[Jan 5, 2012 Editorial Note: This story was originally posted last week but has been updated]
I was watching FOX news last night (don’t ask). The lead story featured a bird’s eye view of a white SUV flying down the middle of a multi-lane street. Cars parted like the Red Sea to make way. Without warning the white vehicle entered an intersection and t-boned a black SUV on the driver’s side. The runaway vehicle slammed to a dead stop; the black SUV was tossed 90 degrees. As smoke and steam began rising and unidentifiable car parts rolled along the street, two seemingly untroubled dogs jumped through the window of the black SUV and simply ran away.
Dan Pallotta is the president of 
Just over a year from now, on December 21, 2012, life as we know it on planet Earth will be disrupted with a cataclysmic event that signals or perhaps even brings about the end of times.
I have to be perfectly honest, I don’t know Daniel Henninger from Adam. He is a native Clevelander, which is nice. He’s also a Georgetown graduate, a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial staff and an award-winning journalist.
Once upon a time, we went to work for a singular purpose: to do work. We dug ditches, directed traffic, operated machinery, sold insurance, created advertising, designed clothing, milked cows and on and on. And whatever your job was, that was pretty much all you did all day long.
Wouldn’t it be awesome if our biggest concern regarding school-age children was the weight of their backpacks… or the amount of time they spend on the Internet?
You are universally recognized as one of the great visionaries of your age. Big, lofty, creative ideas flow through your brain like oxygen through your lungs. You see things most can’t fathom upon explanation… Then you create them. And still, most can barely comprehend the beauty and elegance of your achievements. Not just one or two inconceivable creations, but dozens… Maybe hundreds… Maybe more. You possess the admiration of generations and exist in a class all your own. Unique. Special.
According to the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity, children and teens are drinking massive amounts of sugary drinks that increase the risk for obesity and diabetes.
In fairness to the other side, I would like to offer some pointed and useful advice on how to not succeed in business and life. In the words of Dwight Schrute: “To me, success is simply the opposite of failure.” Indeed.
My dad (Dennis B. Sweeney) always said: “All things in moderation… too much of anything is rarely a good thing.”
Satchel Paige, the over-aged, overachiever is famously credited for once saying this about his passion for playing baseball: “Don’t look back. Something might be gaining on you.”
If you guessed that a secret is NEVER a secret, you are correct.
Over the past 2-1/2 years I have run more than 1,375 miles, not just to stay in shape, but to enable me to eat Five Guys burgers and fries whenever the spirit moves me.
In the movie Flashback, Dennis Hopper’s character tells his young protégé “when we get out of the ’80s, the ’90s are going to make the ’60s look like the ’50s”. So would you think I am crazy if I tell you that when we get out of the 2010s, people will look at Facebook and Twitter the way people in the 1980s looked at disco and long hair? To paraphrase Nassim Taleb, if you think you understand the world and possess the ability to predict the future, you are probably wrong.
Tom Hanks has nothing on me. Yeah, he was cast away on a deserted island for four years, but did he lose his iPhone? Did he survive a week without checking his email at every convenient moment? Did he suffer the inability to check baseball scores or the ESPN Fantasy Scoreboard? Did he know what it was like to not use a TV Guide app and have to actually flip through the channels to find a program? Did he go to his favorite coffee shop (Starbucks) unable to check in on Foursquare? Did he experience the anxiety of not being able to text friends and associates whenever the spirit moved him? Did he have a clue what it was like to be shunned by the mobile Facebook and Twitter communities? Did he stare into the eye of a QR Code knowing he could not scan and download?
1. Unless you are an Olympic swimmer… no strike that. Any man who wears a speedo or mankini at any time for any reason is a googy.
I have no special insight into the plans and/or capabilities of Specific Media, the new owner of MySpace.
Serendipity.
Not that anyone will ever see this film or even care… it is worth reporting that Morgan Spurlock has now done for the branding and advertising community what he previously did for the fast food industry.
Frank Lloyd Wright would be impressed.
I’ll bet you never thought you’d see the day when I defended McDonald’s, but here it is and here I go.
Though I consider myself a fairly smart guy, I am admittedly not a scientist. So I won’t pretend to understand the chemistry of Alcoa Architectural Products’ new Reynobond® with EcoClean™ – aluminum building panels (cladding) – that clean themselves, as well as the air around them.
It’s the dead of summer, the heat index is above 100 and the media is laser-focused on pretty much any lame story that will get their audiences’ attention. One of my favorites – and I never tire of hearing this – is the “staycation” story. This is a modern version of the “I’m vacationing on Porchville this summer!”
Once upon a time, you couldn’t read “once upon a time” unless you first visited the local library. But that’s no longer the case… and it is causing a serious problem.
I have been in this business of marketing and public relations for more than 30 years now. All of it on the agency side.
It’s UP2U, so UBdaJudge.
