Tom Brosnahan started writing about Turkey 40 years ago as a Peace Corps Volunteer and developed a successful guidebook series to “demystify” Turkey for American travelers. Though his guidebooks, including Frommer’s “Turkey on $5 a Day” and the Lonely Planet “Turkey” are still top sellers, it’s Brosnahan’s TurkeyTravelPlanner.com that turned his business into a mini-empire. “Many travel writers enjoy roaming the entire world, always visiting and describing new places,” say Brosnahan. “I realized early that focusing on a particular niche was the best way to run a successful business and more difficult for competitors to overcome your lead,” says Brosnahan. Turkeytravelplanner.com is laser-focused on Turkey travel and receives two million visitors annually from more than 170 countries. “My web site stands out from larger travel websites which tend to cover the entire world, but thinly,” says Brosnahan. “Because I focus on Turkey with depth and discernment, my website is regarded as a rich resource for planning a trip to Turkey and provides more depth than the competition.”
Month: October 2007
White Dog Café Serves Good Food and Community Education
Judy Wicks, the founder and owner of White Dog Café, is a popular restaurant in Philadelphia’s University of Pennsylvania section that is well known for its commitment to social responsibility. Since opening in 1983, the White Dog has become a Philadelphia institution, locally and nationally known and valued for Wicks’ leadership in social and environmental activism, and just plain good cooking. White Dog’s mission serves four areas: customers, employees, community and nature. The business supports several local causes, including environmental responsibility (it was the first business in Pennsylvania to purchase 100% of their electricity from Wind Power Sources), paying a living wage to employees, and sourcing from local farms where meat and poultry are raised humanely.
New Rules for Selling to Big Companies
Corporate executives wield tremendous buying clout. According to the 2007 U.S. Business Elite Survey by Ipsos Media, senior executives make or influence more than $1.7 trillion a year in spending decisions. These executives have purchasing responsibility for information technology, telecommunications, office and industrial equipment, financial and insurance services, automobiles, and business services. Yet, over the past decade, selling to corporate clients has become more difficult. Corporate buyers are facing pressure to accomplish more with fewer resources. Many companies have consolidated, making it difficult to locate the appropriate internal decision makers. Voicemail is the new gatekeeper, making it harder—if not impossible—to reach the very people within large companies who are critical to begin the selling process.