Don’t be the person who crushes a dream.
In 2005, I helped coach my son’s little league baseball team to the championship. At the end of the season, a father said to me that his son wanted to quit baseball after the prior year; the coach didn’t give his son a chance, played favorites, wasn’t a very good teacher. He said that his […]
A failed door installation re-affirmed critical business truths.
Customers have choices and they’ll choose more often than not to give their money to product and service providers who respect them, offer a great customer experience and work quickly to resolve issues that arise. I went to a local, reputable, family-owned windows and doors business to buy and install a new front storm door. […]
Ten surefire ways to blow-up your web development project.
Want to make sure your website redevelopment project fails spectacularly? Try these things (and please understand the sarcasm):
Need some help from marketing? No problem. Just drop a quarter.
We hold these truths to be self-evident: But, what about marketing? Well, when it comes to marketing, the whole business world believes marketing should function as a vending machine. The answer to all these things? “Sure, no problem. Let me just go to our marketing closet and pull these off the shelf. Piece of cake.” […]
Is your marketing team strong-up-the-middle?
If not, take some cues from Major League Baseball. GMs of baseball teams always like to be strong up the middle when building a team: catcher, shortstop, second base and centerfield. Think early 80’s Phillies: Boone, Bowa, Trillo, Maddox. Here’s how I go “strong up the middle” when building a marketing team:
Be a velvet sledgehammer.
And some other necessary behavioral traits for marketers. I do a fair amount of mentoring of young marketing professionals. Often-times I’m asked my opinion on the behavioral traits needed for success. There’s certainly a long list of traits needed for success; here are just a few that come to mind: For those involved in marketing, […]
Advice to marketers: Don’t solve problems at the table.
Don’t blurt solutions. Take a step back, process things, build a thoughtful plan. I took a break from the corporate side of marketing in my early 30’s. I wanted to work on a variety of brands in a variety of industries, so I moved to the agency side of marketing. At one of my first […]
It’s Day-1 of your marketing leadership role.
What’s your plan? Whether you’re taking on your first or tenth marketing leadership role, the toughest thing you’ll face in getting started is…well…getting started. There’s so much you need to do and learn that it can be positively overwhelming. So, how to get started to put yourself, your team and organization on a path to […]
You’re not a resume, you’re a brand.
And well-built brands stand-up and stand-out from the crowd. There are many reasons why you need to invest in uncovering and marketing your personal brand. Please note, I said “uncovering” and not “building”. Building implies that you’re starting from nothing. Uncovering means that your brand is already there, you just need to reveal, refine and […]
Status quo doesn’t have to be status quo.
For organizational growth, you have to challenge conventional wisdom. My grandfather was born in 1908 and grew up as baseball was being woven into the fabric of America. He loved the game and played semi-pro ball into his early twenties. In the late 70’s and early 80’s as I was playing little league and travel […]
