“You can try this at home…” But you probably won’t. The secret recipe isn’t the reason Coke is successful. And the recipe for KFC isn’t much of a recipe at all. The secret way you do the thing isn’t what keeps your clients coming back. It’s the part you do in public that matters.
Organizations lie all the time. Big lies, sometimes, but usually small ones. Is the call volume actually unusually heavy? Did a chef really prepare this meal just for me? These fiblets are so common that they become part of the culture, a trope that lets the user know that this is a real organization–the same…
I’ve been in marketing for coming up to ten years now (*internal scream at the passing of time*) and, while I like to think I have a bit of savvy when it comes to content marketing, there are plenty of… Read more ›
In this Whiteboard Friday, Jon discusses how to identify, fix, and prevent cannibalization. He identifies three specific types of cannibalization: internal, international, and subdomain.
In 2019, I was a freelance writer with no idea what SOPs were, relying on mental checklists and scrawled notes. Then, I joined an agency where SOPs ensured consistent, high-quality content. At first, I resisted the detailed checklists — they felt mechanical. But after seeing how the agency delivered seamless content for dozens of clients,…
In most roles I’ve begun, an employee handbook was the first internal document I read. So naturally, I’d make a lot of assumptions about the kind of place I was hired at based on the employee handbook. From vacation policies to dress codes to nondiscrimination policies, employee handbooks have given me a clear overview of…
Each week, Laura, Caroline, and I get to sit and chat with some of today’s most innovative marketing masters. We’ve run down the rabbit hole with folks from Spotify, Liquid Death, Oatly, New Balance, Zapier, Hootsuite, the Brooklyn Nets, and even the makers of Chicago’s most beloved tirefire-flavored liquor. If you could smoosh all of…
You might be both. In big organizations, project management is a distinct skill. It involves timekeeping, record keeping and organization. The project manager knows the budget and the deadline, and ensures that constituents stay in sync. This is the construction coordinator and the movie producer. The product manager, on the other hand, makes decisions about…
Like many businesses, I depend on web forms on my website to collect visitor information and to give them an easy way to contact me. They are an invaluable part of my lead generation strategy. You probably know what a web form is and roughly what it looks like, but do you really know what…
When the truck makes a delivery at the nearby True Value hardware store, Danny needs to figure out which shelf to put it on. Should the extension cords go next to the hoses? After all, they both do the same thing, one with electricity and one with water… The purpose of putting things in order…