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Tag : Inspiring

Write Your Briefs Like Dr. Seuss, Not MBA Seuss.

Congratulations!

Today is your day.

You’re off to great places.

You’re off and away.

Out there, things happen,

And frequently do,

To people as brainy,

And footsy as you.

When things start to happen,

Don’t worry, don’t stew.

Just go right along,

You’ll start happening too.

Just step over things

That stick to your shoe

That weigh down your wings

And mess up your do.

Your briefs should be brief,

Small words straight on through,

No jargon or grief,

Just Why? What? and Who?

Oh, you’ll be of great use

Every word that you say

If you write like Dr. Suess,

And not Seuss, M.B.A.

Inspiring Action Brand of the Week: Signal Snowboards

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By: James Nieman

Counterculture. Anti-establishment. Rebellious.

Not long ago, these words were synonymous with snowboarding.

But then snowboarding exploded into a multi-billion-dollar industry. With a few big-name brands dominating a large percentage of the market, the grass roots got buried under an avalanche of money.

Now, one hardy shoot has broken through.

Signal Snowboards is blazing its own trail. The small, independent brand recently introduced the world’s first-ever snowboard subscription. Through technology, Signal plans to bring the benefits of the direct economy to the snowboard community, carving through retail giants along the way.

Founded in 2004 by pro snowboarder Dave Lee, the California-based company was struggling to compete in a retail market dominated by brands like Burton and Volcom.

So Lee took his business off the shelves and put it onto the Internet. With a monthly subscription ranging from $35 to $55, you can have any of Signal’s snowboards delivered right to your doorstep. Since announcing the platform just a few short months ago, the company has already sold out its inventory, a first in the brand’s 12-year history.

But for Lee, going digital was just as much about brand building as it was about boosting sales.

The subscription model provides Signal the advantage of having monthly contact with its consumers, with new and exciting opportunities each time to connect and build the brand. Through these interactions, Signal can begin to create a community among its consumer base and develop lifetime value.

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In a recent Fast Company article, Lee sheds light on the business advantages going direct has had on the brand:

“Think about a seasonal business, where you’re betting your business on three to four months of sales, but now with more predictable monthly revenues, we’re super flexible. We’re not even playing in the seasonal world anymore. We have no retailers or distributors – we do it all direct.”

 Since the very beginning, Signal’s brand mission was to “build something more than just a product.” And thanks to Lee’s entrepreneurial vision, it’s done just that. Signal delivers more than a snowboard. It delivers an experience. By going direct, Signal makes snowboarding and snowboarding culture more accessible than ever before. Building the brand through direct relationships with subscribers means Signal can inspire its boarders to shred more and better, and live their shredding dreams.

That’s why Signal Snowboards is our Inspiring Action Brand of the Week!

 

We Exist To Inspire

Our clients, consumers, one another, the world around us. 

Clients need to feel our passion and enthusiasm for ideas that can build their business. We didn’t sign up for boring cubicles and never-ending meetings. Let’s make the time our clients spend with us meaningful, fun and inspiring.

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At DiMassimo Goldstein, we put our values in a document we call “The DIGO Standard.” It doesn’t just hang on the walls and sit on our desks and desktops. We use it every day. People who visit often ask for a copy. Here’s yours, and you didn’t even have to ask.

Inspiring Action Brand Of The Week: ThePointsGuy

This is Brian Kelly, but you can call him ThePointsGuy.

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Who is he?

Well, as he states in his twitter bio, he’s “living proof that frequent flyer miles and credit card points are not worthless”.

I was first introduced to ThePointsGuy, by our Chief Mark DiMassimo a few short weeks ago. I had just taken a red-eye flight from San Francisco to Newark. Situated uncomfortably in my middle seat, in between a snoring businessman and a mother holding her crying baby, I accumulated a total of one hour’s rest on the five-hour coast-to-coast adventure.

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I try not to let snobbish and pompous thoughts infiltrate my conscious, but with a long day of work on the horizon, I couldn’t help but peak my eyes over the seat in front of me and glare into the first class cabin.

Like a child jealous of his best friend’s toy, I thought to myself  “I want that. No, no, I NEED that.”

The idea of kicking my feet up in luxury quickly escaped my mind. As a recent postgraduate, the hypothetical of taking first class excursions is likely more than a decade away, if not more. In my current situation, it’s just outside the realm of possibility.

ThePointsGuy would say otherwise.

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ThePointsGuy would probably tell me about the different champagnes that they offer. He might even tell me about the time a personal Italian Chef named Enrico brought him a Thanksgiving meal while he was 35,000 feet above the Atlantic. But he would almost certainly tell me that he did it all by using earned miles and credit card points, before explaining that if I took his advice, I could too.

And perhaps I could. He makes it all sound so easy with his 10-step process for beginners like myself.

Brian Kelly has been taking advantage of flier miles and credit card points since he was a 13-year old booking his father’s business trips.

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This hobby of maximizing points and earning great deals only grew to an obsession when he was flying 180 days out of the year as a Wall Street road warrior. It wasn’t until people started taking notice and asking for tips and advice that he realized he could turn it into a profession, and so he did. In 2011, he kicked the Wall Street gig to the curb and started growing his site, www.ThePointsGuy.com, where he shares his unique skill to 1.5 million visitors a month.

