3 marketing topics to school yourself on this fall.

Labor Day marks the second start of a new year, an opportunity, as with the one in January, for a fresh start and self-improvement. As marketers, it’s a good time to take stock of what we don’t know, in order to stay on top of the latest innovations in accountability, effectiveness, and customer satisfaction.

Social media. It may seem obvious, but the proliferation of platforms, broad use of them for customer interaction, and still-experimental state of the industry can result in huge opportunities for you or colossal blunders. Study up to learn from past mistakes and to prevent your own.

Content marketing. Understanding the changes in creating intelligent dialogue with customers is a larger change in the marketing landscape in the past several years than even social media, which has merely accelerated the process. Marketing as a provider not only of information but also of unbiased value is a sea-change and must understood to be properly executed.

Mobile marketing. There are more mobile internet users online than desktop users. Understanding the needs of the mobile user goes beyond device compatibility. Get ahead of your competition because companies that do not adapt to mobile will suffer the same fate of the latecomers to the internet in the 90s.

There are many others, including marketing automation, search engine optimization (Google makes sure you are out of date almost monthly), and alignment of social and search. 

What others are you studying up on?

It's good. Really good. It's TOO good.

Dear Nancy Brinker:

I'm a fan. What you've done for research is amazing. No one is a bigger supporter of the cause than I am. My mother herself was a victim of breast cancer so I say this with love, respect, and admiration:

Consider me 'aware'. I'm full of 'awareness'. I'm up to my eyeballs in 'awareness'. But like a pop song heard too many times, the pink thing has gone from helpfully ubiquitous to having the effect of the vandalism you'd expect from a Barbie-obsessed eight year old girl. It's too much of a good thing.

Your marketing - specifically, your brand communication - urgently needs a refresher because I can't be alone when I say I'm starting to tune it out like I do omnipresent graffiti in Queens.

To make a donation: http://ww5.komen.org/

Deja vu all over again

In this concise epilogue to the BP spill in the gulf, Fast Company points out that:

1. "...it’s clear that in the age of social media, a company can’t spin and rebrand its way out of a mess like it used to."
2. "...it's what companies do, not what they say, that really matters."
3. "...BP is an example of how companies' misfortunes are going to unfold going forward with all the tools and weapons the Internet and social media afford."
4. "Companies screw themselves when they let perception get ahead of reality..."

Gee, where, I humbly ask, did

1. You
2. See
3. That
4. Before?