Conversation Agent - Valeria Maltoni

Books as Personal Media, Most Interesting Titles for Reading

Every season has its books. Winter seems to have come early in the Northeast this year, which means curling up with a good book. I love learning through reading. Reading is the most intimate conversation we have with an author. So in this sense, books are the highest form of personal media. This reading list is based on personal interest, not pitches from publicists. It includes a variety of works with upcoming release dates, and also some older and worthy titles. The books we haven't read yet represent untapped potential. All progress begins with an idea someone expressed, others discussed,... Read more →

Brand Building Toolkit, Personal is the Best Form of Personalization

Personal is the best form of personalization and is stronger than a faceless company brand today. Connection is a result of interactions that over time leads to trust and often love of the kind you cannot bribe. We respond to knowing whose hands or thinking have made something. Influencer marketing is hot because it's about human impressions. Friends and people we trust are our closest influencers. Facebook's organic reach continues to decline. While many mainstream brands distributed through retailers are declining, many direct to consumer products are connecting with people. Publishing on your own domain is still the best way... Read more →

Our Attention Filter has Ten Instinct-Shaped Holes in it. Learning What They Are Helps us Deal with Risk.

We manage to ignore all the noise, including much potentially useful information and data on the facts, yet we pay attention to stories and snippets that trigger our dramatic instincts. That's because we get an emotional high from them. Our filter has ten holes in it. Hans Rosling named them in Factfulness. Fear is the most used among them — the others are gap, negativity, straight line, size, generalization, destiny, single perspective, blame, and urgency. Fear is hard-wired into our brain, we fear missing out (FOMO) and we have a strong fear of failure, making a mistake. We should learn... Read more →

We Have two General Models of Storytelling. One is Ancient. One is New. It is Only a Matter of Time Before they Collide.

We're all storytellers with an audience. Telling stories is how we make sense of our lives. Stories have an infrastructure of data and information. When things change in the data — we have more, or different inputs — the story gets updated. Whoever is able to find more accurate information that is up to date and reliable and can connect the dots and see the hidden patterns has an advantage. The essence of all storytelling is the way events change, says Christopher G. Moore#. Whoever owns the digital storytelling platforms wins. He puts forth an interesting thesis. Today we have... Read more →

The Relationship of Value and Influence

When we think about the future of social media, it's natural to think about future generations as well. Research firm Ampere Analysis found that people aged 18-24 had significantly changed their attitudes in the last two years#. Generation Z are considering quitting social media, that was also the result of half the people U.S. marketing firm Hill Holliday surveyed. Surveys respondents say they'd like to give a more realistic representation of who they are. Social networks are a showcase of lives that don't exist. To gain likes and followers people need to position, trick, and lie. Migrating from Facebook# to... Read more →

Customer Lifetime Value

There's a reason why you've been on hold with customer service for an hour says the Wall Street Journal, that company may have decided you're not profitable. It's one of the stories I shared in the most recent Learning Habit issue. Algorithms determine Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) by keeping a tally of how much money a customer spends. It's important to remember that CLV is about profit and not just revenue. Companies determine the CLV of a person as a score. The score may include geography — the zip code of where we live — and the number of returns... Read more →

Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Turnover in 2018

Any change at the top of an organization impacts the group and the company as a whole. The trend on rapid change has affected the marketing group faster than other groups. Spencer Stuart has done some research# about higher CMO turnover in 2018. A few of the key takeaways resonate with conversations I've had with peers: Poor alignment between the CEO and CMO on the mission (and the timeline) of the marketing organization’s output. Too little time spent defining clear priorities for the CMO, which can lead to flawed or incomplete assessment criteria, as CMOs’ roles vary depending on the... Read more →