Marketing tips, thoughts and expert advice for small business owners and other professionals
The Benefits of Creating Evergreen Content
As a content writer, I write a lot of articles for newsletters and blogs. Most are what’s called “evergreen content”: Timeless articles that will most likely be just as true and relevant two years from now (or possibly even five or 10 years from now) as they are...
Using Marketing Positioning to Turn a Potential Liability into an Asset
When is a potential liability not an actual liability? When you can turn it into an asset through clever marketing positioning. Read on to see examples of how this can be done.
Boring is in the Eye of the Beholder
As a marketing writer, I write about a wide range of products and services. Sometimes when friends ask me about my latest projects, they seem surprised that I can muster excitement about a given topic. But to me, “boring” is in the eye of the beholder. If a seemingly...
Are You Too Close to See Your Business Clearly?
Last month I spoke with one of my clients, Nicolet Araujo of Care Patrol, to get input for her next three newsletter articles. Nicolet is a Senior Care Advisor who helps families find the right housing and care options for their aging loved ones. We had been talking...
How to Deliver Bad News to a Client
It’s a fact: Sooner or later you’ll have to deliver difficult news to a client. Perhaps you made a mistake or missed a deadline. Maybe a delivery will be delayed, prices have gone up or credit has been denied. Whatever it is, how you present the news (i.e. how you...
Complacency: The Silent Killer in Your “Marketing Garden”
As an avid gardener I’ve learned that if you want your garden to flourish, you must stay on top of things. You can’t just look out the window, see that things seem to be going well, and assume that this trajectory will continue. You must water the plants, pick the...
Focus on the Great Benefits, Not the Difficult Process
News Flash: Nobody wants to buy something that’s going to be difficult to implement. People are looking for solutions to the problems they face, and they really want these solutions to be easy. They don’t want to pay for the privilege of engaging in hard work. But...
5 Ways Writing a Book Can Help Your Business
In some fields, those who are published authors get the opportunities, while those who are not get left out. In other fields writing a book is so rare that those who do become authors really stand out. The reality is, even if it’s not a best seller (and most books...
Marketing Differentiation Lessons from a Squirrel
One morning I was sitting at my desk writing the next chapter of a book I was ghostwriting when I happened to look out the window. My office window has a fabulous view of a block wall and the side of my neighbor’s house. I often enjoy watching the neighborhood...
The Multimillion-Dollar Punctuation Error
There’s a popular meme about the importance of punctuation: What’s the difference between “Let’s eat Grandma” and “Let’s eat, Grandma”? When you leave out the comma, Grandma goes from being the dinner guest to being the dinner entrée! As a 2017 court case proves,...