Think you have

a busy business

 and lead a busy life?

Think about this quote

…and this 60-second bullet list!

Pretty scary stuff to be banging around your brain, eh? It’s no wonder you get yourself stressed out. Just think about the information overload comment and what’s happening in every passing 60 seconds worth of cyberspace. I mean,  any entrepreneur in her or his right mind could easily almost die or justify opting in to becoming an ostrich. 

But, no. Here you stand, taking it on the chin (and in the wallet)! You are in it, and you’re going to make it work for you because you are not a quitter, because you’ve got guts and gumption, because you believe in your ideas. What’s missing? Sometimes you teeter on the edge of not believing in your SELF. Sometimes you need a re-charge.

Well, step right up, business and professional practice owners and managers and operators and partners and investors! I know you think you’ve got a “killer” business, so I’ll tell ya what I’m gonna do: I’m going to make you an offer you can’t refuse. Are you ready?

Here’s the deal: You stop reading newspapers and news magazines and newsletters . . . stop watching and listening to news reports and programs . . . take more deep breaths than ever before . . . think more about your family than you normally do and say a few more prayers than you’re used to . . . for 21 days!

If you fail to make something of really major importance happen for you and/or your business in that amount of time –21 days, but you must follow the news abstinence path outlined– I will devote a full blog post to promoting your business interests for free plus provide you –also free– with a professional news release you can use.

I’ll even throw in step-by-step personalized professional guidance on how to make it work . . . Over $2500 worth of professional services for FREE if you fail to succeed with the approach outlined above. No strings attached. No gimmicks. I will not try to sell you on anything else, or on any extension of services.

This is a straight ahead offer.

If you are successful, you get –free– a full 45-minute customized and personalized telephone consultation on how to make more effective and more economical use of your planned and existing marketing efforts. No strings attached. No gimmicks. I will not try to sell you on anything else, or on any extension of services.

This is a straight ahead offer. 

Deadline: You have until July 29th to stake your claim. I will expect a dated, detailed report of the steps you take and the results you produced or failed to produce. You can contact me by email or phone message anytime, and I will respond promptly.

You have nothing to lose except news

(and that never changes anyhow).

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 302.933.0116

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone! 

No-cost/low-cost marketing

doesn’t happen overnight!

When you commit to spending minimal or no dollars to get your marketing message out to your target market, don’t expect miracles. Be realistic enough to recognize that a great many factors can impact your effectiveness. 

Whatever you do must be well done. If it’s news releases, you need to distribute a series of at least 5 or 6 different ones, 10-20 days apart, to a reliable list of media contacts, whose names and titles are double-check spelled correctly . . . and who are treated with utmost respect and gratitude for consideration.

Remember you are asking these people to give you free publicity. They decide if you get it or not, if your words are worthy, if they like the way you ask, if they are in a receptive mood, or if they will require you to buy advertising time or space first.

Your releases must be:

• NEWSWORTHY – Use “enlightened” self-interest, not just self-interest!

• GRAMMATICALLY FLAWLESS – Use Spellcheck. Use AP and UPI “Style” books, and Strunk and White’s Elements of Style

• 1.5 PAGES MAX, AND 1.5 – 2 LINES PARAGRAPH SPACING

• 3-4-LINE PARAGRAPHS

• ACCOMPANIED BY:

  • Your contact info
  • Interesting, captioned photos whenever possible
  • Short, personalized-as-possible cover notes that point out why each release will have interest to the recipient’s reader or broadcast audiences

If you’re using social media and/or emails (and you should be on both counts, if for no other reason than to support and promote the use of releases), think before you “Send.”

Always include a shortened link to your site. Be social. A steady stream of sales pitches, day after day numbs Twitter and Facebook and LinkedIn subscriber brains into Delete Mode.

As with your news release headline, make sure your message attracts attention without being alarmist or overstepping acceptable boundaries of good taste.

Be smart enough to realize that the economical course of action you choose for your marketing simply does not offer the same accelerated pace of providing and paying for an advertisement and getting immediate exposure.

“Free” takes time!

Expect — even when everything and every person involved in the process falls neatly into place — it’s going to take you longer than you want it to, to make things happen.

A news release that finds its way to a receptive editor may get tossed at the last minute because a major news event breaks. Coverage of that takes priority because it sells newspapers, magazines and broadcast aduiences.

That’s what sells advertising time and space and that’s what pays salaries.

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 302.933.0116

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone! 

