Business and management articles | Cooler Insights

The Heart of Singapore’s Productivity Challenge

January 14, 2015 • Blog, Business and Management • no comments

Flying robot waiters are nifty, but are they enough? (courtesy of RT.com)

How can we raise Singapore’s productivity? That is the multi-billion dollar question.

A recent report in Business Times offered suggestions by economists to lower the steep productivity growth targets for Singapore from 2-3 percent per annum to 1-1.5 percent. Various suggestions such as supporting Research & Development for the PIC scheme (which IRAS already supports by the way), and offering discounts for not hitting the foreign worker hiring ratio were suggested.

January 11, 2015 • Content Marketing • 1 comment

Courtesy of Socialbrite

What are the ingredients of a good content marketing strategy? How can one differentiate one’s business through content marketing?

After reading and listening to a tonne of content on blogs, podcasts, and videos, I believe that successful content marketing is predicated on 6 key ingredients. Taken together, they can raise the chances of success in any content marketing endeavour.

How do we build strong brands in the digital age? Should brand marketers “bow to algorithmic salvation”, allowing data and process to ride roughshod over inspiration and creativity?

Chairman of JWT Asia Pacific Tom Doctoroff provides compelling answers to these burning questions in his latest book Twitter Is Not A Strategy. Author of the book What Chinese Want, Tom argues in his new book that “new-media cleverness” cannot be a panacea for marketing. Rather, effective marketing begins with deep customer insights that translate into a great brand idea that is media-agnostic.

What is Influencer Marketing all about? How do you pick the right influencers to work with your brand, and how much should you pay for them?

In this article, I will cover the basics of who influencers are, what influencer marketing is all about, ways to work the right influencers to work for your brand, the cost of engaging an influencer, and how you should choose the best influencers to partner with.

MoolahSense Brings Crowdfinancing to Singapore

January 2, 2015 • Blog, Business and Management • 1 comment

Are you an entrepreneur seeking to raise funds but unable to secure a bank loan? Or perhaps an investor looking to diversify your portfolio?

If you belong to either category, you may wish to consider crowdfinancing. Unlike traditional means of securing funds through bank loans or equity investments, crowdfinancing (or crowd-lending) allows businesses to borrow money through an online peer-to-business platform from individual lenders.

December 24, 2014 • Blog, Personal Branding • no comments

Courtesy of Victoria Brain Injury Society

One of marketing maven Seth Godin’s recent post on what generosity truly is struck a deep chord with me. As we are celebrating Christmas tomorrow, I thought it would be good to highlight some of his ideas, peppered with my own perspectives.

In Godin’s own words:

“Generosity is not merely giving a discount, or giving what you make away or creating a race to the bottom. It’s far more complex than that. ”

Thrive: Book Review

December 18, 2014 • Book Reviews, Personal Branding • 1 comment

Courtesy of AARP

How do you define success? Can it be measured by wealth or power alone?

Apparently no. Not least according to Arianna Huffington, founder and editor of Huffington Post Media Group – one of the world’s most influential news and information brands. In her latest book Thrive, Huffington proposes that there is a “third metric” which quantifies success by one’s well-being, wisdom, sense of wonder, and ability to give.

Sales guru Zig Ziglar was a master in persuasion (courtesy of Attitudes 4 Innovation)

Persuasion is a huge part of our every day lives. It is a major aspect of human-to-human interactions at work, play or school.

Without it, we are unable to get what we want in our interactions with people. And that certainly sucks.

December 9, 2014 • Content Marketing • 1 comment

Content is king! Content rules!

Yeah, we know that already. Thanks to the burgeoning growth of content marketing – the new “silver bullet” in a marketer’s arsenal – everybody is hopping onto the content marketing bandwagon.

However, how do we tap this rising trend? More specifically, what should you do to “create killer blogs, podcasts, videos, e-books, webinars (and more) that engage customers and ignite your business”?