Make People See Your ‘It’, A 5-Step Approach

Here’s a short story on innovation from Seth Godin that I’d like to share. It brings home what we do and why it matters. The sad, true tale of Otto Rohwedder Otto Rohwedder invented sliced bread. He focused, like most inventers did, on the patent part and the making part. The thing about the invention…

Read More

The Dark Side Of The Cloud

I am often asked what cloud computing is. Most people know the buzzwords: working in the cloud, move to the cloud, life in the cloud, etc. Technically speaking, Wikipedia says cloud-computing means using multiple server computers via a digital network, as though they were one computer. Cloud computing, like regular computing, can be broken up…

Read More

5 Social Media Must Haves

Here are the 5 things every business must do to build a community online and bring in clients via social media. 1. Website It’s your web basecamp, start here. photo © 2006 Grant Kwok | more info (via: Wylio) 2. Blog, forum, or some way of delivering active audience-focused content. I have a few clients…

Read More

The Pluses and Pitfalls of Partnerships

Many entrepreneurs and startups would never have been formed if it weren’t for partnerships –as in dual ownership of a business entity. Many depend on one partner contributing capital, while the other contributes intellectual capital; some depend on complementary skill sets, some depend on sharing time spent working on the business and multiplying what working…

Read More

Small and Medium-Sized Business Tips On Raising Your Brand

I posted this article late last fall and today I think it needs repeating. Since posting, I’ve come to realize that small and medium-sized businesses have difficulty understanding the need of developing a recognizable brand. Why would Harry’s Garage in Green Bay or The Little Doz’ Inn in Appleton, WI need a brand? Because it…

Read More

Vanity Suffixes For Your Domain, Small Businesses Need Not Apply

domain-suffixes

This week in Singapore, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which is the Internet body that oversees domain names, voted to open the control of domain suffixes a.k.a. gTLD (generic top-level domains) like .com, .net, .biz, etc. In the past they have allowed a total of only 22 suffixes. Going forward, companies…

Read More

Who Should Be Your Next ‘Go To’ Employee?

“So I have a website –now what?” That is the question I often get when a client is asking why the website they either made themselves or ‘had a friend’ design isn’t getting any results. And I mean it –ANY RESULTS. So many small business owners are not getting the point. A website is only…

Read More

10 Things You Could Do Instead Of Going To Work Today

photo © 2009 Marcy Kellar | more info (via: Wylio) I’m on vacation at the beautiful boutique hotel of Posada Yum Kin in Tulum, Mexico. So while I’m whiling away my time walking the pristine beaches or snorkeling in one of the numerous cenotes in the area, I think you should take it easy, too.…

Read More

Attention, please

Frazzled? Me, too. Leave it to Chris Brogan to help us find our ‘center’. Check out his short video entitled, “What Has Your Attention“. He sure set me straight. I think this is something that all entrepreneurs and small business folks struggle with. Sometimes there are so many choices of what you COULD do that you…

Read More

Free -and Legal- Images for Your Blog

Creative Commons Attribution Levels

For basic tips on using images online, please see our blog, Image Basics for Bloggers, from last week. What is Creative Commons? In the past, buying photography was expensive and complicated. Royalties needed to be paid and photos were limited to many restrictions on how they could be used. Then along came Creative Commons in…

Read More