Mobile Marketing : A New Channel

As print or interactive marketing mediums continue to grow and evolve, a new channel arrived in 2003, mobile phones.  Mobile marketing is the use of cell phones and other mobile devices to market a brand or message.  As businesses see an opportunity to reach their target audience, mobile marketing is starting to play a crucial role in an integrated marketing strategy. Mobile marketing is commonly used in order to generate customer opt-in databases, increase brand awareness, and drive attendance to specific events and locations. There are barriers to creating an effective mobile campaigns, including wireless carriers’ individual policies, privacy issues, and the slow growing rate of adoption of smartphones in the U.S.

5 Creative Uses of QR Codes

Here are a couple examples of how businesses have used QR codes in their marketing campaigns.  The first example, Hidden Sounds, from Leo Burnett was designed to promote alternative music label Zoo Records in Hong Kong. The marketing campaign carefully place visuals of a variety of animals, composed of download QR codes, that street walkers could take cell phone pictures of the animals and stream new music to their mobile devices instantly. This campaign resulted in sold out records, extreme street credit for Zoo Records, and the widespread dispersal of an underground sound.

1. Public Art – Zoo Records “Hidden Sound”

2. Temporary Tattoos          3. Stamps           4. Scavenger Hunts             5. Restaurant Glasses

QR Codes Tips & Tricks

• When creating a mobile marketing campaign, remember that there are enormous variety of mobile phone screen sizes and memory limitations. Strive to create original content best suited to a mobile device. If the code is part of a specific marketing campaign, send viewers directly to the content they will expect based on the campaign’s call to action. Shape the path.

• QR codes are great tools in driving customers to interact with your marketing content, but just that — a tool. Don’t get mixed up with utilizing creative tools with creating an entire marketing campaigns around them. QR codes aren’t the end all to marketing campaigns. Like social media, marketers should use these tools because they are effective, not because they are cool.

• Use the QR code to achieve a specific marketing goal and make it worth viewers’ time to decode it. Similar to increasing “Likes” Facebook Fan Page, offer incentives to viewers like promotions, discounts, and sweepstakes.  Even sparking smartphone users’ curiosity can get them to use QR codes.

• Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Give your audience multiple paths by adding another response mechanism.

•  Educate the public. Since only 50% might have smartphones, include instructions to use the code.

What is your favorite QR Code Campaign?

The Heath brothers are known to drill their points with sticky stories. Go figure. But I want to highlight their main points and framework that can create change in organizations, your personal life, or even the world. So let’s dig into the key concept that the book is based around. Humans have two systems that are constantly working independently from each other. We have a emotional side and rational side. The emotional side is what I call your gut feelings that feels pleasure and pain. A persons’ intuitive instinct. Your rational side is a persons’ conscience system that analyzes situations. We need both to make good decisions.  See my pervious blog post on Gut Feelings Vs. Wikinomics Mashup: The New Traditional Way of Business for more information on why we need both. Below is a list of surprises that people normally misunderstand about change. Don’t forget to check Dan Heath’s podcast Switch For Marketers.

3 Surprises About Change

1. To change someone’s behavior, you’ve got to change their situation.  You’ve got to influence not only their environment but also their hearts and minds.

Switch uses Jonathan Haidts’ analogy of the Elephant and the Rider extracted from his book, The Happiness Hypothesis.  Our emotional side is the Elephant and our rational side is the Rider.  Heath brothers continued in writing,

Perched atop the Elephant, the Rider holds the reins and seems to be the leader. But the Rider’s control is precarious because the Rider is so small relative to the Elephant. Anytime the six-ton Elephant and the Rider disagree about which direction to go, the Rider is going to lose. He’s completely overmatched.

If the Rider and Elephant disagree, then we have a problem. Even though the Rider can temporarily get the Elephant to submit by tugging on the reins, similar to a person’s willpower, the Rider will eventually exhausted.

Self-control is an exhaustible resource.

If people exhaust their self-control then they are exhausting the mental muscles needed to think creatively and continue when frustrated or fail. These are same mental muscle a person needs to make a big change. Change is hard because people wear themselves out, not because they are lazy.

2. What looks like laziness is often exhaustion.

Of course if the Elephant isn’t motivated to change, then change isn’t going happen.  But the Rider also has to be sure in what direction to steer the Elephant or he will just lead him in circles.

