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Reading the Chicago Tribune business section I learned that Barbie, the world’s most popular doll, had lost her “Wow” and the president of her division at Mattel, Neil Friedman, had sent his team on retreat to go and find it. They returned with a new slogan, “Dream Big In Pink Heels” and as soon as [...]

It was the 9th Anniversary party of the Catalyst Ranch and the crowd was gathered around the raffle drawing.  All of the buckets with lucky tickets had been pulled and only the last fabulous prize remained. This bucket had the most tickets. This bucket was the one I wanted. I hovered near the front, tickets [...]

Please join us in celebration of Big Ooga member, Lauren Young, President of  Freshly Baked Communications as she launches her new book, the first in a series of four, Pour-Marketing Success Starts with the Right Ingredients. The night will feature the talents of Spark Entertainment * Keri Slattery * XO Pictures * Citygirl Weddings and [...]

I emailed Les Brown and asked him to speak at Big Ooga. I was shocked when the phone rang a few minutes later. “Hello, this is Big Ooga.” “Hello, this is Les Brown.” I must have been drinking the motivational Kool Aid when I reached out in the first place. “Why not give it a [...]

Liz Strauss has had the courage to voice who she is in a whisper heard round the world. The foremost businesswoman on Twitter, she has refused to accept business as usual. Like thought leaders before us, in the privacy of her own observations she has understood the contributions of individuals, small companies and corporations and [...]

Succeeding From the Inside Out – Powerful Thinking to Change Your Business Named by the Wall Street Journal as the most influential woman on Twitter, meet visionary Liz Strauss and learn how to shift your thinking to reshape your business. Find out why her 81,500 Twitter followers are listening and why her thought-leadership conference, SOBCon [...]

We have an incredibly important Big Ooga meeting coming up August 2nd and I’d like to tell you the story. When CFO-Pro, John Lafferty joined Big Ooga I checked his site and called his references. They were SO glowing that top business people said they could not have succeeded without him. Soft spoken, knowledgeable and [...]

Featuring Phil Gerbyshak Learn the fastest and simplest best practices for creating a company social media strategy that can be executed in 3, 5, or 10 minutes per day. At this presentation you’ll learn how-to create your own Social Media Strategy Playbook to socially engage your customers and prospects more effectively, hit your target markets [...]

In conversations with search engine optimization experts in Chicago, the consensus is, it’s not just about the traffic but what happens once you get it.  Do your visitors stay or go? Do they return and connect?  Are they compelled to pick up the phone, buy something, sign-up for something or even walk through your door?  [...]

There is nothing more exhilarating than knowing where you’re going in business, seeing the road ahead and knowing what steps to take.  Just having that in your pocket feels like a currency, like being rich with hope AND strategy. Conversely, speaking for myself and possibly the other 22 million of us US entrepreneurs who sometimes [...]