One of the things I like to do from time to time is check in on a variety of different leading economic indicators to get a sense of how the overall economy is doing. That knowledge lets me know – within a certain amount of error – what marketers can expect their quarter to look…
Every now and again, something bugs me, a little voice in the back of my head that says, “Go take a look at some other data sources to see a bigger picture”. This stems from my years in financial services, where every chart held the potential to be the insight you were looking for to…
A lot of people have wondered and speculated about how to achieve more economic equality, about how to level the playing field so that the 1% don’t continue to dominate the economy. While this is not a comprehensive solution, Blizzard Entertainment may have given us part of the solution. For those who don’t play World…
After having played Guild Wars 2 for 2 weeks, I’ve found a rather interesting comparison between its in-game economy and the World of Warcraft economy. In World of Warcraft, there’s a limit of 32,767 players who can participate in your faction’s Auction House, the in-game market. On some Warcraft realms, that number is significantly lower.…
One of the hot topics yesterday was the acquisition of ExactTarget by Salesforce (which I wrote about here). As someone who worked in the email marketing industry for a long time, this is a huge seismic shift, because Salesforce is the gold standard CRM for most midsize and large businesses. Having a built-in email marketing…
I started playing Guild Wars 2 last week, and one of the most significant changes as a Warcraft player (and no, I haven’t given up on Warcraft, it’s just that the content for Patch 5.3 ran out REALLY fast) is that GW2 permits you to spend real world currency for in-game currency. You go to…
Have you ever heard of a PEST analysis? It’s not something you do with annoying people on Facebook or around the house. It’s a basic form of business analysis that looks at four key “big picture” factors that might influence your business, factors in the environment around you and your company. These factors are political,…
One of the most dangerous things about a consumer-focused material goods economy, from an environmental perspective, is that in order for you to have a sustainable business, you have to consume resources. Not only do you have to consume resources, you have to consume a lot of them. That’s at odds with the long-term environmental…