3. What looks like resistance is often a lack of clarity.

Knowing these three surprises of change can help tackle the switch you want to make in your life, business, or society. From a marketer point-of-view, we might want to change customers’ attitude of your company and buying habits. Below is the basic three-part framework the Heath brothers expand on throughout their book. You can also download a more detailed outline copy in PDF format here. I suggest read the first chapter or if your in rush, listen to this great podcast below. Enjoy!

Switch For Marketers Podcast by Dan Heath

Direct the Rider. What looks like resistance is often a lack of clarity. So provide a crystal-clear direction (Think 1% milk).

Motivate the Elephant. What looks like laziness is often exhaustion. The Rider can’t get his way by force for very long. So it’s crucial that you engage a persons’ emotional side —get their Elephant on the path and cooperative (Think of the boardroom conference table full of gloves).

Shape the Path. What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem. We call the situation (including the surrounding environment) the “Path.” When you shape the Path, you make change more likely, no matter what’s happening with the Rider and Elephant (Think of the effect of shrinking movie popcorn buckets).

I hope this blog post didn’t come off as a huge plug for this book but inspired you to start thinking about what changes you need to make in your life. What changes have you made?

Related Articles

• Heath, Chip and Dan: Switch (book-blog.com)
• How a big push and a little help can convince people to change (robcottingham.ca)
• How to Change Your Life (friendlyanarchist.com)
• How to Create a Culture Overhaul (ducttapemarketing.com)
• Don’t Reinvent the Wheel, Duplicate Success (ascpa.wordpress.com)

Branding. Every company seems to be going through a rebranding campaign. Marketing specialists can’t stop talking about brand.  I don’t want to add the plethora of inaccurate information or participate in spreading these murky perceptions of brand. I’m here to set it right. Companies that have a true grasp of brand and its positioning can embedded these key concepts into their marketing communication strategies. If implemented correctly, it can become what the women at Warschawski call a “Rinse. Wash. And Repeat” cycle.  It becomes a virtuous cycle, building brand strength over and over.

Brand Is Not Your Tagline And Brand Is Not Your Logo

This should have been tattooed on my forehead while at Warschawski. Taglines and logos are important supporting elements of your brand. Brand is the basic emotional experience that you want consumers to have each time they come in contact with your company, product, or service. Let’s take a look at service, specifically customer service. Excellent customer service is rare. Our daily encounter with businesses as customers is usually mediocre or poor. Excellent service is exceeding the customers’ expectations and giving them an experience of a lifetime. Companies are giving control to customers by creating dialogue via social media platforms. Scott Stratten, President of Un-Marketing, says,

Everyone is a marketer and everyone is marketing.

But no one talks about “meh” customer service.  By giving them an experience (or a story), customers are inclined to share their pleasant encounter with others. Remember stories are sticky. See my previous blog post Sticky Ideas Brings SUCCESS: Creating Unforgettable Advertisement Ideas that Stick for more sticky ideas.

Know. Like. Trust.

Customers believe information from people that they know, like, and trust.  By spreading their story, others might be more likely to try the company’s services for themselves. Make a mistake and there can be a brand disconnect. Your loyal customers might forgive you the first time, but companies should act as if every interaction is a first encounter. Like a first date, first impressions are crucial how people perceive your company, service, or product. However, even with the increase of companies leveraging social media as part of their integrated marketing communications campaign, the average person doesn’t believe news from social media platforms compared to other means of newsgathering mediums.

Above is a chart from Edelman’s 2011 Trust Barometer^®, the annual survey that gauges attitudes about the state of trust in business, government, NGOs and media across 23 countries. If we look closer at the numbers above, social media only accounts for 5% of first new source. Watch the short video overview on the key findings from the President and CEO, Richard Edelman.

Steve Rebul, Director of Insight at Digital Edelman, highlights an important point in the video below dealing with brand. Search engines are no longer just search engines but reputation engines.

Whether passionate customers, bloggers, or creditable media outlets establish your brand reputation, well-planned marketing communications campaigns have what I call by-product PR opportunities. These built-in public relations campaigns complement your marketing program and even further reinforce your brand in online or traditional print publications.

Rinse. Wash. And Repeat.

You have established your brand, developed a marketing program (that consistent with your brand values), and have a strong built-in public relations campaigns so now just Rinse. Wash. And Repeat. and watch your brand strength grow.

