Contributed by Bryce Ward When trying to better understand the nature of advertising, it helps to refer to its Latin origin. “Advertise” can be traced back to the Latin verb, advertere, meaning literally “to turn toward.” Simply put, then, the goal of advertising is to “turn heads,” specifically in the direction of your product or service. And it isn’t enough to have people only glance your way either – the goal of advertising is not only to have them turn their heads but to have them walk in your direction, also. In order to accomplish this, you have to understand…

Contributed by Bryce Ward In 1956 Wendell R. Smith published a groundbreaking article on marketing strategies called “Product Differentiation and Market Segmentation as Alternative Marketing Strategies.” The title is intimidating, but the content is much easier to grasp, and Smith’s ideas are becoming increasingly relevant in our current marketing landscape. Smith wrote his article in a time when mass production was dominating the economy – Henry Ford had introduced the first moving assembly line just 43 years before – and business owners struggled to differentiate themselves from competition (a struggle that still exists today). Their solution, which was far from…

Contributed by Bryce Ward It’s no secret: American love coffee. Coffee not only helps us shake the morning glaze out of our eyes, it helps us stay productive throughout the day even when we start becoming mentally and/or physically fatigued. Whether you’re a CEO or an intern, the next great novelist or a blog writer, coffee can help you bump up your productivity to the next level. But is it the only way? Medical experts agree that a reasonable amount of caffeine can be beneficial not just for your mental alertness but even for your overall health. However, you can…

Contributed by Bryce Ward The term “marketing” still brings to many people’s minds things like door-to-door sales, billboard advertisements, and high-school students spinning cardboard arrows in the general direction of some pizza shop, but these traditional marketing strategies have been becoming increasingly less relevant in recent years as companies are stampeding towards digital content marketing. A main reason why: content marketing can be personalized to a degree that traditional marketing cannot always match. For example, instead of hiring a teenager to spin a cardboard sign on the side of a busy road in hopes of attracting a hungry customer on…

Contributed by Bryce Ward Think Outside Away from the Box Whether you’re trying to better market your own company or someone else’s, one thing is certain: marketing relies upon creativity – without creativity, there can be no growth in a company. We are told that some people are inherently more creative-minded than others, and that is true to some extent, but everyone, regardless of their personality type, struggles intermittently with their creative endeavors. Much like the renowned “writer’s block,” efforts to increase creativity suffer from less than ideal approaches. There are a multitude of things we can do that may…