Best-selling author, consultant, and speaker Mark Schaefer returns to Marketing Smarts to share surprising research and insights from his new book, 'Marketing Rebellion: The Most Human Company Wins.'
MarketingProfs Director of Marketing Matt Snodgrass shares findings from the 2019 Marketer Happiness Report and offers insights into how you can be happier and more fulfilled as a marketer. This episode features exclusive data from research conducted by MarketingProfs and Mantis Research.
Analyst and speaker Jeremiah Owyang, founding partner of research and advisory firm Kaleido Insights, explains the gig economy and how it will affect marketers and the freelancers they work with.
Storytelling and marketing expert Ron Ploof shares insights from his new book, The Proverb Effect: Secrets to Creating Tiny Phrases That Change the World.
21 industry stars, 21 pieces of valuable advice for you to up your marketing game in the new year: don't miss this special yearend video episode of the Marketing Smarts podcast!
Singer-songwriter and "Nashville Star" alum Jimmy Charles joins Kerry O'Shea Gorgone of MarketingProfs to discuss building an entertainment brand today, the importance of giving back, his work as spokesperson for ZERO: The End of Prostate Cancer, and his new nonprofit organization to support cancer patients: I Am Not Alone.
Consultant, author, and creativity expert Dave Birss gives the MarketingProfs audience a sneak preview of his system for fostering creativity, covered in his new book, How to Get to Great Ideas.
Ekaterina Walter and Jessica Gioglio join Marketing Smarts to share tips from their latest book, 'The Laws of Brand Storytelling: Win--and Keep--Your Customers� Hearts and Minds.'
Author Dan Schawbel shares research and insight from his latest book, "Back to Human: How Great Leaders Create Connection in the Age of Isolation." He explains how companies can combat employee isolation to improve engagement and retention.
Best-selling author Allison Maslan shares tips from her latest book, Scale or Fail: How to Build Your Dream Team, Explode Your Growth, and Let Your Business Soar.
B2B Marketing Forum speaker Clare McDermott, head of research at Mantis Research, gives Marketing Smarts listeners a sneak preview of her MarketingProfs B2B Forum presentation, "Give Them What They Want: Produce Original Research Your Audience Craves."
In this special video episode of the Marketing Smarts podcast, Daniel Waas, director of marketing for GoToWebinar at LogMeIn, shares findings from GoToWebinar's recent report: Trends in B2B Content Engagement.
SAP Ariba's vice-president of influencer marketing, Amisha Gandhi, discusses the company's approach to building lasting relationships with industry influencers.
Cindy Klein Roche, chief marketing officer at security software company Cybereason, explains how innovative content marketing can achieve dramatic results in B2B industries.
Jay Baer and Daniel Lemin share insights from their new book 'Talk Triggers: The Complete Guide to Creating Customers with Word of Mouth.'
The VP of Marketing & Communications for ZERO - The End of Prostate Cancer discusses nonprofit marketing and explains how ZERO's community of champions (ZERO's Heroes) has helped those affected by the illness and drummed up support for research.
Crisis management master Melissa Agnes offers a sneak preview of her MarketingProfs virtual conference presentation, Crisis Ready: A Strategy for Building an Invincible Brand in an Uncertain World.
Content strategist, B2B Marketing Forum speaker, and author Jon Burkhart explains how brands can use constant curiosity to create "firecracker moments" for customers. He also shares the secret to knowing when to engage in real-time marketing.
Michelle Cirocco, head of global marketing at demand generation company Televerde, shares how the company trains female inmates as sales professionals, and why it hosted the first TEDx event held inside an Arizona correctional facility.
Heike Young of Salesforce and Hilding Anderson of Publicis.Sapient share some surprising findings from new research on what shoppers want, based on a survey of 6,000 consumers and 1.4 billion e-commerce visits.
Bot Academy and Mixergy founder Andrew Warner chats with Kerry O'Shea Gorgone of MarketingProfs about how chatbots can enhance your marketing efforts.
Startup marketing expert David Cooperstein, founder of the agency Figurr, shares insight into how marketing for startups differs from enterprise marketing, the advantages of each, and the importance of customer experience to any marketing organization.
'Bullseye Marketing' author and consultant Louis Gudema discusses the surprising disparity in marketing investment between software companies and other kinds of businesses, and offers advice on how marketing organizations can bridge that gap.
SEO expert Jeremiah Smith of online marketing agency SimpleTiger discusses voice, AI, and other developments in search engine marketing, and shares tips for maximizing traffic and conversions.
Denise Lee Yohn shares insights from her book 'Fusion: How Integrating Brand and Culture Powers the World's Greatest Companies.'
Musician, marketing expert, speaker, and author Damian Keyes shares social media insights from his experience building a $60 million business in the music industry. He also discusses his new book, The Rule-Breaker's Guide to Social Media.
Shorty Award winner Jeff Barrett, a social media and PR consultant, speaker, writer, and influencer, shares tips for making influencer marketing work for brands and influencers alike.
Productivity and attention expert Neen James offers advice from her book Attention Pays: How to Drive Profitability, Productivity, and Accountability.
Consultant and author Minter Dial shares insights into the trends that are shaping marketing and talks about his new book, Futureproof: How to Get Your Business Ready for the Next Disruption.
CoSchedule CEO Garrett Moon shares insights on marketing project management and leadership from his new book, 10x Marketing Formula: Your Blueprint for Creating "Competition-Free Content" That Stands Out and Gets Results.
JTG Daugherty team owner Tad Geschickter talks about his approach to NASCAR sponsorship and brand partnerships. Geschickter's team fields the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series cars of AJ Allmendinger and Chris Buescher.
The CMO of GE Business Innovations & GE Ventures discusses branding and demand generation, the role of emotions and data in powering your marketing, the importance of a diverse marketing team, and building and measuring brand value.
Ryan Malone, founder and CEO of digital agency SmartBug Media, discusses "intelligent inbound marketing," enhancing employee engagement, and cultivating balance within a marketing organization.
Author and brand strategist Nick Westergaard of Brand Driven Digital shares tips from his latest book, 'Brand Now: How to Stand Out in a Crowded, Distracted World.'
Katie Bullard, chief growth officer at sales and marketing intelligence company DiscoverOrg, discusses account-based marketing, marketing technology, and the critical importance of cleaning your data.
Lawson Abinanti, B2B marketing and messaging strategy consultant, offers tips for positioning a B2B brand, and urges marketers to be "ruthless" by focusing on ideal buyers instead of diverting resources to one-off sales.
Nichole Kelly, chief consciousness officer at Conscious Marketing Institute and author of How to Measure Social Media discusses "conscious marketing" and explains why marketers need to embrace transparency and use the data they collect to benefit consumers.
SAP Ariba Chief Marketing Officer Tifenn Dano Kwan explains why the most empathetic CMOs are the most effective, how digitization isolates people (and how to combat that isolation), and what diverse outside interests (like riding motorcycles and playing the drums) have taught her about marketing.
Daniel Waas, director of marketing for GoToWebinar at LogMeIn, shares secrets to webinar success based on his team's analysis of 350,000 webinars.
In this podcast, award-winning mountain climber and guide Vern shares the story of how he built a global reputation for guiding people on some of the world's most daunting climbs, and discusses one of his books, Seventy Summits: A Life in the Mountains.
Ron Tite, speaker, author, and owner of content marketing agency Church + State, says creativity is the key to marketing, likens business disruption to a political coup, and discusses the rise of the "Expression Economy"--his take on modern business.
Chris Penn, co-founder of Brain+Trust Insights and author of Leading Innovation: Build a Scalable, Innovative Organization, discusses predictive analytics and how your company can use data to plan more effective marketing campaigns.
Mathew Sweezey, principal of marketing insights for Salesforce, shares insights into the differences between high-performing marketing organizations and everyone else, based on research into 7,500+ businesses from around the world.