Silence is NOT golden!

Just because you get the news release done and out, doesn’t mean anybody cares!

I ran a small “News Release” workshop recently, and was reminded of how important news releases have become in the face of government-borne economic recovery impossibilities being shoved down the throats of struggling small businesses. When you can’t afford to advertise, you twist your message into news and release it into cyberspace.

Public and community relations are free

but not easy!

The problem is that even after you’ve done a 100% perfect job of packaging what you want to say, the media people who get your release, simply don’t care. It has to suit their whimsy, sense of balance, and their boss’s mood… unless you’ve been holding hands and buying them lunches for years, and toss some advertising bucks their way!

To get around all this,  you actually do need to package your message 100% perfectly –format and content both. `It must be NEWSWORTHY.  Self-serving, salesy, promotional, and contrived releases get deleted and trashed in record time. Editors and writers and news directors are usually much smarter than the companies they work for.

You’re expecting free publicity. What you say has to make a difference for your recipient’s audience.

Every release needs a personalized, respectful, courteous cover note that thanks the recipient for her or his time and consideration. It also needs to make some kick-butt statement about what makes the attached/enclosed release important to the recipient’s audience. You need to know the readers and viewers as well as the editors and writers.

So, random “Dear Talking Head” notes? No.

Homework first? Yes.

 ————————————

 A while back, I read a blog post by Laurie Halter:

“The Press Release Is Dead.”

Don’t believe it. Especially from someone who still -archaically– calls it a “Press” release! (Though she happens to be a truly superb writer!). The point is she’s wrong.

It has simply become much harder to make news releases work, but for those who persevere and are willing to trade hard work and a tenacious follow-up effort for free exposure that is proven to be over ten times more credible than paid advertising, the return on investment can be great.

All of this of course assumes (I know, I know, a dangerous word) that you are prepared to be exceptionally creative in the manner with which you present your newsworthiness. Like a billboard or online banner, catchy short (six and seven-words max) headlines get results.

Your headline needs to attract attention, create interest, stimulate desire and –hopefully– bring about or promise action, along with offering some assurance of satisfaction. Just the headline alone? Yes, just the headline alone, in seven words or less!

The opening paragraph will ideally give the reader the who, what, when , where, why and how of what the release is all about, and do that in 3-4 lines of type. Open your release with your name and contact information (email address and phone number), and close with a standard block of descriptive “elevator speech” copy.

KEEP IT SIMPLE!

Double check that the intended recipients are still employed where you’re directing your release, that they still spell their name the same, that they still have the same title, and that the email address/address is still the same. Media people live much more transient lives than most of us. One reporter I know changed jobs 3 times in one week!

If you are the boss, don’t expect miracles. Expect that the job is time-consuming, labor-intensive, and slow to get results (on the average, it takes 5-6 releases to the same person before actual news coverage is realistically considered. If your investment is backed by skillful writing and determined energy, you will get a return.

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     Hal@Businessworks.US or 931.854.0474

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone! 

Short, provocative,

word-crafted questions

with double meanings

that make you smile

 are what sell best! BUT

they’re not waiting

to jump out

of your closet!

At the risk of looking like one of those idiotic email FWDs written by “anonymous,” here are some inspiring examples of great double-entendre marketing theme line questions. . .

• GETTING ENOUGH? (Delaware Sleep Disorder Centers)

• GOT MILK? (Who doesn’t remember the white moustaches?) 

• WHERE’S THE BEEF? (Years later, we still laugh at that one!) 

• ARE YOU BREATHING? (Stress management exercise for businesspeople and healthcare professionals)

• CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? (Verizon has us still saying this with every static crackle)

• IS IT IN YOU? (Yup, Gatorade) 

• MOUSE GOT YOUR WRIST? (Safe-Zone Stop-wrist-pain brace for computer operators)

Add your own favorites: ____________________________________

Yes, fun stuff, and hopefully inspiring. That’s the good news. The bad news is that these short sweet nothings, these provocative, punchy few words of flair do not fall from the sky.

Neither do they get dreamed up by in-house staff people who write coherent emails, business reports and plans, even news releases, church bulletins, or local fundraising flyers (or well-intentioned poetry-writing relatives with Fine Arts degrees who want to save you money).

Great headlines that slam out great short questions are the product of many years of studying and understanding consumer psychology, consumer behavior, emotional buying triggers, and professional advertising and marketing writing. That kind of expertise costs money.

