“You can’t fully love someone if you’re afraid to get hurt.” Ever heard that phrase before? I can’t recall where I got it from… Probably some TV show! I know it sounds cheesy, but there’s a kernel of truth to it. When you’re afraid to get hurt, you put up walls and barriers to…
“Neurons at the ready … Go!” It’s the final of the World Memory Championships at the University of Oxford. Ed Cooke is one of 34 finalists who have just been given a shuffled pack of playing cards to memorise. Focusing hard, he quickly skims through the cards, then smacks the timer next to him. It…
Remember this scene from Glengarry Glen Ross? When Alec Baldwin tells his real estate agents that they are losers and terrible salesmen, and they should all be fired? “A-B-C. A – Always, B – Be, C- Closing. Always be closing. ALWAYS BE CLOSING….. “A guy don’t walk on the lot lest he wants to buy….
It felt like being pounced upon. I’d just come back from an Internet marketing show in London. After hearing from industry leaders, I’d noticed that there were several stands exhibiting Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms, and asked for demos. I wasn’t really a serious buyer – yet. Over the previous few months, we’d started wondering…
A few weeks ago, a client shared a very powerful story with me. Before launching their current healthcare business, this client ran a successful clinic helping people shed significant amounts of weight through gastric bands. In order to attract relevant traffic to his site, he ran an online forum for people to air their concerns…
“Know your competition.” It’s one of the golden rules of marketing. And it’s sound advice. You wouldn’t launch a business without carefully surveying the marketplace first, to figure out the opportunities and threats (I hope). The same goes for your marketing. But there’s a danger in looking too closely at your competition, too. You can…
I may have mentioned once or twice that I love books and I love a good story. Even better, I love a book that has a story behind the story. Which is why I have a treasured copy in my library of ‘Cold Comfort Farm’, a comic novel about rural life from 1932. The copy…
“What books do you recommend in order to improve our company’s online marketing?” I was asked that recently…. And I think that the person asking the question was rather taken back with my answer. They thought they were going to get a list of some of the summer’s “hot” online marketing books, written by…
“The last thing we want to do is annoy people with too many emails.” I was speaking to the CEO of a healthcare company with over 6,000 email addresses on their database. They were desperate to market themselves better, and wanted to talk about all kinds of options: Social media, direct mail, LinkedIn advertising. But…
We’ve been moving to a new marketing automation system, and while dealing with that process, I’ve taken the opportunity to re-read some of the messages I wrote last year. Looking at them with fresh eyes, sometimes the structure doesn’t quite work. There are too many enthusiastic exclamation points (!!). They could also be more…