What is your favorite campaign that has illustrated the “Rinse. Wash. And Repeat” brand cycle?

Objectives. Objectives. Objectives.

We have seen companies jump into social media marketing because it’s THE THING. It’s not pretty.  But it’s time to start doing social media because it’s effective, not because it’s cool. Your objectives should determine what technologies to use to accomplish your marketing goals, not vice versa.

My college professor, Dr. John Guiniven, warned his students not to jump the tactics/tools (social media) before determining their specific marketing and communication objectives. We seem to get too excited that social media is a cure-all to our marketing and communication problems. Above is the Forrester’s Four Step Approach to the Social Strategy. It’s a simple yet genius POST acronym that will help get you back on track.

ROI or ROO?

Financial metrics are just one way to evaluate social marketing programs. Social media can bring a variety of advantages to organizations, both for short and long-term success. To accurately asses the impact of their social media marketing efforts, marketers must align their objectives, metrics, targets, and strategies with a “balanced scorecard“.

A balance scorecard brings other perspectives into focus, not solely measured on financial metrics.  Dr. Robert S. Kaplan and Dr. David P. Norton’s, The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action, is a wonderful book that explains that an effective social media marketing balanced scorecard considers metrics from four different perspectives:

• Financial: Has revenue or profit increased or costs decreased?
• Digital: Has the company enhanced its owned and earned digital assets?
• Brand: Have consumer attitudes about the brand improved?
• Risk Management: Is the organization better prepared to note and respond to attacks or problems that affect reputation?

I recently read an analogy that said direct marketing is like getting the consumer wet by directing a hose and spraying water on him or her; brand marketing is a fog that constantly envelopes the consumer and gets them damp over time. You can measure the water coming out of a hose, but how do you measure fog? To properly assess your social media marketing programs, other perspectives must be accounted for when determining short and long-term success.

Now, think about the potential success when you have a clear understanding of what your company brand is from the beginning. Talk about powerful marketing. I will go a little deeper in branding in a PR stand point in my next post. Until then, take care.

Related Articles

• The Power Of Real Time Social Media Marketing (piercemattiepublicrelations.com)
• Social Media Marketing is Failing (marketingtechblog.com)
• Forrester Report Offers Analyst Look at Social Media ROI (socialmediaexplorer.com)
• Is Social Media Marketing Effective?! Small Business Owners Give Us Insight… (dustinlsmith.com)
• ROI and FRY on Social Media (flatworldbusiness.wordpress.com)

After an amazing and intense internship at Warschawski, I am BACK. But before I dive back into my marketing and PR posts, I wanted to share my great experience that helped me mature my marketing and PR skills.

A Little Background Info

Warschawski is a full service branding, PR, marketing, advertising and interactive agency in Baltimore, Maryland. It was named “U.S. Small Agency of the Year” four of the past five years and has won over 200 marketing communications awards in the last ten years. I was lucky enough to work for an agency that has been ranked one of the “20 Best U.S. Agencies to Work For” the last nine years in a row. With such an impressive track record, I knew there were high expectations joining a team of rock stars.

The W Experience

Right off the bat, I knew that every Warschawski team member was a BRAND expert and had clearly mastered the art marketing and public relations. The guru that trained his army to become these brand warriors was the main man himself, Mr. David Warschawski.

David is the simply the real deal. I recently was able to attend one of his seminars on how to successfully use social media in an integrated marketing communications strategy to help companies achieve their business goals and reinforce their brand. I will be expanding on some of the basic ideas in future posts. Stay Tuned!

Mission: Grow.

While interning at Warschawski as an Assistant Associate (AA), I played an important role working on client accounts, learned how and why strategic decisions are made, and actively participated in brainstorming sessions for clients. I worked on a variety of accounts, ranging from a tree top adventure company to a luxury high-end mattress company. One advantage of working at the W, I was able to get the experience and expertise of a large firm but have the personalized mentorship of a boutique agency.

My main focus during the AA program was to develop my media relation skills. DONE AND DONE. I was able to generate news and obtain media coverage that increased name recognition, credibility, and visibility for clients. While at the W, I established strong working relationships with key editors, producers, and reporters. I will be posting links to these placements in the near future.