It’s your call! Not every business owner or entrepreneur wants to sell products or services by identifying them and/or the brand name with a custom-created household expression. But if you do, you can’t cut corners. Top-notch sales messages sell. The exceptional ones can literally bury the competition.

Each of the examples cited above took at least a month (and probably longer) of intensive focus and concentration.

Contrary to auto dealership mentality, words that sell are not seat-of-the-pants, knee-jerk, last-minute compositions. Even with a professional marketing writer, substantial time is required to experience a process of what I call “total immersion.”

A record-sales campaign I once produced for Great Western Wine and Champagne came only after a three-month process of picking grapes, working in the winery, giving tourists tours, cleaning the vats (a time-limit situation to avoid passing out from the fumes!), and learning about processing equipment and the aging process..

I met with the glass bottle manufacturers, the cork people, the wire and foil wrapper makers, the label makers, the glue makers; I worked on the loading dock, in the front office, and out in the field with the sales reps; learning the history of wine and how the master winemakers grafted vines together to create varietals.

Don’t believe anyone who tells you she or he can write you sales-winning words without becoming thoroughly engaged with every level of your business. It doesn’t happen, even for a 2, 3, 4, or 5-word theme question or 7-word branding line.

Award-winning author/journalist Malcolm Gladwell is the epitome of this thinking. To write about John Kennedy, Jr’s piloting death plunge into the ocean at Nantucket, he hired a pilot to fly him to the same spot and dive. When you’re seeking big-time copy, find someone with big-time experience who’s willing and anxious to dive!

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Hal@Businessworks.US

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

As a writer, designer, teacher, 

artist, architect, landscaper,

jewelry-maker, stylist or stage

performer, if you’re not

risking . . . you’re not

being honest!

With special thanks to author Mary DeMuth for the three great words: “Risk being unliked” which were featured in her article, “A Smart Approach to MEMOIR” in the June 2011 issue of The WRITER.

Those of us who create for a living, who own, operate, or manage creative businesses understand immediately what the “Risk being unliked” message is all about. And does it apply to professional selling too? Absolutely.

Whether we create with computers or paint brushes; with crafts supplies, hair, or music; with classrooms or pen and paper, or with the ways we communicate our sales messages, we must –as Ms. DeMuth so aptly puts it– “Tell the truth as you understand it. If you’re a writer,” she says, “you have a moral obligation to do this.”

I propose that truth-telling applies to all businesses, even the least creative.

When your focus, your branding, your website, your messages, your employees, and most importantly YOU are all about telling the truth as you understand it, you are setting yourself up to cultivate strengthened long-term high-trust relationships. Those who unlike you for it are not those you want to deal with anyway.

Honesty is (still) the best policy!

I’m not suggesting any limitations here. What’s the best way to express this idea to people who earn their keep with their creative talents? Could there be any greater and more meaningful statement than the following six words from Shakespeare?:

To thine own self be true.

When you believe heart and soul that the line, the dimension, the color, the musical note, the arrangement, the word choice, the emphasis is what your gut, your intuitive experience, says it needs to be, go with it and don’t waste time worrying about winning a popularity contest. People will judge your authenticity, not your masks or apologies.

For ALL business pursuits, not fibbing to or misleading customers, employees, associates, partners, referrers, investors, professional advisors,  lenders, and the various communities you serve is just one chapter of your build-a-better-business book. Leadership transparency is another. Honoring commitments is yet a third. 

Delivering exactly what you say you’re going to deliver –and more– exactly when you say you’re going to deliver it is the standard by which others will continuously measure your business performance.

There’s risk involved in all of this, but as with the mark of true entrepreneurship, the risk is always a reasonable one. We’re not talking about harnessing creative spirit here. In fact, if anything, the suggestion is to set it free, and to recognize that the results produced by an honest free spirit outperform those born of smoke and mirrors.

Don’t throw the tending to details, business conduct, and tight-fisted money management out with the baby’s bathwater simply for the sake of being more expressive in the products, services, and ideas you create. But do stop cowering away from being straight-ahead with your work and with all those you come into contact with every day.

Your behavior is of course your choice. Where do you think your reputation comes from?                                            

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 302.933.0116

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Does your website sweep people

into boredom? Does it wallow in

self-aggrandizement?

Does it need a lobotomy?

I run across them every day. So do you — websites that put people to sleep faster than a week of watching C-Span (Okay, the Weather Channel maybe, for those who live inside “The Capitol Loop.”)

