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And I think to myself,
what a wonderful word.

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<h2 class="wp-block-heading">We all remember the old saying, "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade." Using one small thing with the suggested tendency of sourness or difficulty and with just a few ingredients makes it into something positive, sweet, and desirable. A lemon represents your brand, and an expert marketing firm will take your lemon and fresh squeeze it with skillful hands, humanize it and tell your story through creative well-designed ingredients, resulting in sweet success, because let's face it, no one wants to just suck on a lemon.</h2> <p class="has-drop-cap">People will work on their corporate identity or their "lemon" but usually do not plan a budget to implement it.  Having the best product, best location, best ideas all are great. Still, when you decide to skimp on that marketing budget that introduces your product, brand, or service to reach a larger audience and formulate strategies for growth, you fail your brand and impact your prosperity and success. Many companies tend to underspend on their marketing strategies, and if you are not spending, you're saving in the long run, right?  Many small businesses think hiring a marketing expert is an unnecessary luxury expense that they can not afford. The bottom line is, are you willing to invest in yourself? If you must skimp or cut your budget, don't make it your marketing budget.  Put your money where your brand is.</p> <pre class="wp-block-verse has-medium-font-size">U.S. small business says successful companies should be spending 7-8% of their gross revenue for marketing up to 5 million dollars in yearly sales, more if your income is more significant. Over-all, someone should spend 5-12% on marketing and brand identity.</pre> <p> As we look at lemons to brands, we all remember the Americana summertime iconic "Lemonade Stand." Most of us probably persistently pestered our parents to have one as a child. We most likely remember setting up a table of some sort, we may have had in a garage or basement, placing a bright-colored happy little cloth over it, stealing cups, lemons, water & sugar from the kitchen, and then trying to think of the best design for our lemonade stand sign.</p> <p>Even a kid from Omaha, Nebraska, was a lemonade stand entrepreneur. I read an article where this individual discussed his childhood and how he started a lemonade stand. He touched base about the competition and how everyone had a lemonade stand that summer, but the two things that most were forgetting, number 1 is location, location, location, and secondly marketing and advertising. This boy from Omaha is currently worth 84.6 billion dollars and even in 2009 had a kid's cartoon on the Hub Network called "The Secret Millionaire's Club," a business show for children. </p> <p>Many of the brands, products, and businesses can take a few lessons from these kid entrepreneurs.  Some of these start-ups are not kids play anymore.  While still being fun and exciting and teaching children the value of hard work and dollar, it has become a pretty big market these days, and these kids know who to market.  Did you see a start-up lemonade stand will start at $20.00 to over $400.00 depending on how elaborate you go and budgets?  These kids are becoming more aware of how branding works, and it's not only just about location.  These kids are attending workshops in person and virtually; they use digital advertising, social media advertising, organic content; they even have kidpreneur events throughout the United States.  So no more cardboard boxes, construction paper, glue, and crayon signs; these kids mean business, and so should you!</p> <p>The top four reasons that you should hire a marketing firm. Business cards, sure there are many places you can get free templates or pay a minimal fee to design your own, but do you want the same business cards as 100's other companies have? Or do you want a business card that stands out and is memorable, unique to only you?  Website design, professional websites increase traffic, positive customer experiences, and establish your brand.  It says you are serious and professional about your business.  Photography, a picture is worth a thousand words, well it's worth more. Professional photography is vital because anyone can take a photo, but only a professional can make a photo.  Content companies undervalue good content that wants a professional storyteller to help them connect to their consumers, but they don't want to pay what it's worth.  On top of all these things, let's not forget the -going budget to keep your lemonade fresh and sweet. On-going content, edits, updated photography, website re-designs are all part of a marketing strategy and critical factors to continued brand success.  Marketing is responsible for about ¾ of a consumer's journey through a brand.  Consistency is crucial and should be up to date across all aspects. Marketing is hard, so when life gives you lemons, plant the seeds, grow an orchard, and let your marketing team squeeze the day by telling your epic story while you enjoy the lemonade.</p> <p class="has-medium-font-size">Way to squeeze the day Lisa! </p> <div class="el-meta uk-text-meta uk-text-primary uk-margin-top">Article </div> Girl, 7, sells lemonade to pay for brain surgery</strong><br><a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://www.today.com/parents/girl-7-sells-lemonade-help-pay-brain-surgery-t210529" target="_blank">https://www.today.com/parents/girl-7-sells-lemonade-help-pay-brain-surgery-t210529</a></p>

