Month: June 2016

What does Google and Facebook know about you? A lot!

It is no secret that our digital lives are tracked, dissected, and targeted based on where we have been, what we’ve looked at, and what we like. Facebook has made this a much more widely known fact.

Being very much aware of many of the tracking that goes on as a marketer, I was dumbfounded when recently made aware of Google’s My Activity page, then drilled down into the location timeline feature.

As you see below, it knows where I have been and when I was there. You can click on those little red buttons and it will show you which hotel you stayed in, what airport you were killing time in on a layover, but when you click in deeper, it shows you exactly what you were doing on your honeymoon as I discovered from my Greece trip with Read more →

The Mobile World of Micro-Moments & Why You Should Care

If you’re like me, the first thing you probably do when you wake up is the same thing you do as the last thing you do before you fall asleep. You check your phone.

According to Checky, an app that tracks how many times a person checks their phone each day, the average person checks their phone an average of 60 times per day (noting it varies widely). Another Google report references we check our phones 150 times per day, which adds up to approximately 177 minutes per day of phone use. One step further brings you to their magic number of 1 minute, 10 seconds per use.

Welcome to the world of Micro-Moments. These are those times when you quickly need to check your calendar, order an Uber, make Read more →

Be Like Ducky: On Pride, Passion & Zamboni’s

I’m a self-appointed “Beer League Hockey Star.” That means myself and others skate a couple times a week and take it way more seriously than our wives and significant others care for. Some of us even drag those friends and family members along to admire our out-of-shape, beer guts chase a black piece of rubber across a sheet of ice with some sticks. This isn’t just in Austin, TX, or Houghton, MI, or Middleton, WI. This is at hundreds of rinks around the country almost every night of the year. Regardless of the outcome, despite our dreams, none of us will ever play in the NHL, perhaps some beer leaguers have in their heyday, but the passion remains. Often that passion can be more about about the camaraderie and hanging out in the locker room recapping your highs and lows with cheap beer. Read more →