This Week in Small Business: Serious News from The Onion’s CCO

news you can use

No joke. The Onion’s CCO share some great insights on native advertising. You’ll also find an extra dose of information on branding your small business among the top articles presented here.

Leadership, management and productivity

We’ve all dealt with “tough customers.” Here’s how to turn them into loyal brand advocates.

Customers are in the driver’s seat today and that’s why you need to see customer service as a new differentiator and your top priority. By the way, knowing the experts and reading the books listed here, should help.

You know that remote workers can save you $$, but how can you make the relationships actually work? On the same subject: Discover how using freelance workers can take your business to the next level.

Marketing and sales

Native advertising works. Humorous advertising works. See what The Onion’s CCO has to say about all of this.

Funds tight? Then you’ll appreciate these five “zero to cheap” DIY promotion strategies.

Stay ahead of the curve and check out these five marketing trends that are on the horizon. But at the same time, you need to know how social media has changed over the past three years.

Just like baseball players start every spring training with the fundamentals, it’s critical to be certain you have these 10 fundamentals of SEO implemented on your website.

Two good articles on branding: 5 ways it will grow your business and why people unfollow brands on social media.

We read a lot about agile marketing. This article covers the challenges of implementing it for a small business on a tight budget.

Allan Hall gives us seven ways to market to an eight-second attention span…assuming your prospects can hang in there that long.

Yes, it’s possible: Three ways your small business can engage consumers without a website.

Entrepreneurship, startups and innovation

Want to try your hand at an online ecommerce startup? Here are all the steps required to start a t-shirt store using WordPress.

Speaking of WordPress, it powers a huge percentage of websites and if you’re using it to launch your small business, you need to go down this checklist.

In this short video, Alyssa Milano talks about how she diversified her life and broke into entrepreneurship.

Hey Baby Boomer! Not ready to retire? Then check out these franchise opportunities.

Politics, government and the economy

Steve Tobak says that boosting the economy isn’t rocket science and wonders how simple economics can be so divisive.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bipartisan bill on regulatory relief for small businesses.

The administration’s new overtime pay rules will impact some 4 million workers.