Public relations and social media expert Shonali Burke shares tips for PR measurement and effective influencer marketing.
Joe Chernov, chief marketing officer at sales intelligence company InsightSquared, discusses why account-based marketing and inbound are often at odds, how brand marketing is coming back, and why 2018 is the year of customer marketing.
SAP Chief Digital Marketing Officer Mika Yamamoto discusses the importance of a human touch in digital transformation, and how to set the tone at the top to create a truly customer-centric organization.
Drew Burns, principal product marketing manager for Adobe Target, shares tips for using personalization to enhance B2B lead generation and improve marketing results.
Chris Marr, founder of CMA, gives Marketing Smarts the inside scoop on how he hosts some of the most popular marketing events in Europe--and how he uses that success to power his broader business goals.
Content-strategy insights and tips from best-selling author Jason Miller (Welcome to the Funnel), head of content and social media marketing at LinkedIn Sales and Marketing Solutions EMEA.
Bruce Swann, senior product marketing manager for Adobe Campaign, explains how different types of organizations can use marketing automation to enhance their marketing campaigns and operations.
Sales expert, speaker, and author Ian Altman talks 2018 business trends and offers tips for aligning your sales and marketing teams so they're all focused on the same revenue-related goals.
Perry Marshall, business consultant and best-selling author of books on sales and Google AdWords, shares valuable insights from his book 80/20 Sales and Marketing: The Definitive Guide to Working Less and Making More.
17 marketing experts and a guest co-host gush about what's got them excited for 2018. Artificial intelligence, customer experience, humor, and much more are in store for you in this special holiday yearend episode of Marketing Smarts.
Digital marketing and PR strategist, consultant, author, and speaker Lee Odden explains why B2B brands need to work with influencers and offers tips for building mutually beneficial influencer relationships to co-create valuable content.
Veteran content marketer, cartoonist, and author Tom Fishburne (Your Ad Ignored Here: Cartoons From 15 Years of Marketing, Business, and Doodling in Meetings) talks about the role of humor in marketing and why cartoons might be the ultimate content marketing tool.
Marketing consultant, speaker, and best-selling author Mark Schaefer discusses the revised edition of his book The Tao of Twitter and explains why your company needs to be using Twitter for marketing.
Jeff Goldenberg and Peter Reitano, co-founders of the Facebook-first performance marketing agency Abacus, share insights on Facebook advertising and the future of agency marketing.
Wendy Connell, vice-president of marketing at digital media company Storyblocks, shares tips for acquiring new customers, retaining existing customers, minimizing churn when you operate on a subscription model, and more.
Amanda Milligan, branded content manager at creative digital agency Fractl, shares content marketing tips based on her experience helping B2B and B2C clients build brand awareness and achieve content marketing ROI.
IBM's first "chief digital officer," Bob Lord, explains why cognitive developers and data scientists will be indispensable members of your marketing team in the near future.
Hootsuite founder and CEO Ryan Holmes talks about why the "first-mover advantage" isn't really a thing, how he launched his business, why companies should promote employee health, and more.
Marketing Smarts celebrates a major milestone: the 300th episode of the show! To mark the occasion, we bring back our very first guest, Lou Imbriano--strategist, author, and former vice-president and CMO of the New England Patriots.
Author, consultant, coach, and speaker Dorie Clark shares tips from her new book, Entrepreneurial You: Monetize Your Expertise, Create Multiple Income Streams, and Thrive.
Decision science expert and creative strategist Nancy Harhut shares email secrets from her upcoming B2B Marketing Forum presentation, "9 Insanely Effective Email Tactics You Can Use Tomorrow."
Humor columnist and marketing expert Erik Deckers discusses creative writing techniques that can improve your content marketing.
Kathleen Reidenbach, chief commercial officer for Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, shares lessons in managing a global brand for a hospitality company with more than 60 boutique properties all over the world.
Steve LaCroix, executive vice-president and chief marketing officer for the Minnesota Vikings NFL football team, discusses how sports marketing has evolved and the importance of enhancing the game-day experience for fans at the stadium.
Author, speaker, and entertainment business veteran Jeffrey Sass shares marketing lessons from his book, Everything I Know About Business and Marketing, I Learned From THE TOXIC AVENGER: (One Man's Journey to Hell's Kitchen and Back).
Barry Kirk, vice-president of marketing for Maritz Motivation Solutions, shares tips on developing effective loyalty programs and discusses strategies for building "cult loyalty" for your brand.
Award-winning actor and best-selling author Alan Alda (M*A*S*H) shares insight into how actively cultivating empathy can improve communication in sales, medicine, science, and practically every other industry. He discusses improv and other approaches for relating to others, and shares many fun stories along the way!
Branding and merchandising expert Andrea Syverson explains how brands can become merchandising rock stars, how B2B and B2C brands alike can use merchandising to address customer pain points, and how "verbifying" your brand can help you to focus your marketing message.
Dan Dunn, founder of programmatic direct mail company Paperplanes, discusses how the shift to digital advertising has opened up valuable opportunities for marketers using direct mail.
Best-selling author and marketing expert David Meerman Scott and musician Juanito Pascual, co-founders of sonic branding studio Signature Tones, discuss how a "sonic logo" and custom music can help you connect with your audience.
Claire Diaz-Ortiz, co-author of One Minute Mentoring (written with Ken Blanchard) explains how mentoring benefits both the mentor and the protege, how to find a mentor, how to know when it's the right fit, and more.
Marketing consultant, speaker, and author John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing shares tips, tricks, and insights for better content marketing, and discusses his latest book, SEO for Growth: The Ultimate Guide for Marketers, Web Designers & Entrepreneurs.
Jay Stocki of Experian Marketing Solutions explains addressable advertising--what it is, how it works, and why it's the future of TV advertising.
Kevin Cloutier talks about how his experience creating games for reality TV shows, including "Survivor," inspired him to start team-building events company Feet First Eventertainment with his brother, Dave.
Marketing strategist, author, and MarketingProfs B2B Forum speaker Michael Brenner discusses employer marketing--the importance of HR for marketing success and the rise of "champion leaders."
Message strategist Tamsen Webster explains "The Red Thread"--a framework for structuring communications that will move your audience to action.
Joe Martin and Mark Booth of Adobe talk about how Adobe effectively uses influencer marketing to dramatically increase the company's reach during (and long after) its annual flagship event, Adobe Summit in Las Vegas.
Scott Dubois, co-founder of digital agency Pidalia, discusses generational marketing, the power of personalization, qualities to look for in an agency, and more.
Digital marketing experts Seth Price and Barry Feldman discuss how to balance your employees' personal brands with the corporate brand, and they share insights from their personal-branding book, The Road to Recognition: The A-to-Z Guide to Personal Branding for Accelerating Your Professional Success in The Age of Digital Media.
Radius Senior Vice-President of Marketing Shari Johnston discusses how marketing operations has evolved so that Marketing now directly contributes to an organization's revenue strategy.
Most marketers have the next year planned. Really ambitious marketers might think ahead five years. The author of Future Marketing has a 13-year-plan (and he thinks you need one, too). Hear him prognosticate about what's ahead in the world of marketing.
Dale Beaumont, author, speaker, and founder of BriN (a business adviser powered by artificial intelligence) discusses the impact of AI on business and explains the changing landscape for marketers.
Simon Perkins, director of brand marketing at The Orvis Company, tells the story of how the oldest mail-order retailer in the United States evolved into an international outdoor lifestyle retailer with more than $340 million in annual sales.
Alicia Tillman, chief marketing officer of SAP Ariba, and Lisa Skeete Tatum, co-founder and chief executive officer of Landit, discuss enterprise branding, the importance of embracing a corporate mission, and women in leadership positions.
Hollywood-filmmaker-turned-brand-storyteller Vern Oakley provides tips and advice for marketers on how to use video to showcase the human side of their organization.
