Monday, July 30, 2007

CORRECTING FOR DRIFT

Aviators are taught to correct for drift in order to stay on course. But, you might be asking, "What has correcting for drift in piloting an aircraft have to do with marketing?" Quite a bit actually.


The Dispatch for July 30, 2007 can be found here:

CorrectForDrift.pdf (PDF File)

Monday, July 23, 2007

MARKETING SPEAK: AN UNCOMMON LANGUAGE

Many non-marketers tend to regard marketing as more art than science. Or, at least, if they admit it is a science at all, it must be one of the "softer" ones. This all implies that learning marketing, including the language of marketing, should be a lot less complex than, say, learning engineering and the language of engineering. Trouble is, the language of marketing is not at all as clear as it could be. Multiple terms are used interchangeably to mean the same things (when, in fact, these terms are not always exactly the same things). In other words, marketing is much more of an "uncommon language" than it is a common one - so it seems in many marketing organizations. That's the dilemma we consider in this week's Dispatches.


Marketing-SpeakAnUncommonLanguage.pdf (PDF File)

Sunday, July 15, 2007

SELLING OUT?

The term "selling out" refers to someone who is abandoning principles or ideals for money. It's a failure to give one's best and make a real difference. Instead, it's about cashing-in on a popularity or reputation. It's making a withdrawal from an equity account that has been built upon performance, trust, loyalty, customer satisfaction, etc.



The Dispatch for July 15, 2007 can be found here:

SellingOut2007.pdf (PDF File)

Sunday, July 08, 2007

THE MARKETING OBJECTIVE - SOME LINGERING QUESTIONS

Who doesn't admire people who know exactly what they are aiming toward, what they really want to get done? Even after all these years of MBO Management (Management By Objectives), who in business still does not appreciate a meeting that starts with someone stating, "Here are the objectives for today's meeting"? So why is it that when it comes to investing big bucks in all kinds of marketing activities we so infrequently have in mind what results we expect, other than the obvious ones like, "grow share" or "keep the momentum going"? This week we once again return to the all-important subject of Marketing Objectives, and we take a shot at answering some of the common questions we encounter about them. A fundamental subject, but one that it seems we cannot review enough!



The Dispatch for July 8, 2007 can be found here:

MarketingObjective-Some Lingering Questions.pdf (PDF File)