The book industry is changing. At STIR-Communications, we love the written word (obviously), the verbose and the brief.
Also, we applaud Seth Godin and his company Domino for the impact they will make on sharing knowledge through books – it will be huge.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Resistance is the enemy to great work, says author Steve Pressfield in Do the Work. But with enemies come allies. Consider, who and what will push you through the dips and help you do the work that matters.
Here’s an excerpt from Do the Work about the champions on your side (available for free on Kindle for another three weeks only):
1. Stupidity
2. Stubbornness
3. Blind faith
4. Passion
5. Assistance (the opposite of Resistance)
6. Friends and family
Stay Stupid
The three dumbest guys I can think of: Charles Lindbergh, Steve Jobs, Winston Churchill. Why? Because any smart person who understood how impossibly arduous were the tasks they had set themselves would have pulled the plug before he even began.
Ignorance and arrogance are the artist and entrepreneur’s indispensable allies. She must be clueless enough to have no idea how difficult her enterprise is going to be—and cocky enough to believe she can pull it off anyway.
How do we achieve this state of mind? By staying stupid. By not allowing ourselves to think.
A child has no trouble believing the unbelievable, nor does the genius or the madman. It’s only you and I, with our big brains and our tiny hearts, who doubt and overthink and hesitate.
Don’t think. Act.
We can always revise and revisit once we’ve acted. But we can accomplish nothing until we act.
Be Stubborn
Once we commit to action, the worst thing we can do is to stop.
What will keep us from stopping? Plain old stubbornness.
I like the idea of stubbornness because it’s less lofty than “tenacity” or “perseverance.” We don’t have to be heroes to be stubborn. We can just be pains in the butt.
When we’re stubborn, there’s no quit in us. We’re mean. We’re mulish. We’re ornery.
We’re in till the finish.
We will sink our junkyard-dog teeth into Resistance’s ass and not let go, no matter how hard he kicks.
Blind Faith
Is there a spiritual element to creativity? Hell, yes.
Our mightiest ally (our indispensable ally) is belief in something we cannot see, hear, touch, taste, or feel.
Resistance wants to rattle that faith. Resistance wants to destroy it.
There’s an exercise that Patricia Ryan Madson describes in her wonderful book, Improv Wisdom. (Ms. Madson taught improvisational theater at Stanford to standing-room only classes for twenty years.) Here’s the exercise:
Imagine a box with a lid. Hold the box in your hand. Now open it.
What’s inside?
It might be a frog, a silk scarf, a gold coin of Persia. But here’s the trick: no matter how many times you open the box, there is always something in it.
Ask me my religion. That’s it.
I believe with unshakeable faith that there will always be something in the box.
Passion
Picasso painted with passion, Mozart composed with it. A child plays with it all day long.
You may think that you’ve lost your passion, or that you can’t identify it, or that you have so much of it, it threatens to overwhelm you. None of these is true.
Fear saps passion.
When we conquer our fears, we discover a boundless, bottomless, inexhaustible well of passion.
Assistance
We’ll come back to this later. Suffice it to say for now that as Resistance is the shadow, its opposite—Assistance—is the sun.
Friends and Family
When art and inspiration and success and fame and money have come and gone, who still loves us—and whom do we love?
Only two things will remain with us across the river: our inhering genius and the hearts we love.
In other words, what we do and whom we do it for.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, May 2, 2011
Monday, April 18, 2011
Who We Are
“You need to be a jack of all trades.”
"Better to be a master at one thing than mediocre at many.”
“Just do it.”
Since this is tax day, I will share with you the most taxing issue I am facing of late: other people’s opinions. And you thought the IRS is a pain in the ass.
As you know, I have NEVER once used this platform to outwardly promote our company, STIR-Communications. Today, I use it more as a reference, albeit ad nauseum, and with the less than subtle attempt to express our overarching virtues and modesty, which is only surpassed by our unequalled skills, which is only surpassed by our modesty.
Our company’s approach to the practice of strategic public relations, advertising and marketing can best be summed up in the words of R. Buckminster Fuller, the American architect, author, designer, inventor, and futurist. In his book, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth (1969), he writes:
“If…nature required man to be a specialist she would have made him so by having him born with one eye and a microscope attached to it. What nature needed man to be was adaptive in many if not any direction…Mind apprehends and comprehends the general principles governing flight and deep sea diving, and man puts on his wings or his lungs, then takes them off when not using them. The specialist bird is greatly impeded by its wings when trying to walk. The fish cannot come out of the sea and walk upon land, for birds and fish are specialists.”
