In Y2011, we find ourselves striving to take advantage of Social Media Marketing (SMM). Today its all about looking for the “best” marketing strategy to connect with a company’s target audience. So, recognizing this flow of progress, we might ask ourselves, really how much has marketing really changed in the last twenty-five years? From the beginning, the basic objective of every successful marketing strategy has been the same – establish or develop stronger connections or relationships with people.

Whether you have a wonderful business idea – or – you are investigating business opportunities for yourself or a client, it is critical that you put each idea through a “reality check” – an analysis to determine if they are truly valid and worthy of further effort. All of your ideas must have a demonstrated need, ready market, and ability to provide a solid return on investment.

Is the idea feasible in the marketplace? Is there demand? Can it be done? Are you able to pull together the persons and resources to pull it off before the window of opportunity closes? These questions must be considered and answered.

Let’s face it: business owners are busy people with more things to do on their list than there is time to do it all. If you’re a business owner and your personal bandwidth is spent, who is monitoring your content online?

If no one is keeping your social media brand fresh and up-to-date with meaningful posts and the right kind of message, it is more than likely that your business will or already has suffered.

Business owners who have already made the decision to set up their social media outlets whether it is on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook or even their blogs, the truth of the matter is that someone needs

Improving Relationships: The greatest key in reducing turnover in your business (as well as significantly improving the quality of your own life).

Once upon a time a small boy and girl were building a sand castle on the beach. They spent hours building towers, walls, and a moat. As they were building the castle, the tide slowly kept creeping in closer and closer. Finally after working on this castle for most of the morning a big wave came in and wiped it all away. An adult who was watching all of this was at first feeling sorry for the children because of all the work they had put into building the castle. The adult then saw the children hold hands and run together laughing down the beach. It was then that the adult realized that although it is fun building empires, the lasting fun is having friends with whom you can continue to laugh and be with after all that you have spent your life building has washed away.

A website’s success is all about answering that famous question: What’s in it for me?

In order to capture someone’s attention (and keep it) you have to offer them something they want today!!! And they must feel enough urgency to act on it today.

How many times have you told yourself you’d come back to that website “later” and never did?

If your website doesn’t have a hook that keeps the visitor on site, you’re losing business – more importantly, you’re losing valuable repeat business; because an effective hook will not only reel visitors in the first time around – it will also cause them to return to your website over and over and over again.