Business Startup
The Privilege of Doing What You Love
As the old adage goes, “Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” Mark Twain’s famous words had merit then, and they do now. After all, does anybody wake up and say to themselves, “I really want to be bored at my job today”? Probably…
Read MoreSmall Business Organization: Where Should an Entrepreneur Start?
Small business owners and entrepreneurs face the challenge of wearing ALL the hats. With or without team members, we are responsible for making or doing the thing we sell, answering the phone, responding to emails and incoming inquiries, and handling sales and marketing and bookkeeping and taxes, to name a few. It’s no surprise overwhelm creeps…
Read More3 Steps to Successful Competitive Market Research
As the saying goes, keep your friends close and your enemies closer. When you’re a business owner, it’s critically important for you to be aware of what your competition is doing. Of course, this is important when you’re in the startup phase, but even once you’ve been established in business for years it’s still a…
Read MoreThe Customer Experience: What Good Customer Service Really Looks Like
What does Customer Service really mean? From a very young age I’ve had the privilege of learning about good customer service from the master of them all: my mentor, my dad. As a manager at Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlor, and then at Newport Bay restaurants in the Portland area, dad learned from Bob Farrell, author…
Read MoreThe Impact of Branding (it’s not just about a logo)
What impact does branding have? Let’s start here: When you hear the word ‘brand’ what do you think of? It may be a company like Nike, or Apple, or Target. You might picture a particular product that a company has advertised or that you’ve come across that impacted or spoke to you. You may recall…
Read More40 Self-Care Ideas To Keep You Balanced
Self-Care Keeps You Balanced I’ve had to learn this one the hard way. Multiple times. Since I hope I’m done learning it, I hope you’ll learn from my mistakes and prioritize your own self-care. As entrepreneurs, hopefully we feel we are made to do what we do. Even knowing you must wear all the hats…
Read MoreThe Foundation of Your Online Presence
Your website is the foundation of your online presence. Potential clients will research your company, and when they do, one of their first interactions with your company will be your website. This means your website should be easy to navigate, provide current information, and grab the viewers attention. Whether your company consists of 2 employees…
Read MoreHow to Find Your Brand Voice
Brand Voice The art of a consistent, appropriate, and cohesive brand voice is an important one that requires constant TLC. How to find your brand voice means truly looking at the personality, values, and style, and is based on target market research and interactions you have with clients, customers, and consumers, as well as with…
Read MoreAnnual Business Planning: Jamie-Style
If you know me, odds are good that you know about my annual business planning ritual. Every year, I go through a six step process that brings clarity and purpose to my business for the upcoming year. Because I consistently get questions about what I do during my retreats, how I do it, what I…
Read MoreThe Website Platform Comparison Guide for 2014!
Building a website is not easy business. You can outsource it to a professional web designer or try to build it yourself. One can be expensive and the other headache inducing. Thankfully, there are platforms out there that make the process easy and cost-efficient.
The first step is to pick a website platform to build your website on. But, how do you choose? Which one is the right one for your business? With all of the options available to users, picking one platform can seem overwhelming.
First and foremost we have some questions to answer.
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