Packaged Facts just released its newest report on Snack Foods in the U.S. (4th edition). And apparently “meals” (breakfast, lunch and dinner) are slowly but surely being replaced by snackles (just what you want, whenever you want).
Considered a serious frontrunner in the 1988 U.S. presidential elections, Gary Hart did what so many politicians before and after him did… he lost his way. Like the Kennedy’s before him and John Edwards and Bill Clinton after him, Gary Hart allowed himself to go where many men had gone before, but shouldn’t have.
You would think an iconic figure like Mr. Clean would be synonymous with truth, justice and the American way. But you tell me. Is the new Magic Eraser 30% larger AND 30% more durable or is it just 30% larger and some other percentage more durable?Content Marketing: Creating Value for Target Audiences
Content marketing is nothing new. However, we see so much “noise” being created on and offline from online and traditional press releases to social media sites and sites set up just for organic search engine optimization purposes that we wanted to take the opportunity (prompted by a recent Cleveland Social Media Club meeting) to revisit why generating truly valuable content for your target audiences is imperative and beneficial.
Content marketing is the process of developing and disseminating relevant and valuable content to customers and prospects. The goal is to engage and ultimately drive an engaged action from consumers. The key benefit for customers/prospects is they receive information that benefits them, and the reward for the business is it becomes a trusted resource when a customer/prospect is ready to take action on a related product or service.
Examples of content marketing include educational microsites, expert blogs, education videos, useful smart phone apps and small bits of information disseminated through social media. Even creating feature articles for magazines is a good example of content marketing.
Take this article that appeared in TFM Facility Blog. It’s providing relevant content for facility managers when selecting LED lighting.
Below are a few tips on developing/distributing content that will truly benefit your target audiences.
Build Content Around Customer’s Pain Points: In order to develop content that is valuable for your customers and prospects, develop a clear understanding of the things that make them tick as well their challenges. Once you understand the type of information your customer needs, it is easy to develop content directly addressing topics they care about.
Identify Channels of Distribution: It is absolutely essential to know where and how customers/prospects get their information. This of course is different for every industry. If your customers/prospects are not using Twitter or Facebook, no matter how good your content is, it is not going to reach them. Don’t know the best way? Conduct a survey.
Develop a Strategy: Develop a clear editorial calendar to guide your content. What exactly will you publish, when and how often? And yes, this even goes for Facebook and Twitter content. Plan topics in advance and then modify as needed based on current events and emerging trends. A little work up front can save time and frustration in the end.
Content Should Change Behavior: The goal with content marketing is to make a connection with customers/prospects that will eventually lead to profitable action. The first step is developing content that is important and relevant to the audience. But in order for the content to be an effective marketing strategy, marketers need to find a way to relate that content to their company’s message, communicate indirectly how a product or service eases a pain point, and encourage a change in behavior that benefits both the customer and the business. Not seeing behavior change? Test new content and delivery methods.
Understand Impact on the Bottom Line: It is simple to track and measure microsite hits, blog visitors, followers, likes, circulation, etc. But go beyond those statistics. When implemented successfully, content marketing should drive profitable customer actions. If your content marketing strategy is not helping to achieve your goals (increasing qualified leads, driving sales, saving money, increasing customer satisfaction, etc.), it is not truly effective and needs to be revised.
Believe it or not, a lot of people were afraid of Lady Gaga when she first captured the nation’s attention in 2008. Before her, they were afraid of Madonna. Before her they were afraid of David Bowie. Before him they were afraid of Elvis Presley. And so on and so forth.
It’s bad enough when your CEO looks like a goober, but when he starts talking nonsense that threatens to undermine your entire brand, what do you do?
The Wall Street Journal reported today that 
Recognizing that American consumers are “under renewed economic pressures”, Walmart CEO is confident that his scenario “could work in Walmart’s favor.”
The past half decade has been brutal for many – if not most – consumers. The economy has either cost them their job or denied them pay increases essential to keep up with rising expenses. Meanwhile, taxes continue to increase, the cost of staple goods continues to increase and the value of what little consumers own has plummeted. In the meantime, mother nature has dealt the global population a non-stop smackdown that includes hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, blizzards and droughts that have devastated lives. Then there are the wars and the oil spills and the Bernie Madoffs of the world.
We are a nation obsessed with numbers and crowds. It is all about volume. How many impressions did you make? How many unique visitors came to the site? How many click-thrus did you score? How many followers do you have? How many Likes do you have?
What does Walmart suddenly know that no one else seems to know? At a time when traditional retail sales are struggling to even stay in the shadows of online sales, Walmart has decided to increase its base of SKUs with more than 
I had lots of heroes growing up. Edward R. Murrow was one of them. And I am reminded of something he was once quoted as saying: “Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn’t mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.”
I have been participating in a personal social media experiment this week to measure the networking value of 
Look at this guy; even he knows he is cool.