Why would a great country with countless clever and educated people produce such appalling guff? Oh God! Maybe they’ve been copying our lot When I first came to London to seek my fortune in 1961 I shared a flat with …
Read MoreAuthor: Drayton
Good email, bad email. The right way – and the “Let’s bore the living s**t out of you” way
Judging by these two examples, Ziff-Davis has schizoid tendencies. One half corporate hogwash; the other quite normal Here is the opening to a typical email from Ziff-Davis. It is headed Connecting Social Interactions Throughout the Customer Lifecycle. Gets the old pulse …
Read MoreHow not to behave at the funeral of a great man when the whole world is watching
Called ‘one of the highest-powered “selfies” ever’. Now you know what interests politicians most. Themselves. And definitely not you and me US President Barack Obama, UK Prime Minister David Cameron, and Denmark’s PM Helle Thorning-Schmidt photograph themselves at the …
Read MoreOnly read if you want to make the world a better place: If it makes you sick, why not speak out?
If when you see the news you often think “that’s wrong” here’s how to make a difference. I have signed many of these petitions – maybe you might too Let me emphasise that nobody suggested I put this up. I …
Read MoreCorporate twaddle – or mystical moonshine? Which email do you prefer?
One trots out jargon-esque tripe. The other is away with the fairies. Why don’t these people learn a little about writing before they abuse the ionosphere? You’ll find a free video at the end of this. I learned a lot from …
Read MoreWhat to avoid in your emails: a short demonstration, starting with a lie
Make sure it’s from nobody in particular, sell four things at once, and fancy it up with needless illustration Someone witty once said that an obituary brings new terror to death. Many of the emails I receive beget life-sapping irritation …
Read MoreSo how do you restore faith in the banks? And what should politicians be learning before they ruin us all?
Rory Sutherland gets lots of laughs and some puzzled faces at South Bank University – and makes one extraordinarily important point Last Tuesday I went down the Elephant and Castle to hear Rory Sutherland speak, because he always makes me …
Read MoreSo, what response rate should you expect? They keep asking. What should you reply?
Someone – an accountant, what a surprise! – wrote to me a week or so asking what response rate you should expect. He was “firming up” his direct mail plans. I gave the same reply I have been giving for …
Read More“You cannot bore people into buying” – Ogilvy. Would you buy this person’s services?
God help us all. Almost every word of 91 is a cliché or marketing waffle or both – with seven uses of the word strategy or its derivatives. Only one fact is missing: “Cannot write for toffee”. In their excellent …
Read MoreWhy big businesses fail: a telling example for you from IBM
A little smile for you. It’s one of my helpful ideas – actually not mine, but I wish it was. It was both funny and helpful. A reader wrote: As a reader of your tips and your blog, I just …
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