Branding consultant and former Global Director of Creative Strategy at Coca-Cola Daryl Weber shares insights from his book, Brand Seduction: How Neuroscience Can Help Marketers Build Memorable Brands, and offers tips on how to forge emotional connections with your audience.
Ben Kaplan, senior director of mobile strategy and product at the American Cancer Society, discusses the mobile strategy that increased mobile app revenue 80% in 2016 for the organization.
Marketing strategist, educator, and best-selling author Mark W. Schaefer shares insights from his latest book, Known: The Handbook for Building and Unleashing Your Personal Brand in the Digital Age.
Many once-dominant brands find it tough to stay relevant today. Brand strategist Nicole Ertas offers tips for building a "free range" brand that reaches various types of buyers. She also discusses new buyer archetypes and how to appeal to each type.
Tips, tricks, and hacks for managing marketing projects from Nathan Ellering, the demand-generation lead at marketing calendar company CoSchedule and an instructor for the Marketing Project Management Essentials course from MarketingProfs.
Musician Peter Hollens built a following of more than 1.5 million YouTube subscribers through collaboration, a commitment to regular content, and audience feedback. The lessons he learned can help marketers build their own valuable audiences.
Inbound marketer Adithya Murali of Techwyse shares his secrets to creating highly personalized, targeted emails at scale that inspire people to reply and act.
A brand's name can make or break a business. Naming expert Mike Pile of Uppercase Branding shares his secrets for winning the high-stakes name game.
Nipul Chokshi of predictive analytics company Lattice Engines explains how account-based marketing can be scaled to work for companies with a large volume of target accounts, and offers advice for implementing ABM.
Christine Vermes, vice-president of marketing at sales and marketing analytics company Full Circle Insights, discusses funnel metrics and attribution, and how to measure marketing ROI in any industry, from software and technology to the game of polo.
Marcus Sheridan used blogging to turn his struggling pool business around. Now he's a content marketing consultant for some of the world's top companies. In this episode, Marcus offers a sneak preview of marketing secrets from his forthcoming book 'They Ask, You Answer: A Revolutionary Approach to Inbound Sales, Content Marketing, and Today�s Digital Consumer.'
Eight marketing all-stars discuss memorable holiday campaigns: what made their favorites stand out and how to create marketing that stays good longer than your neighbor's fruitcake.
Kristen Craft of video hosting company Wistia shares the secret to creating video content that converts.
The co-authors of The Physics of Brand share insights from the book on building a valuable brand. Authors and marketing experts Dan Wallace, Aaron Keller, and Renee Marino discuss who drives the majority of buying decisions, how you can connect with influencers to amplify your message, and the importance of creating memorable brand experiences.
Avenue CEO Bob Domenz discusses brand activation and engagement for B2B organizations.
SAP Ariba CMO Alicia Tillman discusses the company's rebranding campaign and commitment to ending forced labor throughout the supply chain, and how B2B buyers and B2C buyers are not so different.
Speakers and B2B marketers stopped by to chat with Marketing Smarts host Kerry O'Shea Gorgone in Boston at the MarketingProfs B2B Forum. All guests discuss three things: what they want to master in 2017, their favorite social network for B2B (you'd be surprised), and what they think is going to disrupt the B2B space. Collective smarts from the premiere conference on B2B marketing!
Peter Friedman, former Apple vice-president, and founder and CEO of LiveWorld, shares insights on social media for brands, customer experience, and business.
Amit Joshi, director of product and data science at tech company Forensiq, explains the different types of ad fraud and how marketers can help detect and prevent ad fraud from siphoning off marketing dollars.
Search engine optimization expert Kris Reid shares tips for optimizing content and unconventional approaches for hiring talent. He also discusses how (and why) to build a business overseas.
Kathy Klotz-Guest, business storytelling strategist and author, shares insights from her new book, Stop Boring Me! How to Create Kick-A** Marketing Content, Products and Ideas Through the Power of Improv.
Marketing professor and agency marketer James Loomstein explains why marketers should focus their efforts (and their budgets) on the consideration phase in 2017.
Social media expert and networking powerhouse M. Valentina Escobar-Gonzalez lays out her strategy for helping nonprofits and small businesses achieve social media success.
Stonewall Kitchen CEO John Stiker shares the story of how two entrepreneurs grew their homemade jam and jelly business into an international success through content marketing, social media, and brand engagement.
How can you use stories to garner support for a cause or organization? Here's a story that inspired the movie Dolphin Tale and saved Clearwater Marine Aquarium from financial disaster, as told by its CMO, Bill Potts.
Full Funnel Marketing author Matt Heinz explains why (and how) marketers should embrace revenue-based metrics to demonstrate Marketing's impact on the organization.
Digital marketing and e-commerce expert Marsha Collier, author of 32 books, including eBay for Dummies, discusses how to manage customer relationships across channels, why behavior is more important than demographics, and what marketers can learn from successful eBay sellers.
SaneBox COO Dmitri Leonov discusses email overload and offers suggestions for marketers hoping to keep their emails from being funneled into the "Later" folder.
Marketer and educator C.C. Chapman and recent Internet marketing graduates and authors Temitayo Osinubi and Michelle Bassett discuss modern marketing education.
Gain insight into programmatic advertising and sponsored content from Daniel Bornstein, senior vice-president of media monetization and operations at Demand Media, a holding company that owns ehow, LIVESTRONG, and CRACKED.
TEDx speaker, "Dragon's Den" failure, and successful entrepreneur Tom Hunt explains how he doubled down on his less-than-auspicious turn on the BBC's "Dragon's Den" and won big in business.
Fitness expert, author, and YouTube personality Lucy Wyndham Read shares how she dominated the HIIT (high-intensity interval training) market through endorsements, social media marketing, content, and more.
Best-selling author Jonah Berger explains the hidden forces that shape people's behavior and shares insights from his latest book, Invisible Influence.
Janice Person, online engagement director at Monsanto, shares how blogger outreach and community engagement help the B2B company to overcome negative brand sentiment, misinformation, and outright trolling.
Book marketing and publicity expert Fauzia Burke has run campaigns for Mary Higgins Clark and Tom Clancy, among many others. Here, she shares tips from her recent book, Online Marketing for Busy Authors.
Tracy Rosecrans, SVP of marketing and product for Healthline media, explains how she used content, UX, and SEO to transform Healthline.com into the fastest-growing health information site in the US, with more than 40 million monthly unique views.
Global digital marketing influencer, strategist, and blogger Jeff Bullas offers up the secret to "growth hacking" and explains why it's valuable for big brands and smaller businesses alike.
NewsCred VP of Marketing Alicianne Rand discusses lead nurturing, content strategy, curation, and licensing.
"Millionaire Mentor" Dan Lok shares the story of how he overcame his early failures to grow a portfolio of successful businesses by mastering the power of marketing.
Marketing technologist and former energy industry marketer Virginie Glaenzer discusses sustainability, open source content, customer experience, and what it means to be an "awakened brand."
Story expert Ron Ploof explains how brands (B2B and B2C alike) can create more effective marketing pieces by applying the fundamentals of storytelling to their content marketing.
Brand strategist Nick Westergaard discusses his new book, Get Scrappy: Smarter Digital Marketing for Businesses Big and Small, and explains how big businesses and startups alike can get more for their marketing dollars by doing more with less.
David Spark, owner of brand journalism company Spark Media Solutions, shares practical tips from his book Three Feet From Seven Figures: One-on-One Engagement Techniques to Qualify More Leads at Trade Shows.
Ruth Stevens discusses her new book, B2B Data-Driven Marketing, shares tips on how to collect and use data to improve B2B marketing results, and offers insights from her time as a senior marketer at companies like Time Warner and IBM.
Jason Falls, senior vice-president of digital strategy at Elasticity, explains how (and why) to move beyond social media monitoring and keywords to conversational research and audience strategy.
