Marketing (definition, pre-Jobs)

Understanding your product's competitive differentiation, and best selling this angle to your audience.

Marketing (definition, 2011)

Analyzing consumer need and re-designing your product to better match it.

What if Whole Foods became a not-for-profit?

What if CEO John Mackey had a personal belief that the world should have ever-increasing access to organic food, and his #1 business mission became to mainstream an organic diet?

Is a not-for-profit the best way to achieve this goal? Or does his current for-profit strategy achieve this better?

I really don't know. Maybe the cheaper pricing a not-for-profit could offer also means they wouldn't be able to expand nearly as quickly? Maybe Whole Foods needed to be a for-profit to become what it is, and now, it could consider becoming a not-for-profit?

Either way, the optimist in me thinks that not-for-profit retail is going to be the future.

Clothing. Grocers. Organizations with a desire for individuals to have better, healthier lives.

Wouldn't you feel better shopping at one?

Help me think it through. And join our All Opinions Are Not Equal Facebook page. I think it might make conversations easier. I'll explain more soon.

"I miss the technology from 10 years ago."

No one ever says this. So, why do we believe in the fragility of the human experience? Why do we live in constant fear that one man, one company, one "evolution" is going to walk us off a cliff we will never be able to re-climb.

Life is better than it was 10 years ago. 100 years ago. 1,000 years ago. 10,000 years ago.

Things get better. Always.

1) Greco-Roman Blood Thirsty Savages
These guys hate every yellow flag thrown. They dislike the NFL's growing rules to prevent helmet-to-helmet contact. They want to see guys get flattened. They want to see the big hit. They want to see the car flip over. They want to see the lion eat the Christian.

2) The Ex-High-School Player
These guys think they know what they're talking about because they played a year and a half of high-school football, and can name the two different defensive formations they had to learn to stop an opposing quarterback with a 15-yard maximum arm range.

3) The Stats Guy
These are the guys who wish they could have been on the high school team, and are mad because their physical inability outweighs the fact that they "understand" the game better than 99% of the meat heads on the field. These guys end up working at ESPN.

And then there's me.
These are the guys who don't really know what they're looking at. They like football for the same reason they like Monet. It's beautiful. But they can't explain why. They live for the kickoff returned for the touchdown - the breakout run - the one-handed grab. The constant barrage of action, and the possibility of "wow" on every play gives Football no equal.

Last September, we had the privilege to help out Charity Water as part of the 30 Days. 30 Bloggers. challenge. And this year, we're looking to help out in a big way again.

In 5 years, Charity Water has brought clean water to 2,000,000 people in 19 countries.

And as proud as they are of that fact, they're not happy with the pace. In fact, they're looking to change the game completely - rather than just continuing to fund project construction, they're looking to purchase the actual drilling equipment themselves!

Specifically, an FS250 Drilling Rig that can dig 80 wells in a year and bring clean water to 40,000 new people, each year. Which would mean that in 10 years, 100% of the Northern region of Ethiopia could have access to clean drinking water.

Plus, if we can help buy the one rig, a matching donor has agreed to buy a second!

Buying popcorn to support the Boy Scouts is a good thing. Buying wrapping paper to support youth football is a good thing.

This is a great thing.


100% of your donation goes to providing clean water, with 100% transparency of where your money goes.


Go visit Charity Water's September Campaign site right now.

Watch the video. Cry like I did. And then join them in changing the world.

It looks like we're slowly on our way toward my life goal of an airline providing baby-free flights.

Because in Pennsylvania, McDain's Restaurant has banned children under 6 years of age from their upscale casual eatery.

It has made a lot of people angry. It makes me, who, this past year, had to endure a fussy infant at the nicest steakhouse in the area - on Valentine's Day - very happy.

Many of you claimed my opinions on infant prejudice would change after having a kid.  They have not. I love the idea more than ever. And apparently, so do a lot of people.

His business has grown by 20% since making the switch.

(Note: I apologize for the programming problems when leaving a comment - I am trying to implement Facebook blogging/commenting integration and will let you know when everything is sorted out)

I read Moneyball 3 years ago, and it completely transformed my decision-making process - toward what I hope to be ever-increasing objectivity.

And yes, sadly for you Randians, Moneyball opened my eyes in a way the Fountainhead never could. So, I couldn't be more excited to see the movie adaptation of this book - which is getting widely praised.

But I think I just realized why MyGofer, the personal shopping service I use whose unpopularity I have posted my incredulity over several times here - isn't a success.

They get something wrong in my order every week.

Now... I save two hours a week. Despite my frustration, Moneyball logic tells me its worth it. So, I sing its praises. But most people can't see past the fact that if they shopped themselves, they'd get everything right. And so they give up on MyGofer.

When a company is relying on a completely objective populace for their success - they need a movie like Moneyball to change the way people see the world.

Author Sebastian Junger postulated an interesting idea recently in the New York Times.

Create a Civilian War Memorial, dedicated to the more than 100,000 civilians and counting who have died in Afghanistan and Iraq so far.

Whether you ethically believe in our role in these wars or not, it would show the world we recognize the horrific sacrifices made by the Iraqi and Afghani people over the past decade.

It also might force us to realize the very real horrors of war we don't always see.

Great idea, Mr. Junger.

If you're the best poker player at the table, is it still gambling?

Because the word "gambling" - the negative connotation - presumes an overly risky situation, right?

Whereas, buying a house, investing in mutual funds - these are "investments". These are either popular or historically safe enough financial decisions not to be associated with "gambling".

So, at what level of risk should something be considered "gambling" - in the negative sense the word currently conveys?

You are not a coal miner. An 8-hour day is no longer, by definition, twice as valuable as a 4-hour day.

You now live in the knowledge economy. You are judged by the value of your creation. Not the mass of it.