Failure is a wonderful teacher. The new-economy revolution had many of the trappings of a genuine economic revolt: vast fortune forged in a fortnight, dashing young heroes and heroines, rotten institutions brought to their knees. It held such great promise, yet today even the dreams feel thoroughly eviscerated. What to […]
The incidence of M&A has continued to increase significantly during the last decade, both domestically and internationally. The sectors most affected by M&A activity have been service- and knowledge-based industries such as banking, insurance, pharmaceuticals, and leisure. Although M&A is a popular means of increasing or protecting market share, the […]
The Building Blocks of Brand Creation The brand proposition is the statement of the functional and emotional benefits that a company believes its products or service offers to the consumer. Coca-Cola’s brand proposition is a mixture of functional benefits (taste, refreshment) and emotional benefits (good wholesome fun). Brand positioning is […]
Who Is Really Best? Who has the best rent-a-car service? The best cola? The best ketchup? If you are thinking of Hertz, Coca-Cola, and Heinz, you agree with most customers who make these three companies the leaders in their fields. In fact, there is a strong axiom, or belief, in […]
There is no ideal way of managing customers. Marketers have been brought on customer-goods branding, retail marketing, and sales-force management. Along comes customer- relationship management with the claim to replace or substantially supplement these tried-and–true ways of doing business. However, there are many ways of managing customers. The main ways […]
What is a brand? Put simply, a brand is the difference between a bottle of sugared, flavored, carbonated water and a bottle of Coca-Cola. It is the sum of the functional and emotional characteristics, both tangible and intangible, that a consumer attributes to a product or service. These characteristics are […]
Recent research suggests that globalization is a myth. Far from taking place in a single global market, most business activity by large companies takes place in regional blocks. There is no uniform spread of U.S. market capitalism nor are global markets becoming homogenized. Government regulations and cultural differences divide the […]
We live in a business world taken over by ironies and oxymoron, a world of walking contradictions in which the line between conventional and unconventional wisdom is done with disposable pens filled with invisible ink. The rules that once seemed so useful now ebb and flow like a hyperactive harvest […]
The ability to create and manage strategic alliances is an important skill for most management teams. If you cannot make effective use of alliances in today’s world, you will be at a serious competitive disadvantage. One of the reasons for the low success rate of alliances is that there are […]
Business has changed radically in recent decades and is becoming more sophisticated. The public relations of today has become perception management. Communicators have increasingly come to the conclusion that perception is what really counts. You might run a great company, but if analysts don’t feel that way the stock does […]
