Category Archives: Marketing

Habit makes the world go round

Some mornings, my drive to work goes so smoothly that I hardly notice that I’ve been driving. Habit has carried me down the familiar streets, stopping at red lights, passing laggards and dodging potholes without active thought on my part. It … Continue reading

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Do marketers know too much about you?

“As long as we don’t spook her, it works.” That is how a marketer from Target summed up why his company camouflages its intended offers by sprinkling them among other, undesirable, offers. Recently, the New York Times published a lengthy article … Continue reading

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Are you into Straight Razor marketing?

Straight razors: who can forget Matt Damon’s menacing scene in The Talented Mr. Ripley? And who hasn’t seen movie images of solid citizens calmly shaving on a moving train, unafraid of the cold steel at their throat? The subject of straight razors came up … Continue reading

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Should the Queen’s Printer print?

When I was a teenager in southern Saskatchewan, my burning interest in politics somehow got me onto the mailing list of a federal cabinet minister. Every month I’d get a package from Ottawa, bursting with committee reports and excerpts from Hansard. (Not … Continue reading

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Will the ‘Long Tail’ of eCommerce boost unknown authors?

Does the fast adoption of e-readers mean that lesser-known authors will now find a bigger audience? Paul Barsch thinks so. In a recent post on the MarketingProfs Daily Fix Blog, he suggests that something important is happening in the world of … Continue reading

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More fun with postcards

The good folks at Canada Post have done it again — they’ve given me another way to pepper my mother with postcards.1 This time it’s a dedicated website at www.picturepostcard.ca. In a previous post, I described how customers can use an … Continue reading

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Don’t miss the Christmas card marketing opportunity

Thinking Christmas cards in August? I am. Recently, while visiting a customer’s office, I saw one of the cards we sent last year. It was another reminder that these seasonal messages should be a don’t-miss part of every B2B markter’s schedule.

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Five useful Excel routines for non-programmers

You’re a marketer, not a programmer, and you’ve been tasked with managing an Excel list for a DM or email campaign. There it sits, looking beautifully arranged and ready to go. But like most data files, this one may be … Continue reading

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