I heard a great segment on National Public Radio the other day which demonstrated in spades the value of niche marketing. It was about some folks who wanted to learn how to make a website and thought it would be funny to create a site for what they called the “Prairie Tumbleweed Farm” - a [...]

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This month’s Marketing News reports that an August Gallup poll reveals that 72% of American consumers now pay more attention to which country produces the goods they buy. Sixty-five percent say that they make an effort to avoid products bought in China and expressed a willingness to pay more for goods made in the USA.
Most [...]

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Our pastor at church today made a comment in his message that marketing people only want to sell you stuff. He said, “They want to make you buy even if you don’t want it”. Initially I thought well that is a bit cynical but on reflection, perhaps that is the way most people see marketing.
I [...]

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How does your company rank when it comes to being “green”? For those of you who live in the Portland-Vancouver area, being environmentally friendly is something you should seriously consider.
Fast Company magazine recently listed Portland as one of the four greenest cities in the world. In the last year there have been a [...]

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Myself, Jeff Schneider (Sandler Sales) and Bill Dolan (Spirit Media) will be doing a seminar for the small business forum (Cornerstones for Success) of the Portland Business Alliance on August 2nd.
The objective of the seminar will be to show business owners how to grow their revenue by properly targeting the right markets.
Many companies were [...]

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Last week I was invited by Bill Dolan and Anne DeRock of Spirit Media to participate with them in a short workshop at the Executive Officer’s Club in Portland. The topic we chose was the Importance of the Right Messaging for marketing. We picked this topic because we have both seen so many terrible [...]

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As most of you know, I am a Duct Tape Marketing Coach. As part of being in the Duct Tape network I have the ability to be able to sell the Duct Tape materials. I know it sounds self-serving to make a big deal out of this but I think the materials are excellent. [...]

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If you have a marketing question that has you scratching your head, let us know what it is so that perhaps we can help you. There is no charge for this service  (or any guarantees that we’ll have an answer!) but we’d like to know what is on your mind.
You can either leave your question [...]

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On Tuesday I went to the Oregon Chapter of the American Marketing Association Luncheon. Dan Harbison, Internet Marketing Manager, of the Portland Trail Blazers was the speaker. His topic was “Trail Blazers on the Courts – and on the Web” and he duly explained the Trail Blazers’ web strategy and what they were trying to [...]

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Many small business live or die on referrals. For most companies referrals are a pretty random event. A company does good work, satisfies their customers and hopefully referrals will come. But did you know there are lots of ways you can encourage and manage referrals?
An excellent referral program came across my desk just a couple [...]

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