One of the most recognized sounds computer lovers remember is the dial-up connection and AOL’s announcement that says, “You’ve Got Mail!” It was like a sugar high whenever you heard that sound. Nowadays, most of us feel like we have the stabbing pain of a cavity when we hear our Outlook or Gmail inbox notification saying, “You’ve Got Mail!” What changed? The biggest difference is that many (if not most) of the emails we get today have one goal: to sell us something. Some of that is subtle, like email lists we have signed up for, while others are just blatant phishing, which is a random soluti ..read more

Let’s face it. We are living in a world that is overwhelmed with information. 380 new websites are created every minute, and over 500,000 new websites are added every day 7 million blog posts are published across the internet daily 300 BILLION emails are sent per day (85% spam) 720,000 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube (30,000 days’ worth of video content) per day AI-generated content creation will double those numbers in less than a year Getting your messages in front of any audience is getting harder and harder, let alone the perfect audience who might care about what you do or sell ..read more

If you have been involved in online marketing in any way over the last 10+ years, you have been fed a steady diet of more. More followers equals more sales. More hits to your website equals more sales. More social media engagement leads to more sales. Almost nobody would argue that more sales are bad, but people have conflated more with better. I am here to say that better is worth more. In the world of relationship marketing, sales begin at connection. A connection can come in the form of a follow, a friend request, a connection request, a message, a website form submission, or whatever each ..read more

Trust has to be planted and grown. It is a seed planted through a personal relationship. It needs to grow roots and be nurtured through light and water to produce fruit. Trust must be watered by honesty, warmed and fed through the light of integrity, and rooted in consistency. Strong roots and branches provide shade and shelter in the stormy weather of doubt. It would be great if there were a way to measure trust. You can calculate the number of people who know or connect with you. You can measure likes by the number of people who interact with your social posts or open your emails. However ..read more

Going from Know to Trust requires a stepping stone, and that’s called a Like. You can try to jump over that stone, but it leads to a transactional two-step. You may make a sale, but it will not build a relationship. Relationships are key in the B2b world because businesses need to be reminded that you are there to serve them when needed and that they can continue to trust you. Like is a connection. Online a connection is a follow, friend request, or whatever a social platform says its phrase is defined as a positive affinity, rapport, or fondness with someone in a digital sense. In the l ..read more

Know is a beautiful word. People ask, “You know what?” They text IYKYK (meaning if you know, you know). Know can also be a derivative of knowledge. Know is a two-way street when it comes to marketing. You want people to know about you and your business. You may also want to know who knows about you and your business. Knowing who knows what is almost like the old Abbott and Costello bit, “Who’s on first.” Or, what came first, the chicken or the egg? Just because someone becomes aware of your business or gets to know you exist does not guarantee that they will remember you a week, month, or yea ..read more

The concept of “Know – Like – Trust” has been around for a while. It is commonly attributed to author Bob Burg (Endless Referrals and The Go-Giver). Another person attributed to the concept is sales trainer Michael Goldstein, who talked about buyers needing to experience “confidence, affinity, and empathy” before making purchases. No matter who originated it or how you phrase it, it’s undoubtedly a foundational process to making a sale. When I say process, it’s one foot in front of the other sequence. Yet many business people try to hop over the like part and go from know to trust. Know, Like ..read more

Networking has been around for a long time in business. Some of the names you may recognize (Benjamin Franklin, Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, and John D. Rockefeller) were prolific advocates of networking. As we know it today, networking started taking hold in the 1970s. More formal groups like BNI (Business Networking International) started in 1984. Tradeshows, associations, and even chambers of commerce are all forms of networking. One of the best philosophies I have ever learned about networking is that business is not B2B (business to business); it’s H2h (human to human). Humans are comple ..read more

One of the foundations that’s stuck with me through the years is, “Businesses do not do business with other businesses. People do business with people.” There has never been a corporation that has ever paid cash or written a check. People do that. Yes, companies try to put you on autopilot by making you subscribe to things, but it still takes a human to enter the data and make the initial purchase. What had been the Horatio Alger dream of the Nineteenth Century, starting in the mail room and ultimately owning the bank or factory, now had even more scope. How many loyal workers dreamed of clim ..read more

One of the foundations that’s stuck with me through the years is, “Businesses do not do business with other businesses. People do business with people.” There has never been a corporation that has ever paid cash or written a check. People do that. Yes, companies try to put you on autopilot by making you subscribe to things, but it still takes a human to enter the data and make the initial purchase. What had been the Horatio Alger dream of the Nineteenth Century, starting in the mail room and ultimately owning the bank or factory, now had even more scope. How many loyal workers dreamed of clim ..read more