I get the feeling that the reasoning for these Hollywood-style overkill sick website productions –from some of the culprits who pay for them and probably close to all of those who produce them (because they get paid more)– goes something like this:

“Hey, it’s free advertising; we should take full advantage by putting in a tab for each of our 26 different color and style shirt buttons (or accounting services, or surgical procedures, or pizza toppings, or . . .)

“And then, when visitors click on any of those tabs, they’ll be delivered to a complete showroom smorgasbord of 472 applications for each of our 26 buttom colors and styles (or accounting services, or surgical procedures, or pizza toppings, or . . .)

“And then, we’ll give ’em our 183-page limited guarantee and return policy (or insurance reimbursement) requirements –in really small type of course, and in a rolling scroll window that’s just an inch high so it doesn’t take too much space and so it will give an instant ulcer to anyone looking to return to earlier verbiage that they may have passed over too quickly.

“And then, we’ll throw in 47 testimonial pages — mostly from cousins and neighbors, but who cares? We should have a few pages on why we’re “green” and some more on our “sustainability” efforts with recyclable buttons. Let’s put in maps and stuff in case anyone wants to find us, and how about a dozen pages on the history of our company since 1762? We could throw in a blog and a weekly puzzle to . . .”

It may be time to take

your reality temperature.

Websites have become burdensome. Many have lost touch with the very markets they seek to impress and influence. Others simply seem to reflect an inability to focus. No one accountant or surgeon or pizza parlor can be all things to all people. So back off. Rethink your message.

What is the one single main product or service message you want your target customers/clients/patients to see and hear? Can you spare visitors the company history that no doubt has great importance to your great great great grandfather’s uncle’s sister’s brother who founded the company. With apologies for abruptness: Nobody cares.

When a business or professional practice has a website that overwhelms, it actually UN-sells people. Visitors typically shake their heads and delete. They don’t want to know that the site sponsor can do everything under the sun. They want to know they’ve found a resource that specializes in what they need.

So, what’s the trick to be able to do that? My advice? Hire a professional writer. Forget about “SEO Experts” who will talk the dollars right out of your wallet, and the web designers who will represent your venture the way they think will win them an award, and don’t burden your staff with it. Get great content written. The rest is easy.

Like a resume, your website just needs to get prospective customers, clients and patients to your door on on your phone or in your in box. Fewer than 5% of all websites actually make significant sales.

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 302.933.0116

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

BEING TOO GRATEFUL?

Is there such a thing!

The only person who finds it annoying to hear you say “Thank You” over and over is someone who is too self-absorbed to routinely express appreciation, or just too ignorant to consider it, or who is insecure about speaking up. Many people fear being too “overkill” thankful. There is no such thing.

It’s a well known fact that human beings value and respond positively to “Thank You!” especially when it’s delivered sincerely. Don’t you? Think about it. How much can you say it? It’s never too much. Point to one single instance in the world in all of history where someone has died from being too grateful.

So how can you best cultivate all these positive responses in your personal, professional and business lives?

By letting more people know more often how much you appreciate their efforts on your behalf, no matter how insignificant they may seem.

Besides making them feel good, you’ll get more smiles and better service.

Is there anyone reading this who would not enjoy getting more smiles and better service? Really.

So start practicing when you wake up in the morning. In the bathroom mirror. To your spouse and kids. With neighbors. With fellow commuters, associates and employees, partners, advisors, investors, lenders, referrers, suppliers, vendors, visiting sales reps, OF COURSE CUSTOMERS. (Being continually grateful is the highest form of branding!) Thank the guy who fills your water glass at lunch.

You get it, right? Thank you.

Make it as much of a habit as brushing your teeth and fastening your seatbelt. It really is not hard. Simply prove to yourself how smart your brain is, and just choose it! (Thank you!)

Okay, says you, you’re just looking for work. Guess what’s the fastest way to make a positive impression to give yourself the competitive edge boost in your job search? A prospective employer (or client) takes you to lunch to size you up –to make sure you know where the napkin goes, and that you don’t order whiskey shots with your eggsalad sandwich.

You thank the maitre de or hostess, the waiter or waitress with every table visit, the bus boy who cleans off the table, anyone and everyone. If it doesn’t help you get a job offer, the prospect isn’t worthy of your talents and upbeat personality (Go back to the first sentence at the top of this post to see what you’ve got; be glad for not working there).

