It’s not unusual for business giants to flock to a particular location in a country or city. This could depend on factors such as business-tax rates, financial programs that might be on offer there, or the cost of living and how this compares to the national average. While places such as Silicon Valley may be well-known destinations for businesses, there are many more affordable and feasible locations in the United States for companies to set up shop.

The Emerald City is not green when it comes to being a tech hub, in fact it’s pretty firmly established. With two of the biggest names in tech (Amazon and Microsoft) and one of the biggest names in Aerospace (Boeing) in very close proximity, this bustling young city has some amazing tech endeavors founded and run by some incredible Seattleites.

With the holiday season upon us, it’s important to have a clear plan of how you’re going to market to your customers (existing and prospective!) during this period. I recently wrote about how to create a holiday marketing plan, but what about some low cost practical marketing ideas to go with that? That’s what I’m going to look at here.

Every year the holiday season creeps up on me. The leaves begin to fall and the temperature starts to drop and before I know it there are holiday ads on the TV and stores are stocked floor to ceiling with decorations, stocking fillers and gift wrap.

When making a new hire, it’s important that the onboarding process is handled carefully. If it is not done correctly, then you could end up with a number of issues: hiring the wrong person for the job, seeing a rapid turnover rate, or having clashing expectations of the new employee’s productivity and role, for example.

Let’s experiment. When it comes to growing my business I’m definitely not one for standing still - I don’t prescribe to the ‘wait and see’ mentality. Instead, I like to try different things all the time.

There’s such a variety of degrees available nowadays as more and more people are deciding to go to college. It’s no longer just a case of whether you’d like to be a lawyer or a doctor, as there are now so many degrees that you can choose from.

I’ve been busy trying to recruit a new salesperson for my team, which means I’ve been spending the past few nights reading résumé after résumé. Luckily, there were a few really great ones in there and interviews are pending, but I was surprised how hard I had to work to find them among pages and pages of seemingly endless résumé jargon.

We all face crippling deadlines from time to time, and no matter how hard we try, there never seems to be enough time to get everything done. Some of us feel the pressure building up day after day as we accomplish mind-numbing task after mind-numbing task, never actually getting close to our to-do list finish line.

What’s your small business brand identity? Sure, you’ve got a logo, a website, business cards, signage and perhaps even a storefront – but your brand is so much more than the “look” of your business. While all these can help you project a carefully crafted image to your customers, true branding runs a lot deeper.