Episodes

Sales and the customer journey. Are we giving salespeople the right tools to help them succeed? Years ago, sales were about pushing the customer in a direction and convincing them to buy. Today it is about discovering the customers’ needs and proving to them their return on investment. Today we also have the tools to help sales persons guide them through the process and show the customers facts, not fiction. This episode explores the customer journey, beginning with customer contact and sales. T...

Leadership expert Chris Pearse used an analogy in his Forbes article in 2018 on “Leadership in Crisis” This analogy made us think about leadership. It brought to light the mistake we often make in leadership today. Although not in exact words, he said if you want to grow a pumpkin, you need four elements, earth, water, sun, and a seed. While growing that pumpkin, your focus is on those elements, not the pumpkin. With the right focus, result will be a great pumpkin. In leadership, most of the tim...

Germany's “Umwelt Bundesamt” talks about the new “Green Economy. “They claim the present economic system is destroying our natural resources with the result of eroding the prosperity of future generations. They say that “Business as usual” in industrialised countries’ are resource-intensive, and with emerging countries following suit, it is not a feasible course for the future, which is why transforming into a Green Economy is necessary. . But this is Germany; what is the rest of the world sayin...

A company’s greatest asset is its people. It does not matter how innovative your product or services are; the people who stand behind the products and services interact with the customer and continue to innovate to move a company forward. In March 2020, as companies struggled to move their workforces remotely, employers also faced “The Big Quit”. As a result, many companies struggled to retain employees, but those companies that forged a collaborative and flexible culture thrived. In this episod...

On February 22, 2022, the world shifted when Russia invaded Ukraine. Now five months later, we still witness devastation in Ukraine and the attack on democracy. We are seeing criminal acts as Russia uses war tactics that target civilians in the hope that the solidarity and will of the Ukrainian people will be broken. We are also feeling the wars impact the world economy. So when and how will this end? No one has a crystal ball, but we can examine the direction the world's most robust and influen...

Digital Marketing has become very complicated. Consumers have changed their behavior, Google is constantly polishing their Core Web Vitals, and new media channels are popping up daily. At the same time, we have other trends like stricter personal data restrictions while new technologies are emerging, and AI is becoming more prevalent when it comes to targeting audiences. This makes digital marketing trends hard to keep up for SMB’s and even for brands who dedicated digital marketing teams. But i...

Today we are facing the “Big Resignation”. All over the world, companies are struggling to find personnel, and no one can answer why this is happening. Possible reasons are wage stagnation amid the rising cost of living, long-lasting job dissatisfaction, safety concerns around COVID-19, and the desire to work for companies with better remote-working policies and new work-life balance values stemming from the pandemic. Some economists have described the Great Resignation akin as a general strike ...

Consumer Behaviors have drastically changed in the last 24 months. We can observe the changes in foot traffic ( in-person behaviour ) when we are at the grocery store, airport, or simply walking in any city centre. Still, we do not always see the changes in consumer behaviours online. We all know how our own search behaviours have changed, but unless you own a business with an e-commerce shop, you may not know how your customers search for your products or services. You may also not be unaware o...

We live in a world where change and transformation are the new normal, but sometimes we make decisions and go about change as we have always done. Today have more data and information available than we have ever had in the past, but we do not always use it when making decisions or initiating change. When it comes to transformation, many companies and organizations tend to look outward rather than inward when inward is where they should be looking. An organization's digital footprint can tell us ...

When executives speak about diversity, you often hear them say, yes we are good at meeting our targets around diversity. But diversity is not about numbers; it is about fostering a culture of innovation from a mix of people with different experiences, perspectives, and backgrounds where they can contribute to achieving a common goal. It's about DEI, which is more than just diversity it’s about equity and inclusion. It is proven that companies that foster DEI outperform companies that do not. But...

Today, customer experience is more important than ever, and the first person the customer meets in the customer journey is usually a salesperson. But customers today are more informed than they were in the past, which means the average salesperson can no longer fly by the seat of their pants when conducting a sales call. Today, the salesperson needs a lot of knowledge and a whole new set of skills. In this episode, we talk to a customer experience expert about how companies can manage their sale...

Cultural forces are always at play in today’s Global Economy. Although effective management of cultural differences is not necessarily a guarantee of business success, understanding and deepening one’s knowledge of the other culture is vital to the success of any venture. Culture influences communication, decision-making, negotiation, resolution of conflicts, the management of cross-national alliances and diverse teams. Without understanding the impact culture plays in any business transaction. ...

