Latest Articles
Latest Articles
ABC — Always Be Communicating
No matter what your marketing, the key is to keep marketing. Continue talking to your customers -- whether consumers or business clients -- without stoppages. Pauses in outgoing communication hurt. Stoppages kill. Take Palm. There were years that the Treo was the...
Android Devices Creating Sales, Happiness
JD Power and Associates released a survey yesterday on smart phone manufacturer satisfaction. They asked 6,800 people. The maximum score was 1,000 and Apple led the pack with a score of 800. But here’s the big news: Motorola and HTC -- makers of Android devices --...
What’s the Value?
The tech industry focuses on specs out of habit. Even today. Still today. What if you shift your focus to value? What's the value of your high tech product or service to customers? How will it improve their lives? How will it make something easier for them? The best...
Are Smart Phone Sales Plateauing?
People used to buy personal computers every year or two. Remember? That was when the industry was quickly moving from 286 to 386 to 486 to Pentium processors. Concurrently, Microsoft was flying through versions of DOS and Windows. Also, sophistication of productivity...
Marketing Lessons from Blockbuster’s Bankruptcy
As a former Blockbuster Total Access customer (this was their DVD-by-mail service; we've since transplanted to Netflix) I have some personal experience to add to these business lessons: It got to where people didn't know what kind of company Blockbuster was. Was it an...
Do You Think the Media Enjoys Being Managed?
I've received some fascinating feedback on my posts about having company executives pitch the media directly. In particular, see the thoughtful comments on this post. I agree with some of the excellent things that were written. But here's a big problem area for me: PR...
Mad Men, Boardwalks and Redemption
This is not a tech story, but it is a good story, and about two of my favorite topics: good television and redemption. A few years ago, Matthew Weiner was shopping his television show, Mad Men, to cable networks. HBO, which was looking for its next Sopranos, famously...
If Your Executives Pitched the Media…
This piece is another installment in my September PR Master Class series. Building on yesterday's post on having your executives pitch the media instead of 20-something PR kids... If your executives pitched the media: The media would be impressed. The media would be...
60 Members of the Media
Continuing my September PR Master Class series... Nearly all companies have the wrong people reaching out to the media. Too many firms fill their PR departments with young, unsophisticated just-out-of-school kids (I call them VYPRAs -- Very Young PR Adults). These...
Why Nokia’s Choice Of A Former Microsoft Exec For CEO Is All Wrong
Nokia announced yesterday it was replacing its CEO with the former head of Microsoft's business unit, Stephen Elop. I don't know the man, but I know Nokia, and I know Microsoft, and I can tell you this is a match made in mutual mucky problems. Nokia used to make...