What Are Your Rules Designed To Do?

It’s never a good sign when a flight doesn’t board on time. When the ground staff make announcements about ‘engineering faults’ and begin handing out meal vouchers you know you’re in trouble. And so it went last month for flight 029 to Hong Kong. Three hours after the first announcement the flight was cancelled, leaving…

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What To Question

The comedian doesn’t think about how he to be funnier, he tries to understand what makes people laugh and why. The shoe designer doesn’t simply consider what will look good, she obsesses over what will make a woman feel good. The architect doesn’t just consider the orientation of the building, he cares about how people…

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Double Your Business

Greg opened his diary and booked the new client in. It was a small electrical job, hardly worth going out of his way for the call out fee of $120—the kind of job that most of his competitors wouldn’t have dreamed of booking this close to Christmas when everyone wanted everything yesterday. He turned up…

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The Right Thing To Do

Joe was in a real fix. The equipment he’d been scheduled to hire from the builder’s supplier had accidentally been hired to another customer, there wasn’t an alternative machine available for a month. Joe needed to do something fast, if he didn’t the job he was working on would be behind time by weeks and…

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The Value Of Unknowns

Will the new product launch be successful? Is this really what customers want? Will the digital marketing initiative drive enough sales? Is this the right person to hire? Will the redesign improve engagement? Is the timing perfect? The truth is that we can’t know for sure. That doesn’t stop us trying to act as if…

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Design For The Outcome You Want

Susan is the VP of Sales at a large company. She’s more than a little frustrated that her sales team keep selling legacy products to customers and don’t make the effort to introduce new product lines to them instead. Of course it’s easier for the sales guy to earn his bonus by filling repeat orders…

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The Long Way Round

In most situations if there’s a shortcut we’re tempted to take it. It’s human nature to conserve energy and take the most efficient route from point A to point B. This makes the business of selling hard, because we are naturally impatient to see signs of success and to avoid nagging doubts about the fear…

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What Your Marketing Needs More Of

Think of a person you love to be around, someone you have rich and satisfying conversations with. It’s likely your conversations are a two-way exchange including acknowledgement, pauses and even moments of silence. Compare that to how we market to customers. We know that the best conversations make room for both parties. Traditional marketing conditioned…

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Where’s Your Magic?

The long Sunday morning croissant line at Lune moves slowly and never gets any shorter. Not a single person in the queue complains or shoots a frustrated glance at the time that is clearly slipping by. The servers work slowly, carefully boxing each pastry as if it were made of porcelain. All the while the…

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Good To Do Vs. Right To Do

The brand new billboard spanned the four lanes of the freeway that led to the airport. The location was obviously a strategic move, given that the company being advertised was in the travel business. The gorgeous image of a lone traveller in the wilderness had likely been painstakingly chosen by the marketing department in consultation…

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