Exploring the gap between a leaders’ vision of what their teams should be doing and their teams’ understanding of and ability to do what they do If you’re a founder (or you work for one), you will find this episode helpful if you’ve had to navigate that point in a business at which a founder’s […]

Is being the hero leading your business really a solo role? We do tend to think of heroes as solo champions who save the world. But no hero (or business leader) is an island. Even the iconic hero, Superman, relied on Lois and Jimmy to get him out of tight scrapes when the likes of […]

Would you join a community build around your brand? If you’re anything like Groucho Marx, you’d refuse to join any club that would have you as a member, which is why this episode might make some uncomfortable and challenging listening, re Belonging To The Brand. This book by Mark Schaefer, offers community as a new […]

The marketing rebellion is here. Are you with us? This is an important start to our second season. Through the Marketing Rebellion book by Mark Schaeffer, we are all reminded that we control only a small slither of our branding efforts. Customers rule the world. We explain in more detail, along with poking fun at […]

Why you should validate and fascinate people Don’t you wish you could weave some words and have people fall under your spell? In the Principles section, David explains how author, Blair Warren, has compiled a list of 27 words that will achieve this end. Is this hocus pocus or does it have substance? You’re about […]

Empowered employees are the secret to success All the research says empowered employees make a huge and positive impact on businesses but the concept scares the living daylights out of owners and managers. That’s why, smart speakers and authors like Josh Bernoff and Stan McChrystal, change the language to terms like Strategic Alignment And Customer […]

Distilling insights from Joe Polish’s What’s In It For Them Joe Polish is a highly capable marketer, but he surprised David and Steve by inserting the word “grateful” into his mantra that we should approach networking, relationships, and business, with a blend of being useful, grateful, and valuable. in situations, I initially struggled with why […]

You can’t just sell to people, you need to build a relationship with them Not everybody feels comfortable “selling”. In fact, most of us feel darn right uncomfortable at the thought of “working someone” so you can get them where you want them. But, of course, that’s all based on a fairly narrow definition of […]

There are times you simply need to destroy what exists in order to replace it with something better We go back to 2015 to start this episode of Talking About Marketing, in which we consider whether we should burn social media down and develop new strategies for marketing in the social channels. The discussion centres […]

I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter In this episode of Talking About Marketing, we discuss how to be clearer and more engaging in our communication; in short, writing without BS. It’s funny how fluffery creeps into business writing, whether that’s internal messages, emails to […]