Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}It’s not often that I share a “data gag” outside of my circle analyst friends, but I thought this was worth the effort! The title of this post comes from a Dilbert cartoon strip, which, whilst amusing, also made me think that remembering what data really is should be at the forefront of the [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}You’ve no doubt seen the little brown boxes packed with healthy nibbles being delivered to colleagues around your office from graze.com. When I saw a free box offer code on a friend’s Twitter stream, I thought I’d give it a try. On clicking through and signing up on the very easy to use site, [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}However engaging your email programme is, there will always be a proportion of people who no longer want to hear from you. I think that it is vitally important that you maintain a dialogue with your customers/subscribers for as long as possible, i.e. up until the final moment they leave you. Much in the [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}If the recent Borrell Associates report is to be believed, then “Direct mail has begun spiralling into what we believe is a precipitous decline from which it will never fully recover.” OK, we’re all familiar with email’s benefits over direct mail…cheaper, quicker, easier to measure, greener, etc. However, before we write off direct mail [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}Having spent more time than is healthy thinking about how much or how little data is the "right" amount to collect, here are my tips on how to gauge what is right for you. 1. Why am I collecting data in the first place? Consider what you are going to do with the data [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}Once again, my inbox is inundated with marketing messages from various top-named brands using 3rd party email databases.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against 3rd party email lists, in fact I use them frequently in order to recruit new customers, sometimes successfully, sometimes less so.  The question I want to address is that [...]

Tweet{lang: ‘en-GB’}Over the past week or so, I have received several marketing emails from very reputable major brands that are seriously missing the mark as far as Best Practice is concerned.  I have two gripes, the first being use of dubious email sources that the end user may or may not be aware of, the [...]