Zignal Labs Vice-President of Marketing Tim Hayden discusses data-driven marketing and split-second analytics, and why email and Twitter are very much alive.
Customer experience expert and best-selling author Jeanne Bliss shares tips for creating a customer-centric organization and discusses her new book, Chief Customer Officer 2.0.
Branding expert, speaker, and best-selling author Martin Lindstrom discusses his unique brand of in-depth consumer research, and shares insights from his latest book, Small Data: The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends.
Award-winning actress, author, and philanthropist Jane Seymour shares lessons on branding, storytelling, and the importance of giving back in this special video edition of Marketing Smarts.
SmartBear CMO and MarketingProfs University instructor Bryan Semple shares insights on marketing measurement and the B2B customer journey.
Adam Bluemner shares strategies for following up with B2B website leads based on his study that analyzed 63,256 phone calls.
Joshua Dreller of data science company 4C offers insight into the lasting appeal of television and how data on viewing, combined with social data, can supercharge your message targeting.
Chuck Brinker, director of research solutions at SurveyMonkey, shares crisis communication tips for brands and explains data's role--before, during, and after a crisis--in helping your company come out on top.
Fully 80% of companies say they deliver outstanding customer service, but only 8% of their customers agree. Hug Your Haters author Jay Baer shares the secret to winning customer loyalty and turning haters into brand advocates.
Christopher S. Penn, vice-president of marketing technology at Shift Communications and author of Leading Innovation, discusses why innovation will make or break your organization, and shares tips for making innovation happen at your company.
Kiki Burton of Adobe offers offers a map for accessing the goldmine of customer insights your company doesn't even realize it's sitting on, and explains how you can use data management to grow your valuable audience.
Career expert and author Laurence Shatkin, PhD (50 Best Jobs for Your Personality), explains how aspiring marketers can brand themselves for success, how current marketers can better position themselves for a career change, and what skills and interests make someone well suited to the field.
Can you tell your brand story in six seconds? Because that's all today's consumer will give you. Bill Fasig of TopRight Partners shares the consultancy's process for distilling a complex narrative into a six-second story.
Ford Motor Company's digital media manager, J T. Ramsay, discusses Ford's influencer outreach, brand ambassador program, content marketing, and more.
Secrets for sussing out what truly drives buying decisions and brand loyalty, courtesy of Dr. Carl Marci, chief neuroscientist at Nielsen Consumer Neuroscience and co-founder of Innerscope Research.
Twelve top marketing experts share their wish list for marketers: what they wish marketers would stop doing, and what they'd like to see more of in the coming year.
One World Play Project Chief Catalyst Neill Duffy explains how brands benefit from partnering with organizations to support causes, the way General Motors is sharing its brand message by providing seven million highly durable soccer balls to children in disadvantaged communities.
Digital marketing strategist and bestselling author Daniel Lemin explains how online reviews can damage--or improve--your business, and how you can protect your company's reputation.
Jon Milller, co-founder of Marketo and co-founder and CEO of Engagio, explains account-based marketing and how it can improve your marketing results.
Jon Taffer, host of Spike TV's "Bar Rescue," rocks Marketing Smarts, sharing insights about branding and promotion based on his 30 years of experience making bars and restaurants profitable.
How does a postage meter company thrive in the era of digital marketing? By powering location technology for Twitter, for one. Grant Miller of Pitney Bowes shares the company's agile development philosophy--and more.
Mitchell Levy of Aha Amplifier explains how you can become a thought leader in your industry--and provides insight into why it's worth the effort!
The MarketingProfs 2015 Bright Bulb Awards recognize brilliance, excellence, and innovation in B2B marketing. This special video edition of the Marketing Smarts podcast featuresGretchen Newby of The Ritz-Carlton Leadership Center, Cindy Valladares of Tripwire, and Michael Passanante of BESLER Consulting.
Adam Lavine, CEO of mobile-first marketing agency FunMobility, shares insights from the firm's award-winning interactive campaign for Chiquita Bananas featuring gamification and character tie-ins from the motion picture Minions.
Entrepreneur, professor, and opera singer Ja-Nae Duane shares tips and insights from her latest book, The Startup Equation, due out in early 2016.
B2B Marketing Forum speaker Eric T. Tung discusses social media for B2B organizations, including why executives need to join their employees in the social space.
Eric Poses, creator of the game "Loaded Questions," talks game marketing, social media, crowdfunding, and more.
TV host, author, and business celebrity Jeffrey Hayzlett shares insights from his latest book, Think Big, Act Bigger: The Rewards of Being Relentless.
The story of how a struggling actor turned his experience into GigSalad, a company that enables event planners and others to browse, contact, and hire the entertainers and other services they need for events.
Chris discusses his forthcoming book, Insider: Strategies and Secrets for Business Growth in the Age of Distractions. He also shares his incredibly successful approach to email and how he has used content marketing.
Bestselling authors Jill Konrath (Selling to Big Companies) and Donal Daly (Account Planning in Salesforce) explain how sales managers can set their teams up to succeed in the era of modern, customer-centric marketing.
Demandbase Chief Marketing Officer Peter Isaacson discusses the "golden age of B2B marketing," how to measure success, and using account-based marketing to increase revenue.
Consultant and author Mike Goldman ("Performance Breakthrough: The 4 Secrets of Passionate Organizations") explains how to enhance your company's performance by hiring for natural talent and core values and creating the right culture for success.
Amanda Holmes became CEO of Chet Holmes International when she was 24, and she has proven an incredibly effective millennial CEO. Amanda shares her approach to sales, leadership, and more.
Social business strategist and bestselling author Bryan Kramer discusses the science and the art of sharing, and how to use it to make your content more valuable (and shareable),
Christian Lachel shares his secrets to building lasting customer relationships through emotionally evocative brand experiences that increase loyalty and drive revenue. He and his team at BRC Imagination Arts have created some of the world's most memorable brand experiences.
Kevin Bachus, co-creator of the Xbox, senior VP of entertainment and games strategy at Dave & Buster's, discusses how the company uses mobile games to stay connected with customers between visits.
Former Gigwalk CEO and ad-tech industry veteran Bob Bahramipour of InMobi offers insight into the future of mobile advertising, the metrics that really matter, and the role of corporate culture in building a successful global company.
Attorneys Sara F. Hawkins and Kerry O'Shea Gorgone discuss the latest tips from the FTC on how brands and bloggers should legally disclose sponsored content and run promotions.
Mike Saldi, formerly of Salesforce.com, now chief customer officer at software company Preact, shares secrets for spotting which applicants are most likely to rock that job you're hiring for.
Mack Collier and I discuss whether attending conferences is still worthwhile, and what elevates a conference from "meh" to memorable.
David Palmer, marketing director at Wiley, oversees Dummies B2B and the For Dummies, Business, and Education product lines. He explains how B2B marketers can use books and other content to make themselves indispensable to their audience.
Millennials are masters at tuning out marketing messages, but you can connect with this elusive demographic: You just need a different approach. YouthNation author Matt Britton explains how to engage today's youth.
Marketing strategist and musician Robert Sprague, president and CEO of marketing agency PCI, discusses how little words like "a" and "you" can have a big impact on your marketing success.
Teradata Applications Chief Marketing Officer Lisa Arthur discusses her evolution from journalist to CMO, the advent of data-driven marketing, and the importance of customer experience to marketing success.
MarketingProfs founder Allen Weiss shares the story of how he founded the company, how it's evolved over the past 15 years, and what role mindfulness plays in effective marketing.
The founder and CEO of advocate marketing software company Influitive explains how he co-founded marketing automation giant Eloqua, why training and development are a "mission-level priority" at his company, and how he hires exceptional employees.
Ernie Capobianco discusses the legacy of Mad Men--how the advertising tactics depicted in the AMC series have held up--and how the tools of today have changed marketing and promotion.
Author, strategist, and MarketingProfs Marketing Writing Bootcamp instructor Geoff Livingston discusses marketing strategy, customer experience, content, PR, and more.
