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Ask Lita Online is a Business People Connection to valued business services, useful tips and helpful information.   Through online discussions and social media tools, Lita Williams, Executive Business People Consultant works to address business questions, offer strategic support and advance essential relations for businesses, entrepreneurs and professionals.

Ask Lita Online Radio Guest Highlights:

Roberta Kühleis, Owner and Business Consultant at GesQuali Consultoria em Gestãoin Brazil helps businesses gain a competitive advantage.

Through successful employment of quality management tools, Roberta has helped businesses receive quality management awards and attain business goals. As an active volunteer for the Gaucho Quality and Productivity Program in Brazil, Roberta’s passion to help business owners continues to result the improvements needed for businesses to achieve success.

Roberta Kuhleis



Mishele Vieira, Certified Professional Organizer, uses a holistic approach to assisting people with organization. I was impressed to hear that Mishele listens to understand client needs and allows the conversation to determine appropriate next steps. She told me that often clutter is the result of other issues that need to be addressed.
 
Mishele not only works to clear physical clutter, she offers suggestions to help relieve mental and emotional stresses that make clearing clutter difficult by connecting clients to other helpful resources.

Mishele Vieira

 

Erik Deckers, Owner Professional Blog Service shared that viral marketing relies on word of mouth. Unlike traditional or gorilla marketing, which often rely on getting attention from a large audience in a specific span of time. Erik explained that the key to website traffic or getting a website to go viral is in linking people to a website through items of interest and by using relationship focused engagement strategies. Erik contends that a blog combine with social media networks is the most effective catalyst for establishing relations to drive website traffic.According to Erik Deckers, social media and blogging is simple enough to engage that anyone can do it and everyone with a business should not hesitate with getting started.

Erik Deckers

 



Marshall Hatfield CEO & Founder of Moonlit Ventures, offering marketing and advertising services with a unique approach. Along with marketing strategy consulting and on –demand lead generation, Marshall guarantees his “done for you” profit marketing campaigns. According to Marshall, the point of entrepreneurship is to deliver value.

During my interview with Marshall, he stressed that a strategic approach to marketing is best and a tactical approach fails in comparison. Marshall focuses on small businesses with small to non-existent marketing departments. His company, Moonlit Ventures, provides full service marketing or engages clients as an outsourced vendor.

Marshall stated that all marketing plans should focus on three aspects for growth:
1. Get more customers
2. Get customers buying more and more often
3. Get customers buying at higher prices

Marshall contends that business owners focused on developing life time relationships through reoccurring services can afford higher client acquisition cost.

Marshall Hatfield

 

Alan Kitty (IAF, SAG, DG, Playwright, Mark Twain impersonator, Organizational Development Consultant) holds an undergraduate degree in Social Science from Suffolk University, with masters work from New York University. Has been impersonating Mark Twain since 1979. He is well-known for his creative interpretations of many character roles over the years, in touring productions of "A Delicate Balance," "Come Blow Your Horn," "Speed The Plow," "Dead Wrong," "The Cruicible," "Murder in the Cathedral," "Twilight of the Golds," and dozens of other modern works. He has been praised for his unique approaches to character leads in musical classics such as "Damn Yankees," "L'il Abner," Godspell," "Bye-Bye Birdie," and many others.
 
As a playwright, he has penned musical and non-musical plays, including "Bing," "Elective Behaviors," "Mark Twain is Alive and Well," and "Landscape." For television, he was commissioned to write a three-part series "Reel Exposure" which aired during the early years of Cable.
 
As an organizational development consultant, Kitty created a unique approach to team building and cultural change - delivered in the guise of Mark Twain, he borrows from modern approaches to Team-building and Leadership theory. His clients come from the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing and Financial Services industries.