Brian inspired action by mapping the pattern of behavior he wished to change, which is #7 on our list of the ten signs of an inspiring action organization

He knew there was an entire world of luxury travels that people were missing out on, not because they didn’t have the money, but because they didn’t know to properly take advantage of the deals offered to them. And so he sought out to change their behavior. Through his website and social media channels, he began building a following. Now, with over a million devotees, ThePointsGuy is educating the masses on how they too can trade in the hostel bed for a 5-star suite.

Bon Voyage indeed.

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 To see the full case study on ThePointsGuy, click HERE.

– James Nieman, Integrated Marketing Manager

 

Inspiring Action Podcast With Alec Brownstein

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The Creative Director of the Dollar Shave Club is also the guy who made himself famous with a Google Experiment that got him a copywriter job in a top agency (budget $6). His name is Alec Brownstein, and he’s also the co-author of two best-selling comedy books, an award-winning copywriter, a film director and, yes, currently the creative director at the Dollar Shave Club. Spearheading one of the world’s fastest-growing and innovative companies, he’s quickly established himself as one of best outside-the-box thinkers in the industry.

Brownstein is also the mastermind behind the above mentioned “Google Experimentan inspiring example of how creative problem solving and persistence can put you in a position to succeed. The experiment gained him some overnight fame, but more importantly, it landed him a job. Listen in as Brownstein tells host Mark DiMassimo about how an unemployed International Relations graduate with zero marketing experience was able to catch the eyes of some of the industry’s most highly touted executives.

And, if you’re into laughing, you may want to order his books HERE and HERE. These books fit perfectly on a coffee table or even a bathroom, right next to your razor which you probably got from signing up to the Dollar Shave Club HERE.

 

Inspiring Action Podcast With Sir John Hargrave

Sir John Hargrave is an inspiring innovator, published author, agency owner and the current CEO of Media Shower, a premiere content marketing company that has written editorials for The New York Times, Business Week and MSNBC among many other publications. His upcoming book “Mind Hacking: How To Change Your Mind for Good in 21 Days” is an inside look at the life hacking techniques that Hargrave has developed to turn his life in a more positive direction.

A self-proclaimed computer geek, Hargrave has a comical yet refreshing take on how to tackle life’s obstacles. Listen in as Sir John tells host Mark DiMassimo all about the best practices to “reprogram” and “debug” your brain so that you can accomplish anything you put your mind to. And, since we know you’re going to feel inspired enough to want to read his book, we’ll just leave the free download link for you right HERE!

 

Inspiring Action Brand Of The Week: Casper

Buying a mattress can be a disastrous struggle.

You trek to your local Sleepy’s. You bounce around from bed to bed, testing each out, all under the very ambitious belief that the 3-5 minutes you spend lying down will provide an accurate depiction of what a year’s worth of sleep will be like. Based off of that assumption, you proceed to spend roughly $1,000 on a mattress that you will inevitably have to haul up three flights of stairs, and somehow, some way, manage to fit through your tiny apartment door.

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“Maneuver to the left!”

That doesn’t work.

“Tilt it to the right!”

Nope, that doesn’t work either. Eventually, with sore arms and an aching back, you get your overpriced mattress settled in its new home in your bedroom. But your precious Saturday afternoon? That has come and gone.

Enter Casper. An online, direct-economy mattress company that’s waking up a multi-billion-dollar industry.

Adopting the online retail model made famous by eyewear company Warby Parker, Casper is bypassing the middleman and delivering mattresses straight to your bedroom. The mattress, designed with cutting-edge technology, can be folded to fit inside of a box, providing Casper with a delivery capability unrivaled by competitors. Why is that significant? Well, by eliminating the 3rd-party supply cost, Casper can sell their mattress for a much cheaper price, increasing its value and putting smiles on customers’ faces.

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For Casper, it was simple. Find out what your consumers are struggling with and provide a solution. By tackling the customer experience issue that has forever been associated with mattress shopping, Casper isolated itself from industry competitors who are still using outdated tactics. Casper put the customer first, and the customers have responded.

With a $55M investment this past June, Casper solidified itself as a pioneer of the direct-model revolution.

Retail giants like Sleepy’s cannot afford to sleep on Casper any longer.

For more on Casper, read our Inspiring Action Case Study HERE.

from: Shontell, Alyson. “There’s A ‘Warby Parker Of Mattresses’ That’s Shipping Fluffy, King-Size Beds In Boxes As Small As Golf Bags.” Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 22 Apr. 2014. Web. 20 Nov. 2015.

 

Inspiring Action Podcast With Mark Taylor

Mark Taylor is a keynote speaker, leadership trainer and organizational consultant who uses his 35 years of experience as an accomplished CEO to run think tanks in Manhattan. Under his mentorship, hundreds of different organizations and executives have flourished.

In this episode of the “Inspiring Action Podcast”, Taylor talks about how his past experiences in the corporate world led him to an epiphany that ultimately transformed his outlook on growth and success. Shifting his focus towards the importance of a strong working environment and culture, Taylor’s career took an enlightened turn that will leave you feeling inspired