The Marketing Spotlight

There’s a lot coming at us in 2012. From mobile marketing and social media, and from an election and poor economy. So we need to be prepared to make good use of our marketing and advertising dollars. This week, we start with a social media reality check. Yes, mobile phones and social media are growing [...]

Article first published as Small Business Conquers the Corporations on Blogcritics. Little Dudes and Divas is going head-to-head with the likes of Nordstrom, Macy’s, Babies “R” Us and even Diapers.com. This small business does 90% of their sales through the internet and the rest through their brick-and-mortar store in Rockaway Park, N.Y. Even with the [...]

There are two great articles I came across while researching this week’s show. One is from USA Today. It’s about free applications that let you find your laptop or smartphone when they’re lost. I got a lot from reading this one. The other is from ComputerWorld. It’s about securing your wireless network. The cool thing [...]

Is capitalism dead? The stories this week on Social Media: Cheap and Easy are all about companies that claim to be capitalist. Are they? Or are they just profiteers and opportunists who no longer understand the meaning of capitalism? In the latest effort to establish an e-book lending library, Amazon is putting forward their plan. [...]

Welcome to our newest members. 1485 new readers have joined us in the last 7 days. Your readership and participation are much appreciated. There’s been a sort of explosion in small business using websites, social media and e-mail over the last year. Unfortunately, the results aren’t what everyone was promised. Let’s have a look at [...]

Applying Business Sense to Fundraising & Social Media We just finished an interview for Social Media: Cheap and Easy with Bill Garlough. I know, you’ve never heard of Bill Garlough. That’s okay. We’ll be meeting a lot of business owners we’ve never heard of. That’s because it’s important for all of us to see examples [...]

Are You Smarter than a Highway? Ever hear the phrase “Dumb as a post?” Or “Dumb as a box of rocks?” How smart is the typical roadway? Right. Not very. And that may be about to change. Here’s a video I saw this morning on a Rotary e-Club site: Nice video, yes? And how, you [...]

I just had a conversation with the Executive Director about building the list for her non-profit with direct mail. It was interesting, and there are some good points to share. First, she’s under pressure from her Board to increase the number of names on the mailing list. Now, this is just “let’s get it done” [...]

This started out being a hard read, but now that I’m over halfway through I’m liking it. The concept is simple. Imagine there are 3 circles around you. Inside the first circle are your friends and family. The second circle holds clients, and the third circle is everyone who likes what you do. Seth doesn’t [...]

The Glocal Wave and the Future of The Marketing Spotlight Can you stop marketing, take a break, and still come back to success? Yes, you can. When Friends, Followers and Customer Evangelists: The 2010 Business Owner’s Guide to Social Media (#FFCE) was being prepared, David Hancock (Founder, Morgan James Publishing) asked me to stop marketing. [...]