by Ohad Rozen, UX Matters User Experience as Competitive Advantage Though it’s taken quite a bit longer than many frustrated UX designers thought it would, the business world is finally waking up to a fundamental fact: when it comes to B2B or B2C Web site design and development, a great user experience is not—and has never been—optional or merely nice to have. Rather, it is essential to a successful customer journey and as vital to organizational success and growth as…
CNET: Yahoo is trying to become one of the smartphone cool kids
by Richard Nieva, CNET (Excerpt) When Marissa Mayer became CEO of Yahoo three years ago, the former Google executive staked her reputation on one thing: bringing Yahoo, an ailing pioneer of the early Internet, into the smartphone age. To that end, Mayer made one of her biggest moves just over a week ago, unveiling a mobile app called Livetext, a video-chatting service aimed at teens. It’s only the second brand-new mobile app the company has introduced during her tenure. If…
Internet Retailer: A look at Yahoo’s native ads push
by Zak Stambor, Internet Retailer The Internet pioneer’s acquisition of Polyvore is the latest in a series of moves aimed at helping marketers reach millennials. Yahoo Inc. CEO Marissa Mayer is betting she can turn around the Internet pioneer’s fortunes by figuring out how to help marketers reach millennials. The task isn’t easy, particularly given the company’s dwindling financial results; Yahoo posted a $132.1 million loss in the first half of the year, which compares to a $68.6 million gain…
Sidecar Puts Passengers Aside, Pivots To A Mostly-Deliveries Company
Via Ellen Huet, Forbes Excerpt: The U.S. ride-hailing market may have room for two players, but apparently not for three. Sidecar, an on-demand car service that trailed far behind Uber and Lyft despite often being the first to build new and creative features, is morphing into mainly a delivery service for other businesses, the company told FORBES. The move suggests that the industry’s established players — Uber and Lyft — have pulled so far ahead that it’s become nearly impossible…
[New eBook] Attention is Currency, Featuring Brian Solis and Hugh MacLeod
By Jason Miller, LinkedIn We tend to assume that because consumers are consumers, they will naturally consume everything we produce. So it becomes easy to think of our work as just “content.” And to think of “marketing” as the publishing and promotion of said content. In an era when the flow of content is accelerating while the adult attention span is declining, we need to move beyond these assumptions – we need to focus on the human aspects of engagement….
Brian Solis on how to tell better brand stories without brand journalism
An incredible write up of Brian’s presentation at LinkedIn by Derek Handova at B2B News Network. Wow. Terms like content marketing and more recently “brand journalism” have captured the attention of B2B marketers for some time. However, many people talk about brand journalism but nobody’s doing it. At least nobody’s doing it very well. That could be the one of the takeaways from last week’s Content Marketing Summit at LinkedIn, presented by Ragan Communications and PRSA. For the first time,…
The Top 50 Marketing Gurus
Top50 MARKETING GURUS Ever wonder how good the Marketing Guru you have discovered is at marketing themselves? Top50 Marketing Gurus is an interesting way to rank the best of the best in marketing gurus based on their own current online presence. Top50 Marketing Gurus is maintained by PIVOTSTACK. While Brian thinks that most list processes are rarely on the mark and thus misinform the public about who can really help who and how, he is appreciative of being included.
#GROWconf spotlight: Brian Solis says innovate or perish
by John Gray, BETAKit It’s simple in thought, but in reality being innovative is excruciatingly difficult. The GROW Conference is in its sixth year and all about the future of innovation, growth, and entrepreneurship. From August 19-21, Whistler, BC will play conference host for a second year. Once again, GROW is delivering an impressive line-up of speakers, sessions, events, and networking opportunities. After organizer Debbie Landa kicks off the event, Brian Solis will be first on stage to present “Living…
Why Marketers Should Care About Millennials and Anyone Living a Digital Lifestyle
What is a Millennial, and why should a marketer care? That was the question Adobe’s Simon Nicholson asked me during Adobe Summit EMEA in London earlier this year. I joined Simon in a live chat on the topic and have included the fun, casual yet informative conversation below… Let’s start with this, the definition of Millennials is imprecise, with the consensus being they’re aged around 18-34. But one of the key points that I emphasized in our discussion is that…
Mashable: BuzzFeed Television? Maybe it’s closer than you think
by Jason Abbruzzese, Mashable Arianna Huffington built The Huffington Post into a global digital media empire, while Jonah Peretti, who helped found HuffPo, went on to co-found BuzzFeed, turned into a digital juggernaut that could soon be valued at $1.5 billion. The former colleagues now stand at the vanguard of the new media industry, watched and discussed and speculated about all the time for clues about where digital media is going. But both of digital media’s big empire-builders are looking…
