For years, classic brand strategy has always been about the creation of a single message that can be used with all of your constituents; investors, employees, senior management and customers about who you are and what value your company provides. Brand managers tend to write it up and paste it ... more

A recent BusinessWeek , 'Hey, Starbucks, How About Coffee Cubes?' had me saying "Finally!" About a month ago, java giant Starbucks launched its new web site just so that its customers could make suggestions, discuss ideas, vote on ideas others submit, and otherwise, put their 2 cents in. The site ... more

No business that strategizes around making people happy by giving them a voice and a sense that they have a stake in your business will experience less wealth. In the simplest sense we are talking about building relationships and communities around our business and the products and services we Here's ... more

In this Marketing Over Coffee we discuss what the email blacklists are and how to deal with them, and the growth of sponsored email blasts..... all that and more in this Marketing Over Coffee, a weekly audio program sponsored by MarketingProfs that covers classic marketing tactics and what's new on ... more

Lifehacker editor Gina Trapani ignited a bit of a firestorm over the weekend when she that she was launching a wiki to blacklist PR firms that send her "irrelevant and unsolicited"' pitches. Some PR bloggers then fired back that maybe it was bloggers that should be Geoff Livingston blogged "I ... more

As marketers we often struggle with getting customers to pay attention to our marketing messages, much less remember them. A specialized learning technique–the spacing "–is helping people all across the world assimilate more languages, facts, and retain gobs of information. Is this learning technique applicable to improving the efficacy of ... more

Getting comments on a blog post is one of the most positive outcomes you can experience as a blogger. Comments are rewarding on so many levels. Think about it, your readers Moved to action by what you Giving you feedback, either to improve your idea or validate Interested and Reaching ... more

I once had a co-worker recount the tale of her junior account position at a 4A's agency. Her account was for a well known brand of– well–tampons. Evidently, the team brainstorming sessions (comprised largely of men), yielded many unfortunate and hysterical marketing and product development ideas .... most of which ... more

The cost savings of outsourcing low-level work overseas to countries like India, China, and the Philippines can look pretty attractive. But it's The lack of language skills among the outsourced employees can lead to misunderstandings, lost credibility, customer service complaints and missed I learned this first-hand. I tried outsourcing some ... more

I've been getting a lot of requests for friends on various social networks lately. You probably have been too - there seems to be an explosion of interest lately, particularly on I'm generally encouraged by this, as it means that the space is continuing to grow, rather than to wane ... more

Last week, my friend and colleague Susanne Sicilian sent an email highlighting the 5 Reasons Your Boss Needs to Send You to . Among the One-on-one time with our speakers, exclusive (and free) research, "Usability Labs" on your Web Site, Email campaigns, and Social Media efforts that essentially amounts to ... more

In this Marketing Over Coffee we discuss 3 things to make your News Releases more effective, what to consider when adding "new media", and sales vs. marketing..... all that and more in this Marketing Over Coffee, a weekly audio program sponsored by MarketingProfs that covers classic marketing tactics and what's ... more

Business is running a series of what you might call "self-help articles for businesses." Before you yawn and think it's the same old, same , you might want to check this out. In an April 28th article Finding Your Company's Great , I was pleasantly surprised by the content. I ... more

When marketers design a marketing campaign .... we typically design them for "rational" buyers. But do buyers act rational? And what about When we make decisions we think we're in control and making rational choices. But are Dan Ariely a faculty member at MIT's Sloan School of Management and member ... more

I am frustrated and I can't be the only one. I've written about this topic before and it isn't improving. Either companies should bring their call center staff back to North America or develop better protocols to handle North American I recently discovered that I must add a state tax ... more

My wife loves to travel, and spring break for my kids is always the perfect excuse to get away. But this time was different; for over a year my wife had been planning a trip to Turkey with a family we tend to travel well Of course April is always ... more

Let's talk about putting up barriers of entry to your latest Web 2-point-ohhhh project. I don't know about you, but I'm getting invited to web apps and social networks that I've never even heard of before (and a lot of them sound the same to me). Signing up is all ... more

I've thought of myself as a writer since I was a little kid. I can get absolutely enthralled with how words sound in certain combinations and how they wrap around ideas and bring them to life. But today, I fear for them. Because I think we are wearing them I ... more

Over the past few years marketers have been working on tracking conversations about their brands on the Web. (You are tracking and listening, aren't you?) But once you have that in place, then Strategies for understanding and dealing with the flow of all these conversations are the natural next step. ... more

In this Marketing Over Coffee we discuss buying lists, Google Audio Ads, the fishbowl and applying Marketing 2.0 strategies to local markets..... all that and more in this Marketing Over Coffee, a weekly audio program sponsored by MarketingProfs that covers classic marketing tactics and what's new on the technology Direct ... more

A short, interesting piqued my interest in Packaging World recently. The "Braille 'signed' on sleeved bottles" simply discloses how Italian milk producer Milk Depot, based in Brescia, Italy, has added expiration dates on its packaging in Braille. While this may not seem like much to some, the addition of Braille ... more

Many marketers believe that innovation and competitive differentiation arise from giving customers more choices and options. But through the strategy of "offering more choice", marketers may actually end up increasing complexity, costs and causing customers "mental fatigue." Is there a better way to win over A typical big box retailer ... more

Lots of brands are finding out the hard way that there are plenty of conversations taking place about them online. For good or bad. Many brands choose to ignore this. But hope is not a Since consumers rely heavily on the Web as an authoritative source of information, managing a ... more

By raise of hands, how many of you think that Web sites are going to go away? With all this talk of social media on one hand, and the clicks version of bricks on the other, there might remain little appeal for a static, brochure-like online presence. Business directories and ... more

I attended a conference in Houston this week and I lost count on how many times I heard "I don't know what I'd say" in response to why that person wasn't blogging or on Twitter. But by the end of the conference on Tuesday, I was talking to many of ... more