A little while back a former colleague of mine was invited to a job interview where they were asked to make a short presentation on “the barriers to innovation in…
Fear and Loathing in Professional & Financial Services
A few thoughts on B2B marketing
Why AI isn’t killing B2B research just yet
In a recent piece in Marketing Week, the The B2B Institute's Peter Weinberg and Jon Lombardo opined on how AI is going to positively impact B2B market research. As the authors testify, it’s certainly true that there’s plenty…
The 3 key mistakes CMOs make when commissioning research – and how to avoid them
Picture the scene: a CMO faced with a rapidly changing market needs to get to the heart of why too many target prospects are buying from their competitors, and needs…
Uncovering where a small change can make the difference between losing a sale and landing it
“Better to have pitched and lost than never have pitched at all” might sound a little trite on the ear to your typical Sales Director, but for all the frustrations…
Sometimes the old advertising ideas are the best
When I first started working in advertising back in the early 1990s, I worked on the Lloyds Bank account at a division of famed ad agency Lowe Howard-Spink. The…
Do your staff value your company values?
Many, many years ago I did some contract work for Churchill Insurance. Upon entering their Bromley Head Office for the first time, I was presented with a massive sign…
What do you do if your sales targets are up, but your market is in decline?
If you're in corporate sales, right now it may feel like you're being asked to constantly push a stone uphill, but it needn’t be so. The good news is…
Maybe “loyalty marketing” is a misnomer. Maybe we should all be inertia marketers.
Another day, another mailing from John Lewis Finance politely asking why I haven’t got around to applying for their new Partnership credit card. But this isn’t a regular credit…
How to out-think the competition in a recession
Thought experiment. A recession looms, and the business you work for decides to tighten its belt. All discretionary or uncommitted marketing spend is put on hold until the business…
How to fail quietly – and succeed in the process
Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover seems to be following the classic phases of the “Move Fast and Break Things” mantra. That’s fine for Musk: right now he’s the richest being…