Nine Marketing Trends

By Deb Brown | November 23, 2015

According to CMO.com (an Adobe site) there are 9 marketing trends for small businesses to pay attention to.  They are: Binge TV watching – not only can you watch on tv, but the streaming services are providing new value.  Netflix, HBO Now, Showtime, Amazon – you can watch tv online now too. Building Media Plans…

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Be Weird

By Deb Brown | November 18, 2015

Be Weird No, really … The Small Business Social Media Summit was last month.  Over 120 small business people attended – a record number for this first time event.  The speaker line up was fabulous, and everyone left with lessons learned and a toolkit to take back to their offices/stores/businesses. Today we’re sharing just a…

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Beaujolais Nouveau with Friends

By Deb Brown | November 17, 2015

Christine, Cruzanne, Lynn and I used to celebrate Beaujolais Nouveau Day on the third Thursday in November with the new wine from the Beaujolais region from France, crepes and a long and happy meal together.  I think it’s where I started to think that everyone’s birthday was in November.  It was such a fun evening…

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What really matters?

By Deb Brown | July 27, 2015 |

My mother was born in 1929 – when the stock market crashed, when food was more valuable than most other things, when life was hard.  When Christmas came one year (she was little and can’t remember the year) all she got was this little bear.  Her brother Paul got a small truck.  That was it.…

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dot what?

By Deb Brown | July 15, 2015

They’re called gTLDs — that i generic Top Level Domains.  Now you no longer need to be a .com or .net or .org.  You can choose an extension that makes sense for your business. There are over 810 extensions now available, and don’t pay to get the list or sign up for a newsletter/email list/etc.…

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Creating a Personal Mission Statement

By Deb Brown | July 3, 2015 |

Forbes recommends that each mission statement answer these questions: What do we do? How do we do it? Whom do we do it for? What value are we bringing? In 2008 I wrote about creating a personal mission statement and came up with: I live each day with a listening, happy heart that guides me…

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Iowa is Getting Younger

By Deb Brown | July 1, 2015

According to the US Census, in contrast to most states, five experienced a decline in median age between July 1, 2013, and July 1, 2014: North Dakota, Hawaii, Montana,Wyoming and Iowa. Millennials, or America’s youth born between 1982 and 2000, now number 83.1 million and represent more than one quarter of the nation’s population. Their size…

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What’s in store for retail?

By Deb Brown | June 22, 2015

McKenzie reports that by 2020 1/3 of the worlds markets will be emerging. Retail stores will need to be leaner, denser and more in touch with their digital channels.  When it’s so easy to shop online, it’s obviously affected the brick and mortar stores.  Did you know 44% of those surveyed actually do product research…

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No Foolin’ – Google Places for Your Business

By Deb Brown | April 1, 2015

Chamber Nation handles our CRM at the Webster City Area Chamber.  In their newsletter this week they shared exactly how to put your business on Google places.   If you haven’t done so .. time to get with it!  It will allow you to show up on Google map results, on Google search results TWO…

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