When I wasn’t pitching to different media outlets, I was learning how to create communication campaigns that brings clarity to a company’s brand.  These integrated campaigns combine marketing strategies with PR, advertising, and creative and interactive design. Warschawski’s brand-centric and business goal-oriented model, BrandMaPR© (pronounced brand-mapper), helped me understand how companies can positively impact their bottom line and ultimately move their target audience to action. I’m only scratching the surface of an extremely intricate process. Visit W’s website for more information on their BrandMaPR© model.

So Was It Worth it?

Absolutely. Even though traffic was horrible at times (particularly my eight-hour commute during a snow storm), my experience at Warschawski was worth every minute. It was worth the average 3.75-hour commute each day, the $100 dollar gas bill each week, and the 2,480 miles I put on my car each month traveling.  Yes. I’m crazy… crazy about Warschawski. Thank you to everyone at the W. I will miss you all.

Related Articles

• PR By Another Name: Public Relations and the “New” Competition (crenshawcomm.com)
• What Marketers Don’t Know About PR (crenshawcomm.com)
• Is Integrated Marketing Achievable in Social Media? (relationship-economy.com)

ENTER CONTEST!

Search for contest in fields that you have interest. One part of marketing I love is designing and branding. I recently stumbled upon a website called 99designs. Similar to Groupon’s crowd-sourcing platform that I mentioned in Groupon: Bringing Deals and Business? post, 99designs is a site where designers can enter contest win clients accounts. Once the deadline is up, the company that posted the contest picks their favorite design. With more designs, the company has a better chance in finding a design that fits their needs.  We are all competing for a chance to be a rockstar. Sometimes designers just need a shot. With 99designs, it guarantees your design work will be seen. Watch this video below to see how the company XL Media logo contest brought him the perfect design.

The best part is the private feedback you get back from the company. As one project ends, another begins. So if you’re trying to have a constant To Do List, sign up for a contest and get busy. I’m starting to enter tomorrow! Now it’s your chance to shine.

Interested? Another site that you might want to check out:

• crowdspring.com

Related Articles

• 99designs’ GAP Logo Community Contest (pamil-visions.net)
• 99designs.com Auctions Webby Award Speech to Raise Money for Oil Spill Relief (eon.businesswire.com)
• Crowdsourcing, not Crowding Our Market (prweb.com)
• Using Crowd Sourcing Tools to Solve Problems (questionpro.com)

Email:

Create an email signature. Have your brand incorporated into to signature so people can immediately associate you with your work. Show off your personal logo at the bottom followed by all the ways to stay connected: Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, blog, Flicker, or YouTube channel, ect. Don’t forget the basics. Include your name, tag-line or job title, your work mailing address (optional), email, and phone number. I tried using WiseStamp and failed. Many people are successful.

It must have been me.

So I created my own using a great site Social Media Icons for your Email Signatures where it gives all online icons and a web address to easily insert icon with a Gmail account (and I’m guessing other email servers). To insert an image you just put in the URL of each icon when you click the image button. Then link each image to the the right website. Example: Twitter icon to your Twitter home page. Easy right?  I recommend using 16X16 pixel images if for some reason the site doesn’t have your social networking icon. This was the case for my online portfolio network, Behance.  Here is my email signature.

Simple and sleek. And that’s just what you want. Having an email signature is a blessing for those looking at your work. Instead of searching and digging for your information, they know they have it all right there in one place. For most hiring managers and HR employees, it’s all about convenience.  Let’s make it easy for them. Not to mention, email signatures have more of a professional look. This can potentially transfer over to more followers, phone calls, and connections.

Put it this way, it won’t hurt your brand.

What’s the coolest email signature you’ve seen? I want to know.

Related Articles

• WiseStamp Puts a More Personal Signature on E-mail (xconomy.com)
• 6 Tips To Get More Out Of Signatures in Gmail (makeuseof.com)

SIMPLE

Being simple is about getting down to the core idea and finding that core idea. The authors use a great example by the Commander’s Intent (CI) that lets the extreme detailed plans of foot soldiers not to forget the basic mission assigned, do what’s necessary to complete the mission.  When we learn to prioritize our ideas to the essential core idea, it leaves a clear focus and objective to accomplish.

The short story of “Names, Names, Names” is another great example of how a newspaper has found its core belief. Their focus was on amount of local names the newspaper to increase circulation. People loved seeing the names of people they know and their own name inside the newspaper. Therefore, Dun North Carolina newspaper has pushed for local names ever since they discovered this sticky idea, becoming the leader for readership with 112 percent. SO think SIMPLE and get to the core idea.

