In the early 1950s, there was a young Italian farmer named Ferrucio who made tractors. He grew his tractor business steadily over time, establishing a brand that was synonymous with quality and dependability. Feruccio’s  business became very successful and before long he was considered one of the most wealthy in Italy. Ferrucio loved cars, and owned several Ferraris among other super cars, however his Ferraris all used to give him constant trouble. Being a mechanic, he tried to fix the problem and found out that his Ferraris all had the same clutch that he used in one of his tractors. "A ..read more

An idea can sound great when presented in a conference room, but when you get it out there... sometimes what you thought was a great idea can go terribly wrong in so many ways. Whether it’s the execution, the underlying marketing strategy or how customers perceive it, the end result can be a complicated mess that can hurt your brand. Here are three epic marketing fails made by global companies – which just goes to show that everyone makes marketing mistakes.  We’ve broken each down so you can learn from them.   1. Gap’s Logo Redesign In 2010, iconic brand Gap replaced its 20-year-ol ..read more

Our world has 7.9 billion people, and 4.48 billion of them have social media accounts. In other words, more than half of the world’s population is plugged into social media, making it one of the most powerful digital marketing tools on the planet. While many brands are having a time breaking through with their social media strategy, there are some that are hitting it out of the park. Not only did their sales increase, but it shifted their entire brand image and positioning in the marketplace - in some instances taking small players and making them a main player (see Casper mattresses below). I ..read more

  “Some say the world will end in fire. Some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire.” Robert Frost   Great marketing is as simple – and as difficult – as making people want what you sell. At the heart of this transaction is the element of desire. That’s what great marketing does – it makes people desire what you sell. If you understand how desire works, you can harness its power in any economy – especially a down economy. Let me explain why. During the great depression, John Keynes was a world-renowned economist who helped President Franklin ..read more

Goodbye Google and Facebook, hello Tik Tok. Image source Unsplash.com According to Cloudflare,  TikTok has officially dethroned Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple as being the world’s most popular websites.   If your business is not yet advertising on TikTok, you might want to reconsider. Below we’ve outlined for you a universal set of best practices to help you be successful. Before we jump in, let’s review what makes the TikTok audience different and unique from any of the other social media platforms. TikTok Audience By The Numbers According to TikTok here’s who ..read more

Are you wondering how to take your marketing to the next level?   We’re so glad you asked! It’s time to make video marketing a key component of your marketing engine. Not only will it help elevate your brand and reach new audiences, but it will also: a.   Help increase your conversion rate b.   Build trust c.   Get higher SEO rankings on Google (Google loves video, remember they own YouTube!) Videos allow you to increase the time spent on your website by visitors , the longer exposure builds trust and signals search engines that your sit ..read more

 Thousands of years ago, a famous Chinese general had a reputation for being an astute and cunning leader. One day, at the end of a long campaign, the General decided to stop and rest in a stronghold. He kept a small battalion of soldiers with him and sent his main fighting force ahead to rest elsewhere. Meanwhile, one of his enemies caught wind of the General's location and decided to march his army of hundreds of thousands of soldiers on the General's all-but defenseless position. In the middle of the night, the General was shaken awake by one of his men: "The enemy is close. They'll b ..read more

“We don’t see things as they are. We see them as we are.” Anais Nin  Not long ago, the Cornell Food and Brand Lab conducted an interesting experiment about people eating out. They gathered together a group of test subjects and dived the group into two. The first group was ushered to a room to eat and were handed a plain menu card describing the meal: fish, scalloped potatoes, green beans and chocolate cake. The food was served on paper plates with plastic forks, knives and spoons under standard fluorescent lighting, and the tables they sat at were basic with hard, plastic chairs. After ..read more

  “Observe the masses and do the opposite.” Unknown   If you’re thinking about increasing your company’s digital marketing ad spend, or wondering how to get more bang for your digital marketing buck you might want to read this first.     Below are five well-kept secrets among digital marketing agencies. If I was in your shoes as a CEO or CMO in charge of increasing ROI, I would want to know about them, so here goes:   Digital Marketing Secret #1. Digital ad fatigue is real, especially post-pandemic.  Here’s how to combat it. The reality of digital m ..read more

“No one plays this game, or any game perfectly.  It’s the guy who recovers from his mistakes, who wins.” Phil Jackson     In my experience, scaling a business to its first $25 million in revenue can be more challenging than scaling a business from $100 million to a billion. Why would this be the case? One of the key reasons is that a company with larger revenue has made a lot more mistakes getting there and will pivot quicker from them than a smaller company still focused on making success as straight a line as possible. Wherever you're at in your business-building journey, here ..read more