Imagine taking the US Military Field Manual for Counterinsurgency, putting it into Google Translate and converting it into brand speak. The result would be Brand Resilience: Managing Risk and Recovery in a High Speed World by Jonathan R. Copulsky. We’ve often heard of marketing compared to warfare, but that’s old school. Now, with social media amplifying and accelerating messages, the concept of protecting your brands using ... Read More

Adam Zuckerman is a blogger and people connector inspired by the intersections of business, law, media, technology, and all things outdoors. The best products in the world can fail with lackluster branding and marketing. Even some of the most successful companies of all time have experienced this phenomena. Take Coca Cola’s New Coke, Pepsi’s Crystal Pepsi, Google’s Wave, Microsoft’s Zune, and Apple’s Newton for examples. On the ... Read More

Becky Johns is a PR professional, blogger, and photographer. American Idol fans were outraged the last two weeks as we watched some of our “favorite” contestants get eliminated from the show. How could this happen when the results are based on the popular vote? The judges were shocked, the media played up the story as a huge upset and many people were confused why perhaps the ... Read More

It’s finally here, if you can believe it! How long have we been teasing you? We’re ready to unleash Project Jack Bauer and, as we swallow our waves of panic and try to get some sleep through our excitement, we hope you’re as ready (if not more) for this as we are. Introducing….Spin Sucks Pro! What Is Spin Sucks Pro? If you’ve ever heard me interviewed, ... Read More

I was talking to Erik Hare yesterday about how we both have blog posts in some sort of process for days, sometimes even weeks. I’ve already written shells of the blog posts for Friday, Sunday, and Monday. And I have a half-written guest post for Troy Claus. Typically, I walk Jack Bauer and I think about that day’s intro (and also curse Marcus Sheridan because I ... Read More

On Sunday, I was stalking Ricardo Bueno’s blog, which I was introduced to when Social Media Examiner did their 17 ways to grow your blog post earlier this month. He wrote a post last week called, “Watch how first-time readers use your blog.” Interested, I clicked on it and found Clue, a “fun and easy way to test what people remember on your site.” It shows ... Read More

Jim Mitchem is an award winning copywriter and founder of one of the first virtual ad agencies on the planet in smash communications. A few years back, Home Depot ran a television commercial showing one of their fully decked out 18-wheelers driving along a beautiful country road. A voice over talked about Home Depot’s commitment to communities they serve. As the camera panned out, we saw ... Read More

Beth Harte is a seasoned marketing and communications thought leader, author, and speaker with a passion for excellence and a pragmatic mind for business and results-oriented outcomes. When Gini Dietrich asked me to share a version of my tongue-in-cheek 9 Truths About Marketers post on Spin Sucks, I responded with a resounding “heck, yeah!”  If there is an industry where spin runs rampant—it is marketing... Read More

Jonathan Lewis wrote this brilliant piece on Hollywood’s version of Marketing 101. In honor of the Oscars this weekend, we bring to you a special Oscars edition of Spin Sucks, signed your CCO, Lisa Gerber. He is an account executive at McKee Wallwork Cleveland Advertising and is pretty sure the spinning top never stopped spinning. Christopher Nolan’s mind-twisting action-thriller wowed movie-goers last summer with a multi-layered ... Read More

Annelise Loevlie loves to laugh, ski, write, do BIZ, create, and a whole lotta other things that won’t fit in a two line bio. This summer I met a man who changed his name because of a book he read. Hans Lysglimt (“Light-Shine”) formally Hans “Something else”, was a stoic, chisel-faced Norwegian who, over a Las Vegas salade Nicoise and a watered down iced tea, brought ... Read More