Oh, and while thank you’s will certainly not replace raises, bonuses, 401ks, healthcare plans and insurance coverage any time soon, you’ll be surprised how your increased use of them with employees will have the effect of minimizing these kinds of concerns as contentious issues, and there’s no better way to motivate your troops!

Try just 10 more thank you’s a day for one week, and see what happens.

You’ll thank yourself.

Then what?

What’s next?

Hmmm, well maybe think about trying “Please” more often?

. . . Hey, thank you! 

                           

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 931.854.0474

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Pretending to enjoy the

Royal Wedding Kiss when you

haven’t even had a hug

since mid-March                                                                                      

Trying to “think green” when there’s none in your wallet. Rooting for the San Diego Padres and Minnesota Twins to finally break into double digit season wins when your own favorite team is tumbling into last place. Thinking that yet another White House-prompted stomp on small business is crushing . . . until you see the tornado devastation.

Laughing with a new puppy and new baby until it’s scoop-up and diaper-change time, or waking up to wailing cries and incessant barking. Thinking that Mid-East violent turmoils are too far away to be concerned with. (Are they?) Struggling to reconcile government reports of climbing unemployment with government reports of growing job creation.

Network media news ends every broadcast with sports, weather and some new medical discovery of traumatizing side effects (including the possibility of, of course, death or extended misery, or both) from breathing air, drinking water, sleeping too long or too short, eating health food, getting check-ups, singing . . . you know the rest.

Gas prices are headed to $8 a gallon, but not to worry; it’s okay, we’re told because gas prices in Europe are even higher and have always been higher.

We’re just starting to catch up with other countries.

Oh, sorry, I should have known there was a good reason to not be upset with having to second-mortgage my house to pay for gas for my car.

Gee, I guess I’ll just take it on the chin that skyrocketing food costs result from higher shipping costs which result from higher gas prices which –advises Mr. Obama– we should just suck it up about, or just trade in our cars to get more energy-efficient vehicles so that rising gas prices don’t become an issue.

Well, of course. Why didn’t I think of that? 

Every human on Earth has a different comfort zone. Physical, emotional and intellectual comfort parameters vary as dramatically as individual personalities. Think about that before you approve the next marketing creation (and accompanying expense) that’s thrown your way. . . especially for misguided online productions: the majority.

Your comfort zone, were you to draw a circle around your body, can vary considerably depending on location, environment, circumstance, and others around you — also where you were born and raised. Human space needed to function comfortably in Hong Kong is far less than that required in rural Texas, or Manhattan vs. Waterloo, Iowa.   

Get outta my face! Get outta my space!

Just how far do you “go with the flow”? How does physical proximity impact personal selling? Presentations and demonstrations? Business meetings and lunches? Golf? Giving visitors tours of your facility? What about the use of space in your ads, banners, direct mail, packaging and labeling, client reports, promotional materials, forms?

Then there’s the past, present, and future comfort zones. We can gain great comfort from reminiscing so it’s easy to get ourselves hooked on thinking about past events, ideas, and people. The future is at least equally compelling to many. And drifting periodically for short visits into both arenas can enhance the present here-and-now moment.

Staying in touch as much as possible with the present moment is what allows us to function best and most productively day to day. It also gives us the internal emotional support necessary to make adjustments that allow us flexibility in our subjective (and generally conditioned) physical proximity comfort zones.

When you sense your comfort zone moving into the “Twilight Zone,” take some deep breaths and recognize the choice to go there or stay where you are, or cut out some new paths, is completely your own.

Your “zone” is your OWN!

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Hal@Businessworks.US or 302.933.0116

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

C’mon . . .When was the last

time you ever remember 

in your whole entire life

having a “trillion”

of ANYthing????  

Have you been listening to all the politicians talk about budget-slashing? They must be kidding!

Hey, it’s definitely no joke the economic mess we’re in. And TRUTH? Truth is -no matter who says what– truth is that we’ve got to live with it all for at least another three years. It’ll take a year and a half or more just for the new White House to undo the reckless spending tangle that the great “Hope and Change” hero created.

Business Owners Beware!

If you own a business and you’re not already working at unseating the socialism plague that’s practically brought you to your knees, you must be part of that crowd that thinks it understands “trillions.” I just read somewhere that a million dollars a day every day since Jesus died wouldn’t even add up to close to a trillion dollars.

The deal is that you must protect your budget without tearing it out by the roots. Oh wait, that’s your hair. Well, the thing is that if your business budget isn’t bare bones yet, you may already be out of hair and roots!

