the brain+trust blog
Electrifying the Car Business: Abrupt Changes Ahead
Between now and 2030 the automotive industry as we know it will undergo more change than it saw during the previous 100 years. For automakers (OEMs), dealers, suppliers, and service organizations, these rapid and fundamental changes to the entire industry and...
Get the Most from your Media Agency: Three Big Things
with special thanks to my co-author, David Pierpont Media spending typically represents the largest percentage of a marketing budget and brands rightfully ask their agencies to show results - ROI, ROAS, attribution and more. But before you ask your agency... What...
Trouble Code: Redefining Automotive Through DTC
Source: Motortrend.com 2020 In the automotive world DTC refers to a diagnostic trouble code. It is used by a vehicle's onboard diagnostics (OBD) system to alert the driver when a vehicle experiences a malfunction. So what code pops up when not just a part, not just...
If You Can’t Give a Customer a Cookie
Delivering a customer-centric content experience is the ultimate marketing goal. But data management issues and an impending seismic shift may prevent you from reaching it. Use these approaches to bridge the chasm that will be left when Google, Apple, and others end...
Where Cause and Data Meet: Modeling a Return on Purpose
With special thanks to my inspiring co-author, John McNeel. Photo: Brayden Law Cause- or Purpose-based marketing has traditionally been a ‘nice-to-have’ -- a brand’s way of broadcasting to the world that, beyond building good products and services, it could also be a...
Snackable – Newfound Loyalty With Blockchain
Blockchain is the modern shipping container - a game-changing advance that brings efficiency, security and global opportunity to business. Great news if you're a supply chain manager or CFO, but if you run your brand's loyalty program, do you care? Loyalty programs...
Snackable – Digital Transformation
Digital transformation is a rabbit hole of a topic. Change for one organization doesn't look the same as it does for another - there are too many variables that factor into what comes next. That said, three priorities apply to each of us as we build for the...
Five Things – The Brand Marketer’s 2020 To-Do List
I talk just about every day with brand-managing friends, colleagues and complete strangers on planes (they start it – I’m not a chatty seat-mate) about what digital transformation actually means and how to set priorities in the current business ecosystem. We're...
Roaring Change in the 2020’s: 6 Ways Business Will Never Be the Same
We are already a week into 2020, and it is obvious that this will be a challenging and opportunistic decade for business. Not since I was managing staffing efforts for EDS and SAIC to deal with legacy systems integration and Y2K compliance projects have I seen so much...
As Far As We Know: Episode 1 – Deepfakes, Misinformation and Business in 2020: Josh Ginsberg
As Far As We Know is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Radio Public (below), Google Play, and iTunes. On the inaugural episode of As Far As We Know, Tracy Arrington and Tim Hayden are joined by Josh Ginsberg, CEO of Zignal Labs, on several media and content...