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Northern Initiatives and Our Customers are On the Move

Data That We Track, April 2017
  New Data and New Information   In March we saw jobless rates fall in 84% of our counties, and in April the rates fell in…
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Data That We Track, March 2017
  New Data and New Information   It is a little surprising to see the jobless rates in so many counties decrease in March, but…
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Need Some Magic to Conjure New Customers? Use a Conversion Funnel.
  Despite the claim of this picture, there’s nothing magical about small (and large) businesses using a funnel strategy to move prospects into repeat buyers.…
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Three Reasons to Care About Your (Financial) Ratios
Financial ratios aren’t usually the first topic at cocktail parties. But for small business owners, maybe they should be. A solid understanding of the role…
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TripAdvisor: A Road Trip to Success Tip for your Small Business (But Don’t Tell Anyone)
Shhhh. We have a secret to share with you.   Did you know on average 390 million people visited TripAdvisor last month alone? And 60…
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Pricing Your Product (or Service)
Chart the right course. As a small business owner, you know that pricing your products correctly is crucial to sustaining and growing your business. But…
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Data That We Track, February 2017
  New Data and New Information   The February jobless numbers came out last week and as would be expected all but two communities saw…
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Data That We Track, December 2016
  Not unexpected for rural Michigan, winter brings seasonal adjustments and they are almost always upward with respect to joblessness.  Two of our 51 counties…
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Becoming Tax-Smart Takes Planning
What is tax planning and why is it important to your small business?   First, let’s consider the word “plan.” According to Merriam-Webster, a plan…
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