It’s both hard and easy to believe that the sentiment “Digital will become the core” still attracts a lot of attention in 2020. It’s hard to believe: Isn’t that the pivot we have all been making for more than twenty years? But it’s easy to believe when we experience interactions with enterprise companies that are …
Digital goes horizontal: challenges in the cultural sector
As educational and cultural institutions fight for relevance in an attention economy against a backdrop of an increasingly distrustful environment, taking digital horizontal is a C-suite imperative.
Friday 5 — 3.10.2017
Luxury brands have not been early internet adopters — I can recall 1999 meetings with Neiman Marcus execs highly skeptical of the taint of technology. Today, brands are online en masse. Some craft a unique approach to user experience, while others contemplate direct sales via WhatsApp. There’s been endless analysis of the Snap IPO and its non-voting shares this past week. …
Friday 5 — 2.24.2017
Amazon celebrated Alexa reaching 10,000 skills with a new musical game called Beat the Intro. The fast rise of Alexa skills invokes the inevitable comparison to Apple’s app store, and with it the associated growing pains of discovery. Is that really Michael Flynn on Twitter? Before you retweet or reply, take these steps to determine if a Twitter account is legit. How do leaders make the …
Friday 5 — 12.2.2016
Thanks to the 200+ readers who filled in the survey. Great feedback on areas of digital to cover, and I am equally impressed that the most common write-in entry was for NYC food and drink recommendations — see below. Your experience of email is starting to look a lot like your experience of the web. Animation and …
Friday 5 — 7.22.2016
Keeping up this weekly newsletter relies heavily on a single Chrome extension, Pocket. Throughout the week, I use the productivity tool to capture the interesting articles that fly by and read through them all on Thursday evening. Product Hunt promises that these seven Chrome extensions will similarly change your internet life. AI is coming to marketing through capabilities as diverse as website design, …
Friday 5 — 1.29.2016
Snapchat is targeting users over 35, but it’s not the most intuitive interface for people familiar with platforms like Facebook on a desktop. Now the service is making it easier for users to find one another with the ability to share your user name. Need more of a primer? The Wall Street Journal explains everything you ever …
Friday 5 — 11.20.2015
Google just made a big improvement to finding in-app content on mobile. On Android devices, Google will now launch the app if you have it installed, or stream the content to you if you don’t. This is an important step forward in a world where 50% of all online time — not just mobile time — is spent in-app. …
How Budweiser won the Nobel Prize in chemistry
It’s easy to spot the difference between an organization with digital DNA and an organization still making the transition. Here’s an example highlighting different approaches to breaking news. On Monday morning the Nobel Prize in chemistry was announced. The Wall Street Journal was pushing the story via multiple Twitter accounts. So I clicked on one …
Friday 5 — 9.11.2015
If you’re thinking about mobile as just another line item in your overall internet strategy, Benedict Evans will set you straight. Some company cultures are more conducive to digital transformation, while others hinder progress. This HBR post discusses the risks of excessive focus on technology, and the benefits of distributed decision-making. Your digital footprint — gleaned …