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Small Biz Survival

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Small Biz Survival

The small town and rural business resource
  • Know your customers: What do they want to be good at?
    entrepreneurship | marketing | rural

    Know your customers: What do they want to be good at?

    ByBecky McCray March 25, 2019March 23, 2019

      A few weeks ago, we talked about knowing your customers in order to help them answer questions they get asked. This week, get to know your customers better by thinking through what they want to be good at. What do your customers want to be good at? You help customers all the time. The…

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  • Know your customer: Who’s asking them questions?
    entrepreneurship | marketing | rural | social media

    Know your customer: Who’s asking them questions?

    ByBecky McCray February 11, 2019February 24, 2019

      You know I’m a big fan of answering customer questions. That’s been part of my marketing advice for 10 years now. Should I blog for my small business? Yes, answer customer questions Talk less about you, more about them Top small business blogging questions answered But there’s a deeper layer to serving your customers….

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  • Dress up empty buildings with these creative window ideas
    economic development | marketing | rural

    Dress up empty buildings with these creative window ideas

    ByBecky McCray June 11, 2018March 8, 2019

      Every small town has empty buildings downtown. Whether they are completely empty or just used for storage, they can make your downtown look vacant. If the building has windows, though, there’s an opportunity to dress them up a bit and maybe even promote another business at the same time. In the picture above, a…

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  • marketing | Small Biz 100 | social media | success

    The TRUTH About No-Cost Marketing

    ByGlenn Muske February 21, 2018February 20, 2018

    You’ve seen the stories, “Build Your Business with No-Cost Marketing.” This headline has been used many times, most recently when talking about social media. We want such things to be true. Yet, we also know the reality – there is a cost to everything. It may not be a cost in dollars, but instead, it…

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  • marketing | Small Biz 100 | success

    Marketing Requires Balance

    ByGlenn Muske January 31, 2018January 24, 2018

    As you review articles for help with your small-business marketing, you may notice that many of them focus on a single strategy or method. The reality is that a good marketing plan has balance. Often today the strategy is online marketing or, getting more specific, social media marketing. Video marketing is also quite popular. These…

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  • marketing | rural | Small Biz 100

    Marketing is More Than Advertising

    ByGlenn Muske December 20, 2017December 19, 2017

    “I need help in marketing my product. “ That short sentence is the one I hear often as I work with small-business owners. Most often, when asked to clarify what they want, the owner talks about increasing his or her sales. They want to see more goods and services go out the door. While sales…

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  • marketing | rural | Small Biz 100 | success

    Getting Your Marketing Message Seen

    ByGlenn Muske December 13, 2017December 6, 2017

    The numbers are daunting. Every 60 seconds, 347,000 tweets are shared. 510,000 Facebook comments are made. 5,100 Instagram photos are liked. 48 hours of video are uploaded on YouTube. Now add information we get from other online information sources such as email, blogs and websites. Then there is what might be called the traditional sources…

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  • rural | shop local | Small Biz 100 | success

    Keep Doing Things That Worked

    ByGlenn Muske December 6, 2017December 6, 2017

    Small Business Saturday has come and gone. What worked? What did you do? And what do you wish you would have done? Now is the time to answer those questions. Yes, I know that for many of you it is also the holiday shopping season and you have just run the gauntlet of getting the…

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