Dorie Clark, author of Stand Out: How to Find Your Breakthrough Idea and Build a Following Around It, explains how to use personal branding and thought leadership to enhance your career and get your breakthrough idea heard in the marketplace.
Author, speaker, and educator Mark Schaefer discusses his latest book, The Content Code, and shares secrets for igniting your content so you can break through the deafening noise and achieve marketing success.
In line with the theme of this episode--marketing that surprises--as well as the day it airs (April Fools' Day), a surprise host takes over Marketing Smarts to discuss campaigns that surprise and (sometimes) delight!
Soffe Apparel's director of marketing, Paul Anderson, explains the research and strategy behind the company's rebranding and its targeted use of social channels such as Instagram to energize audiences.
Author and Altimeter founder and CEO Charlene Li explains why and how executives should use social media to engage with their employees, their customers, and their brands' larger audiences.
Guy Kawasaki, chief evangelist at Canva and author of 13 books, shares tips on content marketing and social media, and discusses how to spot a winning startup.
Emily Videtto and Alyssa Hall host the "Style My House" Facebook page for GAF, a 129-year-old roofing manufacturer with a complex B2B sales cycle. Videtto and Hall share their secrets to reaching a new audience through social media, audience research, and relevant content.
JetBlue's executive vice-president of commercial and planning, Marty St. George, shares the secrets to the airline's success in using social media for customer service.
Jordan Kretchmer, founder and CEO of Livefyre, discusses research on social media trends and Forrester Research's prediction that brand communities will take on greater importance in 2015.
Chris Reimer, social media strategist and author of the book Happywork, talks about the profit potential in positivity--and why managers should care whether their workers are happy.
Lars Birkholm Petersen, author and global director of business optimization services at Sitecore, explains how brands can use data to create connected customer experiences across channels. He shares insights from the book Connect: How to Use Data and Experience Marketing to Create Lifetime Customers
Tom Gimbel's staffing firm, LaSalle Network, has an employee retention rate of 90% and absenteeism at his company is less than 1%. Tom shares advice on creating a company culture that enables both your employees and your business to thrive.
Ford Motor Company's global marketing and digital communications manager, Angie Kozleski, discusses Ford's approach to influence marketing, blogger outreach, event marketing, and social media.
Jason Miller of LinkedIn offers tips for content marketing and the effective use of LinkedIn, and shares insights from his new book, Welcome to the Funnel: Proven Tactics to Turn Your Content and Social Media Up to 11.
Author and entrepreneur Peter Shankman discusses his book, Zombie Loyalists, and the surprisingly simple approach that turns customers into loyal, passionate brand advocates.
What's the biggest mistake marketers make? 15 marketing experts answer this question, sharing stories and advice in this special yearend episode.
Author Mitzi Perdue, wife of the late Frank Perdue, shares business and leadership lessons from the way Frank grew a father/son business into a major brand.
Chris Hayek, director of global brand management for Shell Lubricants, explains his approach to integrated marketing, communicating innovation, and creating experiences that bring the brand to life for consumers.
Get insight into how big brands manage their communities, and learn secrets for making the most of channel partner relationships... from Dave Hansen, Dell Software global vice-president and general manager of sales, marketing, and services.
Scott Monty, executive vice-president of strategy SHIFT Communications, solves the mystery of more effective marketing--with a little help from Sherlock Holmes.
B2B and B2C marketers both need to create marketing communications that speak H2H (human to human). Social strategist and author Bryan Kramer shares a communication framework all marketers can use.
Deon Newman, IBM's vice-president of marketing for System z, and recipient of the B2B Marketer of the Year Award at the MarketingProfs Bright Bulb Awards, shares insights into what made IBM's Mainframe50 campaign successful.
Marketing consultant, author, and speaker Lisa Nirell talks about how mindfulness makes you a more effective marketer.
Communication expert Tamsen Webster explains why most marketing and sales messages fail to drive action; she also shares the surprisingly simple secret to more effective messages.
Paul Roetzer--founder of inbound marketing agency PR 20/20, author of The Marketing Agency Blueprint--shares tips for smart staffing and measuring marketing results from his latest book, The Marketing Performance Blueprint.
Sysomos SVP of Marketing Amber Naslund shares insights about enterprise marketing, the importance of corporate culture, cultivating brand advocates, and more.
Entrepreneur Syed Balkhi, creator of popular sites List25 and WPBeginner, shares tips for creating shareable content.
Marketing consultant, speaker, and author Mark W. Schaefer discusses omnichannel marketing for brands, content shock, Big Data, and more.
Aviation and hospitality industry marketer Uthpala Kumara of JKCS offers insights into building relationships in B2B industries with long, complex buying cycles.
Crowdly founder Dan Sullivan shares insights about community management, brand advocacy, influencer outreach, and the psychology of trolls.
Best-selling author, speaker, and marketing expert David Meerman Scott discusses the radical change underway in sales and customer service, and shares tips for how businesses can succeed under these new rules.
Mark Horvath, founder of InvisiblePeople.tv, shares advice for marketers on how to share meaningful stories that move people to take action.
Marketing expert and bestselling author Andrew Davis talks about niche marketing, brand partnerships, and ways nonprofits can get free marketing advice.
Marketing expert and frequent speaker C.C. Chapman, co-author of Content Rules and 101 Steps to Making Videos Like a Pro, shares tips for creating quality video content and hiring (and keeping) the best creative talent.
Altimeter Group analyst and digital marketing expert Rebecca Lieb shares insights from a recent report on marketing software vendors, and offers tips for choosing a solution that supports your company's content strategy.
MarketingProfs' Kerry O'Shea Gorgone interviews Kim Garst of Boom Social and Nathan Latka of Heyo onsite at the Social Fresh East conference in Orlando, Florida.
Tim Hayden, co-author of the forthcoming book The Mobile Commerce Revolution, shares insights into consumer behavior, how mobile affects that behavior, and how marketers can embrace the seismic shift that mobile represents.
Show and Tell author Dan Roam explains a new way to craft presentations that will grab (and keep) your audience's attention and inspire them to take action.
Larry Vincent, founder and executive director of The Brand Studio at United Talent Agency, discusses brand attachment, including how marketers can use it to predict buying behavior.
Content strategy expert and author Ahava Leibtag shares practical tips for helping your organization develop a content marketing strategy.
From native advertising and content strategy to how the C-Suite has evolved, Larry Weber and Lisa Henderson discuss what marketers need to know to stay relevant in their industry.
"Clarity therapist" Steve Woodruff explains how you can break through the noise, help people to understand your business, and ensure that they remember what you do so that they can connect you with potential customers.
Change expert and business consultant Stephen Beck discusses how focusing on customer frustration and business vulnerabilities can help you grow your company.
Former Marketing Smarts host Matthew T. Grant returns to talk with Kerry O'Shea Gorgone about developing online courses as a form of content marketing for your business.
Michael Brito discusses why companies need to become publishers, and how they can transform their organizations to embrace this change.
Siegel+Gale CMO Margaret Molloy shares tips for creating a culture of innovation, creating effective B2B content marketing, measuring impact, and hiring the best marketers for your team.
Noted communication professional, speaker, and "Spin Sucks" author Gini Dietrich explains how lying or "spinning" damages brands in the long run, and how to take an ethical approach to PR that drives positive business results.
Jay Baer of Convince and Convert, author of Youtility and co-host of the Social Pros Podcast, talks about some interesting trends he and his team discovered when they interviewed 27 "Social Pros All-Stars."
Jill Rowley issues a clarion call for salespeople to embrace social selling, or risk losing out as modern buyers increasingly direct their own journey.
You think you have problems: Try pulling into port with a dead whale hanging off the bow of your ship! Jonathan helped turn that massive PR crisis into a defining social media success for Denmark's Maersk Line.
