In the past, high-powered marketing agencies have always come with high-powered price tags, creating expensive gatekeepers that have barred small businesses from gaining the marketing benefits of agencies that can truly move the needle.

This article explores the pros and cons of various informal approaches to assembling your own experienced marketing team. We’re certainly biased, but we think they left the best, most effective type off their list: a complete, outsourced marketing department including a CMO & VP of Marketing (learn more about the JointSourcing Solution).

Read the full article at: www.entrepreneur.com

While the overall benefits of “going green” are readily apparent, we found it interesting to see these added suggestions for furthering your business’ green initiatives as the world economy continues to cautiously reopen after the Coronavirus impact of 2020. Try these four “greening” methods as your company ramps back up in the post-pandemic world:

1. Go after smaller markets that embrace green practices.
2. Motivate your employees to adopt green initiatives in their work and daily habits.
3. Invest and engage in sustainability programs.
4. Focus on energy efficiency with your equipment, buildings, and vehicles.

Read the full article at: theconversation.com

“Going green” is an oft-used phrase, but many small businesses have difficulty working environmentally conscious practices into their operations - especially in the services industry. Determining how your customers can use your green services to meet their business goals, however, is a clever approach to eco-marketing (where you, your customers, and the environment all win) that we’d love to see more often!

Metro Sign & Awning, a Sales Renewal client, wanted to increase referrals from architect and general contractor partners, so they created a content marketing campaign around white papers that explained the benefits of environmentally-friendly, energy-saving business signage to the customers of architects and general contractors. By helping their partners attract customers interested in green signage, Metro was able to grow its referrals from them and deliver many more environmentally beneficial signs.

Read the sample white paper at: www.metrosignandawning.com

Starting your small business can be hard for anyone, but women especially struggle in the entrepreneurial field, which has traditionally been male-dominated.  The SBA is working to level the playing field with a new platform that offers FREE educational resources to women

Read the full article at: www.kold.com

Reviews have been an important for online businesses since the beginning, but they're even more important now.

Consider:

• Consumers require an average 40 online reviews before believing a business’s star rating is accurate (up from 34 in 2017)
• 85% of consumers think that online reviews older than 3 months aren’t relevant

The authors propose mulitple strategies to use to get more reviews for your business, here are their best:

1. Deliver an Outstanding Customer Experience (if you're not, don't bother with getting reviews)
2. Ask Every Customer
3. Respond to Positive and Negative Reviews
4. People Have their Preferences, Select Sites Customers Use
5. Make Leaving A Review Simple
6. Time Your Request
7. Automate Requests
8. Play the Long Game

And finally, when creating an online reputation management program, it's important to understand the important difference between 1st and 3rd party reviews

• 1st-Party Review: Feedback or testimonial given directly to your business by a customer. The business owns the content.
• 3rd-Party Review: Feedback given to a 3rd-party review site like Google or Trip Advisor. The site owns the content.

Read the full article at: gatherup.com

Research is a cornerstone of any marketing plan - just ask one of the Top 50 Most Powerful Women in Business, Cheryl Grace.  Her commitment to using multicultural consumer segment data has helped propel her beauty brands forward with informed marketing strategies that speak to a much broader audience than her competitors.  Find out what data types can be relevant to your business, and how to leverage that data in your own marketing strategy, in the full article.

Read the full article at: beautymatter.com