This is Marketing

Sesame Street is trying to sell to you. Patagonia is trying to sell to you. Hallmark is trying to sell to you. Disney is trying to sell to you. I am trying to sell to you. This is not a bad thing. Marketing is not a four letter word. How else are brands (like mine) […]

Un-Cliché

Clichés. They get a bad wrap. We turn to them as our lazy “go-to’s” when it’s time to hammer home our point. In the spirit of setting yourself up for success in the year to come, below are six twists on cliché’s—let’s call them “un-clichés”—to ponder as you work through your 2022 (“New Year’s Revolutions”) […]

Want To Be Great? Great.

One of the greatest concerts in the world is Arcade Fire. What makes them great? All of them don’t just sing; each rotates for the duration of their show playing every instrument. The greatest basketball player of all time is Michael Jordan. What makes him great? He wasn’t just a prolific scorer. Rather, a fierce […]

Happiness is Planned

I founded my first creative agency when I was 29. The year was 2004. We were 4 people out of a house. The first five years, all four of us worked 6.5 days a week. My motivating drivers were fear, freedom and stubbornness. I didn’t just pick up the phone and have SOWs signed by […]

Think Standard Time

You’d think with so much alone time the last two years, that our think time would be on the up and up. But I actually think it’s the opposite. Many of us have been zoom-hopping from meeting to meeting to meeting—so much that we are robotically jumping from work session to work session. I worry […]

How Can You Build Trust?

All truth passes through three phases: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it’s violently opposed. Third, it’s accepted as being self-evident. This still-relevant 17th century quote by German Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer bubbles up three lovable takeaways: 1. Embarking on something new will always be met with skepticism and friction. Even when things works out, in the […]

Your Business is a Nation

Your business is a nation. It is composed of citizens. It is made up of laws. It should shoulder a soul. Your brand is your flag, Telling the world what you stand for, Who you stand with, What you won’t tolerate. Your company has a language, Spoken from your Commander In Chief. Does their state-of-the-union […]

e-Chat with Eric Toda

Eric Toda is a courageous voice who is tired of the way things are in America. Eric is a fast friend, an activist and the Global Head of Social Marketing at Facebook. I asked him 6 questions below. 1. Eric, this has been just another brutal month in America. You were one of the first […]

Lawrence Fink’s Letter

Lawrence Fink doesn’t need good press. When you’re the CEO of Blackrock— a company managing $6 trillion in assets, your top motive is not to land on the front page of the NYT. So why would Fink send the following letter to all the CEOs in his portfolio? I don’t believe it’s a leadership call […]

Good Things Come To Those Who…

I had an amazing mentor who used to say, “Things don’t just happen; you make them happen.” In the spirit of this quick dose of courage, we’ll evolve it to, “Good things don’t just happen; you make them happen.” Personally… I’ll take the proactive or the persistent. I’ll pass on the passive or the patient. […]