I first encountered After Thought in the early 1990s, a decade into working with tech companies that were changing the world—and changing me. I was living inside a machine-mediated world before most people recognized it. But James Bailey’s book After Thought: The Computer Challenge To Human Intelligence taught me something new; exploded my mind –…
Social norms, technology and the economy are under constant pressure. Small but meaningful changes that have the potential to disrupt our plans are advancing every day. Like pressure on a fault line, they can release small tremors or become major earthquakes. From the decline of intermediaries to the growth in protests, the shocks will affect…
The gift bag at the recent Emmys included tens of thousands of dollars worth of products, trips, samples, and more. Product placement in movies and TV shows – whether subtle or more obvious – can expose a product to millions of people, and in a situation and use that is most positive to the brand….
The famous ad – “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” – is successful both in it catchiness and truism: in Las Vegas you can let your hair down and behave in ways you may want to forget. Given Vegas’ place as a center for conferences and trade shows, the reference is certainly not just…
The Closing General Session at MPI World Education Congress 2014 featured Scott Schenker, the General Manager, Events and Production Studio at Microsoft and Founder of Janus Dialogs. Scott believes there is magic in discovery and innovation. However the process of innovating is not magical – it comes from observing what others are doing, tapping the collective…
Posted August 4, 2014, 7:00 AM EDT by BizBash At the Event Innovation Forum in Los Angeles, Scott Schenker examined some of the latest buzzwords the event and meeting industry is obsessed with. These days it seems the event and meeting industry is obsessed with a constant stream of new buzzwords. But are they really…
Unity and alignment are powerful forces, and when they can be harnessed they can drive great accomplishment. I think about a personal collection I am very proud of, a set of posters from the Second World War, posters made by, in part, my grandfather who was the creative lead of the Sheldon-Claire Agency at that…
Event teams can adopt a classic marketing model to focus efforts and achieve their objectives. In early 2013, Harvard Business Review posted an article titled, “Rethinking the Four P’s” suggesting that the classic marketing mix model1 (product, place, price, and promotion) should be retooled to better address the needs of B2B marketers. The article was…
While the technology of additive manufacturing (3d printing) is at the foundation of the 3rd industrial revolution, other social, political, economic, and technical changes are fueling this disruption in more surprising ways. Kickstarter (@kickstarter), launched only four years ago, serves as a crowd-funding site where those looking to start a project can find those…
It would be nice to think that as a species we are forever improving. Stronger, faster, smarter. But what if we aren’t? What if we have passed our evolutionary mental zenith and are now on the down side? Matt Ridley explored this for The Wall Street Journal concluding: “’Has brain size stopped increasing?’ For a…
In early May of 2012 I presented at the Event Marketing Summit 5 trends facing the Experience Marketing industry. That presentation is embedded below. Some additional notes related to this presentation: An update on the Apple Store Protest in Australia can be found here The Flash Mob that was denied a…
![No [self determined] Good Deed Goes Unpunished](https://scottschenker.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/mickey-l.jpg)
During the fundraising for the New World Symphony in Miami, there was a donation for $90 million. The scale of the donation is not the most interesting aspect, the fact that the donation is from “anonymous” is. A business making a donation of this size would want the associated publicity. But why would an…
WHAT FOLLOWS IS A POST FROM A FRIEND AND COLLEAGUE WHO HAS BEEN A THOUGHT LEADER IN THE AREA OF MEASUREMENT FOR MANY YEARS. IT RELATES TO THE NEW NORM OF EQUALITY AND USER GENERATED CONTENT. _______________________ The history of the event industry can be characterized as an unending search for the next big…
Growing up, I was taught a memory technique of creating a word from the letters of what you wanted to remember. The first I recall was “Homes” which was the great lakes in the Midwest – Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior. Businesses rely on these acronyms all the time, creating unique ones for department…
A few “tools of the trade” for caretakers of marketing events and experiences: SWOT | Helps to determine the competitive advantage (or disadvantage) that one faces as well as the challenges and possible opportunities to pursue. Strength Weakness Opportunity Threat STEP | Used to build an assessment and context of the landscape in general,…
In the song “The Hardest Part” Blondie sings Twenty five tons of hardened steel rolls on no ordinary wheel Inside the armored car ride two big armed guards In a bullet-proof vest, shatterproof glass, overdrive, we’re gonna pass Twenty five tons of hardened steel rolls on no ordinary wheel The hardest part of the armoured…