Author: Eric M.

Great Marketing: Getting Sold.. and Liking It

Marketing really interests me. For two quarters in college, I prepared a thesis on marketing in the form of a case study. I found it pretty fascinating; it’s really a study on human tendency and what moves people to buy.

One thing that I find even more impressive in marketing is how it works on ME. I get this odd sense of enjoyment when I see that a company’s marketing has worked on me, when they’ve suckered me in to buying, upgrading or subscribing to their product. I stop and think “well you know what, good for them! They marketed to me and they won.” I can think of a few specific examples of this.

Buzzer-Beater Hiring

It’s the finals. The game has been close. Your team is two points down and there are only 1.8 seconds left on the shot clock. The win is so close you can taste it.

You’ve set what you know is a solid play for your team. You’ve discussed it thoroughly by this point and you know Smith is going to get the ball and take a quick 3 point shot. Your player prepares to inbound the ball, an opponent wildly flailing his arms to distract the pass.

He passes it in to Smith.

1.7, 1.6, 1.5…

Is the Customer Really Always Right?

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT’S NOT READY YET?!”

“Sir, again, I’m so sorry about that. It seems like…”

“I HAVE TO GET BACK TO A MEETING AND NOW I’M LATE!”

He had a right to be perturbed. He’d placed a large order for an office lunch online, but there was a glitch in the system that had us scrambling to get his food ready with short notice.

I got right in there with the staff, to make sure this man’s food got to him as soon as possible. But I wanted to do more than just that. I wanted to go above and beyond to make him feel happy.

Read More

Challenging Myself with Travel, Part 3: Getting Exotic

I would also not attach the term exotic to most of the places I’ve traveled to. But that definitely changed my trip to Japan and Thailand a few months ago, most especially the latter. Between booking our trip and taking off for it were only three months. The anticipation began to quickly build from the moment three good friends and I got our plane tickets confirmed.