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Fitch Ratings is calling for the weakest holiday season in the past twenty years for retailers. For 2009, Fitch expects that these trends will continue as consumers curtail discretionary spending and look to maximize value. Emphasizing value is the key that I would take away from any of this. It's time to make customers understand what valu Read More

The Yahoo! Green study found that more than three-quarters (77%) of consumers consider themselves to be greenies and just over half (57%) have made green purchases in the past six months. But, that is not to say that all green consumers react the same way to ads which may create a quagmire for marketers. Here are a few tips. Read More

What happens when the insatiable drive for profits permeates the culture of an organization? Eventually you forget whose business you should be taking care of--just ask Office Depot. Here's can you do to avoid the high cost of broken trust. Read More

Peter Montoya, author of The Brand Called You, is the latest visitor to the BizBooks discussion series, hosted by Slate's BizBox. Submit a question before December 5th! Read More

Almost every “start your own business” guide out there seems to have one piece of advice in common: you MUST have a business plan. In order to grow a successful business, they say, you need to have every aspect planned before you start. While I agree that this may be true for someone who will be launching a full-scale small business that they wil Read More

Last week at a Tweet up organized for the Research Symposium for the Society of New Communications Research in Boston I chatted with Mihaela Vorvoreanu, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Communications at Clemson University in South Carolina and a research fellow with the society. We discussed the concept of agenda setting* in the press. Read More

The thing with all this talk about social media and how it changes marketing is that I don't think you're going to like it. I don't think the end state is what most companies are thinking about. Google doesn't buy other companies because they seem neato. Pepsi doesn't want to talk with a few hundred people at a time, do they? It's just that all th Read More

It's encouraging to see that companies have increased interest in social media, but I'm hoping they stop and think about what's in it for the customer more than they think about what's in it for themselves. Companies who've listened first and continuously learn from participation in social networks have seen improved engagement levels. Read More

The trouble with social media happens when the resources required to nurture relationships - and the time involved in cultivating same - become more and more cumbersome. It's far more difficult to tend to a massive commercial farm than a backyard garden, so you have to adapt some catch-all tools in order to do that. It doesn't negate the need for Read More

Are you taking action or relaxing? Meaning are you going after what you really want or just sitting and wishing to have what it is you desire? Read More