John J. Wall, author of B2B Marketing Confessions, shares insights from his book, including an explanation of "pragmatic marketing" and tips for calculating tradeshow ROI.
Marcus Nelson, founder of Addvocate, shares insights into how companies can empower employees as brand advocates (and why they should)!
Chris Brogan discusses his new business book, The Freaks Shall Inherit the Earth, as well as what distinguishes "freaks" from more traditional entrepreneurs and how to maintain a supportive community when the trolls come calling.
Ekaterina Walter has led strategic and marketing innovation for brands such as Intel and Accenture, and she is a cofounder and the CMO of Branderati. I invited Ekaterina to Marketing Smarts to talk about her latest book, The Power of Visual Storytelling, co-written with Jessica Gioglio.
Facebook marketing expert Mari Smith shares tips for achieving the best reach possible using a combination of paid and organic posts.
Organizational psychologist and best-selling author Tasha Eurich offers insight into effective management, and how anyone can learn to be a better leader.
Tom Webster, vice-president of marketing and strategy at Edison Research, explains the simple shift in thinking that can help marketers to create more effective messages.
MailChimp's chief data scientist explains what "data science" is and how it affects marketing communications, product development, and more. He offers marketing professionals concrete tips for crunching numbers to turn data into insights.
Social technology strategist and Google+ expert Lynette Young shares insight into how businesses can take advantage of the social network's potential for marketing.
Bestselling author and millennial branding expert Dan Schawbel shares career tips and insights from his book, Promote Yourself: The New Rules for Career Success.
Burt Herman, co-founder of Storify, explains how to curate quality content using a mix of social media feeds, how technology has changed journalism, and what marketers can learn from the evolution of social.
Helping your company to embrace social selling doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing proposition: You can implement a pilot program to demonstrate how social media can have a positive impact on revenue. Glenn Gow shares tips for starting a successful pilot program at your organization.
Nashville-based consultant and "New Business Networking" author Dave Delaney shares tips for rebuilding your network after a move or a career change, including the role that social media sites like LinkedIn and Twitter should play in your networking efforts.
16 Marketing Smarts guests from 2013 tell you which marketing tactic they would choose, if they could use only one.
In his third book, Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, Gary Vaynerchuk offers marketers strategies and tips to help them succeed on each social network and site, and he shares how offering value pays big dividends down the line, time and again.
Scott Stratten's expressed his frustration with QR codes in no uncertain terms. His most recent book--QR Codes Kill Kittens--provides example after example of poorly executed marketing concepts that will make you want to laugh and cry at the same time.
Author Brian Sheehan discusses his latest book "Loveworks," the characteristics of beloved brands, and how you can create a "sensual experience" for your prospects and customers.
Inside sales expert and author Josiane Feigon discusses her new book, Smart Sales Manager, explains how to manage Millennials, and shares insights into how salespeople can cultivate relationships with social-savvy customers.
Tom Martin--founder of Converse Digital and author of The Invisible Sale--discusses his secrets for using content and social networking to drive business growth without cold calls, advertising, or pitching.
Using paid advertising to borrow someone else's audience isn't sustainable. Jeffrey K. Rohrs explains how to build a "push-button audience" that will serve as a renewable energy source for your company.
Michael Stelzner talks about his journey from writing white papers to founding MyKidsAdventures.com, and what he learned along the way about building a community, honing your social media strategy, and parenting in a high-tech world.
Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey started Barefoot Wine in a laundry room and grew it into one of the top US wine brands. They talk about how their approach to selling wine disrupted the industry, and what others can learn from their business model.
Corey Sommers, SVP of whiteboard strategy at Corporate Visions, is also co-founder of WhiteboardSelling, where he was CMO. In this episode of Marketing Smarts, he discusses the book he co-wrote with David Jenkins, Whiteboard Selling: Empowering Sales Through Visuals.
Presentation expert Nancy Duarte shares tips for creating marketing presentations that persuade, and talks about how she and her husband disrupted the graphic design industry with the startup they ran out of their California apartment.
IBM's Director of Social Strategy and Programs Ethan McCarty talks about how (and why) the company selects and showcases the social media posts of employees from across the organization.
What factors influence decision-making? Author Noreena Hertz discusses her book, Eyes Wide Open, which uses scientific research about decision-making processes, along with real-world examples.
Food branding expert Chris Cornyn serves up marketing advice for would-be food entrepreneurs--including on the Lifetime reality series "Supermarket Superstars."
Jonah Berger, author of the bestselling book Contagious, discusses how companies can use word-of-mouth and social transmission to amplify their brand message.
Jamie Bearse, CEO of ZERO--The End of Prostate Cancer, discusses nonprofit marketing, blogger outreach, and promoting men's health (even when doing so makes them uncomfortable).
Spredfast CMO Jim Rudden discusses trends in social marketing, content strategy, and using existing content to make "content risotto."
Michelle Andres, vice-president of digital media for the Baltimore Ravens, explains how the organization rose to social media prominence in the NFL and turned its official website from a lonely afterthought into the online destination for fans.
Author Mack Collier talks to Marketing Smarts about his book Think Like a Rock Star and the ways companies can meaningfully connect with their best customers (and biggest fans).
Serial entrepreneur and Skyword CEO Tom Gerace talks with Marketing Smarts about content strategy, affiliate marketing, entrepreneurship, and everything in between.
A perennial favorite of marketers and marketing instructors alike, The New Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott has sold 300,000 English-language copies over four editions. David discusses what's changed in marketing since the last edition, and how we marketers are in the midst of a communications revolution.
Nick Westergaard of Brand Driven Digital gives us a sneak peek at his B2B Marketing Forum presentation on Choosing Your Own Marketing Adventure. For more great insights, come see him speak in October.
Jay Baer's new book, Youtility, provides a comprehensive guide for businesses on "marketing sideways" and winning loyal customers by providing extremely helpful content. Baer offers compelling evidence that becoming a Youtility leads to business success, and provides tips for making the change at your organization.
Mark W. Schaefer has written three books, including best-sellers Return on Influence and The Tao of Twitter. His marketing blog, {grow}, has won numerous international awards. I invited Mark to Marketing Smarts to discuss his recent book, co-authored with Stanford A. Smith, Born to Blog.
Best-selling author and online marketer Jackie Huba shares marketing lessons from her book Monster Loyalty: How Lady Gaga Turns Followers Into Fanatics.
Ian Cleary discusses how he started the social media and technology blog RazorSocial.com, and the tools and tactics he used to turn RazorSocial into one of the "Top 10 Social Media Blogs of 2013" in just six months.
Providing the best product won't be enough to carry your business into the future: You need to create experiences your customers want to share. Author Brian Solis discusses the need for innovative leadership, the new generation of consumerism, and his recent book, What's the Future of Business?
"Be nice" isn't just advice for kindergartners: Nice businesses earn more money. Author Peter Shankman talks about the value of creating a "nice" corporate culture in his latest book, Nice Companies Finish First: Why Cutthroat Management Is Over--and Collaboration Is In.
National Geographic has dominated print media for 125 years, and now the organization is staking its claim on social networks and photo-sharing sites. EVP and CMO Amy Maniatis discusses brand management, the power of content, and the importance of emerging platforms like Instagram and Google+ for increasing your brand's reach.
B2B Marketing Forum Keynote Jill Foster gives us a sneak peek of her presentation "Stuck in Elevators and Other Unsavory Networking Disasters," and provides valuable networking advice for marketing professionals.
Digital marketing expert and author Mitch Joel shares insights from his new book "Control Alt Delete" and discusses such topics as social media and content strategy, and how marketers can prepare for upcoming technological changes.
Author Amy Howell talks about how professional women can use their personal networks to build their career, and the importance of cultivating genuine connections online and offline.
Michael Stoner shares insights he gained from compiling 25 case studies in higher education marketing, and how marketers can build integrated marketing plans that maximize audience reach using traditional channels, social media, and emerging platforms.
