A new habit that I took over the last months is to listen to work-related podcasts. It’s a better use of my time than listening to the same tunes on the radio. This morning, I listened to the 4th episode of the marketing podcast from my friend Lara McCulloch. Lara interviewed Marsha Shandur of Yes, Yes Marsha.
Marsha is a networker. She did something that anyone who is interviewed should do. Marsha created a landing page specially for Lara’s listeners and announced it at the interview.
These three words summarize what 2014 brought me. I recalled how I felt at the same time last year. At that time, owning and living in a house that would be perfect for our family was only a dream. Then, we found a house perfect for us.
We became home owners in spring. Then, we renovated our home over the summer to fit our taste and our needs. Although I co-founded Sproutive last year, I devoted more time on the life side of the work-life equation. The process brought nice surprises. It’s funny how everything fits together sometimes when we work together towards a common goal.
Today I want to talk about the power of intrinsically knowing your audience. To do this, I will tell you how I orchestrated, as a food and entertaining blogger, to be featured in 2008 on Kotaku, the most influential video game blog and the 19th blog of the world at the time.
A blog for hard-code gamers is not where you expect a post on a birthday cake. Plus, my timing was out of sync. I succeeded because I perfectly understood what their editors wanted in a story. My pitch had the right ingredients. With my husband’s help, I designed a cupcake tower filled with clever gaming details.
Thursday, I wrote about how my plan to capture my year plan with three words. Today, I reveal what they are.
Last year was a year of transition work wise. I had the gut to close At Home with Kim Vallee, the lifestyle blog that became my business. I questioned what I truly want to do for living. I analyzed business opportunities. I looked at where the market is heading. Should I create an agency, launch a startup or simply work as a consultant? I had too many choices. Now that I focus on consulting and training, I’m back into the game. I feel stronger and more confident about my choice.
This year is definitely about actions. It is about making things happen. My three words for 2014 are:
Before we start, I wish you all the best for 2014. I also hoped that you had fun celebrating the New Year. I did!
Have you set your New Year goals, yet? I’m still working on putting mine in words. Last year, I selected five areas for my year plan. In retrospective, 5 areas are too much which is why I will try this year the 3-word system of Chris Brogan. Selecting three words (nouns or verbs) seems more focused and easier to follow for a year.
Don’t let what happened to Formula 1 happen to you. I watch Formula 1 racing since the mid-1990s. I saw its progression from being an entertaining sport where the drivers and team owners spoke their minds to an aseptic corporate communications machine. I lost touch. I stopped reading the news. These days, I watch the races that I pre-recorded the day before. I recalled when I stayed up late to see the start of the race live. Frankly, I missed the time when I couldn’t wait to read the F1 news before, during and after each race.
Sadly, this is what many marketers and business people are doing online. They lack personality. They feared to show their human side. They try to appeal to everyone. They fail to tell stories that resonate with their customers — current and potential customers. I think all this is a mistake.
Like most people, you are probably rushing from morning to night. You can accomplish a lot by determining what will be the focus of your day every morning, by sticking to what’s on your to-do list, and by limiting interruptions and other distractions. But it might not be enough. It is easy to forget about the little things or the things that…
Smartphones have become the shopping companion of the majority of people who enter a store. A study, done in conjunction with the Google Shopper Marketing Agency Council and M/A/R/C Research, states that 84% of smartphone shoppers use their phones while in a physical store. It’s huge!
As a retailer, you need to be ready for it. By ready, I mean that you need to embrace that fact and see how you can make it easier for shoppers to buy at your store. First, you need to understand how shoppers use their smartphone as their shopping companion.
