I end my keynote talk about artificial intelligence with the following: In the future, there will be two kinds of jobs. Either we will manage the machines or the machines will manage us. At first, this statement seems somewhat bleak. “A machine managing me? Who wants to report to a machine?” We conjure up dystopian…
I was asked recently: “What are some of the most prevalent marketing misconceptions you’ve run into?” This is an important question, because too many marketers are working with outdated misconceptions about what still works in marketing. Here are just a few examples: On-Page SEO: Very few things you do on your website matter when it…
One of the most misunderstood and misinterpreted terms in marketing analytics and business measurement is the key performance indicator, or KPI. What is a key performance indicator? What determines a KPI? How do we know which metrics we measure are KPIs and which aren’t? Let’s dig into some answers to these questions. A KPI tells…
In my work as a public speaker, I’m privileged to talk to so many marketers about their marketing and measurement challenges. One consistent theme that keeps cropping up is about metrics, and more importantly, the use of them in our marketing. With so much data, what should we pay attention to? What should we or…
Over the weekend, I spoke with a couple of small business owners who were just getting started in digital marketing. They asked, for a brand new website and a brand new business, what should they do first? They felt overwhelmed by all the choices and channels available. What I suggested to them was a punch…
If you’ve not spent a lot of time around your creative services team members, you may have never heard the term swipe file before. A swipe file is a collection, a scrapbook of materials that have worked, arranged in such a way to inspire you and give you future ideas. Done properly, it can be…
One of my favorite authors in the world of magic is Darwin Ortiz. In his landmark book Strong Magic, he talks about what makes good magic vs. bad magic, and one of the strongest criticisms is magic for magicians versus magic for laiety. In short, magic has a purpose. When you choose to become a…
I love the power that mind maps give us to organize our thoughts. Unlike traditional outlining, mind maps let us rearrange our thoughts easily and see connections between different ideas. Mind maps are one of my secrets to productivity – I find I’m able to outline and plan much faster with them than other planning…
Do industry marketing benchmarks matter? Consider these two benchmarks, completely out of context: The average clickthrough rate (CTR) is about 4% for B2B. (source) The average Facebook organic reach for pages with 500 likes or more is 2.11%. (source) Do these benchmarks provide you any useful insights? On the surface, they might seem to, but…