Like Buckminster, STIR-Communications eschews the concept of specialization, while still being special. The common industry notion is that when an agency is smaller, it is more efficient to specialize in one industry. Hence, there is no shortage of boutique agencies specializing in food, technology, health care, home goods, social media, financial services, travel, fashion, beauty, or anything else you can imagine.
But, what is the true cost of such “efficiency”? We believe the cost is stagnant, uninspired and derivative work. Even worse, the agency becomes subservient to the industry or category itself and has to put its own reputation within the category above and beyond the reputation of its clients. Yawn!
If an agency specializes in one industry, then it has to always “play by the rules” of that industry. It has a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, because the agency itself becomes the very epitome of the status quo. It can’t afford to rock the boat or ever challenge the conventions of the industry. It certainly can’t represent a client that is trying to do things differently, to innovate. After all, how would the firm’s other clients react to such heresy? In the end, boutique agencies simply can’t take risks. Clients may come and go, but once the agency loses its reputation, then all is lost.
An antidote to the traditional boutique agency, STIR-Communications is a multi-specialty boutique firm, working within a wide variety of different disciplines and industries. All agency members are required to work with a diverse client base, where they get broad and differentiated experiences. The result is fresh, original and creative programming, as well as big-idea development. It is this unique, boundary-less approach that makes STIR-Communications a “Circular Communications Agency,” and true “thought providers” (see last week’s blog).
Our industry and category agnostic approach allows us to put our clients first. At STIR-Communications, we don’t care if we challenge the conventional thinking of an industry … in fact, that’s what makes us get out of the bed each morning; or, because we are contrarian work directly from bed. That’s right, often we even eschew the office itself, since we have found the least amount of productivity is accomplished in a “working” setting.
As a result of this specialty (or we should say anti-specialty), we have come to realize that STIR-Communications is ideally suited to working with companies that value non-traditional thinking above and beyond specialization. As a result, the overwhelming majority of our clients tend to be industry challengers or innovators.
As a matter of fact, multi-specialization is not only beneficial to challengers, pioneers or iconoclasts, but really to any organization that needs to reach multiple constituencies simultaneously.
It’s no surprise that lots of companies need to communicate with different audiences. For example, a B2B company may need to reach out to enterprise customers, mainstream consumers, internal audiences, investors and the government all at the same time. If the company is big enough, it can hire multiple specialist agencies or hire a large global agency with multiple practice areas, essentially the same thing as hiring a bunch of smaller agencies—except they receive one very large invoice. But what about smaller to mid-sized companies or any company that can’t afford this option?
Don’t fret, my contact info is below.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
"Better to be a master at one thing than mediocre at many.”
“Just do it.”
Since this is tax day, I will share with you the most taxing issue I am facing of late: other people’s opinions. And you thought the IRS is a pain in the ass.
As you know, I have NEVER once used this platform to outwardly promote our company, STIR-Communications. Today, I use it more as a reference, albeit ad nauseum, and with the less than subtle attempt to express our overarching virtues and modesty, which is only surpassed by our unequalled skills, which is only surpassed by our modesty.
Our company’s approach to the practice of strategic public relations, advertising and marketing can best be summed up in the words of R. Buckminster Fuller, the American architect, author, designer, inventor, and futurist. In his book, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth (1969), he writes:
“If…nature required man to be a specialist she would have made him so by having him born with one eye and a microscope attached to it. What nature needed man to be was adaptive in many if not any direction…Mind apprehends and comprehends the general principles governing flight and deep sea diving, and man puts on his wings or his lungs, then takes them off when not using them. The specialist bird is greatly impeded by its wings when trying to walk. The fish cannot come out of the sea and walk upon land, for birds and fish are specialists.”
Like Buckminster, STIR-Communications eschews the concept of specialization, while still being special. The common industry notion is that when an agency is smaller, it is more efficient to specialize in one industry. Hence, there is no shortage of boutique agencies specializing in food, technology, health care, home goods, social media, financial services, travel, fashion, beauty, or anything else you can imagine.
But, what is the true cost of such “efficiency”? We believe the cost is stagnant, uninspired and derivative work. Even worse, the agency becomes subservient to the industry or category itself and has to put its own reputation within the category above and beyond the reputation of its clients. Yawn!
