David Dalka attends and reports business events and conferences to discover the future of business where technology, organizations and customer exeperience meet. Also serves as emcee, moderator and motivational business keynote speaker.
Josh Kopelman has another great post challenging conventional wisdom where he says the odds of winning the lottery are better than selling your company to Yahoo! or Google. It’s time for people to stop focusing on Web 2.0 and focus on real businesses that satisfy real unmet needs which also can be profitable.
On another note, congrats to Josh on winning the 2006 Joseph Wharton Award for Young Leadership!!!
Yesterday’s loud announcement of a Macy’s boycott (forward via e-mail to friends) and destruction of new Macy’s credit cards to loud cheers shows that customers aren’t satisfied with Macy’s decision to remove and destroy the Marshall Field’s (and other) brand name. If Federated’s CEO Mr. Terry Lundgren and board of directors thinks this strong feelings of people are going to go away on this they are wrong. Since traditional newspapers get significant advertising revenue from Federated they have little incentive to push the true story (notable exception: big props to P.J. Huffstutter of the LA Times), this is a job for bloggers to work to reduce the store’s sales and eventually force Federated to sell these stores to someone who will change the name back to Marshall Field’s. This may take months or even years, but it can happen!
Notice all the blog posts out there, the conversation is only starting to link, bond and discuss (use “Macy’s boycott” and “Marshall Field’s” in your posts/tags): Dauber’s Chicago Blog, The Budget Fashionista, baka_duo_neka, ikam, Temporary Trouble Spots, All-American Girl’s Road Trip, etc…
The Chicagoist.org also recently reported Macy’s doesn’t even know what street it’s located on!!!
Stay tuned to fieldsfanschicago.org and the blogosphere for more info. Rumor has it Macy’s is seeking a variation to put up a large neon sign and that there is a zoning committee meeting on September 15, 2006 at Chicago City Hall regarding this eyesore. Contact your Alderman and ask that this be stopped!
Macy’s is not what the lady (customer) wants, she wants Marshall Field’s (other flickr photos):
Though the name Marshall Field’s survived 154 years, two major fires and one flood of it’s basement, those heartless people at Federated Department stores have already killed Marshall Field’s and it’s web site – a full day early! OK, for those of you not in Chicago, some “branding geniuses” thought changing the name of Marshall Field’s after 154 years to Macy’s was a good idea, but it’s isn’t, wasn’t and never will be. You can see the hatred in Chicago blogs. See the outpouring of emotion on this issue here and here and well you get the idea already.
Please join us to witness anger, tears and protest at 9AM Saturday in front of the Marshall Field’s State Street store!
My Tumi laptop bag strap wore out recently. I called Tumi’s 800 number regarding their lifetime guarantee and within a week, a new strap arrived at no charge on a 6 year old item!!! Yes Tumi is more expensive, but the service level justifies it based on their actions after this phone call.
It’s great to see a company that stand behind their product and are customer focused like this, it’s all to rare. So please join me in showing Tumi some love as an example of a company that sets the bar in how to treat customers.
I stepped into the Recruiter’s Lounge with Jim Stroud, he interviewed me briefly about my experience with Intellext and my attendance next week at the Online Recruiting Conference here in Chicago.
In a smart move, Ford hired outside it’s own industry for it’s next CEO.
Imagine that, hiring someone for their knowledge and competencies, realizing that fresh perspectives are necessary to lead in a different way and solve unique and complex problems. Great article and a better decision. Are you listening search engine and interactive marketing leadership and boards of directors?
Good luck, Alan Mulally, you are taking on an immense challenge.
Why do I love holiday weekends? Because the major media goes home and there is a ton of great blog posts out there based on people’s core thoughts everywhere I look (including my blog) instead of the major media discussion follow on. In fact, why does David Sifry of Technorati make the mistake of classifying these big media sites as blogs at all if they don’t allow trackbacks, comments and true discussion? David you should really fix that.
What Scoble talks about in his post along with a cast of great comments is interesting and all too accurate. But the notes about lack of retail investor involvement are encouraging, I don’t think we have Silicon Valley restraint to thank for that I think we have Enron and Sarbanes-Oxley (higher cost of doing IPOs and being public now).
In Flickr doesn’t suck, the Don McAskill post states, “Companies triumph over market leaders all the time. They do it by innovating and executing brilliantly.” What a refreshing thought process. Sad to see it on a site discussing 19 zillion unnecessary photo sharing sites that gets tons of traffic discussing this topic, but refreshing nonetheless. So, maybe people are focusing on the businesses that tech guys are building and hyping because they are missing the critical element – business skills, search engine optimization and related expertise. A product manager is someone with a combination of business and technical skills in every successful company I’ve ever been a part of, I doubt this rule will change. People need to think bigger than “Google will buy us”.
What is wrong with Frothy Bubble 2.0? It’s not based on basic business principles like customer satisfaction, unmet needs and workable business models. I can spot this stuff a mile away when I talk. For example, when I went to Search Engine Strategies last month, one Web 2.0 person I know asked me, “Why are you going to such a boring conference, dude?” That sentence wouldn’t be right without the dude would it? Well, I had the time of my life and I learned a ton of great stuff to boot! Meanwhile his project is $100,000 in expenses and no revenue in sight.
So what is there to do? How about looking at some of the business plans I’ve seen that make sense, have revenue models and either go into new markets or attack fundamental basic flaws in the existing search engines? Naw, that would take real work, less photos at parties and it would take brainstorming and thinking outside of the box.
Think about it, pick up the phone if you have a real idea or you are an angel investor – especially if you are one that doesn’t even own a camera – then I really want to hear from you!!!