The Consumerization of Corporate IT
One of the biggest headaches that corporate IT has to deal with these days is “consumerization.” The consumerization of IT happens in two ways. First of all, consumers are using more and more IT in their personal lives. Consumer user-interfaces and product capabilities are in general more advanced than their enterprise equivalents; they employ better interfaces and more advanced data models. They work on mobile devices and are social media enabled. The technology, capabilities, and ease of use or consumer products are causing...
read moreBiz360: Lead Generation
Situation: When you invent a new product and a new category, you need good marketing. When the new product costs over $100,000 per year, you need great marketing. Biz360 invented marketing analytics, which enables the quantitative measurement of corporate communications activities. But as with many innovations, successful selling it required a time-consuming education process. And like all start-ups, time was a luxury Biz360 could not afford. Strategic Insight: Selling Biz360′s product required strong positioning, and education at...
read moreCisco: Web Architecture
Nobody knows more about delivering the bits and bytes of Web content than Cisco. But when it was time to organize and refine the content of their own website, they turned to us. We helped Cisco make their website more effective by organizing key site areas around industry solutions. In the process we simplified navigation by reducing the density of unrelated links while increasing the density of related ones. We also gave it more impact by eliminating decorative images and ensuring that every picture told a part of the story. Our approach...
read moreVerio: World Domination
In 1995 the web was in its infancy. Scott Adams and Bill Nesbitt saw the potential for businesses, but recognized that most companies wouldn’t want to run their own servers. They started Hiway, one of the first web hosting businesses, from their condo in South Florida. Their challenge was delivering the complex message of outsourced web hosting to a non-technical audience while staying ahead of the competition that was sure to follow. Their CMO, Steve Umberger, engaged us to tell their story to the media and drive demand from...
read moreHeidrick & Struggles: Service Innovation
Situation: Like many executive search firms in 2002, Heidrick & Struggles was battling a cyclical decline in its core business. Strategic Insight: Heidrick needed to move away from the “start-stop-start-stop” engagement model of traditional executive search firms and create a service model around continuous client engagement. Working together, we created and marketed a suite of “Leadership Services”, including interim placement, executive assessment and coaching. We then leveraged Heidrick’s unique assessment...
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