​When Google released their Panda update in 2011, they took the internet by storm. What stood in the aftermath was the foundation of blogging in 2020: a world of long-form content, detailed guides, and lengthy articles that delivers unique value to readers hundreds of millions of times every day.

Small business owners and savvy marketers know that in order for your promotions and sales efforts to be most effective, you should know as much as possible about your potential customer; what their habits are both online and off, their income, commute habits, communication preferences, etc. 

This all helps paint a picture of their needs, and helps you determine at what point your products or services could be of use to them. This type of personalized data on your customer is incredibly valuable, and one of the reasons why big data is such a rapidly growing market. ​

Yet for most small businesses, finding the right customer at the right time using snippets of demographic and other consumer behavior data can be time consuming and hit-or-miss. Even the best, most thoroughly researched marketing campaigns only convert a small percentage of their target audience. 

A number of our small business clients come to us because they need a better web presence or want to begin marketing their business online. We hate to do it, but sometimes we have to pump the brakes, take a step back and discuss their branding. For most small businesses, "branding" may consist of their logo and perhaps a small set of preferred colors, and maybe, if we're lucky, some defined fonts and images. 

But the importance of your small business' logo cannot be overstated. The logo is often the first interaction and subsequent reaction a new prospect experiences when discovering your business. So the important question is: does it send the message you want to communicate about your company?

As a small business owner, deciding where to spend our marketing budget can be a challenge. On the one hand you may want to be everywhere and not miss an opportunity to woo potential customers. On the other hand, you need to be strategic about your digital marketing spend to ensure you squeeze the most marketing juice out of your campaigns. 

​So how do you discover where your potential customers are hanging out online and how do you engage them there? Luckily we've found some great data to share...

We have a lot of empathy for our small business clients who are struggling to make an impact on social media. It can be a challenge to devote time and resources to managing your social channels. It can be even harder to continue to tread that social water if you're not seeing results in the way of an increase in followers or engagements. 

But if your primary focus on social media is worrying about content ideas and what to post, you may be missing out on opportunities to engage your followers and grow your communities. Here are six things you should be doing on social media besides posting your own content to help you be more a efficient and effective social media marketer:

If you've been in business for awhile, eventually you face the reality that at some point in time you will need to raise your prices. Usually external forces are at play - either your suppliers have raised theirs or other costs of doing business have increased. Clearly, this is not the most pleasant aspect of small business ownership, but a reality nonetheless. 

​So how do you go about raising your prices without risking sales volume and loyal customers? ValPak offers some valuable insights and data points to consider: