Marketing would be a lot simpler if customers acted as predictably as spreadsheets. Many people in boardrooms, marketing teams, and strategy meetings share a common wish. Even some optimistic analysts dream about it. It goes something like this: If we collect enough data, build advanced systems, map out detailed customer journeys, and set up plenty…
Why do human beings continue making perfectly irrational decisions while insisting they are being entirely logical? Human beings like to think they are rational. This is one of the most persistent and entertaining misconceptions ever created. Ask someone why they chose a particular supplier, product, restaurant, software platform, or brand, and they will often offer…
Imagine how much simpler marketing would be if every customer came with an instruction manual. Modern marketing has become remarkably good at measuring clicks. We can track who clicked, when they clicked, where they were, what device they used, how long they stayed, which page they visited next, and even how many milliseconds passed before…
Modern marketing has become fixated on numbers, but it still struggles to understand people. Marketers once had almost no data to work with. They would launch campaigns, hope for good results, and wait to see what happened. Results would come in weeks later, often bringing a mix of excitement, confusion, and someone insisting they always…
How businesses can accidentally make themselves forgettable by focusing too much on efficiency. There was a time when efficiency was a relatively straightforward concept. You found a way to do something faster, cheaper, or better. Ideally, all three. Everyone celebrated, productivity increased, and somebody somewhere received a promotion. Simple. Then businesses discovered spreadsheets, and things…
Why human beings continue making emotional decisions while pretending they are being entirely rational. Human beings like to think of themselves as logical creatures. This is one of the most charming myths ever invented. We like to think we carefully look at information, weigh the evidence, compare our options, and make decisions through a logical…
Why do two departments pursuing the same goal occasionally behave like rival civilisations? If you spend enough time around growing businesses, you eventually discover one of the great mysteries of modern commerce. Marketing wants more leads. Sales wants better leads. Marketing believes sales doesn’t follow up quickly enough. Sales believes marketing sends people who downloaded…
One of the questions I get asked most often by listeners of The Overthinker’s Guide to Modern Marketing is surprisingly simple: “What equipment and software do you use to make the podcast?” The truth is that while there are endless options available for podcasters today, my setup is intentionally straightforward. Rather than chasing the latest…
Why do human beings continue making business decisions like human beings despite decades of effort to prevent it? There is a persistent belief in some corners of the business world that B2B marketing should be entirely rational. After all, businesses are not people. Businesses do not have emotions. Businesses do not become excited, nervous, curious,…
Why the next decade of marketing may be simultaneously more technological and more human than anyone expected. Predicting the future has always been a risky business. Entire industries have been built around making confident forecasts that later proved to be spectacularly incorrect. In the 1950s, people imagined we’d all be commuting to work in flying…