Susan Solovic's Blog, page 2

How to become your own best business idea generator

All the good ideas have been taken! This is an often-heard complaint that is about as far from the truth as the earth is from Alpha Centauri. The problem is that we live in such a stimulus-rich environment that it dulls our imaginations. John Steinbeck said, “Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and […]

Head to Holland (Michigan) if you want to launch your startup in the #1 rated small city

Hate the big city life, but you still want a good chance at success when you launch your startup? Wallethub surveyed cities with populations between 25,000 and 100,000 residents. They graded these cities on a 100-point scale on 18 metrics within three key dimensions: Business Environment (50 points possible), Access to Resources (25 points possible), […]

Have a comprehensive facility security plan? Download our free security checklist

The tragedy at the YouTube headquarters in San Bruno highlights a new danger posed by the reach and pervasiveness of online relationships. While I don’t have any special information and don’t want to offer “the last word” on this person’s motives, it seems that she was prompted by her anger toward YouTube and that anger […]

The Facebook Fiasco Lesson: Don’t let ‘big data’ steamroll human concerns

#Deletefacebook How do you think Mark Zuckerberg – and dedicated Facebook employees – felt when they woke up one morning to discover that trending hashtag? It had to be their worst nightmare, right? In the immediate wake of the data-control controversy, Facebook stock lost almost 20 percent of its value, government officials on both sides […]

Why you need to upgrade your onboarding and how to do it

See if you’ve ever had a first day at a new job that went something like this: You spend a half hour or hour with someone in HR, signing papers. The person gives you a company manual and may go over a few essential rules. You meet up with your supervisor and walk around greeting […]

Don’t Allow March Madness to Put Your Small Business At Risk

March Madness is in full swing and that means business owners should brace themselves for a dip in productivity. Survey results from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas found one-third of workers will spend at least three hours per day following the Tournament during work hours.

How to bring the power of ‘bundling’ to your benefits package

By Susan Solovic, THE Small Business Expert “Bundle it baby!” Tweet by Frank Fritz, co-star American Pickers. Anyone who has seen even a single episode of American Pickers knows that Frank Fritz, one of the stars of the popular show, loves to “bundle” items to get what he wants at the price he needs to […]

2 simple customer experience principles to live by

Tommy Smothers of the Smothers Brothers – if you don’t remember them, look them up on YouTube – used to have a short comedy routine about golf with a title something like, “The 37 most important things to remember during your downswing.” While the routine was especially hilarious to anyone who has ever taken a […]

Custom vs Curated Content: How to leverage the benefits of both

If you aren’t publishing a mix of custom and curated content in your digital marketing program, you aren’t enjoying all of the benefits available to you. Let’s quickly outline what I mean by these two categories of content. Custom content is anything created expressly for your website or social media accounts. Curated content is content […]

Need reasons to be more optimistic? Read this.

Optimism comes in many varieties and throughout the last year, we’ve seen that small business optimism in general has been running high. In addition to this, a recent targeted survey on optimism has made me even more optimistic about the current streak of optimism running through small business owners. Let me explain my optimistic view […]