The Blog - Where Business Collides with Human Nature

A Story About a Duck

This is a story I have told many times. It is a funny story about a duck, success and thinking fast. (with a moral to the story)

A Story About a Duck

Topics: Funny Personal Branding Inspiration

How to Name Yourself

Putting things in a nutshell for naming yourself. 

My name is ___

Things are so bad because…

I am awesome and this is how!

I am committed to doing good… and will conquer the bad!

Watch, cheer or join… just stay out of my way.

Watch the video below for an inspirational example:

Topics: Personal Branding

How to Name Your Broker Business Domain

If you introduce yourself as a broker, you may see eyes dart back and forth as the person you are talking to looks for an excuse to escape.  "Broker" in almost any context means "sales person".  The exception is when someone is already interested in buying or when they have something to sell.

Introducing and branding yourself as a broker is similar to branding yourself a doctor.  Doctors are more respected. Both "broker" and "doctor" are generalized labels which leaves more questions than answers.

In the new world of data and media, everything is indexed, including your services. When you dig deeper into Google's keyword ideas tool and ask for suggestions for terms related to "broker", there are many ideas provided:

Topics: Domain Names Branding Personal Branding

The 3 Biggest Sins of Building Business Relationships

Success…how bad do you want it?  My guess would be probably be pretty badly.  Business success is founded on the concept of building and maintaining relationships with other business people. 

Relationships hold a real value when it comes to business practices.  A recent network survey by the Referral Institute of over 12,000 business professionals from all over the world said that networking played a role in their successes -- and spent 6.3 hours every week in activities related to networking.  So what are some business relationship blunders you should avoid?  We recommend steering clear of these three big sins of building business relationships:

Topics: Networking Guerrilla Marketing Personal Branding Business Success Tips

How to Nurture Business Relationships

If you’re like most entrepreneurs, you already know how important networking is to the life of your business. But it’s not just about creating relationships with key individuals, other businesses, customers, and vendors. Your ability to foster and maintain these relationships is what will set you up for the growth and long-term success you crave. So what should you be doing after the initial conversation, elevator speech, business card swap and handshake?

Topics: Networking Guerrilla Marketing Personal Branding

Socializing is Better Than Networking

Networking is not as important to success as you may think.  Socializing is much more beneficial than networking.  The importance of people contact, friends and collaborators to an entrepreneur or small business owner may be more important than for big business.  The real you may not be very attractive but the real players in any room look deeper than you realize.

Topics: Networking Personal Branding Guerrilla Marketing Ideas Relationships Communication