Online conflicts can cost businesses thousands of dollars (and hours) to resolve. Attorney Andrea Weckerle, author of Civility in the Digital Age, explains how you can protect yourself when a situation turns ugly.
Jason Falls of CafePress talks about cause marketing, Autism Awareness Month, and how businesses of any size can give back to the community.
Dorie Clark talks about the concept of personal branding, the importance of producing your own content as part of a reinvention effort, and how one goes about finding and benefiting from work with a mentor.
Michael Weiss, managing director at figure18 and a veteran speaker, consultant, client advocate, and sales executive, has an interesting perspective on marketing and advertising, not to mention the role of the agency, in today's always-on, always-open business environment.
This week's guest on Marketing Smarts is Tim Suther, chief marketing and strategy officer for Acxiom, a firm that Tim referred to as "the original Big Data company"; FRONTLINE called it "one of the biggest companies you've never heard of."
Though living in a new era of participatory media, our notions of what constitutes an audience and what audiences actually do has not changed much since the broadcast era--and that's a problem, argues Sam Ford.
Steve Bushong's background in systems engineering, and his experience with sourcing, procurement, and operations, gave him a unique perspective on how marketing can and should work in today's complex media environment.
Testing your online campaigns, landing pages, forms, website, and so on can't be an every-now-and-again thing. Testing must be iterative and ongoing if it is to produce results. Which means, among other things, that your organization must institute a culture of testing.
Demonstrating value is certainly a fine reason to measure our actions and their results. But discussing marketing measurement with Jim Lenskold during this week's Marketing Smarts podcast got me thinking that we may be thinking about the purpose of measurement exactly backwards.
"Buyer personas don't work if you make stuff up," Adele Revella told me during this week's episode of Marketing Smarts. "They work if you listen to customers first." But to gather real, actionable customer intelligence, you need to talk to actual customers. That can be challenging for two reasons.
David B. Thomas, senior director of content and community for Salesforce Marketing Cloud and author of The Executive's Guide to Enterprise Social Media Strategy, discusses social media policies.
Dan Pink argues that selling (especially in the form of persuading or convincing someone to do this or that) is deeply embedded in our nature. "We need to move away from thinking of selling something as a kind of unnatural, scurrilous act," he insists.
The Atlantic magazine has made a highly successful transition to the digital world. To understand what has led to its digital success and uncover what content marketers might learn from its example, I invited Bob Cohn, the magazine's digital editor, to Marketing Smarts.
"Search engine robots--the last time I checked--do not have credit cards to buy your product," says Sonia Simone of Copyblogger Media. Which is why, she adds, "It makes more sense for us to look at SEO as a function of content, rather than content as a function of SEO."
"All of us want to belong, and all of us really want to make an impact, and some of us... we invent Facebook," Ekaterina Walter, social media strategist at Intel and author of Think Like Zuck told me during this week's episode of Marketing Smarts.
We covered a range of topics on the Marketing Smarts podcast in 2012. In this episode we share some highlights on creating compelling content, allowing social media to humanize your organization, building community, and navigating the sometimes tricky relationship between marketing and sales.
Beth Kanter and Katie Delahaye (KD) Paine, authors of Measuring the Networked Nonprofit: Using Data to Change the World, discuss performance metrics and nonprofits.
C.C. Chapman, co-author of Content Rules, has a new book out, Amazing Things Will Happen, which is a collection of short pieces, lessons, and observations intended for "anybody out there," C.C. says, "who may be stuck in a rut or maybe just not doing exactly what they wanted with their lives."
John Jantsch believes that if businesses are to grow, they need to be ready, willing, and able to change. To navigate and instigate such change, business leaders need a clarity of purpose and they need to set big, audacious goals.
Before we can effectively communicate with our customers, we need to get their attention. According to Jeff Bander of EyeTrackShop, this means that when evaluating the effectiveness of our ads or calls-to-action or emails or whatever, we need to answer the question, "Did they see them?"
Ellen Valentine, product evangelist at Silverpop and my guest this week on Marketing Smarts, has an interesting perspective on the perennial tension between Marketing and Sales: Technology is to blame! And it's likely the solution, too...
Marketers need to think and act more like executive producers, those people behind the scenes of movies and TV shows who spend all their time "trying to find the resources to create the right kind of content for the right audience," argues Andrew Davis.
"There will be times when your income is zero and you just might as well plan for that right now," Becky McCray told me. She is a resident of Hopeton, Oklahoma (population 30), cattle rancher, liquor store owner, and co-author (with Barry J. Moltz) of Small Town Rules, which, among other things, introduced me to the concept of "planning for zero."
Boston University's Dean of Students Kenn Elmore discusses BU's sometimes-pioneering use of social media, including for "reaching the unreachable." During our conversation, I asked him to explain what he meant by "the unreachable."
Rick Jensen heads up both sales and marketing at Constant Contact, which is an interesting predicament to be in, considering the evolving relationship between Marketing and Sales. I thought he might have something interesting to say about the subject. I was not wrong.
Rohit Bhargava, author and social media strategist, thinks business books need to be useful--to help you solve a problem you're facing. So it has to speak to you from the get-go, draw you in, and convince you it's going to help you solve your problem. And the best way to do that is to start off by telling a story.
This week's guest , Laura Ries, believes in tying a brand's core message (the "verbal nail") to a striking visual image (the "visual hammer"). Her premise is straightforward: To leave a lasting impression on the mind of customers and potential customers, brands must rely on images because they wield a blunt, emotional force that words lack.
Dave Carroll is the man whose guitar United broke. He joined us to discuss his book, titled United Breaks Guitars, about the experiences that led up to his now famous music video, lessons he learned along the way about social media, and the keys to effective, meaningful customer service. I asked him what companies need if they are to avoid a "Dave Carroll" in their future. This is what he told me.
According to IBM's Yuchun Lee, "every communication has to be relevant. That has to be the bar." So how do you make sure that the messages you send out, the offers you make, and the content you create are relevant?
Brands are now publishers. That's no longer news. But what are the implications? For one, brands need editors--and not just for their content. In this episode, Tom Fishburne, the Marketoonist, explains that he learned the power of editing while working as a product marketer--and editing not just when creating content but especially when designing and developing the products themselves.
In this episode, we talk with Tim Washer, the man behind the IBM marketing video selected as a "Staff Pick" by Comedy Central, an honor not many B2B marketing pieces can claim. Tim is now social media manager at Cisco, and he talks about how to make comedy an effective part of your marketing.
Has your organization ever created buyer personas? If so, did you ever use them? Many don't--because they don't create truly useful personas in the first place. Ardath Abee lays out key elements of personas you can really use.
HubSpot's Kipp Bodnar discusses why so few B2B companies blog, how to develop a social media strategy, and what roadblocks companies encounter when trying to implement their strategy (if they actually have one!).
The "S" word can be intimidating, but failure to articulate a clear strategy (and goals!) for your content marketing will undermine its effectiveness. Here, Michael Brenner discusses how SAP defines--and implements--its content strategy.
Joe Pulizzi is THE content marketing guy. And he has quite a bit to say about content marketing in general, but I was most curious to find out how he has used content marketing to grow his business at the Content Marketing Institute. The resulting conversation focused a lot on how every piece of CMI content is tied to a specific call to action.
All rumors to the contrary, email marketing is not dead or dying. In fact, email is thriving, according to DJ Waldow and his co-conspirator Jason Falls, co-authors of the forthcoming book, The Rebel's Guide to Email Marketing, which explodes many email myths and "best-practices."
Stand-up comic, author of How to Be Black, and former director of digital at The Onion, Baratunde Thurston has a lethal sense of humor--and an uncanny ability to meld business sense and humor to both build an online audience and keep advertisers happy. Hear what he has to say.