UNEXPECTED

To get people to remember an event or idea, people need to be disrupted from their normal schema. For Example, a flight attendant making quick unexpected joke about the disco lights on the floor to exit the plane will catch everyone’s attention because it’s not a part of the normal routine. Another way to grab and hold persons’ attention is by surprise. The Buckle Up…Always commercial by the Ad council is sticky because it shows how to disrupt the normal schema about driving safety in neighborhoods. When a car comes flying into the side of the minivan AND BOOM! It highlights the idea that accidents can happen everywhere, even in your quiet neighborhood. This shocking event makes us remember to always buckle up. The commercial was successful in sending its message. UNEXPECTED, got it?

CONCRETE

Sticky ideas are concrete. I remember learning addition and subtraction math problems by using concrete images like apples. This has been the success story for Japan in why their students are more advanced in mathematics.  The Nature Conservancy, or TNC, has also caught on in using sticky ideas in their environment project to save land. Their goal was to save two million acres. WOW, that’s a lot of land, specially to most public and private businesses wanting to help conserve the rare land by donating money. So they began to split this idea in tangible and reachable goals so they didn’t overwhelm businesses. They redesign their goals into a more realistic look in saving acreage in terms called landscapes. The new objective was to save five landscapes. Eventually over time, TNC protected all two million acres of land. Landscapes were the new type of measurement that allowed TNC to be successful in accomplishing their goals.

Concrete ideas can also work in explaining complex ideas like racial discrimination to elementary school students. By breaking down abstract ideas like  racial discrimination and transforming them into concrete idea like blue-eyed brown-eyed kids activities,  children can make better sense of the information.

CREDIBLE

Today, everyone wants proof to know if products work. To make people believe in your idea, it must be credible. Two scientists, Warren and Marshall experience this first hand in their discovery that bacteria caused ulcers in the stomach. A simple action of taking antibiotics and bismuth would cure the pain but that was not enough to make the medical world believe. Being interns in training, their credible wasn’t established.

Winning the credibility of others is a fight against personal learning and social relationships that have been crafts over years of life experiences.

It takes great amount work to persuade a person with a new message. Celebrities that match our own morals are great sources of credibility, like Oprah and her book club. Once Oprah has your novel on her list, it’s a bestseller a week later. People idolize Oprah and respect her decisions. Her fans naturally think “If Oprah likes it, I must like it too.”

EMOTIONAL

Sticky ideas play on our emotions. We are human and hate to see others struggle. Most charities you see on TV focus on one personal story, usually a cute malnourished girl. We have all seen her cute face. We are more likely to make that idea stick to help out the little girl when they play on own human emotions. Again, being overwhelmed by the scale of the problem might make a person feel their contribution is meaningless. But if you tap into just one individual story, it gives hope us the idea that one person can affect other people’s lives.

The Philip Morris’ anti-smoking advertisements started the Truth campaign.

These commercials were stuck in our mind because they were emotional (and concrete). Instead of acting rebellious against The Man by smoking, Truth campaign made tobacco companies the new Man. Advertisers associated emotions that already existed and transferred them on the tobacco companies.

STORIES

Everyone likes a good story. They can either motivate us to act or provide knowledge about how to act. But the bottom line is stories make people act and can transfer messages through entertainment. Instead of using a dry email to send message about a copier error, people could tell the story of the Xerox repairman and mystery code that led two men on a wild goose chase around the office…Weird but within the story holds the message.

People want to be entertained NOT giving instructions. Stories are successful because they subtly transfer a message in an entertaining way.

Sticky ideas = S.U.C.C.E.S.S. Advertisers can have a long effective frequency of viewers by using these sticky suggestions. Ideas should have a primary focus and simple core. Get rid of all the non-essentials. Ideas should break out of own normal schemas for idea to be more memorable. Ideas should be concrete and in context that people can understand. Ideas have to be from a trusting source. Credibility is crucial in persuading people of your message. Ideas must make people care. Emotional ideas are effective because they make us feel and want to act. Finally, stories make us informed and take action while still being entertained. The message is not lost in the story but is highlighted through the interesting account.

What is your favorite sticky idea you know?

