Digital Transformation

What does it mean to do a digital transformation?

Differentiation, Value & Change

I was reading an email from a creativity coach today that asked me to look at myself and see what makes me different. It could be my education, my work experiences, the way I think or approach problems, the places I have been, the people I have been exposed to, a disappointment or failure that…

eCommerce Stories

I think I may be late to the party on this perspective. So I apologize if you have heard this before. But it was an eye opening way of looking at things for me. eCommerce is most often defined as a shopping experience. But I think that is really short sighted. To me, eCommerce is…

Brands that understand real life

I really love it when brand marketers understand real life and help us laugh at our struggles. It helps to build brand loyalty and a bond with consumers that is truly meaningful. The team running the Folgers brand has done an excellent job of taking our current situation and finding a way to help us…

Facebook adds shopping section

This could be big news or an experiment that fails. According to Retail Dive: “Facebook added a shopping section to its main social networking app and plans to offer more software tools to help businesses set up online stores. Facebook Shop is a dedicated place for merchants to show product catalogs to shoppers who can…

The Power of Branded Apparel

Thanks to Microsoft for a great holiday ad and a perfect demonstration of the power of branded merchandise. I saw this ad before a movie at AMC.  It shows Microsoft people, dressed in Microsoft branded hats, t-shirts and scarves singing to Apple employees. Some of you who read my blog know that I have been working…

Big Lots Goes Real

This blog is a shout out to Big Lots for using real sized women for their holiday ads.  I saw the first one for Black Friday and then the one that followed where they sang “Christmas doesn’t happen without me.” It was so refreshing to see ads that don’t feature stick figures dancing and singing.…

Nice Job GNC

It has been a while since I have posted, but today I was inspired by GNC to write. GNC has launched a new ad campaign called Beat Average.  You can view it here.  I am impressed with this campaign for 4 reasons: 1. It has tremendous insight into consumer behavior and the reality of how we…

Social Media – It isn’t news

I attended a presentation last night at the University of Chicago Marketing Round Table.  The presenter, Jonathan Salem Baskin, made some interesting points about social media that I wanted to share. He recently wrote a book where he traces social media throughout history.  With many major technology innovations in the past, our ability to connect…

Customer Control and Social Media

Peter Kim from the Dachus Group (formerly with Forrester and also a UPenn alum) is a long time writer and consultant about social media.  I subscribe to his posts and want to reprint one for you in its entirety today.  I think this presents a truly balanced perspective on the amount of power consumers have…