Algorithms and Humanisms

“Facebook Inc. is largely ruled by algorithms. But ultimately people must make judgments about what to show its 1.6 billion users and how.” -May 11, 2016 Wall Street Journal People actually have something to do with what you see on Facebook – oh my! According to the article, there are “allegations that Facebook workers manipulated […]

Victoria’s Secret Kills its Catalog. Does This Mean Print is Dead?

I won’t keep you in suspense: print is alive and well. Back in the day, when investing marketing dollars, it was easy to draw a line between mailing catalogs (the only direct marketing investment at the time), the value of acquiring a customer and the bank statements that arrived months later. This news from Victoria’s […]

I think, therefore I brand…

I recently came across an interesting study that looks at the power of brand from a little different angle. Anyone reading this is probably familiar with the concept of the placebo effect. The subject of countless articles, it was first defined over 60 years ago. It identified the important role that perception plays in physical […]

Selling + Storytelling: 3 Sites That Get It Right

You only need to do two things to have a great website. 1). Make shopping your website as intuitive and simple as possible. 2) Tell the story of your brand and your unique selling proposition, without interfering with the above. Simple, right? Riiiiiiiiiiiight… In search of that elusive combination, I found three eCommerce websites that tell their story […]

What does Google Know?

Well…literally almost everything. Their search engine has indexed over 30 trillion websites and executes billions of searches each day. “Google” is now used as a verb, joining the ranks of brands-become-eponymous terms like Kleenex, Band-aid and Frisbee. So what can Google teach us about human behavior online? Literally almost anything. Let’s do a thought experiment: […]

5 Steps to a Great Call to Action

These Call-To-Action Best Practices Still Stand The Test of Time. Last week I received a magazine subscription offer in the mail that contained no less than 7 paths to respond, including but not limited to the traditional ‘place YES sticker here’ reply postcard, an 800 number and three online response options with separate, but corresponding […]

Sustainability: A Deeper Dive

Case Study: Seventh Generation When it comes to household goods, specifically those in the cleaning, paper, and personal care product lines, I’m not sure if there is a better example of sustainability in practice than Seventh Generation. From the company name to their product ingredients, down to the containers their soaps and cleaners arrive in, […]

Sustainability: A Deeper Dive

Case Study: Patagonia While some companies incorporate sustainability practically into sourcing and shipping and others focus on the empirical side of things through product ingredients and consumer honesty, there is a third segment whose very brand essence relies on their inherent relationship to ethical consumerism and their perceived identity in the marketplace. Standing atop the […]