In English ⁽³¹⁾

The brilliant physicist Enrico Fermi famously wondered: With billions of Earth-like planets orbiting billions of Sun-like stars for billions of years, the galaxy should be teeming with life. So …where is everyone?

You’re starting a business, you have big ambitions, and you need to quickly make your brand known and loved out in the world, to start bringing in the customers. You should probably pick up a book or two on the topic, but to kick things off, here’s my version of Marketing & Branding 101.

When I ask people about their target audience, quite often the reply is “Everyone, really…” or something along those lines. For you, reading this, it probably won’t come as a surprise that that’s not very helpful. But even experienced marketers, who are used to think in terms of target audiences, will often define their target audiences much too broadly. And when I ask them to be more specific, I get a lot of resistance. It’s understandable. When you have a great product that you believe in, you want everyone (or at least everyone who can pay) to know about it. And you…

Black Friday is almost here again. And it’s getting crazier by the year. Here are some reasons why you should ignore the most dangerous shopping day of the year, and advice for those who can’t.

There is a lot of outrage in my Facebook and Twitter feeds, in the comment sections I see, and in the op-eds and letters to the editor I sometimes read. Outrage at politicians and big corporations; at science-deniers and at bad science. Anger at Trump supporters and at the liberal P.C. elites, at beggars and rich people, hipsters and yuppies, millennials and boomers. Anger over fake news and the mainstream media’s bias. Fear and loathing directed at ISIS, Bashar al-Assad, Russia, Israel, Palestinians, Muslims, refugees, immigrants, etc. Before you get outraged again, please understand that you are being manipulated. Most…