John Steel’s new book “Perfect Pitch: The Art of Selling Ideas and Winning New Business” focuses on every presentation as a conversation. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in or what form your presentation takes. Think of it as a conversation and you’ll be on your way to success. Read On
As Google and other search engines become ever more sophisticated, some SEO experts are calling for radical changes to web design that ignore essential aspects of web usability. Some thoughts on the importance of balancing the mixture to ensure successful web sites. Read on
New creative approaches using social media tools like Facebook Connect can be spectacular. But with these new developments come real challenges that have nothing to do with the creativity involved. Unless marketers address these issues, their efforts won’t work. Read on
What makes a good headline? After all, it represents 84% of the effectiveness of any communication. Some insights on how using Twitter can help you write more powerful headlines.
What about Flash? Useful as a web technology or not? This article appeared as a Futures column in Marketing magazine, Canada’s version of Advertising Age, in June 2002. I wanted the reader to be thinking of the rich visual motion-oriented environment Flash could make possible. Since then, Flash has continued to see limited success. Though the situation has not been helped by security concerns, complexity, and the lack of iPhone support, I believe much of the reason for slow growth of the technology is because there is so much bad implementation. Sites that are slow, clumsy, and where Flash only gets in the way are far too common.
I came across this interesting example of how moving simple punctuation around can totally change the context of a story. It’s pretty funny
Business people hear about their competitors making sales online, sometimes with very impressive numbers, and rush to the web with the only objective not to be left behind. As a result, they end up with poorly conceived e-commerce sites that do nothing for the brand and quite often damage the valuable brand assets. Some helpful advice
Most people are unsane. They aren’t completely sane, and they aren’t completely insane. They’re somewhere in between. That’s an important distinction in marketing and advertising. How to make the most of it
Copy alone, even with no visuals or music to embellish it, can have a powerful impact. It can make you laugh out loud. It can bring tears of sorrow. It can make you pick up the phone and dial a number with your credit card in hand. But good copy is hard to write. Here are some tips
It’s been fascinating to watch how the internet has been changing human expectations and responses in other areas of communication. The influence of technology is changing our expectations, and those in the advertising, design and marketing communication businesses need to pay attention. Read on