If an agency specializes in one industry, then it has to always “play by the rules” of that industry. It has a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, because the agency itself becomes the very epitome of the status quo. It can’t afford to rock the boat or ever challenge the conventions of the industry. It certainly can’t represent a client that is trying to do things differently, to innovate. After all, how would the firm’s other clients react to such heresy? In the end, boutique agencies simply can’t take risks. Clients may come and go, but once the agency loses its reputation, then all is lost.
An antidote to the traditional boutique agency, STIR-Communications is a multi-specialty boutique firm, working within a wide variety of different disciplines and industries. All agency members are required to work with a diverse client base, where they get broad and differentiated experiences. The result is fresh, original and creative programming, as well as big-idea development. It is this unique, boundary-less approach that makes STIR-Communications a “Circular Communications Agency,” and true “thought providers” (see last week’s blog).
Our industry and category agnostic approach allows us to put our clients first. At STIR-Communications, we don’t care if we challenge the conventional thinking of an industry … in fact, that’s what makes us get out of the bed each morning; or, because we are contrarian work directly from bed. That’s right, often we even eschew the office itself, since we have found the least amount of productivity is accomplished in a “working” setting.
As a result of this specialty (or we should say anti-specialty), we have come to realize that STIR-Communications is ideally suited to working with companies that value non-traditional thinking above and beyond specialization. As a result, the overwhelming majority of our clients tend to be industry challengers or innovators.
As a matter of fact, multi-specialization is not only beneficial to challengers, pioneers or iconoclasts, but really to any organization that needs to reach multiple constituencies simultaneously.
It’s no surprise that lots of companies need to communicate with different audiences. For example, a B2B company may need to reach out to enterprise customers, mainstream consumers, internal audiences, investors and the government all at the same time. If the company is big enough, it can hire multiple specialist agencies or hire a large global agency with multiple practice areas, essentially the same thing as hiring a bunch of smaller agencies—except they receive one very large invoice. But what about smaller to mid-sized companies or any company that can’t afford this option?
Don’t fret, my contact info is below.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, April 11, 2011
Thought Provider
I have come to bury Caesar, not praise him. -- Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare: Act 3. Scene II
I admire many in the world of business. The ability to innovate, initiate and guide their companies to achieve desired success is astonishing. I also admire those tactile bunch that get into the mix physically, working alongside to ensure goals are achieved.
However, over the past few years a new leader has evolved. One slightly more passive than those aforementioned and possibly held in higher regard. I think this new leader would set Brutus in a venal rage.
The “Thought Leader.”
The Thought Leader has become the moniker of choice for those donning the dais of network functions. For purposes of full disclosure, I have used this term often and have been called one by many. OK, by a few … OK, once and it was a family member, but I assumed it was implied many other occasions.
I digress.
The world went array and we looked to leaders for opinions. We elevated those thoughts because we felt ours were somehow askew. However, great leaders, great companies, great people don't just THINK, they ACT and equally GIVE. I don't want to be associated with or be known anymore as a Thought Leader, I seek for "Thought Provider."
My suggestion reminds leaders of their very essence, to lead. And, that is much more powerful.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
I admire many in the world of business. The ability to innovate, initiate and guide their companies to achieve desired success is astonishing. I also admire those tactile bunch that get into the mix physically, working alongside to ensure goals are achieved.
However, over the past few years a new leader has evolved. One slightly more passive than those aforementioned and possibly held in higher regard. I think this new leader would set Brutus in a venal rage.
The “Thought Leader.”
The Thought Leader has become the moniker of choice for those donning the dais of network functions. For purposes of full disclosure, I have used this term often and have been called one by many. OK, by a few … OK, once and it was a family member, but I assumed it was implied many other occasions.
I digress.
The world went array and we looked to leaders for opinions. We elevated those thoughts because we felt ours were somehow askew. However, great leaders, great companies, great people don't just THINK, they ACT and equally GIVE. I don't want to be associated with or be known anymore as a Thought Leader, I seek for "Thought Provider."
My suggestion reminds leaders of their very essence, to lead. And, that is much more powerful.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, April 4, 2011
Blog Poetry
"I Tweet, therefore I am.” Not, René Descartes.
April is National Poetry Month. Poetry is an imaginative awareness of experience expressed through meaning, sound, and rhythmic language choices so as to evoke an emotional response. Poetry has been known to employ meter and rhyme, but this is by no means necessary. Poetry is an ancient form that has gone through numerous and drastic reinvention over time. The very nature of poetry as an authentic and individual mode of expression makes it nearly impossible to define, however, I will try: how's dead or at least on the verge of extinction?
