This is week 10 of our akhiatine. And it’s the last week I’m going to stop and point out how many weeks it’s been. It’s time to start a new streak of time. And because everything from ‘shelter in place’ to ‘in this together’ has a name, I’m going to call this next period of time ‘The Reboot.’
 
That’s largely because I feel a few of my own behaviors have become rebooted during this time. What do I mean by that? For example:
 
I can’t watch a movie or TV show (from pre-COVID, of course) and not look at all of the social distancing and hygiene violations being committed on the screen in front of me.
 
You WENT somewhere? TELL me all about it. What was it like? Were there people there? Did you have your temperature checked? Did you talk to anyone? Were you scared? People used to show slides of their vacations. Now it will be of their trip to the dentist.
 
Do you know all of the basic things I used to do that I now call ahead about? Takeout? Eh, better call and see what their policy is. Going to the dealership? Call ahead. Running into a store? Better call and ask what the special hours are. I barely used to call ahead for … anything. Now? Everything.
 
What things have changed for you?
 
You got me feeling Emotions. This article posted today in Inc. is all about your emotions … and how to remove them from your decision-making process.
 
“Best practices? Better practices! Best practices in the world!” I get the feeling a lot of you reading this are a lot like me and 1.) know that lead-in is a nod to “Wedding Singer” and 2.) when trying to learn the right way to do something you are always looking for best practices.
 
Which is why I flagged this article from Quartz that posted just today, for you. It identifies the best practicer we should be looking at for ways to successfully manage remote teams.
 
Visual reality. Here comes another great tweet from one of my favorite follows – Rebekah Radice. She shared these simple but powerful ways to use visuals in marketing:
 
=Offer a tip, advice or how-to
=Tell your business story (my personal favorite)
=Share a quote from one of your posts
=Promote an upcoming webinar
=Offer a solution to a top audience problem
=Create curiosity
 
Check your email. Guess what? Email is still a viable marketing tool. Now for the part you might not have known. It’s grown by 11% over the last three years. Yep. Salesforce said so. They surveyed 7,000 senior marketing professionals. Here’s what those marketers are most focused on:

-Engaging customers in real time
-Innovating
-Creating cohesive customer journeys across channels
-Unifying customer data sources
-Sharing a unified view of customer data across business units

Engaging customers in real time is a massive challenge. Why? Because everyone’s real time is real different.

It’s almost like you should … shift to on-demand marketing?
 
Free idea time. How about a trade show in a box? Now that’s a random thought.
 
Thanks for reading!