The final stop of the MarketingProfs Smart Marketers Tour was the beautiful deCordova Museum in Lincoln, MA, on July 10, and it was our best-attended. Our guests were Jeff Mayersohn, owner of the Harvard Bookstore in Harvard Square, Cambridge, and Lou Imbriano, CEO of TrinityOne and former CMO of the New England Patriots.
Getting people to talk about your company in a positive way is far simpler than you think. In the end, it's as obvious as being nice or providing thoughtful customer service. The problem is that many companies fail because they forget "to be human," says Andy Sernovitz in this podcast.
Guy Kawasaki loves Google+ so much, he wrote a book about it: What the Plus! Since I've been rather slow to get on the Google+ bus, I invited Guy to Marketing Smarts to talk about why I should give it a(nother) shot.
"Most companies are either under-qualifying or over-qualifying leads," says PointClear's Dan McDade in this episode of the Marketing Smarts podcast. He goes on to explain what he means and offers a three-point solution to the problem.
Whether you are selling complex technical systems or burgers with fried pickles on them--like my guests in this week's Marketing Smarts--you need to understand your customers and interact with them face-to-face.
What does it mean to have a holistic approach to content marketing and SEO? Since that's precisely what Lee Odden calls for in his new book, that's exactly what I asked him in this episode of Marketing Smarts.
In this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, author and social media strategist Jay Baer explains why the easiest way to be successful in social is to "be social about content instead of being social about your company."
In this week's Marketing Smarts, Melanie Notkin, founder of SavvyAuntie.com, discusses an important niche market neglected by marketers--women without children of their own, but with children in their lives.
In this week's Marketing Smarts podcast, Summer Joy Boone, director of assimilation and social media at a Florida church, and Janet K. Altman, principal and marketing director at the second largest accounting firm in Florida, offer unique perspectives on a host of marketing topics.
In this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, author Maddie Grant explains why the new world of communication afforded by social media requires that organizations shed their mechanistic perspective--and become more human.
In this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, author Bob Burg explains why giving--consistently providing value to others--is not only a nice way to live life but also a financially profitable way that helps build valuable relationships.
We took Marketing Smarts on the road and recorded the podcast live in Los Angeles, where I interviewed Eric Granof, CMO at the largest underwriter of surety bail in the US, and Brad Abare, communications director of a Los Angeles-based church.
In this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, social media consultant Michelle McCormack shares four key lessons she's learned about social media success--and what it takes to attain it.
Why should you hire a brand journalist? In this episode of Marketing Smarts, Joe Chernov, Eloqua's vice-president of content marketing, explains why hiring a brand journalist can make all the content you produce better.
There is no question that communities are going to play a bigger and bigger role in the way we all do business. The question is, Is your company ready for it? Rachel Happe of the Community Roundtable offers insights.
In this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, Ian Lurie, CEO of Portent Interactive, and Geoff Livingston, author and marketing strategist, offer unique perspectives on how to rescue marketing from itself.
"It's not just social media," Kurt Abrahamson says in this week's episode of Marketing Smarts. "It's socially engaged audiences that are important." Learn why social sharing is an important indicator of engagement--and more useful to publishers and advertisers than the traditional "reach" metrics.
One of the rules of traditional brainstorming is... "Don't criticize anyone's ideas." But does that work? "Criticism is really good for the imagination," Jonah Lehrer explains in this week's episode of Marketing Smarts.
What does "social business" mean? On this week's episode of Marketing Smarts, Amber Naslund and Matt Ridings tell me why the key to being a social business depends less on technology and more on the application of social concepts internally.
"During major life changes, our habits are up for grabs," Charles Duhigg says in this week's episode of Marketing Smarts. But when companies gather customer data to shape future buying habits, are they helping customers or helping themselves?
Over the last 100 years, a business culture emerged based on mass production, mass consumption, and mass advertising in print and, especially, on television. Now, the media landscape is undergoing an unprecedented technical revolution--and highlighting a critical weakness at the core of marketing communications.
Thought leadership doesn't depend on what you think about your ideas and your perspective; it depends on whether other people are in fact following your lead. You don't choose to be a thought leader, in other words; you become a thought leader. How? By inspiring people to act. And to do that, you need "a signature idea."
In the early '90s, more than a quarter million Glocks (a semiautomatic pistol) had been sold in the US. Marketers can learn a lot from the runaway success of this handgun, as Bloomberg Businessweek's Paul Barrett told us in this week's episode of Marketing Smarts.
"Popular is the last thing smart business people should want to be." At least that's the firmly held belief of Erika Napoletano, author of the forthcoming book The Power of Unpopular, and this week's guest on Marketing Smarts. But whatever could she mean? And why would any smart businessperson set out to be unpopular?
Senior-level marketers don't seem to believe their digital partners are adequately extending their service capabilities in the digital age. So how does an agency demonstrate that it "gets" digital? Glenn Engler, CEO of Digital Influence Group, answers that question in this episode of Marketing Smarts.
"Mobile is a behavior. It's not a technology." That's what Tim Hayden, CMO of 44Doors, told me when we discussed the "mobile moment" in this episode of our Marketing Smarts podcast.
What if you opened a coffee shop and needed to stand out from a slew of competitors? You'd need to create a fascinating aura around your product. One way to do that, according to Sally Hogshead, this week's guest on Marketing Smarts, would be to offer a $500 cup of coffee.
Why is it that so many books, supposedly about marketing and business, seem more focused on self-actualization and personal empowerment? Author Julien Smith answers that question in this week's Marketing Smarts podcast.
We all know that our marketing materials solve our problems. But do they solve other people's problems? I invited Laura Fitton, founder of oneforty, to explore the idea of useful marketing in our latest Marketing Smarts podcast.
Whenever we present content on mobile marketing, we get the question: What are the B2B applications? I've often wondered if B2B marketers could be thinking about mobile--specifically, mobile apps--in other ways.
It's not always clear that the organizations that call for innovation actually want it. In this episode of Marketing Smarts, professor and author Dave Owens discusses the constraints that hamper creative thinking-and kill innovation.
In this week's Marketing Smart's podcast, writer and social media manager Shannon Paul discusses the elements of a social strategy, the keys to effective content marketing, and the art of "being human."
How can you convince the C-suite of the value of your social media efforts? The key is to translate social media metrics into "core metrics your company is already measuring," Marketing Smarts guest Nichole Kelly says.
"Marketers understand what rhetoric's all about," says Jay Heinrichs, this week's guest on Marketing Smarts. Rhetoric is about changing people's behavior. And yet, to many, rhetoric is a medieval oddity, an ancient artifact
People running nonprofits are under attack by zombies! Idea zombies, that is. That was the topic of John Haydon's session at the recent BlogWorld Expo, and the starting point of our conversation in this episode of Marketing Smarts
In this episode of Marketing Smarts, we talk with Scott Brinker of ion interactive about why marketing departments need marketing technologists and why software is the key to creating a memorable customer experience.
Nichole Goodyear, strategic adviser at Extole, chats about running startups, changes in advertising, and the future of social search... in the latest Marketing Smarts podcast from MarketingProfs.
In this episode of Marketing Smarts, Aaron Weber of Spiral16 discusses what makes content popular, how effective algorithms are at parsing the Web's information, and how to connect with the people who are talking about you.
In our latest Marketing Smarts Podcast, we talked to Alicia Arnold, senior VP of digital at Hill Holliday, about the myths surrounding creativity. At the center of our conversation was one myth: Creativity cannot be taught.
"You guys are a bunch of clowns who just do arts and crafts all day!" Is that what your sales team says about the marketing folks? Ever wonder how you might get those two hearts to beat as one?
In this Marketing Smarts podcast, we discuss agile marketing with Frank Days, who defines the agile method, discusses why marketers are "going agile," and recounts his experience using the method.
For this, the maiden voyage of the MarketingProfs "Marketing Smarts" podcast, I spoke with Lou Imbriano, a former CMO of the New England Patriots. He offered a wealth of down-to-earth advice for any business owner.