- Making Your Email 'Social-able' by Kara Trivunovic
Take a minute and think about the folks with whom you socialize. You may have a professional network (LinkedIn) and a personal network (Facebook). You may tweet for fun or business, or for both—or maybe you just follow some sports ...
- Five Essential Strategies for Measuring Marketing Effectiveness by Ram Krishnamurthy, Brad Ewald
To drive response and determine the appropriate marketing mix in this new digital paradigm, marketers must adopt a fresh approach to understand how to influence prospects and customers. By doing so, marketers can maximize marketing spend and generate stronger return ...
- Five Tips for Small B2B Companies That Depend on Big Channel Partners by Robbie Baxter
It's a challenge faced by hundreds of small companies: how to get the CXO of a Fortune 1000 company to consider its product.
One effective strategy that helped get companies such as Citrix and VMware off the ground is to align ...
- Achieving Relevance in Direct Digital Marketing: An Introduction by Bryce Marshall
There are five keys to making a relevance-centered approach a reality in your direct digital marketing programs(such as email, websites, mobile, and so on).
- Avoid the Five Routes to Strategic Failure by Nilofer Merchant
Disconnects are a big cause of strategy failure. You think you've communicated well, then find out you have—just not to your target audience. Or maybe at the end of a long research session, you realize that input from colleagues in ...
- Affiliate Marketing: How to Boost Sales and Minimize Risk
by Kimberly SmithAffiliate marketing is in a growth stage, strengthened of late by an explosion in the number of bloggers and other site publishers who are recognizing its rewards. But an affiliate program can be catastrophic if they are not well-managed.
- 'White Swan' Marketing, or How to Focus on What Works by Jonathan Salem Baskin
When the latest marketing answers fail to produce the results you expect, maybe it's time to start asking different questions.
You don't need me to tell you that we're in a crisis of confidence: Consumers don't believe or act on the ...
- The Pursuit of ROI: Will It Lead You to Rags or to Riches? by Sharan Jagpal
It's no secret that the business world is slow to change. Sure, it has made the evolution from typewriters to computers for word processing, and from snail mail to email for written communication. But in regard to the core of ...
- Knowing What Matters—Your Success Criteria—Is a Guiding Light in the Dark by Nilofer Merchant
Here's a scenario many of us have experienced: The CEO sets the revenue goals in the annual business plan; the plan is handed down; and the business units scramble to make the numbers.
Only one thing is wrong: We don't know ...
- Five Ways to Maximize ROW (Return on Webinar)
by Kimberly SmithHow can your webinar receive a standing ovation? In a follow-up to last week's article, here's a guide to the technical steps for ensuring your webinar becomes a smash hit... as much within your own organization as among the intended ...
- Secrets of Viral Video: Three Keys to Launching a Campaign That Resonates
by Kimberly SmithVideo viewing is way up, but so are video postings. These days, it takes more than a dancing baby to attract eyeballs and gather viral momentum. Here's a straightforward guide for netting your audience's attention, with advice from organizations that ...
- GM's Biggest Strategic Blunder by David A. Aaker
GM's CEO, Rick Wagoner, has opined that the automaker's biggest blunder was to walk away from the electric car.
But GM's biggest strategic blunder might have been its failure to view Saturn strategically—and as a consequence not allowing it to fulfill ...
- Win Through a Social Contract: Use Teamwork to Create Value, Develop New Strategy, Iterate Quickly, and Implement by Nilofer Merchant
People succeed together because they share a unified sense of purpose and a common vision for what they need to do. This unified sense of purpose comes from core beliefs.
Core beliefs help a team to create together because they share ...
- Benchmarking: A Best-Practice for Improving Marketing Performance (Part 2) by Laura Patterson
Knowing what to improve and by how much is vital to establishing realistic performance targets and metrics.
This two-part article discusses how to use benchmarking to assess your organization's performance and to understand what changes to make. Part 1 defined benchmarking ...
- Four Steps to Marketing Smarter (and for Less) in Today's Economy
by Kimberly SmithThe economy is sour, consumers aren't buying, and the competitive landscape is mutating. What's a marketer to do? Well, you can start by following advice from the likes of Tim Berry, Seth Godin, David Meerman Scott, Bryan Eisenberg, and Jonathan ...
- Benchmarking: A Best-Practice for Improving Marketing Performance (Part 1) by Laura Patterson
CEOs and CMOs are interested in seeing marketing organizations improve their performance in two key areas: effectiveness (the ability to produce the desired result) and efficiency (reducing waste). The economic environment makes these efforts even more top-of-mind. Often the question ...
- Something for Nothing: The New Age of Marketing and Advertising? by Tim Brunelle
What's of greater value: the idea itself, the selling of the idea, or the production of the idea? While there seems to be a shift afoot, why does our industry continue to struggle to ascribe value to (and get paid ...
- Staying Up in a Down Economy: Eight Marketing-Strategy Tips from Best Buy and Wipro CMOs by Roy Young
Leading companies do not subscribe to the notion that marketing is a discretionary expense. They know that there is business opportunity during economic downturns, and marketing can lead the way.
- Six Approaches to Marketing in Tight Economies
by Jim LenskoldMarketing pundits have advocated throughout this year that tough economic times are the right time to build bands and grow share of voice. But this will not work for every company. Here are the six approaches that can help you ...
- Marketing to India: The New Frontier for American Business by Gunjan Bagla
Marketing executives and entrepreneurs alike have rushed to China in the last decade. Yet, today, India offers an excellent, although somewhat misunderstood, alternative. Here are some myths (and realities) about tapping the potential of this country of 1.1 billion.