Champagne Strategy

Brain Hurt Scale = 5/10. Part 2 of the 2 part series that explores how to execute live events that generate cold hard cash revenue. Listen to part 1 for a higher-level discussion. This episode goes more into the nitty gritty of execution detail that is as crucial to success as it is frequently overlooked. Ignore the detail if you dare.

Brain Hurt Scale = 3/10. We've all been to webinars and events which are full of employees, sponsors and fan boys/girls - but what's the trick behind using them to generate cold hard cash? Nathan Siekieski is an entrepreneur who has been through the throws of the business world, for better and for worse. Right now, he's helping firms scale sales pipelines via events. So we got the rare chance to f...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10. Everyone talks about the difference between performance and brand - but transitioning from one to the other is often fraught with uncertainty and change that requires both a different mindset, culture and measurement approach. So how do you do it? Preston Rutherford was Shopify Plus' first customers and built SF DTC brand Chubbies into a successful $100mil exit. He&#39...

Brain hurt scale = 6/10.

Brain Hurt Scale = 3/10. Explore all the pros, cons of in-housing your marketing team vs outsourcing to an agency. Packed with real life examples this discussion is suitable for anyone and everyone in the industry. Including senior non-marketing executives who approve/fund the function through to the most green, juniors. We talk with in-housing consultant Chris Maxwell from Lution. Going deep into...

Brain Hurt Scale = 7/10. Henry Innis, founder of MMM platform Mutinex has caused a stir in APAC and more recently overseas. But with media headlines aside, what was the real growth story behind their success? What are the dynamics of the MMM industry and as we both peer into the future of AI, measurement and marketing in general - how should we be preparing for the future? Full episode Season 5, E...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10 - Did you know, one of the biggest growth channels tech companies invest in is community? The same goes for companies outside of SaaS as well. Companies like Sephora and Nike have massive communities of customers that act as the glue for their entire promotional model. But how do you create them? What are the do's and don'ts we need to be aware of and what tools sho...

Brain Hurt Scale = 3/10 - Do you need your advertising to be emotional in order for it to work? Ken Roberts has spent decades researching this with colleagues and is one of the world's authorities on this topic. In this wide-ranging interview we separate fact from fiction about everything from brand tracking, to the creative process, market-share drivers, advertising pre-testing vendors, famou...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10. Dealing with creative fills up a good chunk of any marketing department's time. But do you really have a binary choice between in-house vs agency? Or is there a better way? We interview co-founder of Creatively Squared, Scott Thomas to talk about the awkward creative production transition many companies are faced with. From one where a high-priced TVC sits at the core of t...

Brain Hurt Scale = 6/10 - full episode featuring San Redfern from Canva who details how the company transitioned from a digital marketing attribution mindset into something far more world-leading and sophisticated. Where part 1 of the Digital Marketing Apocalypse series focused on the technical and legal changes that have occurred over time. And part 2 uncovered the impact this has had on company&...

Brain Hurt Scale = 5/10. Following on from part 1, we explore a paper that studied thousands of online retailers between 2020 and 2022. The findings from this study have massive implications on the digital marketing industry, decision-makers, executives and investors. They analyzed 100's of billions of digital marketing expenditure and looked at how this affected customer acquisition and growt...

Brain Hurt Scale = 8/10. Why is Apple all about privacy all of a sudden? Why is it so vogue for governments around the world to legislate user data protections? Take a trip back in time all the way through to the present to understand where it all started and where it's going. From the birth of Google Analytics, the cookie, UTMs through to Meta and Google ads, conversion columns and everything...

Brain Hurt Scale = 5/10. Want a crash course in AI without the sale pitch? Listen to people who have actually used it for years without the buzzword consulting BS getting in the way. Listen to this episode and get the perfect grounding in what you need to know. The terms you need to know. The history you need to understand in order to be confident talking about it even if you haven't used it v...

