This is an excerpt of an article I originally wrote for Entrepreneur.com: Over $500 billion is spent on advertising each year. The average American is exposed to an estimated 3,000 ads per day. Fifteen minutes out of every hour of television programming is devoted to commercials. That’s a lot of marketing. And a lot of marketers. With six million companies in the United States alone, that's a lot of people competing to get their message out. How do you stand out from the crowd? How do Continue Reading
Know Thyself: The Link Between Brand, Business Plan and Marketing
Let’s talk about the big picture of your life and goals. Let’s talk about high-level strategy for a moment. Forgive me for writing this as a business topic. However, frequently that’s what makes the world go round on Earth at the moment. Commerce, finance and organization are somewhat necessary to get anything done—even in the arts. Thus, my interest in the area. If you want to make a large effect, it’s necessary to form or join a group. When you do this though, you’re instantly committed Continue Reading
5 Steps to Marketing That Resonates With Your Prospects
This is an excerpt from one of my articles published on Entrepreneur.com. You can read the original here. From a marketing standpoint, the internet is a hurricane of competing messages, publicity stunts and celebrity endorsements shouting at everyone who logs on. Really, it’s a problem of “tuning out.” There are so many messages out there that the only way people can cope is by tuning out all the sales chatter. The people you're trying to reach are lumping you in with all the other marketing Continue Reading
Successful Marketing: What’s The Real Bottom Line?
This post is the last installment of seven-part series called “The Fundamentals of Internet Marketing.” To read earlier posts, visit Part 1: Introduction, Part 2: Definitions, Part 3: Strategy, Part 4: The Tools, Part 5: The Skills or Part 6: Communicate! At the end of the day marketing is about making sales. In the words of advertising genius David Ogilvy, “If it doesn’t sell, it isn’t creative.” So true. Marketing is about leads. It's about sales. It's about closing. To get serious Continue Reading
The Obvious Secret of Marketing: Communicate!
This post is the sixth section of seven-part series called “The Fundamentals of Internet Marketing.” To read the earlier posts, see Part 1: Introduction, Part 2: Definitions, Part 3: Strategy, Part 4: The Tools or Part 5: The Skills. Marketing is simple. It can seem mysterious and highly technical: Gurus talk a blue streak about the techniques they use. People scream from the rooftops about how you’re doing it wrong. Books upon books and blogs upon blogs make it seem like an immense Continue Reading