When was the last time a hot new poet was downloaded on iTunes?
Have we forgone the patience necessary to open our hearts to explore expression?
Is our societal requirement of immediacy diluting the requirement of cadence and nuance needed for wonderful prose?
Can we truly articulate our most passionate and descriptive thoughts within the newfangled 140 word requirement?
I could only imagine what creative stifling Yates, Dickinson, Cummings and Frost would suffer if they also had to monitor their Facebook page and Twitter accounts.
Like the art of a hand written note, the use of poetry seems to be a thing of the past. Do you think there is any correlation towards the increasing depletion of chivalry?!
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
April is National Poetry Month. Poetry is an imaginative awareness of experience expressed through meaning, sound, and rhythmic language choices so as to evoke an emotional response. Poetry has been known to employ meter and rhyme, but this is by no means necessary. Poetry is an ancient form that has gone through numerous and drastic reinvention over time. The very nature of poetry as an authentic and individual mode of expression makes it nearly impossible to define, however, I will try: how's dead or at least on the verge of extinction?
When was the last time a hot new poet was downloaded on iTunes?
Have we forgone the patience necessary to open our hearts to explore expression?
Is our societal requirement of immediacy diluting the requirement of cadence and nuance needed for wonderful prose?
Can we truly articulate our most passionate and descriptive thoughts within the newfangled 140 word requirement?
I could only imagine what creative stifling Yates, Dickinson, Cummings and Frost would suffer if they also had to monitor their Facebook page and Twitter accounts.
Like the art of a hand written note, the use of poetry seems to be a thing of the past. Do you think there is any correlation towards the increasing depletion of chivalry?!
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, March 28, 2011
My Life in Ruins
"Lead, follow, or get the hell out of the way." – Anonymous
In spite of some prior blogs, I don't fancy the written manner of anything morose or macabre. I pride myself on being a little off-beat, off-color and sometimes off-kilter. I have a been accused of late of occasional lapses into obscurity and a penchant for tomfoolery. I assumed both as compliments.
I often jest and ridicule the masses, of course secretly, since most of my existence is within my own private Idaho.
My "intellectual libidinous" nature provides me the confidence that with a few exaggerated pantomime moves I can conjure the best in situational absurdity and make you love me and agree I am "one of a kind."
However, on this day the crashing realization that I had transformed into a bottom feeding parasite was never more evident. It's not my fault, the devil does walk among us.
For four days in a row, I awoke at 5:00 a.m. like the dolt I have secretly become, filled with an eager anticipation and periodicals to pass the time, then headed out the door. I arrived at the mall, still dark outside. As I neared the Apple store, hopes of buying the iPad 2 was my single-minded focus.
However, for the fourth day in a row I left without my new device in hand. Either there were too many in line in front of me (did the others stay in the mall hiding as mannequins?), not enough arrived at the stores or they were stocked with the wrong type.
Damn you Steve Jobs!
Vowing to end this charade and never to return, I slunk out the mall at 7:45 a.m. I needed a pick me up and headed to the nearest Starbucks in hopes of erasing this whole ordeal.
I'm not making this up, the line was out the door. I am not positive, but I a believe some of the patrons were my former brethren from the mall.
Mr. Jobs meet your long lost twin, Mr. Schultz.
The similarities were too striking. Like the mall, I realized we are a nation of masochists, mirroring the collective descent into the struggles of bovine.
Mooo!
With double espresso in hand, my race for redemption was rampant. I ingested the black gold in one swig, fired up the car and raced for the highway to get to a meeting in Miami, 45 miles from my current location.
You guessed it, after waiting in traffic the whole ride, I acceded at my destination 2.5 hours later.
I have waxed poetic to leaders of business about the marketing importance of tapping into tribal societies and ritual … never realizing along the way I'm at the head of the line.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
In spite of some prior blogs, I don't fancy the written manner of anything morose or macabre. I pride myself on being a little off-beat, off-color and sometimes off-kilter. I have a been accused of late of occasional lapses into obscurity and a penchant for tomfoolery. I assumed both as compliments.
I often jest and ridicule the masses, of course secretly, since most of my existence is within my own private Idaho.
