neiltortorella.com

Starting Your Career As A Musician

nt — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 16:05:22 +0000

My new book, Starting Your Career As A Musician (Allworth Press), is scheduled for release in late February or early March. Amazon says March 1, 2013. We’ll see. What happens is one fine day I open my front door and trip over a package. Voila! My copies have arrived and I know my book is [...]

The Sad State of Design, 2012

nt — Tue, 15 May 2012 17:08:24 +0000

We’re having quite a brisk discussion about whether or not clients and prospects are devaluing the graphic design industry over at GraphicDesign.com. Swing over and join in. We’d love to learn your thoughts, insights and experiences. Here’s a taste of the article:

Okay … this is something of a rant. Bear with me or indulge me. [...]

Taming The Feast Or Famine Beast: Part Four

nt — Fri, 04 May 2012 12:00:44 +0000

Action Plans, Marketing Calendar & Budgeting

Action Plans In the action plans section of your marketing plan, you’ll develop a detailed marketing “to do” list. It’s a task list that describes what will be done, when each task will begin and be completed, along with who’s responsible for accomplishing it.

The action plan picks up where the objectives [...]

Taming The Feast Or Famine Beast: Part Three

nt — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 12:55:09 +0000

Conducting A SWOT Analysis & Developing Marketing Objectives

SWOT Analysis A SWOT Analysis a chart showing those things within and outside your business that will make you swim or sink. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

Strengths and Weaknesses (inside your company) This requires some hard core honesty on your part. What are you good at? What [...]

Taming The Feast Or Famine Beast: Part Two

nt — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 11:40:25 +0000

Conducting Target Market & Competitor Analysis

In the previous post, I touched on conducting target market and competitor analysis. In this post, we’ll get knee deep into them.

Target Market Analysis Critical to your success in marketing any product or service is focusing your marketing efforts on a specific target market or niche. Marketing becomes a [...]

Taming The Feast Or Famine Beast:

nt — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 16:00:52 +0000

Creating & Implementing An Effective Marketing Plan

Please note: This was originally published on TheNetsetter.com, which, to the best of my knowledge, has gone the way of the dinosaur. But, I felt the content and information was of value, so here it is for a reprise.

– Part One –

A well-thought-out and implemented marketing plan is the [...]

Unleashing the Writer Within

nt — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 15:15:52 +0000

Up until ten years ago, I considered myself a graphic designer and marketing consultant. As such, I left the copywriting to the copywriters. Sure, I’d whip up a couple of lines of prose here and there, but the main stuff always went out to a “real” writer.

It wasn’t until I was drafted to write the [...]

The Shy Networker

nt — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 15:32:15 +0000

Most extroverted folks are great at networking events. They’re all bubbly, chatty and such. They make us introverted folks cringe sometimes.

Me, an introvert?

Yup, ‘fraid so gang. I’ve always been a bit shy, even way back in the dark ages when I was but a mere kidlet. Yet, I don’t have any problem with public speaking [...]

Neil Tortorella Joins GraphicDesign.com as a Featured Contributor & Member of Its Advisory Board

nt — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:00:51 +0000

GraphicDesign.com is forming an Industry Advisory Council. The members of the council will be introduced to the public in the near future.

Feedback and input from the Industry Advisory Council will be instrumental to GraphicDesign.com in areas such as site design, user experience, content topics, suggested new contributors as well as major [...]

A Branding & Positioning Primer

nt — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 21:50:31 +0000

Branding and positioning are endeavors that often require a plan of their own. But, for solo professionals, they can often be addressed within the marketing plan. It helps to cut down on all that paper flying around in your office.

Branding is more than simply slapping your logo on a letterhead, sign or business card. Although [...]