Newsletter Blogs
November 11, 2015 at 6:43 pm
Paul Bellantone and I walked to dinner after the first day of PPAI’s 2015 Product Responsibility Summit and talked about the same thing
November 5, 2015 at 4:42 pm
Your job is to solve your customers’ problems. Period. That’s all. You need to become a part of their organizations. This is vital if you want to earn the right to charge a little more and be compensated for your expertise. Think of your job as earning a job at your target prospects' companies. This…
November 3, 2015 at 4:39 pm
My team laughs often during a typical day, and I love being around my team. I love working from home as well, but I miss the "fun" at the office. I wasn’t in the office the day before Halloween when my colleagues all dressed like Dan, a colleague who has a bit of a Steve…
November 2, 2015 at 6:27 pm
The key difference between big businesses and small businesses is that big businesses are driven by timely accountability. Big businesses have boards of directors/advisers to whom management needs to report. If you want to maximize your results, you need to be accountable. Most small-business owners started their businesses because they wanted independence. I get it.…
October 30, 2015 at 4:02 pm
Answer: The safe and easy answer is “nothing.” Some states prohibit surcharges for credit card use, period. Some states permit it but with some complicated qualifiers, like no surcharge on debit cards, surcharge limited to what you actually paid and other such language buried in your merchant service agreement. The regulations are too many, making…
October 29, 2015 at 5:59 pm
I am writing this piece on a business trip like I've never taken before. In the past, I've traveled a bit, presenting education sessions at trade shows and regional associations. I've attended amazing conferences, like the PPAI North American Leadership Conference. This year, I'm attending the ASI Power Summit. The relationships that are nurtured and…
October 22, 2015
How do you make yourself matter to your customers? How did selling today become such a “soft” touch? How did things like liking, loving, trusting and focusing on the mission become more important than prospecting, qualifying, looking at features and benefits, and closing, closing, closing?
October 20, 2015
Security always has been considered anything but sexy. Money rarely flows to security projects since most executives pay little mind to security. Instead, sales and marketing receive the majority of the investment.
May 20, 2016 at 5:50 pm
May 23 to 27 is Promotional Products Work! (PPW) week, an international grassroots event led by the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI), Irving, Texas, and the promotional products industry to raise awareness about the benefits of promotional products among advertisers, marketers and media buyers. PPAI will join together with industry distributors, suppliers and stakeholders to…
August 8, 2016 at 3:51 pm
With major acquisitions, profanity-laden T-shirts and scandals from 1995, we had plenty to talk about in July. And, in case you missed any of it, senior content editor Hannah Abrams is here to give you a recap of the biggest stories from around the industry...