For more sticky ideas, visit heathbrothers.com

Related Articles

• Social Media Promotion: It’s About ‘Stickiness’ (socialtimes.com)
• Change Agents: Are You Sticky? (time.com)
• Concrete: You Can Walk Around On It (highcallingblogs.com)
• Ensure People Remember Your Ideas with SUCCESs [Communication] (lifehacker.com)
• How To Make Sure People Will Remember Your Ideas (zacharyburt.com)

This new “internet time” has companies on edge. Let’s go back to Twitter, the microblogging site that allows users to send and receive 140-character-long messages services from their phones. I finally gave in to the spreading Twitter epidemic and opened an account (my only hesitation was I didn’t have a Smartphone. I know, soo 2002.). I started following Oakley, one of my favorite brands. I looked down at past entries and Oakley had responded in real-time to complaining Twitter users but more importantly, to complaining customers. Below you can see the complaints on the left and Oakley’s responds on the right.

Speed becomes not only a competitive advantage but also a strategic necessity. The more quickly businesses can adjust to customers’ actions and desires––the more quickly they can learn from them and try to stay ahead of them–– the better business will be.

Jeff Jarvis is spot on and Oakley is the perfect example. Mobs can form in a flash and so can fans. While most companies and individuals use Twitter as an extension of their brand, some still haven’t quite nailed how to use Twitter. Ad Maverick, Josh Fleming explains the Top Ten Reasons You #Fail At Twitter. Don’t worry, I’m still working out the kinks but learning google-fast. The internet has caused us to lose control many things: brands, reviews, secrets, relationships with advertisers, price settings, and now TIME.

Pressure to respond is higher than ever. Companies feel the need to give information out to the demanding public in a seconds notice.  I see no problem with this as long as the quality of fact-checking doesn’t  decrease.  Bogus speedy responses like BP’s junk shot technique to clog the oil leak with a golf ball, rubber particles, and hair… then I think Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., chairman of the House energy committee investigating the oil spill, said it perfectly to CBS’s Meet the Press interview,

I have no confidence whatsoever in BP. I think that they do not know what they are doing. They started off talking about golf balls going in as a junk shot. People thought they would be dependent on MIT or Cal Tech instead of the PGA and golf balls…

Key word in Rep. Ed Markey quote, no confidence. I hope we all just breathe, think and then respond. Even if the clock is ticking.

Related Articles

• Google Instant Prevails Over Regular Google in Reader Vote (mashable.com)

Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter.

In other words, information should be available to all, both that are true and false. When you have a marketplace of ideas then the truth will survive. The truth will surface. Information has become democratized. There have been several instances where companies have not told the truth.  We can forgive those who don’t know but what about the companies that do know they are lying? Companies like BP that underestimated the amount of oil leaking into the Gulf. In a New York Times article, BP downplayed the catastrophic results to a measly 5,000 barrels a day, which turned out to be four to five times that amount…Opps. The press conference and immediate press release follow these events. It’s not the mistake that matters but what you do about it. For some it’s a little too late. They have been “Black Listed”.

The Least Transparent Companies:

• Abercrombie & Fitch
• Lorillard
• Scripps Networks Interactive
• Weight Watchers
• Central European Media Enterprises

The Most Transparent Companies:

• Hewlett-Packard
• Intel
• General Mills
• I.B.M
• Kimberly-Clark

This isn’t a corporate Red Scare but recognizing those who use transparency. We should give thanks to those companies that allow the public to know their business practices, business decisions, and factors that go into making those business decisions. Let us remember, “truth is both arms and armor”.  Transparency can increase brand identity and create brand personality. It can even increase return of shareholder value.

Growing up in this post-media generation, we expect honesty and directness. And we respect those who speak with truth and bluntness. Companies can’t spin their way out of trouble, especially not today with the Google monster growing stronger and stronger. It will eventually get you and when it does, POOF. There goes years of trust and brand loyalty. There is a barcode for each story stored in today’s digital library, the internet. That barcode is a link. A permalink, permanently available for all of us to see. Truth is just one Google search away.

Jeff Jarvis wrote in What Would Google Do?,

“Companies shouldn’t be democracies. But neither should they be dictatorships. They should be ––but too rarely are ––meritocracies. Your challenge is to get good ideas to surface and survive from within and without and to enable customers and employees to improve your ideas and products.

Transparency is cool. Transparency is smart.  What is your favorite transparent company?

Related Articles

• Transparency (xconomy.com)
• The inevitability of transparency (elearnspace.org)
• The age of transparency (twingly.com)
• The myth of corporate transparency (economist.com)