My "intellectual libidinous" nature provides me the confidence that with a few exaggerated pantomime moves I can conjure the best in situational absurdity and make you love me and agree I am "one of a kind."
However, on this day the crashing realization that I had transformed into a bottom feeding parasite was never more evident. It's not my fault, the devil does walk among us.
For four days in a row, I awoke at 5:00 a.m. like the dolt I have secretly become, filled with an eager anticipation and periodicals to pass the time, then headed out the door. I arrived at the mall, still dark outside. As I neared the Apple store, hopes of buying the iPad 2 was my single-minded focus.
However, for the fourth day in a row I left without my new device in hand. Either there were too many in line in front of me (did the others stay in the mall hiding as mannequins?), not enough arrived at the stores or they were stocked with the wrong type.
Damn you Steve Jobs!
Vowing to end this charade and never to return, I slunk out the mall at 7:45 a.m. I needed a pick me up and headed to the nearest Starbucks in hopes of erasing this whole ordeal.
I'm not making this up, the line was out the door. I am not positive, but I a believe some of the patrons were my former brethren from the mall.
Mr. Jobs meet your long lost twin, Mr. Schultz.
The similarities were too striking. Like the mall, I realized we are a nation of masochists, mirroring the collective descent into the struggles of bovine.
Mooo!
With double espresso in hand, my race for redemption was rampant. I ingested the black gold in one swig, fired up the car and raced for the highway to get to a meeting in Miami, 45 miles from my current location.
You guessed it, after waiting in traffic the whole ride, I acceded at my destination 2.5 hours later.
I have waxed poetic to leaders of business about the marketing importance of tapping into tribal societies and ritual … never realizing along the way I'm at the head of the line.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, March 14, 2011
Transferring Happiness
Surrounded by family and friends in a convivial setting, my euphoric emotions were bubbling over. When it was pointed out that I seemed less like my sardonic cantankerous self, but rather at ease in a complete state of happiness, I knew any attempt to squabble such would be dismissed. Instead, I beamed my Cheshire smile and embraced the moment.
However, that was short lived. When I was asked “if they made me happy,” pointing to all at the affair, I answered with a resounding, “Absolutely not!” Silence, pain filled stares and gasps were piercing my direction for what was clearly perceived as an act of draconian nature.
I needed to explain quickly or be prepared to pick up the check for the evening’s festivities. As it turned out, both were in order. There is no one that dictates my emotions; I am responsible for all of them. That’s right, no one makes me happy or conversely sad; I am in charge of energizing each and every one.
Even if you are surrounded by numerous acts of happy occasions and people doing kind and wonderful things, this is not an instant recipe for happiness. A person first must be happy with themselves and willing to accept control of personal emotions in order move effortlessly through life’s topography.
You are in charge of your own feelings AND you are not in control of others. It is not your responsibility to make someone feel something and in truth, no one should have such power. Ever provide numerous acts of kindness only to feel your efforts were left unappreciated, or worse, not situational altering? Those are instances where you held the belief you could control the emotional universe.
Far too many are looking at others to inject a transfer of inspirational happiness in order to make it through life. There are whole industries built on this foundation. However, what is largely ignored is the necessity of self-actualization and personal emotional control. Friends, family, lovers, co-workers, bosses and even the baristas at Starbucks that know your order before you utter it, are not in control of your happiness. Be YOU and acknowledge absolute supremacy of YOU.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
However, that was short lived. When I was asked “if they made me happy,” pointing to all at the affair, I answered with a resounding, “Absolutely not!” Silence, pain filled stares and gasps were piercing my direction for what was clearly perceived as an act of draconian nature.
I needed to explain quickly or be prepared to pick up the check for the evening’s festivities. As it turned out, both were in order. There is no one that dictates my emotions; I am responsible for all of them. That’s right, no one makes me happy or conversely sad; I am in charge of energizing each and every one.
Even if you are surrounded by numerous acts of happy occasions and people doing kind and wonderful things, this is not an instant recipe for happiness. A person first must be happy with themselves and willing to accept control of personal emotions in order move effortlessly through life’s topography.
You are in charge of your own feelings AND you are not in control of others. It is not your responsibility to make someone feel something and in truth, no one should have such power. Ever provide numerous acts of kindness only to feel your efforts were left unappreciated, or worse, not situational altering? Those are instances where you held the belief you could control the emotional universe.
