Why should your customer buy from you rather than your competitor? The answer to that question is your “competitive advantage”. The product specs, the pricing options, the user friendly interfaces, the service quality, the whatever-it-is that convinces folks to buy from you when they’re in the market for what you’ve got. You might be shocked, […]

by Monique de Maio If you’re running a small business, you need talent just as badly as the big guys do—but you don’t need thousands of dollars in operating costs. You don’t have a dedicated HR team to handle payroll and benefits packages; you don’t have an aggressively air-conditioned office in a high rise; you […]

by Monique de Maio I had a big win the other day. The contract was enough all by itself to keep me busy for a few months. As soon as the deal was locked up, I breathed a big sigh of relief, I did a little happy dance at my desk—and started planning how to […]

by Steve Facini In Arthur Miller’s famous play “Death of a Salesman”, the main character, Willy Loman, is a salesman trying to reach the American dream.  He is a man obsessed with trying to become sucessful, or at least happy, but he encounters many unforeseen problems that lead to his tragic death. Now, almost 70 […]

If you sell a physical product or service directly to consumers, you’ve probably at least considered running a promotion to help boost flagging sales. Sometimes it even seems like you have to do it, if every single one of your competitors is running some kind of holiday coupon or discount. For some businesses, however, it […]

by Steve Facini When I attend business conferences, the thing I am most careful to prepare isn’t my business cards or my elevator pitches—it’s my etiquette. Being respectful, acting with integrity, and being thoughtful with others’ time is the key to squeezing the most value out of every handshake and every minute spent away from […]

Do you want the long answer, or the short one? The simple reason that you should never treat your customers like they’re stupid is that Why You Should Never, Ever Treat Your Customers like they’re Stupid. What do I mean when I say not to treat your customers like they’re stupid? Well, for one, I […]

by Steve Facini In addition to their normal responsibilities of managing client portfolios, navigating a complex regulatory environment and trying to figure out where the economy and stock markets are headed, Financial Advisors sometimes feel that they should also be experts in digital marketing.   Though the basic tenets of marketing remain the same – developing […]

I was reminded recently of a piece of advice offered by Tim Ferriss in his book “The 4-Hour Work Week”. While Tim presents some game-changing strategies for being more productive and re-evaluating your career priorities, some point out that a few of his suggestions are less than ethical. One such case study within the book […]

I recently had the good fortune of leading a roundtable discussion at The Transformational CMO Assembly hosted by the Millennium Alliance. Participating in the discussion was an all-star group of marketers spanning several categories who graciously shared their unique perspectives on the current state of marketing.  The group included: Jason Angrisani – Bloomberg L.P., Jerome […]

Is your blog turning people off? Once you win the battle of getting traffic to your site, you need to impress them enough to stay, read, and absorb your message. Otherwise you’ll have wasted all the time and dollars you spent getting them there. These five common sins of blogging are seen all the time, […]

I’ve been running into an all-too-common scenario at conferences and networking meetings: the death of the elevator pitch. When asked what their business does, I see far too many people who don’t (or can’t) explain it in the time it would take an elevator to reach their floor. I hear the word “ummm”, “well,” and […]