profbruce's definitions
There is truth and smart truth. In a media-saturated world where each word is parsed by many looking for scandal, it is more important than ever to tell the smart truth. Lawyers, especially criminal law lawyers, understand the difference.
“Coca-cola proudly announced some years ago that it was introducing vending machines that would raise the price of their sodas when the weather got hot. The announcement was widely panned in the media—just when a consumer needed a break most, the company would be raising its price. The smarter play and the smart truth would have been an announcement that the company was introducing vending machines that lowered the price of their drinks when the weather got cold. It is the same thing yet it isn’t—the smart truth would have had radically different (and much more positive) PR repercussions. The end result—the vending machines never left Coke labs…”
by ProfBruce October 31, 2009
Get the Smart Truthmug. Where consumers band together online to influence, collectively, the price of a good or service, a form of social shopping and reverse pricing.
A website or mobile app that reduces the prices of its products or services for every like or tweet that potential customers generate as a group is using a form of social commerce. Or when consumers get their friends to buy a sufficient number of ecommerce coupons, they are engaged in social commerce. In effect, consumers are banding together online to influence the price at which they are willing to buy and companies are paying their customers to do their marketing for them.
by ProfBruce May 7, 2011
Get the Social Commercemug. The moral underpinnings of being or becoming an entrepreneur include: 1. take care of your business, 2. so your business can take care of your family, 3. so your family can take care of you, 4. so you do not become a burden on your fellow human being or the state, 5. so you are in a position to help your fellow human being and 6. so they can help your business.
When you give a person a fishing rod instead of a fish, you have started him or her on the road to self reliance which is the sine qua non of entrepreneur ethics.
by ProfBruce April 21, 2011
Get the entrepreneur ethicsmug. A strategic investor is someone who has a strategic reason for investing in your enterprise; that is, they have an over-arching interest in your success. You can find strategic investors by looking through your supply chain and your value chain. Even your competitors can be a source of strategic start-up capital if they are looking to you as a new co-opetitor.
Say you are bootstrapping a new home builder. A trade creditor (supplier) might extend credit to you for building materials and supplies or a client might give you a sizable down payment on a home purchase; in essence, each of them become a strategic investor in your business. Or say you are starting an athletic wear clothing business, department stores might give you a cash advance in return for exclusivity or a sports drink company might sponsor your line of clothing in return for co-branding opportunities.
by ProfBruce April 20, 2011
Get the strategic investormug. Selling in pairs or other combinations and for more than one year at a time, thereby decreasing the absolute number of deals required to sell out your inventory as well as increasing your efficiency and productivity.
If there are 200 signs in an arena and you sell them to sponsors in pairs for a term of two years each then you only need to make 50 deals per year to sell out your inventory instead of 200 per year--thus, you have reduced your workload by 75%. If you can further increase the number of multi-year deals for pairs of signs you can do per annum then your sales will increase at an ever increasing rate-- that is non-linear selling.
by ProfBruce April 20, 2011
Get the Non-Linear Sellingmug. When brands agree to cross-promote each other. In effect, each brand becomes a separate sales channel for all the others in the group.
When a driver of a high end sedan gets out of the car wearing an expensive watch and a bespoke suit, now that is co-branding. Each of the three brands have agreed to promote each other in RL (Real Life), on television, in print, online, in social media and on the mobile web.
by ProfBruce May 14, 2011
Get the co-brandingmug.