I enjoyed Peter Thiel’s Zero to One which he wrote with Blake Masters. Thiel seems more interesting than most business leaders. The book spews out ideas in a slightly haphazard, but never boring, fashion. (To be clear I’m pretty sure I disagree with him on an awful lot of issues, but still think it is…
Category: Marketing Metrics
Using Marketing Analytics
Two of my MBA professors, Paul Farris and Ron Wilcox, along with a newer Darden professor Raj Venkatesan, have a new book. This examines using marketing analytics through cases. (Raj also runs the marketing analytics initiative at Darden). Numbers-Based Marketing The cases describe scenarios relevant to numbers-based marketing. For example, they allow readers to see the…
Measuring Research Quality
One of marketing academics’ favorite recommendations is to measure outcomes. Still, measurement problems make it hard for academics to take our own advice. Let’s give academics the benefit of the doubt and assume they genuinely want to measure their achievements. How then do we go about measuring research quality? Measuring Research Quality A major part…
Valuing Brands In Accountancy
Valuing brands in accountancy has been a challenge for a long time. The Challenge Of Valuing Brands In Accountancy Brand valuation is a challenging topic. Still, it is a critical one for marketers. It is hard to look at corporate accounts without noticing that marketing is poorly accounted for. The accounts largely omit the value…
Story Spreadsheets
Business school spreadsheets annoy me. I’m not anti-spreadsheet generally. Indeed, a good spreadsheet is a thing of beauty. What irritates me is the belief students have that a good spreadsheet is a complicated spreadsheet. Students sometimes think that the more they can jam onto a single worksheet the better. This fundamentally mistakes the purpose of…
The Balanced Scorecard
Today’s post is about a classic of business literature. The Balanced Scorecard from Robert Kaplan and David Norton is an approach to business strategy. It is hard to argue with the basic idea that businesses should regularly monitor a variety of success factors and report how they are succeeding on each factor. Four Perspectives In…
Misunderstanding Political Marketing
Bruce Philp’s article in the July [2014] issue of Canadian Business criticizes political marketing for being “hollow and disingenuous”. I think this is misunderstanding political marketing. Political Marketing Is Not Just Political Communications I wasn’t impressed. Firstly, I think Philp is equating political marketing with political communications. This is a strange thing for a brand strategy consultant…
Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB)
Marketing has an accountability problem. This is widely accepted even by marketers. The Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) is working on this. Trust Me, I’m A Marketer Marketers argue that their actions are vital to their organization’s success but often the proof offered ends up being: “trust me, we need to do this”. It isn’t hard to see why…
Value-Based Marketing
In 2000 Peter Doyle started the abstract of his paper, Value-Based Marketing with the sentence. “Marketing has not had the impact on the boardroom that its importance justifies” (Doyle, 2000, page 299.) Doyle made a fair point. Marketing’s Lack Of Influence It is very common for academic marketers to bemoan marketing’s lack of influence. Many firms…
Canada’s Top Brands
Like a doughnut the survey in Canadian Business magazine that placed Tim Hortons as Canada’s Top Brand is enjoyable. That said, it is not necessarily the most nutritious thing in the world. What do we know about Canada’s Top Brands In 2014? Loving Tim Hortons We find out that Canadian’s love Tim Hortons’ coffee and…