Brain Hurt Scale - 2/10 - The first of a world-wide mini-series exposing true life stories behind the number 1 impediment to workplace success - politics. Mike Harris is an accomplished former executive and consultant with deep personal skills in consulting, sales, marketing, operations and product. He gives us three examples from a storied career. The first of which is 30mins about a successful t...

Brain Hurt Scale = 4/10. Why does ChatGPT provide me with terrible responses. Why does DALL-E give me an image that's terrible? Learning how to brief creatives is an art form. After all, their job is to create artwork so this probably shouldn't come as a surprise. But if you've never created something yourself, you'll be oblivious as to how it all goes down. That mismatched perspec...

Brain Hurt Scale = 6/10. Republished with permission of an interview John James did with Cognism's Jamie Skeels on The Loop podcast. The Brandingmag articles caused quite a stir and Jamie was keen to dig a little deeper into some of the issues it raised for practitioners. How do we target people to build brand and sales at the same time? Which channels should we use? How do we sell these campa...

Brain Hurt Scale = 3/10. A live recording of that time I was invited by James Pember to speak at the inaugural SXSW Sydney 2023. Note: this is a repost with permission of an episode of the Own The Moment podcast by Komo Technologies. James interviews me on-stage in front of 70+people and I try to answer a series of questions completely impromptu. James is a product leader and host of a podcast run...

Brain Hurt Scale = 5/10. No one in B2B buys based on value. Procurement and buying committees don't operate how you think they do. And why do 50%+ of B2B purchases end in a no-decision? If you want your career to be occupied with creating ads, rely on correlation, work status and manipulate company politics to get ahead. Nothing wrong with that, it's fine. Go for it. You will do well. But...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10. Racing car driver, Marketing Week columnist, retail media speaker and coach to marketing directors. Colin Lewis joins us for the first episode of 2024. While we were supposed to talk about retail media, this was one of those rare chances to tap into someone's mind that's experienced a depth and breadth of experience that's exceedingly rare. Colin's worked i...

Brain Hurt Factor = 4/10. The conclusion and penultimate episode of a 6 part series which explores brand campaigns. Questioning whether Apple's famous Think Different brand campaign was as successful as everyone thinks it is. This episode starts with a short recap of where we left off in 5.2. Then goes into revealing THE key growth factor behind Apple's explosive growth. Before discussing...

Brand hurt scale = 6/10. This is a direct follow on from the previous episode 5.1 which continues the story behind Apple's famous Think Different campaign. Here we go much deeper, analyzing the campaign's impact on Apple financially, both short and long term. Which is hard in audio form because a lot of the visuals are missing. But you'll learn ways you can properly assess any brand ca...

Brand hurt scale = 2/10. The episode everyone has been waiting for is here. This is the story behind the famous Apple Think Different campaign. Touted as one of the best brand advertising campaigns in history. But is it? This is the first of three parts which explores the history of this campaign and analyzes whether it was as successful for the company as everyone makes out. Deeper analysis will...

Brain hurt score = 3/10. If you've been listening to the series so far, you should know what a brand campaign is, where they came from and how advertising and branding works. So what does a brand campaign do? Or not do? In part 4 of the Brand Campaign mini-series we explore 8 legitimate reasons for a brand campaign and 8 red-flags you need to be aware of. By the end of this episode you'll...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10. Note - this is the audio version which is an extended yet similar and different version of the written article which includes diagrams and videos. If reading is your thing go here https://www.brandingmag.com/john-james/brand-campaigns-part-2-where-did-they-come-from/ - but this audio version is more story-like so it makes for perfect listening. Why do some people say '...

Brain Hurt Scale = 2/10. Learn all the hot topics, struggles and opportunities in the current environment from the perspective of two fractional CMO's. After shooting the breeze about coffee (Skip to 4mins in to miss the coffee talk intro) Gregory Kennedy and John sit down to talk about what they're both seeing on the ground right now. With significant declines in the yields and measuremen...