Alan Kitty

Phyllis Zimbler Miller leverages expertise as a social media consultant and blogger to help business people increase website traffic.  Phyllis discusses aligning social media marketing with client objects, her novel "Mrs. Lieutenant" and project "Understand French Like a Native"
 
Phyllis Zimbler Miller (@ZimblerMiller on Twitter) has a B.A. in Journalism from Michigan State University and an M.B.A. in Finance from The Wharton School. An author of fiction and nonfiction books (her Amazon author page), she is the co-founder of the marketing consulting company Miller Mosaic LLC. She writes for the company blog and also writes guest posts for sites such as BookBuzzr.com and Technorati.com

Phyllis Zimbler Miller

Susan Payton shares her expertise on increasing traffic to websites through marketing communications.
 
Susan Payton is the President of Egg Marketing & Communications, an internet marketing firm specializing in marketing communications, copywriting and blog posts. She’s written two books: 101 Entrepreneur Tipsand Internet Marketing Strategies for Entrepreneurs, and blogs for several sites, including The Marketing Eggspert Blog, as well as Mashable, Small Business Trends, FutureSimple, BizLaunch and Lead411.
Susan Payton

Charlotte Davis Levine helps businesses, entrepreneurs and professionals install effective bookkeeping tools including bookkeeping software and other business organizational tools to assist in business success.
 
Charlotte Davis Levine, B.S. in Computer Science and a concentration in Economics.  She is the proud owner of Ledger Has It, www.ledgerhasit.com  – which is essentially here to assist, teach and to provide expertise to electronically set-up your business.  The Ledger Has It Team comprises over 20 years of business experience with backgrounds in Education, Finance, Economics and Accounting.  In addition to owning her own business she is a Project Analyst Consultant handling multi-million dollar budgets.  Charlotte Davis Levine has worked for Xerox as a S.W. Engineer in the Engineering Department. She also has had a successful career in the Internet Sector working with Shopzilla.

Charlotte Davis Levine

Chase Sherman, Owner of Business Tooligans on leveraging Internet Marketing for business.  

What should be some of the first steps taken to increase business presence using internet marketing?

What are the core components of an effective social marketing campaign?
 
This podcast highlights, Chase Sherman, a Social Media Consultant, addressing the answers to how social media can be leveraged for business. The points made are from an ealier interview with Chase sharing social media expertise.
As a social media consultant, Chase provides insight as to how businesses gain in the market place through effective social media marketing compaigns.

Chase points out that there is a core customer exercise that helps to determine a target market so that marketing messages and social media activities can be tailored successfully.  Chase expounds on the importance for a business to clarify a unique selling proposition, work to understand the landscape of the target market and restraint from engaging various social networks until a clear message is established.
 
Chase expresses what many of us business owners know to be true - the key to any successful business is through relationships.
 
Chases answers, what are the best practices that should be used when employing a social media marketing campaign?  He discusses three core characteristics needed for a successful campaign and shares the three musts of any social media campaign including the need to develop social capital to gain credibility and increase the interest of “influencers," those that can help you get your message out.

Chase Sherman

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More on Ask Lita online business guests:

Chef Lauren Von Der Pool discusses healthy eating, the power of vegan cooking and a raw food diet as well as inspirations to help communities gain access to healthier eating and raw food preparation. Well respected celebrity Chef Lauren Von Der Pool shares information about her nonprofit efforts to give back to community and work as a business owner providing superb culinary skills while inspiring clients to include her fabulous recipes for pleasure and business meetings.

Chef Lauren Von Der Pool is the found/CEO of the Green non-profit Von Der Pool Gourmet & Healthy Living Services Inc. that teaches inner city communities healthy living services and agricultural awareness. Von Der Pool is also the CEO and head Chef of Von Der Pool Gourmet, Inc., as well as a world renowned celebrity chef specializing in exotic, vegan and raw food cuisine. She arose from humble beginnings at the age of sixteen selling her raw pies outside of local universities. Lauren, a Le Cordon Bleu graduate, went on to cater the Oscars, Grammys, AMA’s and countless A-List celebrity events. After working under the renowned Wolfgang Puck, Lauren returned to DC to continue her work for her non-profit to help bring awareness to how proper food can heal the mind, body, and soul starting in her own community.
 
