News & Case Studies on Internet Advertising, Marketing & PR

From MarketingSherpa.com...

"Marketers from 110 organizations contributed test results and lessons-learned stories for this fourth annual Wisdom Report, including: American Red Cross, CompUSA, Cox Communications, Deloitte & Touche, Palo Alto Software, and The Motley Fool:

• Email campaign segmentation test results
• Search marketing lessons (especially combining PPC and SEO)
• Offline advertising and marketing lessons
• Web site design and landing page lessons
• Business-to-Business marketing campaign lessons
• Office politics and job searching tips for a successful marketing career

Plus, practical tips from ad agency executives and consultants on how to run a healthier business and land new clients.

Click here to get a free 2006 Wisdom PDF.... "

Blink

From Malcolm Gladwell's website:

"1. What is 'Blink' about?

It's a book about rapid cognition, about the kind of thinking that happens in a blink of an eye. When you meet someone for the first time, or walk into a house you are thinking of buying, or read the first few sentences of a book, your mind takes about two seconds to jump to a series of conclusions. Well, 'Blink' is a book about those two seconds, because I think those instant conclusions that we reach are really powerful and really important and, occasionally, really good.

You could also say that it's a book about intuition, except that I don't like that word. In fact it never appears in 'Blink.' Intuition strikes me as a concept we use to describe emotional reactions, gut feelings--thoughts and impressions that don't seem entirely rational. But I think that what goes on in that first two seconds is perfectly rational. It's thinking--its just thinking that moves a little faster and operates a little more mysteriously than the kind of deliberate, conscious decision-making that we usually associate with 'thinking.' In 'Blink' I'm trying to understand those two seconds. What is going on inside our heads when we engage in rapid cognition? When are snap judgments good and when are they not? What kinds of things can we do to make our powers of rapid cognition better?"

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Winging it

By Robert Genn, from The Painter's Keys Community

"On Dec. 8, 1903, with government funding, countless advisors and great ballyhoo, Samuel Pierpont Langley's flying machine plopped unpleasantly into the Potomac. Nine days later, Orville and Wilbur Wright got their Flyer off the ground. Why did these bicycle mechanics succeed when a famous scientist failed? Langley's plans were mostly theoretical and his machine was produced from blueprint and built by others. But by studying the Wright brothers' working notes, you see that their insight and their execution are woven together. By trial and error and over a period of time they solved problems like wing shape and wing warping. Each adjustment was a small spark of insight that led to others. Along the way they found it necessary to build a wind tunnel and other devices to test the lift and controllability of their ever-changing designs."

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Leadership: 100 Days of Scrutiny

From the Pharmaceutical Executive, January 2006
- by Sander A. Flaum & Jonathon Flaum

By "Did he put his napkin on his lap? Did she know which one is the salad fork? Was he rude to the waiter? The answers to these questions may not be all that important in the great scheme of things. But on a first date, they are all we have to go on as we take the measure of a person who may have tremendous impact on our lives.

The first 100 days for a new leader of an organization can feel just as tense as a first date. Margaret Exley, the UK chairman of Mercer Delta, in a paper entitled 'First 100 Days: The New CEO's Challenge,' wrote, 'Your formal decisions, informal behavior, and symbolic acts will be closely scrutinized by everyone with an interest in your company: employees, customers, shareholders, investors, and competitors. Everything you do and say will send messages, set tone, establish expectations, and communicate directions for the new leadership group.'

The question for me is how can leaders use this period of intense scrutiny as an opportunity to connect with their organizations' people, stakeholders, and customers? And further, how can leaders set the course for a new purposeful direction (that their hiring probably demands) without alienating a group that may have grown attached to the comforts of the status quo? These are complicated questions, and to deal with them I have identified five tried-and-true practices that help the transition be not only smooth but also transformative.

#1 Listen first, talk second

Most people feel that the best conversations are the ones in which they are truly heard. So get out of your nice new office and go sit with your direct reports. Sit with them in their spaces, over lunch or over coffee - anyplace but your space. You want them to be completely comfortable. Ask them what they like and don't"

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The Number

Review from 800ceoread.com

"The Number: A Completely Different Way to Think About the Rest of Your Life" by Lee Eisenberg

"Do you know your Number? What happens if you don't make it to your Number? Do you have a plan?

The often-avoided, anxiety-riddled discussion about financial planning for a secure and fulfilling future has been given a new starting point in The Number by Lee Eisenberg. The buzz of professionals and financial industry insiders everywhere, the Number represents the amount of money and resources people will need to enjoy the active life they desire, especially post-career. Backed by imaginative reporting and insights, Eisenberg urges people to assume control and responsibility for their standard of living, and take greater aim on their long-term aspirations.

In 1999, Eisenberg was in the midst of downshifting from having served as the Editor-in-Chief of Esquire and other high profile positions. He was 'half-in, half-out of the workplace' with an enviable consulting position at Time, Inc., and a family comfortably settled in the suburbs. That's when he received an unexpected offer from the Wisconsin-based Lands' End which, in the end, he couldn't resist. It meant uprooting his family and moving to the rural heartland, and taking on the challenges of an entirely new way of life. Before the move, he admits, 'I was worried about the Number.' Once in Wisconsin, Eisenberg confesses that the 'Number was leading us around by our noses.'

From Wall Street to Main Street USA, The Number means different things to different people. It is constantly fluctuating in people's minds and bank accounts. To some, the Number symbolizes freedom, validation of career success, the ticket to luxurious indulgences and spiritual exploration; to others, it represents the bewildering and nonsensical nightmare of an impoverished existence creeping up on them in their old age, a seemingly hopeless inevitability that they would rather simply ignore than confront. People are highly private and closed-mouthed when it comes to discussing their Numbers, or lack thereof, for fear they might either reveal too much or display ineptitude."

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A Short Primer on Leadership

From On Wall Street, January 2006 - by Danny Sarch

"Skeptics among you can scan to the end and note that 'cynicism' is not one of the characteristics cited in my list of ways to help you become a great branch manager. As inured as anyone who has spent more than 20 years working in the financial services industry, I just don't believe that the phrase 'great branch manager' (GBM) is an oxymoron. The best brokers that I meet in my travels, in person and on the phone, are always looking to improve their practices. Each of these top practitioners almost always speaks of a mentor who has made a huge impact on his or her business. That mentor is often a GBM. Here are six aspects of the job that these GBMs focus on.

Compliance
A branch manager's career can end badly for many reasons. But when he or she is escorted from the building and told that any personal effects will be shipped to him or her sometime in the future, one of two things has happened: Either there was an 'HR' problem (to use a euphemism) or something blew up in compliance.

Bad branch managers get into trouble and get themselves and some of their brokers fired. Good branch managers diligently follow up on problems that may arise, pass their audits and keep their jobs. And GBMs are able to anticipate the problems, showing an uncanny ability to see around the corners and keep the bad colds from becoming the flu. They can seemingly smell a trouble client, keeping the broker out of harm's way, and are quick to get rid of the bad brokers before any true damage can be done."

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