Bestselling author supports Power’s ORS philosophy

Sometimes it takes a random, unconnected experience to shed light on something you thought you already knew. Recently I read an interview with science writer Steven Johnson, author of the book Where Good Ideas Come From, and was struck by how his conclusions were in harmony with Thomas Power’s philosophy that we need to be
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Gap teaches us “community” is a reality that needs dealing with

If you follow business news you’ll have witnessed some interesting issues management by Gap of late. Whether you think what happened is right or wrong, there is I think a greater lesson for everyone in business today. That’s the fact that today a (relatively small) group of customers can make a big noise and derail
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Connie Bensen, yBC’s reporter at Blogworld

This month the big news in social media marketing is Blogworld, the world’s largest social media conference, and it’s happening in Las Vegas over the next few days. For the many people who can’t make the event, the good news is that yourBusinessChannel has got its very own insider and she’ll be keeping us posted with all
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yBC partners with Ecademy to spread digital mindset

If you haven’t yet heard about Ecademy’s Digital School, here’s hoping you soon will have. It’s the latest initiative from yourBusinessChannel’s close collaborators Thomas and Penny Power (founders of ecademy.com), who are making it their mission not just to spread the word about digital business, but to actively help people develop a digital mindset and
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yBC’s social media is still about selling

Hopefully I’m not the only one who’s at a loss about how to have an engaging, authentic, non-selling, non-interrupting conversation with someone that ultimately leads to a sale and therefore justifies the expenditure? That’s what comes from spending an hour reading too many social media blogs. It’s Catch 22 – must engage but can’t talk
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All social media is not created equal

If you follow the debate around social media, you’ll know there are a lot of gurus who argue passionately that “social” is the way to go. What intrigues me is the broad array of examples they use to make the case for “doing social media” – they are so diverse it’s comparable to advocating “doing
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Horses for courses

Recently we interviewed web marketing expert Jeff Molander. He has some strong views about “wasted” social media investment and over the course of the interview I realised why. Because he comes from a DM marketing background he expects actions to product measurable results. No wonder he thinks the advertising people who seek to engage via
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Alterian acquires Intrepid – share price goes up

Around 36 hours ago, our client Alterian Plc announced to the market that it had acquired Intrepid Inc (by the way, if you look at there homepage, I love that fish). In the meantime, there’s been plenty of buzz about the news on social networks, including of course Twitter and Facebook, as the news spread.
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Engagement through participation

Looking through the footage we shot at Alterian’s Engaging Times summit in Chicago, one thing is clear. Leading companies have rethought engagement and they’re a long way ahead of the pack. Instead of thinking about “engagement” in terms of “exposure to the marketing message”, either on a webpage, not unsubscribing to an email or being
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To me? With me? Or for me?

I have recently been in Chicago covering the Engaging Times event for Alterian. One of the highlights has been interviewing DM pioneer Stan Rapp. One thing about a guy who brings 60-odd years of direct marketing experience to social media, his ideas about engagement don’t lose track of the endgame – which is of course
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