Here’s an example of spending priorities

that smart business owners must consider:

• MARKETING — You should be spending money for a professional marketing or branding writer to create your sales messages, but you should NOT be spending money needlessly to get your messages out.

Maybe that sounds like a “Catch 22”? It’s not. There are plenty of ways to reach your target market effectively for free, but you’d better be saying something worthy of capturing attention, creating interest, stimulating desire, and bringing about action and satisfaction, or get back to your budget board and start all over!

• OVERHEAD — Of course you have to pay the mortgage or the rent, but can you sublet part or all the space to a business that operates when yours doesn’t? Many instructional program businesses operate in evening or weekend hours. Do you have extra space you don’t need that you can separate from your workspace?

A lumberyard office building barters one small corner of space to a moonlighting graphic designer who provides the lumber company with free brochure and flyer designs in exchange for the space, electricity, and computer hookup.

• PAYROLL —Maybe space-sharing’s not practical, but what about sharing people? A centralized reception area and receptionist can save two or three or four businesses money and afford to hire a hard-working quality employee.

There’s much to be said for the old entrepreneurial “incubator” days, where all kinds of services and workspaces were shared. These included common area receptionists, centralized booked-time conference rooms, cleaning supplies and maintenance services, delivery and fuel costs, security systems, office supplies. If you can think it, try it!

• PROFESSIONAL SERVICES — When did you ever meet an accountant or lawyer or consultant or creative service person who wouldn’t be please to offer a discount for two, two, two clients in one? (Oh, that was “mints”? Sorry.)  

This kind of arrangement is especially win-win when common elements or interests prevail. Adjoining physical therapy and occupational therapy offices that both require similar electronic medical forms maintenance for insurance coverage reimbursements. A publisher and designer who both need a copyright lawyer.

Dig out your imagination here. Do the railroad track warning thing: STOP, LOOK AND LISTEN. Look around at what you’re doing from the standpoint of sharing, bartering, co-sponsoring . . . and maybe you too can “slash a trillion” or so!

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www.TheWriterWorks.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

This is an attitude message, not a sign-up or recruitment decree

Don’t let the media  

and the White House

bully you around!

It’s your business.

You’ve captained it through rough seas before.

You’ve made it this far.

You know in your heart that –as bad as this economy continues to be (in spite of all the White House and media protestations to the contrary)– you can survive the present turbulence by holding your ship steady and running the engines full ahead.

Why this message now? Because I see and hear about many small businesses getting weak-kneed and starting to actually consider caving in to all the psychological bullying messages that continue to run rampant out of the White House and the federal government’s puppet media, who have abandoned reporting for propagandizing.

Political manipulating has clearly replaced the reality of what it takes to turn around the economy. Don’t be bullied into buying all the nonsense spewing 24/7 out of the army of talking heads. Small business holds the only key to economic turnaround with genuine new job creation — real jobs that provide real career opportunities! 

I’ve had conversations with three business owners this past week (one retail, one manufacturer, and one service) who are claiming to be on the verge of abandoning most if not all marketing efforts to save money. “So board up your doors and windows too! Just toss in the towel now!” I was tempted to exclaim, but realized I’d simply be fueling the fires.

The L~A~S~T place to cut corners is marketing!

T h e   L~A~S~T   p l a c e.

No marketing, no prospects.

No prospects, no customers.

No customers, no sales.

Is that rocket science?

“Oh,” they say, “but we just can’t afford it anymore; marketing costs a fortune.”

No marketing doesn’t cost a fortune! Maybe the kinds of marketing you’ve historically done is proving too expensive to keep afloat in this killer economy, but good marketing does NOT have to be expensive.

In fact, really great marketing can be done for free or close to free when someone knowledgeable and experienced is handling it.

“Yes, but then there’s the expense of retaining those kinds of services!”   

First of all, the “Yes, but’s” run in the woods with the “Rabbuts.”

Secondly, and most importantly, there are VERY many resource people out there who have the know-how and the experience and the creative talents to put together a marketing program for you that is free or minimal expense, and that works, for far less money than you’ve been pouring into your earlier-days efforts.

Stop running! Stop doubting! Start searching! Be a detective!

If you are intent on marketing your business successfully for minimum expense and you are willing to focus a chunk of energy in finding the right individual or team who can do this for you, you will succeed!

And won’t that surprise your competitors? And (ahem!) the White House?     

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Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Make today a GREAT day for someone!