Blog

Behavioral Economics

I have been reading a lot of books recently on how people behave, and how marketers can and do take advantage of these predictable behaviors. The first question to go through my mind, "Is this ethical?"Definitely not when the target audience is kids. Both...

Two New Articles on the Demise of Newspapers and on Getting onto Facebook

In the shameless self-promotion category, I wanted to share two articles I just published. On is about one of my favorite business thinkers of all time, Peter Drucker, and what he might say about the current challenges being faced by the newspaper industry. The...

Credit Card Reform, Subscription Marketing and Behavioral Economics

On Friday, President Obama signed into law the most sweeping reforms to credit cards in about 40 years. Some of the key changes relate to limited how much credit card companies can use behavioral economics to encourage consumers to make decisions that generally...

What’s Old is New Again? Pricing Trends…

I am surprised, although maybe I shouldn't be, that people are still developing products, at considerable expense, without first identifying a clear market need and, perhaps more importantly, a clear buyer--someone willing to pick up the bill.Entrepreneurs, VCs...

Credit Card Reform, Subscription Marketing and Behavioral Economics

Yesterday, OpenTable went public, one of less than 10 IPOs in 2009. Shares were priced at $20, opened at $24.50, and ended the day at 31.89, up nearly 60%. By any account, this was a very successful IPO and hopefully an indicator of better things to come in the...

New Marketplaces for SMB SaaS Applications

Several companies have recently announced new B2B marketplaces for SaaS, subscription-based services targeting small business owners. Verizon has an SMB portal, that they announced in April. Etelos Inc and Renovatix announced another new marketplace,...