From Obsolete Commodity to Status Symbol

Old fashioned wood and graphite pencils were once how we all wrote, but hit their popularity peak decades ago. They are high maintenance - as soon as you start using a sharpened pencil, its point begins to dull and the thickness of the…

How to Write Taglines That Double Sales

Two Customer Types Taglines for products and brands are everywhere, but often they don't get the attention they deserve. A variety of research shows that one phrase slogans can have a profound effect on how customers see the product.…

The Best of Neuromarketing – 2011

Once again, it's time for the "Readers' Choice" Neuromarketing picks for the year. These posts aren't my own choices, but are selected because they garnered the most traffic from tweets, Facebook shares, Stumbleupon clicks, and so on.…

Nine Words Nearly Double Results

A few years after college, I took a position as a sales engineer. After one customer visit with no result, my boss queried, "Did you ask for the order?" In fact, just about every sales coaching book reminds new salespeople of the…

Social Media Tops TV

Could social media ads, or at least ads on Facebook, outperform similar ads on television? It seems the answer is "yes." That surprising outcome was reported in the same study that showed ads on the social media giant being more…

Got a Good Story Ad?

Last week my post at Copyblogger, How to Write Weapons Grade Copy, focused on the power of stories to hold the attention of a customer. Here's a heartwarming ad from the UK department store John Lewis that shows how even a rather long…