Here we cut the world of B2B marketing into digestible nuggets of inspiration, highlighting courageous individuals and ideas approximately two times a month. Want to contribute content to our blog?
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Real-Time, Big Data and Pinterest
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January 26, 2016
As part of an effort to make the app less about self-expression and more about utility, Pinterest has revamped their mobile profile page to be more useful for users. Previously upon opening Pinterest, the collections in your profile appeared in a grid, with the first image you ever pinned acting as the billboard for all pins within a certain collection....

Is Mark Hanna the Tom Brady of CSR?
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January 18, 2016
Mark Hanna, CMO at Richline Group, is a diehard New England Patriots fan and like all of his brethren is in a good mood as the Pats rack up more post season victories. I try not to hold this kind of fanaticism or misplaced loyalty against Mark -- I mean you can't really blame a guy for where they were born, right?  And...

CMO Insights: How Marketing Can Take the Lead
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January 5, 2016
As this is my first blog post of the year, I'd like to focus your attention on the power of positivity.  Don't gag! Seriously, the first step to getting something big (or little) accomplished is believing that you can.  Conversely, if you harbor negative thoughts about a particular challenge chances are you will outright fail and then fall back on the...

Revlon's Lovely "Love is On" Campaign
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December 9, 2015
Admittedly, I'm a biased blogger.  I love big ideas.  And I am more than happy to celebrate big ideas even if my agency had no hand in creating them. Think of it as a form of largesse.  Or jealousy.  Either way, Revlon's "Love is On" campaign meets all of my criteria for a big idea: 1) It's emotional.  What's more emotional...

CMO Insights: Drilling into Content Marketing
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November 29, 2015
Hu-Friedy is a mouthful of a brand name which may or may not have been on the mind of Hugo Friedman when he founded his dental instrument company back in 1908. More than a century later, Hu-Friedy is a global leader in its category and yet, quite remarkably still completes 80% of the manufacturing process by hand.  According to their website, "they meticulously...

Happy Employees = Happy Customers
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November 23, 2015
Sometimes a single blog post can't span the breadth of what I've learned from a particular CMO.  This is definitely the case with Steven Handmaker, CMO at Assurance, winner of The CMO Club Leadership Award who also joined me for the opening panel at Incite's Content Marketing Summit.  While the interview below focuses on his approach to leadership, it doesn't cover what...

CMO Insights: How to Score with Content Marketing
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November 22, 2015
Content marketing is one of those things that is easy to talk about yet extremely hard to get right.  It's not enough to have a clear strategy although that is essential. It's not enough to tell compelling stories across a wide range of platforms.  Even with paid media driving views and influencers adding their audiences, there is no guarantee that your...

Gearing up for Gen Z: The #Selfie Generation?
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November 12, 2015
Just when you'd thought you'd wrapped your marketing minds around millennials, along comes Gen Z to really mess with your head.  Born between 1996 and 2013, the oldest part of this group is just now entering college, wreaking havoc with their multi-tasking mobile mindset and no doubt, creating huge challenges for the marketers trying to engage with them. One such...

Getting B2B Content Marketing on the Payroll
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November 10, 2015
I'm on the phone the other day with my friend John Hall of Influence & Co and casually ask, "Do you know any Chicago-based wizards of content marketing that would be good panelists?" [My inquiry was anything but casual in that I'm emceeing the first day of Incite's Content Marketing Summit and I'm a stickler for getting sharp and articulate panelists thus...