Far too many are looking at others to inject a transfer of inspirational happiness in order to make it through life. There are whole industries built on this foundation. However, what is largely ignored is the necessity of self-actualization and personal emotional control. Friends, family, lovers, co-workers, bosses and even the baristas at Starbucks that know your order before you utter it, are not in control of your happiness. Be YOU and acknowledge absolute supremacy of YOU.
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Monday, March 7, 2011
Love bites!
"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” - Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861)
Romeo is known for his impressive connection to the emotion of love. His soliloquies to Juliet were bountiful, filled with engaging similes in an effort to ensure she recognized the depths of his passion. While Mrs. Browning offered numerous descriptive examples of how her love continued to swell.
Could it be, they were NOT romantics at all, but rather, were simply forced to extend themselves beyond human capacity?
To me, Romeo and Mrs. Browning were just as confused as most of us … early examples of the daunting challenge of defining something abstract.
In the businesses of marketing, a heavy emphasis of late is being placed on measuring all output. Corporation’s budgets are shrinking and scrutinized each penny intensely, and data is often the best defense for spending.
Even über CEO Jack Welch once uttered the famous quote, "I know half my advertising and public relations is crucial and working, I just don't know which half."
2007 and 2008 were the watershed years of the Ad industry. Consumerism was rampant, and so businesses were spending money to drive consumers to their stores and brands. Awareness was king.
Then we hit the skids with the financial meltdown, and the new "normal" is the economy we currently have. Marketer's now strive for tangible results and ROI, having to move towards performance media where there's a direct result and you can say, "we drove people to the store or to an e-commerce site.” Market share is now king.
What do you do when the communication vertical still doesn't have proper analytical tools? Or worse, focus is on the wrong determination?
Last week, we sat with a company that unanimously agreed on incorporating public relations into the mix. The hard to quantify measurable is important for their growth strategy, however, they simply couldn't determine at what degree the importance of “awareness” was. As such, we laid out a plan to tie our output to indicators essential to their business plans.
This simple strategy eliminated the nebulous interpreting of success. We made a "love connection."
So, in business or relationships, no matter if you "love" but are not "in love" or you "like" but don't really "like-like" or, if as Mrs. Browning suggests you will love deeper in death, I say it all works. As long as you and your recipient know what you really feel and agree on the key performance indicators.
Or, maybe Mrs. Browning realized it will take many lifetimes to fix this ...
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
Romeo is known for his impressive connection to the emotion of love. His soliloquies to Juliet were bountiful, filled with engaging similes in an effort to ensure she recognized the depths of his passion. While Mrs. Browning offered numerous descriptive examples of how her love continued to swell.
Could it be, they were NOT romantics at all, but rather, were simply forced to extend themselves beyond human capacity?
To me, Romeo and Mrs. Browning were just as confused as most of us … early examples of the daunting challenge of defining something abstract.
In the businesses of marketing, a heavy emphasis of late is being placed on measuring all output. Corporation’s budgets are shrinking and scrutinized each penny intensely, and data is often the best defense for spending.
Even über CEO Jack Welch once uttered the famous quote, "I know half my advertising and public relations is crucial and working, I just don't know which half."
2007 and 2008 were the watershed years of the Ad industry. Consumerism was rampant, and so businesses were spending money to drive consumers to their stores and brands. Awareness was king.
Then we hit the skids with the financial meltdown, and the new "normal" is the economy we currently have. Marketer's now strive for tangible results and ROI, having to move towards performance media where there's a direct result and you can say, "we drove people to the store or to an e-commerce site.” Market share is now king.
What do you do when the communication vertical still doesn't have proper analytical tools? Or worse, focus is on the wrong determination?
Last week, we sat with a company that unanimously agreed on incorporating public relations into the mix. The hard to quantify measurable is important for their growth strategy, however, they simply couldn't determine at what degree the importance of “awareness” was. As such, we laid out a plan to tie our output to indicators essential to their business plans.
This simple strategy eliminated the nebulous interpreting of success. We made a "love connection."
So, in business or relationships, no matter if you "love" but are not "in love" or you "like" but don't really "like-like" or, if as Mrs. Browning suggests you will love deeper in death, I say it all works. As long as you and your recipient know what you really feel and agree on the key performance indicators.
Or, maybe Mrs. Browning realized it will take many lifetimes to fix this ...
Greg
Gregory Salsburg
CEO/The Big STIR
STIR-Communications
Miami | New York | London
c: (561) 386-8064
o: (305) 407-1723
e: Greg@STIR-Communications.com
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