Month after month, Amazon rated Margaret Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale in its top 10 most-purchased novels during 2017. Hulu’s gripping adaptation was a runaway hit generating countless blog posts. What does it mean? The tsunami of social media surrounding the women of Gilead, the dark dystopian society where the Handmaid’s Tale...
Brands
New Rules for Communicating with Millenials and GenZ
Millennials and Gen Z live in two worlds. The time spent in the virtual world competes aggressively with life in real-time. It also means coming of age in two worlds. For the past five years, I have followed the lives of 90 Millennials and Gen Z teens using social media...
“Hamilton” Meets the Super Bowl
Back in 2008, I drew laughs from the audience while on a book tour for Ren Gen: Renaissance Generation. I guess that struck some people as funny. I get that. It was a bold remark back then. Last...
Thrilling Me Softly: What Digital Natives Love
3 Valentine’s Day tips: Tap into Millennials’ passion for honest come-ons. Have you ever succumbed to link bait? If so, you’ll know it’s frustrating when your sincere desire meets a hostile pay wall or aggressive lead capture. Halt! Go no further without surrendering your privacy or your credit card. So,...
The Ultimate Recipe for Top-Performing Teams
I remember the first time I designed a workshop for a client who wanted to encourage his team after re-organization. The company was poised for a renaissance, he said. If only he could make the new team configuration gel. A few jobs had been eliminated, so people were touchy. Teams...
The Road to Eureka!
It happens fairly often as I’m researching social trends. I’m faced with moments when I’m desperate for that really big eureka. I’m not talking about a run-of-the-mill “aha” moment. I’m talking about the kind of insight that blows the ceiling off a client’s conference room. When I need inspiration sometimes,...
5 Nitty-Gritty Social Trends That Impact Sales
Day in and day out, you put products or services in front of prospects. You may be starting to notice that it’s tougher to close the deals you really want. Perhaps that’s because you‘re relying on a few tactics that no longer have currency in the digital culture. When your...
How to Influence Change: 3 Lessons I’ve Learned
After 20 years of helping companies and influential nonprofits compel change, I’ve learned valuable lessons about what it takes to get people to take action. Chief among them is that it’s not about the issue–it’s about what the issue means in people’s lives. Despite our passion for the causes we...
Future Trends: How Millennial Cultural Consumers Buy Travel, Culture and Luxury
Cultural consumers share traits of luxury consumers. They are educated and economically advantaged. In a recent report from Deloitte, luxury brands will need to up their game in technology if they are to remain competitive with the emerging Millennial consumer. When I read the Deloitte’s second annual Global Powers of Luxury...