Small Business Trends

There hasn’t been very much written about Foursquare.  When I did a search for the number of books on Foursquare compared to Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, I wasn’t surprised to find that Facebook had the most and Foursquare had the least.  Twitter came in at number 2 and LinkedIn at number 3.

Like with many other social media channels, I Read More

If you’re looking for a crash course on sales, or a sales refresher course, and don’t want to read a lot or learn a rigid sales system that some author says you absolutely positively must follow precisely — then Up Your Sales in a Down Market is a book for you.

Up Your Sales in a Down Market: Read More

At the end of each year and into the beginning of the next, we take stock of where we’ve been and where we are about to go.   TV shows and magazines look back on the significant events of the year, and then prognosticators predict what’s yet to come.

One of the best prognosticators out there (although he may not take Read More

The one time I uttered the words ”love” and “customer” in the same sentence I practically got laughed out of the boardroom.  That was 17 years 3 months and 5 days ago and as you can tell by my razor sharp memory of the event, my ego is still smarting a bit from the experience.

So when I first read Read More

Author Joel Libava and I have been colleagues and friends for a few years through our relationship with Small Business Trends and its founder, Anita Campbell.  Of course, living in Cleveland and seeing each other from time to time doesn’t hurt either.

I’ve watched Joel grow his Franchise King brand over the years. Naturally, I was thrilled when Read More

If you’re looking for a business book to read on a holiday flight (or even one to read to get away from the chaos of family), here are some great ones to look at. Here we give you just a taste of three fantastic business books. It’s your job to read them!

Engagement from Scratch!

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What is it that drives people to start their own business? An economy that isn’t hiring; the desire for flexibility in your schedule; or the drive to achieve a long-held dream of building a business that’s bigger than us personally — these and many more reasons drive us into startup mode.

Whatever your reason for starting a new business, you’ll Read More

Deborah Shane, author and branding strategist, once coined the phrase “raise your business metabolism.”  It refers to increasing the pulse of how a business responds to its environment.

Given the increased spending expected for social media campaigns – Forrester predicts $4.4 billion in social media interactive spending by 2016 — it should be no surprise that businesses are Read More

Not long ago at the huge BlogWorld Expo, I met Warren Whitlock in person for the first time.  Warren is someone I’ve known through social media channels for years, but had never met IRL (“in real life”).  I was delighted when he gave me an autographed copy of the new book “Profitable Social Media: Business Results Without Playing Games:” Read More

One fact about business (and life): Dealing with people can be like swimming in murky waters.  You just don’t know how people will respond to your comments. Murky rapidly becomes mysterious in business, because professionalism at times masks deeper personal expressions.  There’s a reason those funny asides on “The Office” don’t happen in public.

Full Engagement: Inspire, Read More