Leading Your Market

Market leadership is about relevant offerings and transcendent stories. If you want to become a market leader you have to produce and distribute a story about your product or service that resonates with your desired audiences.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes: David Bowie as Transcendent Rock Star

How influential was the late rock singer, actor and fashion icon David Bowie? A short list of big pop stars who borrowed his style or musical ideas includes Mick Jagger, Lady Gaga and Peter Capaldi, the current “Dr. Who.” Over

Chipotle’s Challenge Goes Beyond Food Safety

Chipotle Mexican Grill is a 900 lb. burrito in the restaurant industry, with 1,755 stores and more than $4 billion in sales in 2014. In twenty years, founder Steve Ells grew a single restaurant into a market leader in the

J.J. Abrams on “Star Wars,” Communal Experience and Myth

The Los Angeles Times ran a Q&A today with J.J. Abrams, the director of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” He talks about the powerful communal experience of watching the film in a theater, which ties in well with the mythic

Kobe Bryant: A Market Leader Moves On

On November 30, Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers announced that he would retire at the end of the 2015-16 National Basketball Association season. Given that the woeful Lakers are highly unlikely to make the playoffs that would put

The Gray Lady On Gender-Neutral Pronouns

Meet the pronoun “Mx.”, which may become the “Ms.” of the gender-neutral era. From the New York Times column on style and usage, a snapshot of what keeps writers and journalists (and sociologists) up at night.

Why the Force is still with “Star Wars”

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is the latest chapter in the popular and long-running “Star Wars” saga, which began in 1977. The film opens in December 2015 and you can bet it will be huge at the box office. A

Use a Story to Make a Bio Memorable

The biographical profile, or “bio,” is a staple of press kits and websites and I have written hundreds of them. The biggest challenge is to make them memorable. I always look for a fact or anecdote that will make my

You Never Know Where a Pitch will Land

In media relations and baseball, pitching is where the action begins. But whether you are pitching a fastball or a story idea, where the pitch ends up is never a sure thing. That’s why I find pitching the most challenging

Don’t Get Social without a Good Story

Social media has become a staple of marketing but it can be a mixed blessing. On the plus side, you can go directly to your target audience, bypassing any filtering of your story by an editor or reporter. On the