How + Why Students Use Social Media

My buddy John Battaglino recently asked me how and why college students use Twitter.   Johnny of all people should be interested in this because as the Executive Director of Boston University, it’s his job to put them on the map and understand the student body.  Since meeting Johnny last year, it’s clear he is truly in [...]

“Improvement” Doesn’t = Up

I’ve always taken “improvement” to mean up, rise, ascend.  On the ladder scale of “improvement”, anything upward moving is considered “good” and anything downward moving is considered “bad”.  For the sake of this argument, anything stationary is also considered “bad” because it’s not going up, which is the expected movement.
If we think about this though, [...]

Tips For A Successful Internet Hiatus

For the past month or so, I’ve taken a bit of a hiatus from my “productive” and “value-adding” internet activities.  I have not been regularly participating online like I used to, did not share as many interesting articles or links, have not been actively tending to SarahMerion.com, and am not sorry about any of it. [...]

Ding Dong the Old PR Pitch is Dead

This is a guest post from Matt Cheuvront and is part of the Guest Blog Grand Tour over at Life Without Pants. Want to learn more about Matt Cheuvront & see how far the rabbit hole goes? Subscribe to the Life Without Pants RSS feed & follow him on Twitter to keep in touch!
As a [...]

The Age of Digital Mortar

Have you noticed lately?  The convergence of brick and mortar stores and the digital world, that is.  I call this convergence “digital mortar”.
What is the difference between buying online and buying the in the store?  Location.  Perhaps price, but if there were a $5 and I could get it right now by walking down the [...]

Advertising As Supplemental Content

Banners don’t work too well, right?
It’s not nice to be interrupted by an ugly banner when I’m in the middle of looking for something completely different.  We can agree on this, correct?
Then again, banners are merely advertising.  Albeit not a very effective form of advertising, but if you’ve got the budget, you may do what [...]

Simplicity & The Superbowl

Advertising wants to be the biggest and the baddest.   Advertising tries to blow itself out of the water.   I’m not insinuating that we shouldn’t strive for excellence and progress.  Just sayin’ that excellence and progress are not synonymous with over-the-top and in-your-face.  It is synonymous with creative thinking and innovation.
Let’s talk Superbowl for a [...]

This Is Digital Anthropology

I have been shying against the term “social media” lately.  For a few reasons that are very simple…

It’s inaccurate.

Social: well, the internet is inherently social. Always has been and always will be.  It’s just the fact that we’re figuring it now that makes us want to slap a name on it.
Media: this little phenomenon [...]

Quantum Physics & Marketing

I wrote this article with a little help from Dr. Quantum.  Dr. Quantum teaches us about physics, so unless you’re an astrophysicist, you will get more value out of this article if you watch this 5 minute video.

Dr. Quantum is my favorite teacher for alternate views on business subjects.  This cute video on physics has [...]

Designing Intuition

Let’s talk computers for a second.  What makes a good computer?  Most likely, it’s the speed, the size of the hard drive, perhaps what bells and whistles it has (a camera, built in mic, lots of USB ports).  A less likely answer though, is how easy it is to use.  While this is not necessarily [...]