May 21, 2012
Last month, I learned what Jane Goodall must have felt like in Gorillas in the Mist, surrounded by mysterious creatures and unknown dangers, and yet compelled to edge ever closer. On my right in full costume was someone outfitted as an adorable, and somehow huggable, green hammerhead robot...in a dress. (I later learned she was in the garb of a Japanese video game character from Katamari Damacy.) At a table in front of me...
May 18, 2012
People talk about Francis Bacon as the last person to know everything. Apparently, these people don't know any 15-year-old girls. Because these girls know everything. And they just can't believe we don't. And parents! Don't get them started. Plus, 15-year-olds are preternaturally alert. Nothing gets past them.
I was reminded of this at MTV recently, where I ran into...
May 14, 2012
This post is the second in a three-part series.
In his provocative book The Paradox of Choice, Barry Schwartz's warns that giving consumers more product choices actually lowers their purchase satisfaction. Schwartz reasons that having too many options makes us fear missing out, which causes anxiety, analysis paralysis and regret.
But many marketers have dismissed Schwartz's warning,...
May 11, 2012
A serious threat facing most brands in dynamic markets is the loss of relevance because the category or subcategory they are serving is declining. Customers are no longer buying what the brand is perceived to make. New categories or subcategories emerge as competitors' innovations create "must haves." This dynamic can happen even if the brand is strong; customers are loyal; and the offering has never been better, thanks to incremental innovations.
Relevance dominates. If a group of...
Pinterest surged into the spotlight earlier this year when it was revealed that it drives more web traffic than YouTube, Google+ and LinkedIn combined. What's so compelling about a website that lets you make virtual bulletin boards of "pinned" images, observers wondered, and does this service now belong in the pantheon of must-use social tools like Facebook and Twitter? Perhaps most important, marketers are asking, is this something that will drive revenue?
Not long after the...
May 10, 2012
Net Promoter Score (NPS) is perhaps the best known customer loyalty tool around today, based on the entirely sound principle that the more customer promoters you have (i.e., customers who say on surveys that they're highly likely to refer you to a colleague or friend), the more likely you'll be to grow your business and outpace the competition. That makes powerful sense, and the continued growth and success of...
May 9, 2012
As the online waters rose, executives at the Susan G. Komen Foundation huddled behind their fortress walls like first-class passengers on the Titanic. The AP broke the story of Komen de-funding Planned Parenthood Federation of America on Monday, January 30th. As the online world took them to task, according to marketing blogger,...
May 8, 2012
Consumer behavior in China could be changing yet again. Until now, research has shown that the Chinese usually trust better-known brands, primarily because the latter help assuage concerns over product quality and safety. According to the latest McKinsey survey, 35% of respondents in China believe that companies that market products across a range of categories are more trustworthy than those that focus on just one or two segments. That's almost twice the number of Americans (18%) or...
As a growth officer in my early career with the mad men and women of McCann Ericksson, my mom could never quite grasp what I did for a living. But, when we pitched, won and delivered the phenomenon now globally known as Priceless for MasterCard, she could finally brag to her friends at my Aunt Rose's kitchen table. From the moment the very first television commercial appeared (...