Lauren Von Der Pool on healthy eating, vegan and raw food:
 
During our discussion on Ask Lita Internet Radio, Chef Lauren Von Der Pool commented on what it means to be a vegan. She went on to answer the question, what is a raw food diet? Lauren included raw food preparation ideas and options for busy people to easily incorporate eating a raw food diet. She talked of utilizing juicy fruits, dates and preparing raw pies as a breakfast choice.
Lauren’s comments included how to incorporate a raw food diet in a small living space. She stated that all that is needed to get started preparing raw food dishes are a blender, a knife and a cutting board. Lauren talked of the power of vegan and raw foods. At the age of sixteen a major life changing event captured Lauren’s attention.It was during that time that according to Lauren, “that which was dormant became active.”
 
Lauren’s excitement about the benefits of eating a vegan and raw diet is the result of her personal experience and that which she witnessed through the experiences of her clients. Lauren points out the oxygenation provided by a plant based diet, along with the rejuvenating values to cellular structure as well as inner and outer beauty results of a plant based diet. Lauren strongly touts the advantages of lowering one’s carbon footprint through eating a vegan and raw food diet.

When asked, does a plant based diet provide enough protein? Lauren confidently responded that the assertion is a myth and explained that there are many protein options that can be easily found in a plant based diet including goji berries and in the benefits of spirulina.
 
According to Lauren, one’s life and health is worth more than eating just fat. She stated that life is important -longevity is important. “It’s a decision really,” said Lauren.
 
I asked Lauren, “How to get people to try vegan and a raw diet? “Just feed it to them.” she said jokingly. Simply have people try it and when they like it then she shares the health benefits with them.
 
Lauren suggests that people start a vegan and raw food diet with small changes:instead of white sugar use maple sugar, change the type of fat, the type of salt and the quantity used. Lauren shared that it doesn’t matter where you come from people can choose their path. “Thoughts become things, she said. Lauren concludes that things come back to you.
 
Chef Lauren Von Der Pool works with First Lady Michelle Obama’s health initiative by demonstrating raw and vegan food preparation skills to youth. Lauren offers catering services as a personal chef, for small groups and supports very large events by utilizing her relationship with Wolfgang Puck and Le Cordon Bleu students.

Chef Lauren Von Der Pool

 

Donna Lewis, Employee and Labor Relations Specialist, works to assists human resource efforts as a consultant, trainer and a business partner. Donna shares tactics used to strengthen employee relations. During the show Donna spoke about the importance of allowing employees to develop while working within management parameters and company guidelines.

Donna shared her thoughts on treating people as if they were where they ought to be and the importance of companies developing a culture that recognizes employees for more than the outcome of their performance. Donna also talked about employee responsibilities to chart their course by seeking opportunities to demonstrate skills while taking ownership of skill development.

When asked about the current challenges and trends within human resources, Donna spoke about the importance of effectively developing a multi-generational workforce and gaining more with online training, as well as leveraging social media and making a stronger impact in health and wellness.

Donna Lewis

Rita Ogbeama shares job search tips and job search strategies for success.  Need help with job search, job search strategies or career development strategies? 
 
Rita Ogbeama, a Career Specialist and CAREEREALISM Approved Expert, helps entry-level, mid and high-level job seekers become more confident and savvy job search strategists. Rita has written for Examiner.com on effective job search strategies and previously sat on the advisory board for Experience.com. She coaches job seekers to take ownership of their search. She is highly effective at providing coaching on content development on resumes/cover letters, social media profiles, and elevator pitches.

