Month: February 2019

  • The insiders guide to smartphone launches

    MWC is one of the key dates in the diary for smartphone launches by manufacturers. Apple marches to the beat of its own drum, but Android manufacturers try and go close to MWC: The reason why they go to MWC is that it has a critical mass of journalists in Barcelona covering bigger impact stories.…

  • Brick and mortar retail + more

    Forrester: Why Brick-And-Mortar Is Failing Luxury 02/25/2019 – the failure is department stores rather than ‘owned’ brick-and-mortar stores. You could also argue that department stores are primarily aimed at the mid market part of luxury which is being crushed The Kraft Heinz experiment in radical cost-cutting has failed. | LinkedIn – imagine if 3G Capital…

  • PR trends and Edelman’s recent results

    David Brain has written a good PR trends piece over at his blog on Edelman’s recent results. In particular, David focuses on the PR industry’s reaction to those results (some find it amusing to see the class swot get a B-grade). There is a temporary amnesia of other agency group problems. Go and have a…

  • Is there a luxury smartphone segment?

    There are luxury smartphones, but is there a meaningful luxury smartphone segment? From Apple’s iPhone price inflation to Huawei and Blackberry’s Porsche Design devices, manufacturers have looked to cater to a ‘luxury’ consumer. Prior to this is you had the Vertu phone with its concierge service and niche players like Goldvish catering for the the…

  • Shut down digital marketing + more

    Mark Ritson: It’s time to shut down digital marketing teams for good | Marketing Week – return to media neutral and evidence based marketing? It also reminded me of a debate that I had back in 2008 with James Warren about when were we likely to see the end of the digital strategist. It hasn’t…

  • Legend of Old McLanden & things from last week

    BMW’s X7 advert about the Legend of Old McLanden has been cited as a piece of feminist advertising. I won’t spoil it for you watch the clip and you’ll see why. I think that its part of something different which has been less heralded: a return to craft in advertising. We’re starting to see a…

  • Aeron chair + more things

    Why the Aeron Is Still the Most Coveted Seat in the Office | WIRED – love my Aeron chair. The Herman Miller Aeron was an icon during the dot com era. When Enron and at lot of internet startups went bust thousands came on the secondhand market. I picked up my own Aeron on the…

  • Chinas Disruptors by Edward Tse

    Reading Chinas Disruptors by Edward Tse is a great primer on how China’s enterprises are structured differently to foreign companies. The government / private relationship is a complex one. Tse does a good job at explaining it well. This alone is a good reason to read the book. Tse’s background as China based management consultant…

  • Delete your direct messages + more things

    Even years later, Twitter doesnt delete your direct messages | TechCrunch – interesting possible GDPR risk for Twitter. I have cleaned out my public tweet feed as what you share is ephemeral. I could imagine people doing foolish things, but Twitter doesnt delete your direct messages and they could conceivably gathered by court order HSBC…