Blake Landau
Heads up U.S. marketing and social media for blueKiwi Software, a social business software company based out of Paris and San Francisco. In her past life she managed Customer Management IQ, a social networking site and online business publication. She's interviewed Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, Senator David Vitter (R-Louisiana) and Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com. She's the former President of New York Toastmasters. She loves snowboarding, the ocean and running.
Sheryl Sandberg, Marissa Mayer and Cleopatra–Women Leaders Groomed For Success
I’m reading a biography of Cleopatra and I’m learning some surprising facts about Egypt’s last queen. Cleopatra, who was known for her “wit” and…for being a “prankster,” outlived all of her brothers. In the book she is hailed as a “shrewd strategist and ingenious negotiator.” She was a woman who “reshaped the contours of the [...]
Changing the Molecules of the (Board)room
Every Monday night in a cozy Brown Stone on 39th street a group of New Yorkers congregate. I was once one of these New Yorkers. At exactly 6:15 PM I would climb on the small stage, strike my gavel and start the Toastmasters meeting: Good evening and welcome. The mission of our New York Toastmasters [...]
Everyone’s a Publisher with DIY Image and Video Studio Blue Sky
In the coming months I am going to highlight a handful of small businesses that I think are special. They are exciting, and I always have my ears open for hot new little mom and pop shops. I am fascinated by Trader Joe’s. Not just because I love to cook–but because they have that special [...]
The Corporate Social Strategist Can’t Move Fast Enough
It will take more than a few Jedi-mind tricks for change agents and social strategists to convince upper management of the value of social. We are years away from where we need to be in corporate America. Yesterday it was reported that Wal-Mart made 3.5 billion dollars in the third quarter–and most of this revenue was coming from overseas operations. With the state of the American economy, social business might be the trick to speed up progress–unfortunately it’s going to have to be much faster than we can comprehend. As it stands innovation is not happening fast enough.
The Two Step Process to Brand Building Through Influencer Communities
If Christopher Columbus were a marketer he would still be using Google and Facebook. Let’s veer from the “West Indies” of social media marketing. Below is a map providing a faster route to a land full of sugar and spice and everything nice. The Map to Social Biz Marketing We are all in the experimentation [...]
Investing in Your External Community or the Future Valuation of Facebook? My Interview with Retail Prophet Doug Stephens
This week during Blog World in Las Vegas I interviewed Doug Stephens, President of Strategy Consultancy Retail Prophet Consulting. Doug Stephens thought by many to be one of the world’s only retail industry futurists. He’s worked with some of North America’s best known retailers and brands including Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Hudson’s Bay Company, Disney, Loblaw [...]
Gatorade Mission Control Project Misses the Social Biz Mark
When you were growing up did your dad have a so-called “man room”–a haven for football worship and other dad-items banished from the house? My dad did. This room served as a venue for poker and a sound-proof space where he could hoot and holler at the Philadelphia Eagles football team and no one could [...]
What Alfred Hitchcock Would Have Said About Facebook (For Business?)
What would Alfred Hitchcock have to say about social media? His film Rear Window (1954) hits the premise of social media on the head. The film is about voyeurism. And as the script reads ”we’ve become a race of Peeping Toms.” Sixty years later I think Alfred would agree. Why are so many of us addicted to [...]
The Social Network: “Good Artists Borrow. Great Artists Steal.”
The other day I saw the Facebook film about Mark Zuckerberg “The Social Network” based on Ben Mezrich‘s 2009 nonfiction book The Accidental Billionaires. Fact or fiction, the film paints a very human portrait of seemingly insensitive Mark Zuckerberg. The film could have easily had a different name such as “Good Artists Borrow. Great Artists [...]
