CreateWOWmarketing was honored to be asked to document the 2012 ABI “Taking Care Of Business” Conference in Des Moines, Iowa. Along with streaming amazing breakout sessions and documenting the trade show, we had the privilege of hearing the Keynote speaker, Jim Collins, author of “Good to Great” and “Great By Choice.” While Mr. Collins didn’t fail to deliver on the keynote (more on that later), we were ultimately BLOWN AWAY by his comfort in allowing us to take a handful of his extremely valuable time to give us his thoughts on the business environment in Iowa. Some immediate takeaways from
More Marketing News →I am not going to lie; I have only been using Skype for five months. At my last position it was used in office to ask a quick question or discuss lunch plans. My first interview with Andrew, aka The Brand Chef, was over Skype. Last night I was going through my old business magazines and ran across an Inc. article from 2005. The article was about eBay buying Skype for $2.6 billion. I thought to myself, ‘Didn’t Microsoft just buy Skype?’ EBay admitted to overpaying for Skype in 2007. This could be true, but perhaps they just bought it
More Marketing News →There are a lot of positive signs that small businesses are starting to adopt social media marketing as an integrated component of their overall business plans. One significant change, based on a February 2010 Small Business Success Index report, is the fact that social media usage among small business jumped from a meager 12% in 2008 to 24% in the following year (Yes, doubled). Of those using social media, 69% post regular updates / articles of relevance to sites like FaceBook and LinkedIn. Two additional stats that made me smile were: 54% monitor positive / negative feedback via social networks,
More Marketing News →I had the honor of working with the marketing panel and producing media for Entrefest 2011 last week. We had some spectacular speakers and some break-out sessions on marketing, sales, technology, finances and management for entrepreneurs. But as always, there were some standout sessions. Adam Steen’s (from 25 Connections) session on Networking was one that got a LOT of positive reactions. Below, thanks to Adam and the Entrefest crew, we’ have captured and re-posted the session! (sorry for the typing and my loud laughter… I was right behind the camera and couldn’t resist being involved!)
More Marketing News →In a conversation with one of my Des Moines social media buddies this morning, I was reminded that with the onset of CreateWOWmarketing, I’ve (As CreateWOW AND TheBrandChef) fell off a bit on my posting regularity. Sure, it’s one of those “The cobbler’s kids have no shoes” situations. How can I create content and meaningful posts when I’m spending 12 hours or more a day doing it for my clients? Then I remembered a post I’d written over at The Brand Chef. It kinda shook me from my “production-boy” slumber… the contents of THAT post are below. Let me know
More Marketing News →Companies are diving into social media with a vengeance. It’s like they saw the boat in the port for months (years?) and just bought tickets and boarded when they saw the mooring lines being cast off. WHY? Tracking! Everyone is out there selling the tools and the “engagement,” but no one is talking about how to measure success. We constantly hear “…what about the ROI of social media?” Well, listen up. Determining the ROI of social media marketing and your efforts through your blog/website is imperative. Too many sites have the tools installed for great engagement, but how do you
More Marketing News →Does your company have good character? I’m not talking about the people or “characters” within the company. While the people make up a very important part of it, I’m talking about the character of the company, itself. Good character, like TRUE branding, is based on a very specific set of criteria. For TRUE branding, we’ve determined that the brand must be True, Relevant, Unique and Engaging to have a strong, marketable brand foundation. But when it comes to character, there are six traits that form the strongest foundation: • Trustworthiness • Respect • Responsibility • Fairness • Caring • and
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