2012-favoritesHere is my list of personal top ten favorite Brainzooming blog posts from 2012, along with a few notes on the origins or outcomes of each post. Stay tuned Monday for the list of the most viewed new Brainzooming blog posts from 2012. And as has become a pattern, my list and your list are pretty different!

Father’s Day and Some Parental Advice You Should Heed - June 15

I’m always surprised reviewing every blog post for this annual feature about the range of topics covered on the Brainzooming blog. This post - of a personal nature - is without a doubt the most important post in 2012, though. So much business stuff can get fixed later. If you ignore this post’s advice, however, there’s no going back to fix it.

Brand Experience, Glass Houses, and Naked Shower Guy - November 2

This was an easy choice as a 2012 favorite post. I’d been seeing Naked Shower Guy for several years, but wasn’t going to write about this bizarre situation without an underlying connection to Brainzooming content. Ultimately, a user experience research project we were doing for a client this year became the angle. Trying to get our local online “paper” to cover the story ANONYMOUSLY – hoping to let Naked Shower Guy know what was going on - didn’t work quite as planned though!

Research – 7 Ways to Lie with Focus Groups - October 3

This post seemed to strike a nerve among some members of the market research community. One market research celeb claimed it was because the “7 Ways to Lie with Focus Groups” said things nobody will say about market research reporting. The post was inspired by sitting through a poorly-designed focus group and the report out which made it all seem as if the market research supported quantitative conclusions. My favorite part is the someecards graphic desperately created the night before the post ran because it COULDN’T have a stock photo!

Just Thinkin’ – Musings from Twitter (Apologies to Larry King) - December 13

I’ve been a Larry King fan since my first job where I listened to his radio show during all- nighters. His open phone hour had some real wacko callers, which WAS a bit unnerving when you’re the only person in a nine-story office building at midnight! His run-on writing style has been parodied frequently, but this post was my first shot at trying the Larry King, ellipsis-heavy format. But you know what? The Larry King-style column is golden for compiling old tweets and random ideas. Expect to see this format again . . . I promise.

Strategic Thinking Exercise – Black Swan Events in Your Plan - October 25

This post is a favorite for various reasons. The post was inspired by a client question. It demonstrates how we apply the Brainzooming methodology to translate a client’s desired strategic outcome into a strategic thinking exercise to deliver it. There was a way to work a scene from Ghostbusters into it. And one of my strategic mentors, Chuck Dymer, said very kind things about the post in the comments. It doesn’t get any more favorite than that!

B2B Relationship Marketing – 5 Ways Facebook Helps B2B Relationships - July 12

This post recapping a friend’s weekend-long, B2B-oriented entertainment adventure with her clients is a favorite because of the masterful integration of experience marketing and Facebook social sharing. In fact, the Facebook social sharing took a memorable weekend for a couple of clients to a broader marketing effort aimed at potential clients and a challenge to competitors.

11 Strategic Questions for Disruptive Innovation in Markets - May 9

I personally liked walking away from the KCKCC Innovation Summit to be able to devise these questions (based on the presentations) to trigger ideas for disruptive innovation. Interestingly, the post sparked one of the blog’s first troll-like responses: an “innovation” guy who objected to the post’s headline as misleading. Despite his comments on the post, I stand by it. I could have shared very narrow stories from the presenters. Instead, you get very usable strategic questions to create your own potential disruptive innovation.

Gigabit City Summit Idea: When Everything Is in the Cloud, What Does “Place” Mean? - July 25

Great questions resonate for a long time. The question in the title from Josep Piqué during a Gigabit City Summit during the summer still resonates: “When everything is in the cloud, what does ‘place’ mean?” While it’s intriguing to speculate about the answer, it will be even more intriguing to see how the question is answered over the next twenty-five years.

Listening for Blog Content Is an Art within Your Grasp - January 27

This post is a personal favorite because it came directly from going to a networking event (generally not my favorite thing to do), the topic originated within 90 minutes of it becoming a blog post, it underscores how blog topics are all over the place, and it’s one in a series of Brainzooming blog posts inspired by Jason Harper. All that, plus the main part of the post is written in Sharpie marker on the back of my 2012 goals. Unfortunately, I probably did a better job with remembering Jason’s comment than remembering my 2012 goals.

Assistance Unwanted – 5 Management Style Signs Helping Is Futile - August 1

I’ll admit a decent number of Brainzooming blog posts are written about things I’m pissed off about in some way. But rather than blister someone, I try to generalize my frustration so it’s helpful for you and protects the object of my frustration. This frustration-inspired post is a favorite since it uses frustration from six years ago to obscure a 2012 situation that was frustrating me to no end. Venting your frustrations through generalized blog posts works. Add that to the reasons for why you should start a blog! - Mike Brown

 

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