Sheila Scarborough and Leslie McLellan of Tourism Currents laid out a simple starting point for all your social media efforts. Good news: it’s as easy as filling in the blank. Fill in the Blank (Our company) is where (our customers) find (the thing we offer) with (this benefit) So all you have to do is…
Many retailers experience a sales slump during after the holiday season. How do you respond? The slump comes as no surprise and most small-business owners know they just need to plan for it and ride it out. They think of it as time to work in the business and perhaps to grab a short vacation….
Let’s start with Best Wishes for 2018. That wish was to be a part of my post last week. But as you may or may not have noticed, I didn’t get a post done. This is not the first time it has happened but those missed times were typically planned for some reason. Last week…
As you probably know, if you are going into business, the odds your business will be around in five years are not good. But they aren’t as bad as you may think, either. Approximately one-third of businesses close within two years. At the five-year mark, about one-half of all businesses have closed. We don’t approach…
Late last year, I did a blog post looking at how clustering of competitors may have positive results (https://staging.smallbizsurvival.com/2016/11/competition-and-clustering.html). Recently I was asked about this idea in terms of small rural town cafes. If any of you have lived in the Great Plains region of the country, you know the towns and the cafes I…
Do you ever look at the news and ask yourself how what you see might impact your business? If you are like me, the chances are you don’t do a great deal of this. Yes, we watch the news and may read the paper, a magazine and maybe a trade journal. Plus, we may spend…
What plans are you making for your business? For many of us, the idea of developing a plan is just overwhelming, scary and something we often just don’t do. It sounds tedious and time-consuming, and is seen as something that’s useful only as a doorstop. Yet ask a business owner who takes the planning process…
Well, here we are at the end of one year and the beginning of another. Welcome, 2016! For many people, this is the day we make resolutions for the upcoming year. Often these hopes are for something in our personal life. Do you also take time to make resolutions for managing your business? And for…
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