On a Cold, Dark and Still Night…

September 20, 2009 • • 3 comments

After a fun-filled day of climbing windy cliffs, gawking at gaping pelicans, and strolling amongst slippery sea lions, we made our way back to our resort at American River of Kangaroo Island. The night was cold, very dark (street lights are infrequent on Kangaroo Island) and extremely quiet. Not a soul was stirring as our rented car trundled past the dirt path nearing our residence at Casuarina Suites.

Until suddenly, I thought I spotted something with two bright shining eyes staring right at me beside the fence on the road.

How Market Leading Companies Do It

September 18, 2009 • Book Reviews • disabled comments

In the world of business, there are few winners and many losers. The merciless marketplace leaves little room for companies trying to be all things to all men, spreading their resources too thinly across many areas. Those who make it focus their energies and resources on focusing their energies on one of the three key value disciplines – operational excellence, product leadership or customer intimacy – and look at ways to continually improve superior value.

According to The Discipline of Market Leaders, the true formula for enduring strategic success is to be either operationally excellent, exceptional in leading the market in product development, or to have one’s entire business closely integrated with one’s customer’s processes. Authored by Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema, the slim volume proposes that market leaders choose their customers carefully and find the best ways to meet their needs in a highly differentiated and focused manner while ensuring that quality standards are not compromised.

The Aura of Anticipation

September 15, 2009 • Blog • 2 comments

Courtesy of Hella Bus

Have you wondered why a perceived treat or reward sometimes appear better than they really are? Or experienced the endless wait for a brand new gadget to arrive in the stores, rushing to be the first among your friends to get it? How about the thought of that luscious holiday in Europe, where you can soak in the sights, scents and sounds of culture?

The one thing holding these disparate consumption experiences together is anticipation. An oft-forgotten but oh so powerful emotion which grips everyone of us.

Strolling Among Sea Lions

September 13, 2009 • • 5 comments

One of the best things about Kangaroo Island on South Australia is its abundance of wildlife beyond just kangaroos and other marsupials (the traditional hallmark of Australian fauna). As a sanctuary for many marine-based birds and animals, the island attracts a wide diversity of wildlife both avian and aquatic. Many of these animals are indigenous to the island, and they include the Australian Sea Lion and New Zealand Fur Seals, members of the well-loved Pinniped family of marine-based mammals that exhibit interesting social behaviours.

To catch those blubber-coated creatures up close and personal, we ventured to Seal Bay at Kangaroo Island on the second day of our trip there. Here are some photos of our journey.

Seal Bay is both a conservation park, wildlife reserve and a tourist attraction rolled into one. Here’s a usual pose by the sign post.

Calculating Return on Marketing Investments

September 8, 2009 • Business and Management • 2 comments

Now you can splash those ads without fear! (courtesy of Entrepreneur magazine)

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” – John Wanamaker (1838-1922)

Sadly, this age-old problem is still faced by many CEOs and CFOs in an organisation.

All of (Capitalist) Life is But a Stage

September 5, 2009 • Book Reviews • disabled comments

American Girl dolls casting their branded charms (Courtesy of Lauren-xo)

“Lights, cameras, action!” Put on your “costumes”, don your best “branded” behaviour, and perform in the stage of life’s biggest commercial brands.

That seems to be the key message of Maurya Wickstrom’s volume Performing Consumers which described the multiple ways in which big brands endear themselves to their customers through performance and theatre. Peppered liberally with theories of performativity and theatricality, the book illustrated how the creation of brandscapes in the retail environment induces deep emotional connections between man and merchandise.

Are Museums All Things to All Men?

September 2, 2009 • Blog • 1 comment

Dinosaurs are a surefire hit, but should all museums have them? (taken at Melbourne Museum)

Should museums and galleries always attract the largest and widest crowd possible, attracting/attacking every customer segment? Can they be scholastically superior, operationally efficient, highly entertaining, marketing savvy, and customer oriented at the same time? Are major blockbuster exhibitions the only way to draw a big crowd?

Some of these issues were tackled in this excellent post by Nina Simon (of Museums 2.0 blog) in an interview she conducted with John Falk and Beverly Sheppard, authors of the book “Thriving in the Knowledge Age: New Business Models for Museums and Other Cultural Institutions”. Admittedly, I haven’t read the book yet but I am definitely going to check it out.

The Value of Making (or Baking)

August 31, 2009 • Business and Management • 1 comment

We are all creators by heart (3-year old Ethan putting together a toy set)

Have you wondered why toys like LEGO, model planes and Play Doh have such a timeless appeal?

Or mused about the popularity of recipe books (and blogs) springing up everywhere?

Who’s Your City – A Review of Florida’s Book

August 25, 2009 • Book Reviews • 1 comment

I first heard about Richard Florida’s ideas from a public sector conference back in November 2008 and was intrigued by his ideas on how the world isn’t flat (ala Thomas Friedman) but is in fact spiky and dominated by mega-regions. Florida’s earlier assertions about the rise of the creative class and their catalytic roles in urban regeneration have been so significant that they are often cited by cities around the world as reasons to invest in more heavily in cultural infrastructure.

Who’s Your City was a highly ambitious undertaking by the urban theorist and economist Richard Florida to understand the importance of place in both economic and social spheres. Working with armies of researchers and statisticians from Gallup and various universities, Florida plowed through an impressive mountain of economic, social, geographic, psychographic and even cartographic (yes Florida is pretty big on maps) data to substantiate his findings.

Sandy Beaches, Windy Cliffs and Artistic Rocks

August 23, 2009 • Blog • 1 comment

One of the most amazing things about Kangaroo Island is its vastly varying landscapes and breathtaking environment. From one end of the island to the other (which is at least a two hour drive considering the distance), you can experience the South Australian wilderness in a wide spectrum of rustic surroundings – sandy deserts, craggy cliffs, luxuriant forests, sparkling rivers, to rolling hills and scenic bays. Drives along the winding roads of the island are always pleasant as there are very few cars around, plus the fact that virtually every square kilometre of the island is bursting with gorgeous scenery.

Our first scenic stop was the renowned beach at Vivonne Bay, which was once voted as the best beach in Australia in a survey of 10,000 beaches on the continent and its islands.