Is marketing losing its humanity?
Marketing, when I first started was a mind-set that had at its core, the customer. The information we had was by todays standards in the dark ages, and we had to work really hard for it. We pored over sales and basic market research reports by hand, working with...
How do you become a local overnight success?
The great irony of the moment is that we have never been so 'connected' but so alone. We are both connected and isolated by the digital tools that have emerged. This contradiction is slowly leading to the emergence of hyper-local initiatives that have the...
5 key factors to consider when planning your budgeting process.
The new year will bring budget season. For most, it will be an addition to the day job, but it is a critical activity that is often treated with less application of critical and creative thinking than it demands as a precursor to superior performance. Following are 5...
January 1, 2020. An introspective.
It is the end of another year, in fact a decade. 'What have I achieved' seems to be a fair question. For 24 years I have worked as a 'boutique' consultancy. Some may think this is just another word for 'one man band,' and they would be correct, however, there...
Own your digital real estate, or slowly disappear in 2020.
It is getting harder and harder to be seen in the tsunami of stuff posted on various digital platforms. The platform owners are wholesalers of eyeballs, their business is monetised by being the choke point between those who create material, and those who may benefit...
Oh come all ye turkeys
As we hurtle towards another Christmas, the turkeys are out, clamouring to be at the front of the line. Australia's latest quarterly GDP figures were released on December 4, generating a flurry of commentary from all sides of the political and economic tables....
The 3 terminal characteristics of 20th century accounting.
Accounting as generally taught at university, at least when I did it many years ago, and by observation since, does not suit the 21st century. It has served us well for centuries since the double entry system evolved from 15th century monk and mathematician...
How to think critically about your essential investments in marketing
Marketing is almost always seen as an operating expense rather than an investment in the future. This reality poses an absurd paradox. We treat investments in capital equipment for our businesses, and various financial instruments for our own wealth...
How do you predict the unpredictable?
Telling the future is a practise best left to the circus tent, but as strategists we are doing it all the time. The question is not how to avoid being wrong, which means you do exactly nothing, but how do you both increase your odds of being right, and be...
Are brands assets that can be revived?
It is generally accepted that brands are assets, the problem is how we value them. Often the valuation is post some sort of transaction, the business is sold, and the difference between net assets and the sale price is 'goodwill', which is code for stuff we do ...