Squeeze the Day

We all remember the old saying, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” Using one small thing with the suggested tendency of sourness or difficulty and with just a few ingredients makes it into something positive, sweet, and desirable…
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<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Over the year's technology has revolutionized our world and our lives. We have a world of opportunity at our fingertips, with a plethora of apps and platforms.  However, before technology, an app was something you're ordered at a fancy restaurant, and avenues were something one stood upon. Not to mention Amazon now, which was just the largest river in the world, not the largest online retailer in the world. Many will say life was less busy, less stressful, and more enjoyable before technology, and others will say technology has made things faster, more comfortable, and fun.  Well, it made life easier.</h3> <p class="has-drop-cap">Let's talk about social media; for instance, being social before technology meant you had to leave your house.  You wrote letters to mail because there was no email. There was no Tinder if you wanted to date someone, you called them on a landline telephone that stayed in your house, or you wrote them a love letter, "Do you love me?" check YES or NO. What a Concept?  A Social Media post was a printed hard copy piece of paper that you taped or stapled to a bulletin board.</p> <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-default"><p>"Dance Tonight," "Grandma's chicken soup recipe," or "Tupperware Party after work today!"</p></blockquote> <p>Amazingly there were no 24-hour news sources; the news only came on twice a day.  Trolls were mythical creatures in children's books. Web design was strictly for Arachnids, and before GPS, you had to use a paper Atlas.</p> <p>Way before you could use the largest search engine called Google or simply ask "Siri," you needed to leave your house and go to a library to do any research or reading, unless you were one of the lucky few that had Encyclopedias. You know those books that your parents purchased from a traveling salesman, that no one had ever met before, yet somehow, these individuals were invited into our homes for coffee and cookies.</p> <p>Alas, technology has had a "Big Effect" on entertainment and hobbies.  Today we live in a society of innovation and an ever-changing digital world.  We live in an age of time where it is almost impossible to live without some form of entertainment, Television, music, photography, gaming and the list goes on and on.  Before, there were very few channels to watch on Television and for some only one.  You had to leave your house to see the latest box office hit, but not today.  Today we have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and many other service providers that allow us to watch anything we desire at any time.</p> <p>Long before Apple Music, Spotify, and MP3's was the innovative invention of the cassette tape. They were all the rage. You could record music from your AM-FM radio station. Sometimes if you were lucky. They quote "threw you a bone," you could record or tape the top 10 to top 100 songs in one sitting. The other exciting thing was the Walkman, a portable device that ran on batteries with wired spongy headphones.  Now you can listen to music anytime and anywhere with Bluetooth. Before technology, if you had heard that term, you would have thought you had a stained mouth from too much Kool-aide.</p> <div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="alignright"><img src="https://www.blevinscreativegroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/polaroid-pronto-300x271.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-3637"/></figure></div> <p>Let's not even plan to start with gaming technology. Do you have all day? Before, we chased a dot back and forth on a tabletop console with two-dimensional graphics called Pong.  Oh, and by the way, before I Phones and digital cameras, if you took a selfie, you could wait up to a week or more for it to be developed, except for the innovative invention of the Polaroid Instant film camera, which was pricey at the time.</p> <p>Modern Technology made a massive discovery in 1992 with the first smartphone" and to present has paved the way for numerous multi-functional devices that are portable, have advanced software, and are always at your fingertips.</p> <p>Before technology, did we live in the "Dark Ages" or is it an Innocence Lost? In moments of digital anxiety, some will see themselves as digital immigrants, and others will see themselves as digital pioneers.</p>

“Dark Ages” Life before Technology

Over the year’s technology has revolutionized our world and our lives. We have a world of opportunity at our fingertips, with a plethora of apps and platforms.  However, before technology, an app was something you’re ordered at a fancy res…
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