing Golf and became a winner today in a Sudden Death Playoff Challenge. You need to take this level of action thinking when it comes down to your small business today! If it happened to…

I can remember being a little kid and going with my mom as she changed from one bank to another. There was a display table in the lobby covered with stadium blankets, an AM/FM radio/alarm clock, an umbrella, a camping flashlight and a bunch of other cool stuff. Free gifts or incentives for changing banks. Back in the early 70’s, banking was pretty simple. Conveniences like payroll direct deposits, ACH auto payments, recurring payments and online banking hadn’t even been conceived. So, it was pretty easy to lure a customer to your bank. Offer to deposit $5 to a new…