According to a poll by Manta, the majority of small business owners agree that online marketplaces have positively impacted their sales. Nearly 70% of small business owners stated that marketplaces like Amazon and eBay have helped them increase sales, although about 30% believe they have had a negative impact. In addition, most small businesses (81%) believe that online sales are critical to their company's success, but most rely on their websites. Only around 20% of use e-commerce solutions as ...

When people search online for products or services, if your website is not visible on the first page of the relevant keyword searches, you might not get traffic from the search engines. Google, the most widely used search engine, and other search engines provide the most significant area of opportunity for inbound marketers. According to SearchEngineWatch.com, websites on top grab 36.4% of the traffic missed by lower-ranked websites. If you don't rank highly in search results, you probably won't...

It is the fifth anniversary of GDPR, which went into effect and 2018. Since its passage, there have been significant efforts at compliance, At the same time, unfortunately, consumers still felt nudged or bullied by big tech companies into agreeing to business under the old rules, posing the question is the spirit behind the legislation on a level playing field. Then came the pandemic, and in March 2020, the world changed. Virtually every business was forced online and reached out to their consum...

Having honesty and integrity in the workplace is one of the essential qualities of outstanding leadership in business; we all know that but do we all know what that means. Like most things, we probably all have different understandings of what it means. Some may say it is not cheating; it is telling the truth or doing the right thing just because it is correct. There will be different interpretations because honesty and integrity are a state of mind and are not situational. If one compromises in...

Broadcasting is challenging and competitive, but it can be gratifying and fulfilling. It has also changed drastically over the last 25 years. Technology has made media more accessible and widened coverage, regardless if it is sports or news. The people have also changed. Today broadcasting is accessible to almost everyone. From podcasters to influencers to reality TV, media is not what it was years ago. In this episode, we speak with a 25-year broadcasting veteran and award-winning camera operat...

Can you combine a good employee experience with endpoint security? In 2020 most of us were forced into a virtual working environment. Unfortunately, companies and employees were not really aligned on how this would work because it happened so quickly. Cyber-attacks increased 500% as employees used personal devices, security policies did not cover remote work, and leadership did not know how to manage the transition of old employees, never mind the new employees they had never met in person. It i...

In May 2020, just as SMBs worldwide struggled to get their businesses online because of the pandemic, Google introduced core web vitals. In addition, Google informed businesses that these vitals would soon be ranking signals worldwide. In other words, if a business did not get this right, their ranking would be affected. Finally, in August 2021, Google fully rolled out Core Web Vitals as a Google ranking factor. So we are now in April 2022, 6 months later, and what are we experiencing? Do busine...

Women are underrepresented in most global companies, particularly among senior leadership teams—and companies are missing out on opportunities as a result. The pandemic also hit women employees more than men, with women having to return to the roles of educators and traditional family roles as work moved from the office to the home. The pandemic also put a new level of focus on how a sudden change disproportionately impacts certain underrepresented groups. Now companies are trying to fix this pr...

Suppose you ask people what they’re most excited about as life begins to normalize after Covid. You’re likely to get a range of answers: a trip, a family reunion, a dance party, a favourite restaurant. But, of course, most people want to be “in-person” again. But ss people start to get out and about, the question we pose is what will happen to the virtual life we have become accustomed to over the last two years. Will digital services drop across most industries? We, as consumers, have picked up...

In this episode, we bring back a distinguished guest, not for a reportage of what is happening in Ukraine; we see the horrendous destruction every evening when we turn on the television. Instead, our interview talks about the motives behind the Russian attack and how history plays a role in today's conflict. We talked with an expert who is a retired Colonel from the US Army and an author, leadership expert, and a historian. This interview brings to light some things the average person may not ha...

On 21 of February, started aggression that all of us thought may happen but never really believed would happen. Russia attacked Ukraine, an independent democratic country. In the week following, the world changed, and so did the lives of millions of people. In this episode, we talk with a family that fled Ukraine. They talk about the long, trying 1800-kilometer journey. They talk about the happiness they felt reaching safe ground and the disappointment that they are still not united with their f...

The stock market attracts millions of people from all over the world. It is a great way to earn money sitting at home by just investing a few hours of the day. The stock market is not just all about profit, but there is a risk where you might suffer losses. But to be successful in any field, it is imperative to have a good knowledge of that domain. Knowledge, in this case, can be observation, learning and practice. Our guest today understands the markets and help others understand them also. She...