Top 10 Baby Boomer Myths

Monday, February 7th, 2011

Everybody knows baby boomers are wealthy and retiring early, right? Wrong, according to a new study from the AARP, whose Mark Kitchens visits TODAY to shatter those and other boomer myths.  Top 10 Baby Boomer Myths

Integrating Marketing Communications

Monday, November 1st, 2010

In the land of agency buzz words, ‘Integrated Marketing’ is king – but how many companies understand what it’s supposed to mean? In much the same way that many business executives consider the company logo to be the company brand, there is a great deal of confusion on the subject of how to actually “integrate” the marketing. To integrate marketing communications means designing a messaging campaign to be effective in multiple mediums and ideally promote each in a synergistic way so as to surround a consumer or prospect with your campaign when and where they are of a mind to engage with you.

An article in a magazine references your viral video that links the consumer to a microsite for additional information and a coupon that they redeem in-store where they see a mobile promotion linking them to your social network site and info on new products to try and perhaps an invitation to a local event, sponsored by your products.  

Integrating marketing communications can be difficult to do – it involves managing a number of different media channels, schedules, formats and platforms – but done right, the effect is a dramatic ‘omni-presence’ for your brand and message that can cut through the clutter of daily noise and feel like a personal, relevant experience for those minds, hearts and wallets you want to reach.

Maybe it’s time for a Data Audit?

Friday, September 10th, 2010

You know it’s time for a Data Audit when:
*  customer information is kept in different places, by different people, in different programs for different purposes
*  you wonder what a customer would look like if all that information was in one place
*  you wonder what the true value of your customer(s) is – some are worth more than others, right?
*  you wonder if you should be spending more time keeping the most valuable customers and less time keeping up with the least valuable ones
*  you wonder how many customers leave you every year – and why
*  you suspect you could spend your marketing budget a whole lot smarter if you only knew the answers to your questions

A good Data Audit will solve these issues and provide you the visibility into your customer data necessary to identify behavioral trends, issues and segments you didn’t even know existed. That kind of insight into your customers can lead to some compelling message strategies that take your communication relevance to a whole new level.

Wonder if you’re getting the most value out of the data you have?  Maybe it’s time for a Data Audit -

Rise Of The Machines

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

India just created a touchscreen “laptop” that will sell for $35 and is seeking large-scale manufacturers to mass produce it, targeting student populations worldwide. The device looks like a bulky iPad but costs a whole lot less.

Also mentioned is the intention of getting the price from $35 to $20 and eventually $10.  If there was ever a time to sell that student bookstore stock you’ve been holding on to, now’s the time.  We all knew the day would come when consumer electronics would reach the pricepoint of ubiquity, but I think most people expected to see laptops drop to the $99 price range before plumetting all the way to “Starbucks gift card” territory.  Leave it to India to drag the planet kicking and screaming into the future of efficiency – first the cheapest car on the planet, now the cheapest laptop.  In the dictionary under “outsourcing” I think there’s a hotlink to India.

It’s an exciting time to be in the Technology business – and realizing that India has simply dropped the pebble in the water with this announcement – the ripples we’ll experience in the following 6, 8, 12 months from every major laptop manufacturer will be intriguing to see play out on store shelves across America.  Question: does India manufacture flat-screen TVs?

What Does “Integrated Marketing” Mean?

Thursday, July 29th, 2010

The Business Dictonairy provides a pretty good summary definition of Integrated Marketing as “Strategy aimed at unifying different marketing methods such as mass marketing, one-to-one marketing, and direct marketing. Its objective is to complement and reinforce the market impact of each method, and to employ the market data generated by these efforts in product development, pricing, distribution, customer service, etc”

Although fairly comprehensive in scope, that definition lacks one key component of Integrated Marketing that really brings home the ROI.  Not only should it employ the market data generated by efforts for the benefit of sales, pricing, etc – the data should funnel back into the overall campaign elements to better inform targeting efforts overall – creating a continuous cycle of campaign improvement and a very long run-on sentence.

Integrated Marketing is about better leveraging your Marketing budget investment for improved results across the communication channels and beyond.  It’s a single message broadcast in many channels – online and offline – in the social, sales, marketing and PR spaces.  It requires customizing that message to suit the medium – and it requires intelligent design to incorporate measurement throughout.  It’s often complicated – and it’s always worth the effort.