Here’s the definition offered by the American Marketing Association for Marketing.
Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders.

Marketing is not Sales - The best sales people have marketing skills, but the [...]

                       
The other day, I met a personal trainer who was telling me about her career. She was in great shape and obviously lived her profession.
“I love it,” she said, “but they want me to sell it to people in the health club. In fact they want me to interrupt people who are working out [...]

Business in facility planning, architecture, engineering and construction is not easy to come by. The pressure is on your business development function to produce. How are you going to make sure your sales effort has its very best chance for success? Smart marketing and attention to your brand is more important than ever. Offered here for [...]

John Morgan’s book Brand Against the Machine begins with the premise that the model of marketing with tactics designed to bombard a mass audience is flawed. He tells us the system is broken. Messages are unwelcome and unwanted. We need to stop marketing to people and start marketing with people. John is an expert in digital [...]

Necessity is the mother of invention.  It’s true.  The world is slowly emerging from the Great Recession and we’re seeing a paradigm shift.  How business will be done in the future has changed.  The business world is wiping the slate clean and developing new rules of play.
In this new marketplace is great opportunity.  Individuals in [...]

                       
I was reading Tony Rubleski’s blog, Why Customer Service is Vital to Marketing Success, on Indysmallbiz.com, and I was quite taken with the above line, “When you show up often, often good things happen.” It’s not exactly the way he said it, but it’s pretty close. The point was, staying in front of your current customers [...]

                     
Marketing and advertising are illusions for many people. Their theory is to throw something against the wall and hope it will stick. Not so according to Alan Baker, President and Founder of Creative Marketing Concepts in Latham, New York. Alan, a guest on my radio show indysmallbiz.com, gave me the scoop on what it takes to [...]

Writing plays a crucial role in so much of what goes on in the multi-billion dollar global construction business. The Architecture/Engineering/Construction (A/E/C) world includes many highly technical people, but the left-brain bias can sometimes lead to a shortage of right brain articulation.
Consider the following illustrations. In each case writing can be a difference maker.
Grant Writing [...]

When I was a kid, my mom would motivate me by giving me an incentive when I did a good job. Of course I worked harder to get the goodies. In her own way, mom was a psychologist; she understood motivation. Incentives work for both employees and customers. Incentives should be viewed as added value [...]

While talking with some retailers about their businesses, they showed me a thank-you note with the above as the greeting. Inside the note was a small packet of espresso coffee. Really clever huh?
How about World Nutella Day? This was on February 5, 2011, and what could be better? How about create your own special day? I just [...]