Why do underdogs triumph over mightier enemies? How does one turn a weakness into a strength?
In yet another entertaining trip of the intellect, Malcolm Gladwell’s latest volume David and Goliath tackles perennial paradoxes with much aplomb. Written in his usual captivating prose, Gladwell’s book – subtitled Underdogs, Misfits and the Art of Battling Giants – provides one with much food for thought while challenging conventional wisdom.
Can you tame the social media shrew? (source of image)
Social media is a lot like fire. It is a good servant but a bad master.
As a content and social media marketing consultant, my job involves studying how people behave on social media and what brands can do to add value to online communities.
Courtesy of Chorus + Echo
I just read an interesting HBR blog post by Hemant Taneja on The Economies of Unscale. In the post, Taneja claimed that the advent of global manufacturing, trade, and the Internet have created a new playing field for small businesses.
Quoting from the post:
Courtesy of Applicant
We all know that the world is changing at a blinding pace. Yesteryear’s market leaders like Barnes & Noble, Kodak, Blockbuster and Tower Records fade away. Meanwhile, new business darlings like Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google take the stage.
Time and again, we’ve been told that if we don’t think “out-of-the-box” and reinvent our businesses, we will suffer the same untimely fate. The challenge, however, is how.
Marketing is broken. At least in the traditional sense.
Focused on customer acquisition, promotions and sales volumes, traditional marketing views customers as “targets” to be arrowed.
Bigger, bolder and flashier campaigns are launched to attract their rapidly diminishing attention while carrots like discounts, freebies and lucky draws are dangled to coax them to open their wallets.
Courtesy of Life Hacker
Decisions, decisions, decisions. If only you can make better ones in the course of your work and life.
Thanks to a recent podcast on Derek Halpern’s Social Triggers Insider featuring Dan Heath, co-author of Decisive, I uncovered a couple of secrets to making good decisions.
Courtesy of Hollywood Sapien
We’re both actors and audiences in the age of ubiquitous mobile social networks. Powered by tablets and smartphones, we either play the role of thespians or theatre-goers.
Don’t believe me? Well, consider the following:
Courtesy of Disney
Disney’s latest blockbuster movie Frozen was a blast, freezing the competition in their tracks this winter.
Taking top prize at the 41st Annie Awards for best animated film, the film is nominated for two Oscars, and has heated up box offices worldwide. Costing US$300 million to make, Frozen is anticipated to generated some US$1 billion when it completes its big-screen run. The movie did so well that it helped Disney to report a 33% increase in quarterly profits and has been lauded by Disney’s CEO Bob Iger as a “turnaround for animation”.
Since time immemorial, man has been bewitched by stories.
A vital weapon in our communication arsenal, great stories represent universal truths and connects deeply with us.
Source of image
In case you don’t already know, the world of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is going to the birds. Or more specifically, the Hummingbird.
Announcing its brand new algorithm for search recently at its birthday, Google’s Hummingbird claims to make search more natural, contextual and human. In other words, trying to “game” the system through unrelated keywords, meta-tags, links, and other spammy devices may work less effectively in future.