success

The secret to creating deep customer relationships

by Steve Holt January 25, 2015
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I was frustrated. I had been communicating via email back and forth all day with a tech support rep at the company who makes the product that I wasn’t very happy with. It wouldn’t work and the tech support person was trying to give me possible solutions to remedy the problem. At the end of […]

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The Most Powerful Tool You Aren’t Using

by Steve Holt December 8, 2014
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The other day I was in the checkout line at a local store and when I got to the cashier she began scanning my items and putting them into the bag. She never looked at me. She never said hello. She never smiled. In fact the only thing she ever said to me was “That […]

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Find Your Home

by Steve Holt October 31, 2014
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I’ve been a professional speaker for a number of years.  That means numerous times a year I travel to wherever the work takes me, which is sometimes to some pretty cool places.  I’ve been to the four corners of the United States and countless places in between.  I even got hired to go speak in the […]

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Spend More Time Honking

by Steve Holt September 21, 2014
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It was a simple note. It said “You are doing great! Keep it up!” And it was exactly what I needed. I certainly didn’t think it was going great. I didn’t feel great. I actually felt like I was spinning my wheels and not going anywhere. But that’s often how it goes when you are […]

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Learned Behavior: Recharging Your Batteries

by Steve Holt May 11, 2014
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We’ve all been there. Worn out. Tired. Brain fried. Or my dad’s favorite… plumb tuckered out. I’ve been so mentally drained so many times over the past 6 months that sometimes I literally fall into bed at the end of the day and I’m out like a light in 5 minutes. You ever felt like […]

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The Art of the Conversation

by Steve Holt February 11, 2014
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I am thoroughly convinced that most people don’t know how to converse with others.  And that’s a shame because I am also convinced that the most successful people in the world are the ones who understand the art of the conversation. I don’t suppose I can place blame too much.  Advances in technology that make […]

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My 2014 New Year’s Resolution For You (and me)

by Steve Holt January 20, 2014
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So my first article of 2014 is about something that is very personal to me.  I spent the majority of 2013 in a slump. I can’t sing ‘woe is me’ too loud because alot of people were much worse off than me in 2013.  But it was one of those times… maybe you know what […]

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New Beginnings

by Steve Holt December 6, 2013
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Sometimes in life you come to the point where you need to start over.  Sometimes that means taking a step backwards and sometimes it means taking a step forwards.  At 45 years old, in the middle of my effective working life expectancy, I am taking a step forward and making a turn in my career […]

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Why Social Media Metrics Aren’t As Important As You Think

by Steve Holt October 31, 2013
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Social media metric tools are plentiful and getting better and better every day. I often recommend various types of tools so that my customers can keep track of their progress and effectiveness in their social media outreach. There are a bunch of free ones as well as some great professional tools that you have to […]

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Your Brand Is Dying: Here’s How To Save It

by Steve Holt September 25, 2013
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I remember not too long ago when Facebook rolled out new ‘like’ pages that looked like and acted like personal profile pages. I remember the cries of ‘What is Facebook doing?? This is disastrous. Facebook is trying to kill businesses in Facebook.’ What we know now is that Facebook was trying to set businesses up […]

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It’s Time To Give Back

by Steve Holt March 23, 2013
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I have been humbled.  There have been numerous times in the past several weeks that I have been taken down a notch when presented with the good works that others are doing.  My father calls it ‘gettin too big for your britches’.  I call it laziness and arrogance.  Just when I think I am doing […]

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How Not To Screw Up At Work

by Steve Holt March 12, 2013
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Looking back over the jobs that I have had ever since I started working, I can see some valuable lessons learned. I learned some things from some very wise people, and I learned alot of things the hard way, because I was hard-headed. So I was asked the other day by some college students what […]

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Small Talk: The New Sales Pitch

by Steve Holt February 21, 2013
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Selling is not easy. Every successful salesman has their own formula, their own secret. And certain things work for some, and not for others. I have a good friend named Michael Angelo Caruso who is an established expert on selling, and he has trained thousands of people over the years on the art of selling. […]

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5 Reasons They Aren’t Liking Your Facebook Page

by Steve Holt February 4, 2013
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You may have noticed over the past couple of months that in addition to the number of likes on your page growing at a slower pace than before, the number of people commenting, liking, and sharing your Facebook page content has gone down.  It’s happened to me.  It’s happened to everyone.  These are strategic decisions […]

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Surprise them

by Steve Holt January 14, 2013
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One of my favorite snacks as a kid was Cracker Jacks. The reason was simple…. there was a prize inside. Same deal with cereal boxes. My brother and I would pick the ones that had a prize inside because, well, we just couldn’t get enough of secret decoder rings and fake tattoo stickers. Toys in […]

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The Grass Is Greener Where You Water It

by Steve Holt December 3, 2012
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A few months ago I was helping one of my clients with their marketing outreach.  We talked a great deal about their social media outreach and where it fit in their overall marketing plan.  We had spent a great deal of time over the past year revamping and updating their look on all their social […]

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Let Them See Your Passion

by Steve Holt November 14, 2012
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I recently attended a choir concert of one of my kids. It was a pretty big affair, with a choir of about 200, and the choir conductor was an African American gentleman in black tie and tails who appeared to be soft-spoken and genteel. Until the music started. The first song out of the gate […]

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18 Inches

by Steve Holt June 3, 2012
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My head told me one thing, and my heart told me another. It was that pivotal moment when you have to decide who will win… your head or your heart. We have all been there, and you can probably chime in with examples from both your personal life and your business. And I’ve made the […]

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The Top 10 Things I Learned/Found In 2011

by Steve Holt January 7, 2012
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Seems like everyone is doing articles about what to look forward to in 2012, including me, so I decided to talk for just a few minutes about the best things I learned/found in 2011. I hope that you can find some goodies in this list that you didn’t know about, so that you can (of […]

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Once Upon A Time…

by Steve Holt January 1, 2012
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Once upon a time there was a small business owner named Bob who was busy. So busy in fact, that he struggled to find time to do all the things that he needed to do. Each morning when the sun shown through his window and awakened his eyes he struggled to get out of bed […]

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