Rita Ogbeama

The job series is introduced with comments by a previous "Ask Lita" guest Bruce Bixler, a specialist in LinkedIn tools, offering job search techniques for mature job seeke
 
Marc Welker, State Farm Agency Recruiter, rounds out our discussion with information regarding a viable business option, an entrepreneurial position as a State Farm Agent.  State Farm has opportunities that require consideration from those seeking sustainable career choices.
In his own words, a little about Marc:
"I am in my 20th year with State Farm and still loving every day!

I grew up in a family where both of my parents were successful agents (my mom with Allstate and my dad an independent broker) and both of them pushed me to State Farm, when I decided I wanted to be an agent like them.  I am a graduate of Oregon State University (1990).

I spent 7+ years in claims and joined State Farm's Operations recruiting team in 2000 and became an agency recruiter in 2002.

This (State Farm Agent opportunity) is without a doubt THE best entrepreneurial opportunity a person will find!

http://www.statefarm.com/agents/career/

I am involved in our recruiting efforts in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho Montana, Oregon & Washington."
 
Marc Welker

Brand McGill shares search engine optimization expertise to assist businesses, entrepreneurs and professionals with increasing website traffic.
 
Brandon McGill, Owner President of Focus Marketing has been in the search engine marketing industry for the past 4 years. According to Brandon, working for different companies helped him see that the industry is full of companies that are just looking to get a credit card number and the customer service aspect is lost requiring many customers to just spend a lot of money.
 
When Brandon McGill started Focus Marketing in the spring of 2010, he wanted to trek a new path and break that standard mindset that internet marketing cost too much. Providing a high quality product to any level of client, while providing quality customer service is Brandon’s goal with Focus Marketing. Now after a year and a half of business Brandon McGill has a very low cancellation rate and clients are getting results within their budget. As part of how Brandon keeps Focus clients happy is that his marketing services are industry exclusive providing Focus Marketing clients’ results over their competition. Focus isn't the kind of company that wants to take on thousands of clients, but rather get results for clients with the best ROI possible.  

Brand McGill

Atiba Mwangi shares the key to business success along with business tips and entrepreneurial strategies.
Atiba Mwangi an entrepreneur, community advocate and my dad inspires those around him by working to strengthen all within his reach.   For more than fifty years, Atiba has worked to become his best.  Starting with nothing more than a car ride across the country, he focused to develop his passions as an entrepreneur and actor.  With successes both short and enduring, he invites others to gain from his work experiences.  Atiba has a treasure of knowledge as owner of an asphalt paving company and a limo service.
 
Once a neighborhood planning advisory representative, producer of community plays and youth events, Atiba Mwangi has also been recognized publicly for humanitarian efforts and received a distinguished honor presented by the late Michigan State Senator Jackie Vaughan.  Atiba’s acting career includes countless plays including A Raisin in the Sun, No Use Cryin’, James Baldwin plays and plays written by his community organization participants.   Atiba Mwangi continues to develop self so that his best gets better and is always present.
 
Listen in with me as I learn more about one of my greatest supporters, my dad, while we reminisce and enjoy the blessings of our interaction.
 
Lita Williams

Angela Story-Krug an event planner employs excellent customer service to exceed customer needs.
 
This segment on customer service also includes valuable insight provided by Constance "Connie" Jackson Allstate Agency Owner in Pontiac, Michigan.
 
Featured Guest
Employing Customer Service for Business Success:
Angela Story-Krug, Producer Owner Event Source Productions
Growing up in a church where her family had a part in every wedding, funeral, camp meeting, and Bible conference, Angela began learning her craft at a very young age.  Her professional career started just two weeks after college graduation with the Walt Disney Company and today she has over 20 years of live show production experience.  She launched Event Source Productions in 2004, and has since produced events throughout the country.  Her clients include two sitting United States Presidents, Fortune 500 Companies, Professional Sports Organizations and the U.S. Department of Defense.  Angela has extensive experience in live show production from concept development, budgeting, fabrication, and scripting, to complex logistics and precise execution.  From confidential meetings to exclusive social spectaculars, her expertise is reflected in the success of each event. 

Angela Story - Krug