You might have heard of foursquare, the location-based social media tool. But if you’re not using it for business, you’re missing out on a powerful marketing and engagement tool that can help any business—large or small—tell its brand story to a new category of consumer.

Giving great presentations requires skill, work and practice. So if you want to take the easy way out and look like a rank amateur, here are 15 surefire tips to guarantee that you leave a really bad impression.

After watching Garth Brooks captivate a crowd recently, I realized that I had not watched a concert. Instead, I had witnessed a magnificent presentation of his “product”—his songs. I also realized that the way this showman delivered his material carries valuable lessons for communicators in any field.

As customer satisfaction scores continue to decline, take a page from the Ritz-Carlton playbook to motivate your team and to improve the service you offer your customers.

Fear of public speaking causes a lot of us to avoid it altogether or suffer sleepless nights leading up to the event.  But you can effectively prepare yourself for the big moment. The key is not to completely eliminate fear but to accept it, reframe it, and control it.

Few people are more closely asso­ciated with innovation than Apple co-founder, Steve Jobs. Through interviews with Apple employees, experts and analysts, as well as Jobs’ own words, I discovered seven principles largely responsible for Jobs’ breakthrough success.

As small businesses around the country plan for 2011, many are focused on simply surviving. What's lost is the big idea.

The recent salmonella outbreak that led to the recall of half-a-billion eggs affects businesses far removed from the two big Iowa egg producers at the center of the storm. Most are relatively small ventures struggling to survive in a recession and committed to delivering safe food. As a communications specialist, I am often called upon to help companies respond to and recover from a crisis.  These 5 lessons for rebuilding reputations and brands can be applied to almost any company involved in a crisis, food related or not. They can help you survive and possibly emerge even stronger.

Shortly after talk show host Larry King announced his decision to hang up his suspenders after 25 years at CNN, he was asked to reminisce about his favorite guests. What caught my attention as a business communications coach were the traits King says he looks for in an ideal interviewee: passion, a sense of humor, anger, and an ability to explain what he or she does very well.

As a communications specialist, I am often called upon for "crisis communications" projects—helping companies respond to and recover from a crisis.