Author Archive: GuestAuthor
Want “Eureka!” Moments? Napping and Relaxing May be the Answer
There’s a reason inspiration often strikes in the shower or on your drive to work: “Eureka!” moments happen when your mind is relaxed. Special relativity occurred to Albert Einstein while riding a streetcar home one day. Philo Farnsworth realized how an electrical television could work when he was plowing a potato field. These moments of [...]
Your Ability to Tweet Doesn’t Make You a Guru
Too many companies endanger their brands’ reputations by falling victim to opportunists who claim to be social media “experts” without any understanding of social strategy. At their most innocuous, faux social gurus can rack up a bill without providing your company any real benefit. At their worst, a few social missteps can confuse and alienate [...]
Creating a Crash Course for Your Industry
You don’t have time to keep up on industry trends. You’re an entrepreneur, marketing manager, or HR executive, with a schedule jam-packed with the day-to-day activities of your career — not sticking your head in whitepapers on your industry for hours on end. Believe me, I feel your pain. Running Influence & Co., I constantly [...]
From Concept to Sale: How a Video Launched Mailbox — and Helped Them Exit
Each year, a variety of tactics appear that promise instant success if included in your inbound marketing strategy. First, there was tagging, and then keyword placement, which was followed by infographics and long content. For a few years, some of these strategies worked well, but they weren’t designed with a changing economy in mind — [...]
How to Motivate Your Team to Step into Leadership Roles
Every person who starts his own business has, at some point, had the realization that he either cannot or should not be running his business forever. Similarly, as a business grows, the strain and stress of running a burgeoning company introduces the need for employees to step up and become the company’s next leaders. Unless [...]
Finding Small Ways to Solve Big Problems – How Leaders Can Get Unstuck
Whether you’re working at a startup, a mid-sized company, or an enterprise organization, leaders at all levels typically find themselves stuck at one point or another. I’ve interacted with my fair share of founders and executives across industries, and they all encounter the following: a looming, lingering doubt that keeps their organizations from being great. [...]
Lunch: The Most Important Hour of the Day
We’ve all seen it happen: People get trapped in the web of monotonous, boring, unhealthy lunches at work. They don’t leave enough time to prepare something healthy at home. Sometimes, they opt for a bag of chips and a can of soda right out of the break room vending machines. Other times, they splurge on [...]
Keeping Quality Real and Costs Low
Depending on your point of view, your company’s internal costs can be a minor nuisance or the bane of your existence. It’s a real balancing act to figure out just how to maintain a high level of service that’s also financially sustainable. Luckily, there are a number of ways to cut costs while maintaining the [...]
How to Build a High-Quality Brand with an Affordable Product
Providing a product at the lowest price point in your market sounds like a sure way to attract customers and gain an edge on your competition — but it’s not always that easy. The problem is that the brands with this strategy are rarely considered high-quality; therefore, customers have no loyalty and no reason to [...]
Will It Walk? Determining Whether Your Business Idea Has Legs
Every problem is an opportunity because a good business idea can lie in the solution. Most successful businesses begin with someone merely solving a problem. Chances are if you’re experiencing difficulties with something, then others are, too. If you solve that problem for yourself, you can probably make things easier for everyone — and it [...]
