As I was trolling the web for a topic for today’s blog post, it occurred to me I haven’t covered many tips or tools lately.

I herby commit to change that.

Therefore, today I have created a list of 10 types of content you can use for your blog. When you have writer’s block (cough, Lindsay Bell and Jason Konopinski, cough), you now have something to jog your brain.

It’s not just a list, though. Obviously my examples are PR, marketing, or social media relations. But you can easily turn these ideas into something for your industry, blogging niche, or particular interests.

And now let’s see if I’m right about seventh tip. Will this blog post get commented on and shared more than some of our more popular blog post (Pinterest!) in January?

I’ll report back! Continue Reading »

Well, it’s the end of January already and it’s been crazy around here! I was telling my friend Rusty Speidel that January will be more profitable for us than 2008 and 2009 combined. I guess the economy has turned!

Between that and all of the brand building we did last year (speaking, blogging, networking, guest blogging, featured columns, social media, email marketing, and more) things are set to explode here and we’re hiring…again! Just goes to show that it doesn’t happen overnight, but it does happen if you’re consistent and work hard at it.

With that lesson of the week, following are the top five stories. Continue Reading »

We’re on day three of the Livefyre commenting system and I think I’m in love. I may want to marry it, but first I want to hear from you. Do you like it? Do you like how you can @ reply someone and bring them into the conversation? Do you like how it sends one email with a bunch of comments in it instead of 16 different emails?

Or, is it sending you too many updates when people have conversations that have nothing to do with you? I get all of the emails so I don’t know it works for you. Please let me know! If you love it as much as I do, we’ll have a wedding ceremony.

If you’ve not testing it out, try it! Let me know what you think. And, in return, here are the top five stories for week ending Oct. 8, 2010. Continue Reading »

A few weeks ago, my friend Steve McKee wrote in his BusinessWeek column about companies doing their growth a big disservice in a down economy when they cut their advertising and PR budgets. You can read the article and comments here.

Then, when I asked each of you what you’d like to read about in future blog posts, my friend John emailed me and asked, “Why is it that during tough economic times, most companies reduce marketing budgets? If marketing is of real value to a company and if marketing works for that company, wouldn’t you increase spending in tough times?”

This brings me to one of my favorite case studies: How Kellogg won the cereal wars of the Great Depression. Forbes, The New Yorker, and several other national media highlighted this story earlier this year, when it looked like the economy wasn’t likely to get better anytime soon. Following is an expert I refer to a lot when people ask me the same question John asked.

In the late nineteen-twenties, two companies—Kellogg and Post—dominated the market for packaged cereal. It was still a relatively new market: Ready-to-eat cereal had been around for decades, but Americans didn’t see it as a real alternative to oatmeal or cream of wheat until the twenties. So, when the Depression hit, no one knew what would happen to consumer demand. Post did the predictable thing: It reined in expenses and cut back on advertising. But Kellogg doubled its ad budget, moved aggressively into radio advertising, and heavily pushed its new cereal, Rice Krispies. (Snap, Crackle, and Pop first appeared in the 1930s.) By 1933, even as the economy cratered, Kellogg’s profits had risen almost 30 percent and it had become what it remains today: The industry’s dominant player.

With social media you can now heavily push your brand, your company, your service, or your product at half the cost of traditional methods. If you listen, build your communities, let your brand ambassadors spread the word, and provide value, your business will come out of the Great Recession as a dominant player, no matter your size.

So my question for you is: If you decrease your spending and no one knows you’re still in business, which creates a drop in revenue and profits, doesn’t it make sense to spend money and time on the new forms of marketing, advertising, and PR?