It’s in October that you begin to feel the change in seasons. It’s now when we think through our summer to winter closet swap strategy. I hate to see summer go and you can bet I’ll be wearing my sandals until the snow flies! 

In autumn our thoughts turn to pumpkin spice lattes, Hallowe’en and the coming of winter. Autumn heralds the darkest part of the year. It’s also in October when you may begin to feel the effects of seasonal change.…

8 executives share their insights

The call for more diversity, the fight against inequality, it is not new. What we do see is that the debate is becoming more frequent and intense. In other words, more and more people want a more diverse and inclusive society. What do we see of this in the business world? Does it reflect these changes, or are there still steps to be taken? In honor of Netherlands Diversity Day, our Amsterdam team spoke with our clients around this topic to get their insights.…

The climate news is a bit depressing of late, isn’t it?

On the back of several high profile natural disasters – from record breaking temperatures and forest fires across North America and Europe this summer, to flooding in New York City and an earthquake in Haiti – it seems that there is no end to alarming news about the state of the planet and the necessity for us all to do our bit to help slow down global warming and prevent a climate catastrophe. …

Agency types are forever in a scramble to ‘differentiate’. In our eyes, there’s no cookie cutter, and our uniqueness is easily quantifiable & plain to see.

However, I often think Agencies are like goths or EMOs – all individually different from the surrounding pack, yet share common themes that reflect a genre. Of course, the truth is, that to everyone outside agencyland, we all look the same! PR, marketing, digital, content, measurement, performance, advertising, media…all nuanced bands of rockstars that clients would love to see playing in harmony!…

In 2017, Apple announced its intention to roll out Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP), which first rolled out in September that year. In doing so, Apple sent a clear message to big tech that changes needed to be made in the way that user data was used for the benefit of profit.

Since then, we’ve seen the rollout of GDPR (May 2018), CCPA (June 2018), ATT (April 2021), ePrivacy (regulation expected in 2021), and ETP (Firefox – Aug 2020), alongside many other privacy regulations in different jurisdictions, indicating that this space is somewhat of a moving target right now with frequent new developments.…

Not the most glass half-full title for a blog post from someone who’s made a career in an industry where part of the job is to persuade journalists to write about companies, I know, but hear me out. 

I have rarely met a client who was not passionate about their organization; to be an effective advocate, leader, or communicator, you have to love your company. And, you want others to see what you see, to get excited about the things that get your juices flowing.…

Insurance is a crazy concept, isn’t it? You ask someone to take on a risk that you’d rather not take on yourself. You transfer that risk elsewhere for a sum of money. Then you sleep soundly in the knowledge that you don’t need to worry about X or Y, because you’ve got it – literally and metaphorically – covered.

But at the same time, it’s not a purchase any of us want to make. Buying car, life or commercial insurance doesn’t spark joy.…

Let’s not kid ourselves, marketers are in the money business. The entire function exists to drive a greater profit for the organization. So, with a plethora of options out there, how do you achieve that goal?

The different types of marketing

Marketing (as a whole) may be split into two areas:

1. Sales activation

Focused on in-market customers, those ready to buy right now. Here we’re talking tactics like paid search, email or affiliate marketing, pretty much everything that falls under the “performance marketing” umbrella. …

I’ll start with an apology: “tactification” is jargon isn’t it? Sorry for that, but Mark Ritson’s invented word still seems the best way to capture an all too familiar approach in the PR and marketing world: skipping straight to the tactics.

The business problem is glazed over, the audience is based on assumptions and so the strategy becomes (something like) “let’s create some buzz!”; and where does that lead the activity? Marketers chase the bright, shiny new tactics like magpies.

Measure the vanity metrics (8billion people reached, 560,000 engagements!)…

A lot has happened in The Netherlands over the past couple of weeks. Several magazines announced they were going to shut down. And it wasn’t just the newbies that didn’t survive this very competitive market. Some of the magazines that shut down had been around for decades and played an important part in the lives of the adults that now read the news of their demise. Hitkrant, you will be missed!

What went wrong? What can we learn from this? In a radio interview with Marketing Report, I explained what communications professionals can learn from the downfall of magazines.…