In today's online world, social media reviews have replaced the traditional word-of-mouth form of marketing. At ImageWorks, we strongly recommend that our clients engage in a reputation, review, and reward program so that reviews of their products or services are captured quickly and effectively. We recently received this article in our inbox from one of our favorite online marketing resources, Street Fight Magazine.

How do small to medium sized businesses set an effective marketing budget plan for their company? That’s a question we get asked quite a lot. Unfortunately, there is no magic answer.

At ImageWorks, every month is Small Business Month. Helping small businesses grow bigger is our favorite job! Since May is National Small Business Month, we’ve put together a list of tips to help you improve each aspect of your company.

Are you giving your customers too many choices?

More is better, right? More oatmeal flavors, more types of Gatorade, more programs to watch on television. We often hear from companies with a promise of more, more, more!

Not so fast. Sometimes the only thing that results from more choices is more confusion.

Laser focused services and organized products that have clear benefits are what works. Here’s an example from a famous Columbia University marketing study that illustrates our point.

This is a guest post written by Wes Towers.

As someone involved in online marketing, I’m often asked this time of year what the next ‘big thing’ will be in marketing. At the start of every year, people take stock of their lives and make New Year’s resolutions. Likewise, business owners around the globe work on goals for the coming year and are typically searching for a magic bullet. While there is no magic bullet, I have some predictions I believe will help SMEs grow in 2016.