One of the most difficult things for business owners to get a handle on is the true perspective of the needs and desires of their clients or customers. Because we spend so much time working on, perfecting, and promoting our products or services – over time, we get caught up in how awesome our product is rather than how awesome the client will be once he’s used it.Read More
When a business stalls, the reflex is almost always the same. “We need a new idea.” The Panic Move: Chasing the Next Idea Revenue slows. Leads dry up. Momentum fades. And instead of asking what broke, the business starts hunting for something new: a new offer a new angle a new funnel a new platform a new consultant This feels proactive. It feels optimistic. It feels like movement. It’s usually just avoidance. New ideas are comforting because they don’t...Read More
Every business says it wants to scale. Most quietly sabotage that goal by piling on complexity they mistake for sophistication. Complexity Feels Like Progress — Until It Breaks You Complexity gives the illusion of momentum. More systems. More tools. More dashboards. More meetings. More rules. More people explaining things instead of doing them. It feels like growth because something is always happening. But here’s the part no one wants to say out loud: Complexity doesn’t scale. It multiplies friction. Every...Read More
I find it interesting as I begin evaluating prospective clients how infatuated they are with a single metric in their lead generation – volume. Search volume, click volume, impressions, number of calls – whatever it is they watch it like a hawk and sadly make a lot of decisions based on it alone. I think it comes from the common idea that marketing is a numbers game – so if you want more sales, you simply pump up the volume...Read More
Pay Per Click is probably the most valuable and effective marketing medium in the history of the world. But it can be extremely costly if you don’t know what you’re doing. Google has what my friend Perry Marshall calls “a stupidity tax” which means that every way that you misunderstand your customer and their intent costs you money – every way in which you misuse Google’s tools, interface or advertising network costs you money. Google is not out there to...Read More
Unlimited traffic? It sounds like a pipe dream or only a theoretical concept, but in fact it is not only an actual possibility – it will always happen in any online market when someone does a few simple things just a little better than their competition. On the internet, things operate on 90/10 vs. 80/20 When it comes to traffic, 90% of advertisers a fighting over scraps – the traffic left over after the 10% takes their share. This is...Read More
I often hear techie marketers boast about how they are “data driven” so they don’t get caught up in the errors of human judgment – as if it is possible to make complex decisions based solely on what their computer model, formula or data shows them. The idea is seductive because with large data sets over a large period of time it is possible to predict patterns, narrow focus and eliminate waste by optimizing marketing efforts and budgets to the...Read More
More than 60 years ago, Peter Drucker dramatically influenced the foundations of the modern American corporation. His words are as true today as they were then—maybe even more so in the digital age, when we’re all more easily and directly involved with marketing our businesses. One of his most significant and profound observations was that innovation and marketing are the two most important functions of business – all others are costs. Business owners and entrepreneurs probably agree in principle, but few...Read More
One of the most important things of any Google AdWords campaign is to continually test and refine. The best practices for Google AdWords is to continually test and refine keywords, text ads, display ads, placements, ad extensions, target locations, and on and on. When testing so many things, it is easy to test things that don’t matter (yet) before testing things that really matter – or will have a big impact more immediately. Perry Marshall would always tell me that...Read More
This is a great visual of how ugly, outdated, or self-made websites appear when they don’t measure up to just the basic expectations of the visitor. Yes, the creeper van does offer the same technical services as the school buses, but its presentation not only drives people away – it also recruits otherwise indifferent bystanders to warn others to stay clear. The only reason I took a picture of it was because of how out of place it was in...Read More
“He rebranded our company, fixed our marketing, and got us noticed and absorbed by an Italian manufacturer. He knows his stuff.”
– Ray Lopez, Blackhawk Armory
“As a direct result of Dane’s insights and intuition we are generating an additional $350,000 per year that we would have never seen.” – Joel Bauer
“I’ve worked Dane on several of my projects over the past 15 years and can confidently say he knows how to compete in tough markets.” – Martin Howey
