11 rules to ensure customers love you
Customers and potential customers always remember how their needs and expectations were managed through the sales process. It is all part of the experience of doing business. However, In my experience, B2B businesses are often poor at effectively managing these...
Are you Ready to Buy?
Reality TV is about as far from Reality as you can get, but sometimes something useful emerges. Just for the record, I do not watch this stuff, there are thousands of better ways I can think of to waste an hour. However, judging by the ratings and water cooler...
The A – Z of personal branding
In 1997, Tom Peters wrote an article for Fast Company, titled 'The brand called You' which was probably the first articulation of this idea. In it he wrote 'It's time for me — and you — to take a lesson from the big brands, a lesson that's true for anyone who's...
5 crucial parameters of the Value Equation.
Some time ago I wrote a post that listed the 4 questions every business owner should ask themselves: How do we create value? How do we deliver value? How do we capture value? Will it be the same tomorrow? In a recent workshop I was asked to expand on the rather brief...
What is Intellectual Osmosis?
Definition: 'The process by which a great product is conceived and 'launched' to the market, with the developer believing that its greatness will be so obvious that the world will beat a path to his door'. Never happens. That bloke with the better mousetrap is still...
The future of FMCG research has arrived
My 30 year old son, a 'gamer' from way back, bought himself one of the new Playstation Virtual Reality units last week. We have all heard about VR for ages, or it seems that way, always just about to be commercialised, then suddenly, a consumer retail level product...
6 Questions that keep business owners awake at night
Every business is different, but the foundations of every business are very similar. Answering these 6 seemingly simple questions should expose any weaknesses in the foundations of your business. Why should customers buy from me rather than my competitors? If you...
How could Samsung stuff it up so badly?
Once again, we are the observers in what will become another in the great 'How to manage a marketing cluster****' course. I am talking about the public reaction of Samsung to the exploding Galaxy Note 7 phone. Recent history is littered with lessons on both sides of...
3 things advertising cannot do, despite the claims.
Many small and medium sized businesses I interact with seem to have the view that advertising and marketing are synonyms, and if they had a bit more money in their marketing budgets, it would best be spent on advertising. Rarely is that the case. Advertising is just a...
Digital impotence and the Black Knight
I am in the middle of a device free week. Not by choice, my PC took a powder, and is in the 'hospital' for surgery. Now, at the close of day 5 I feel like the Black Knight, still kicking, but no arms. The term digital impotence springs to mind. It is interesting to...