Mediaboss Marketing

Breaking habits is hard. We all know this, whether weve failed our latest diet (again), or felt the pull to refresh our Instagram feed instead of making progress on a work project that is past due.This is largely because we are constantly barraged by stimuli engineered to make us craveand consume, stimuli that hijack the reward-based learning systemin our brains designed initially for survival.

Put simply, reward-based learning involves a trigger (for example, the feeling of hunger), followed by a behavior (eating food), and a reward (feeling sated). We want to do more of the things that feel good and less of the things that feel bad or stressful. These three components (trigger, behavior, and reward) show up every time we smoke a cigarette or eat a cupcake. This is especially true at work. Each time we try to soothe ourselves from a taxing assignment we reinforce the reward, to the point where unhealthy distractions can become habits.

So why cant we just control ourselves and decide to replace bad habits with good ones? The doctrine of self-control has been promulgated for decades, despite the fact that researchers at Yale and elsewhere have shown that the brain networks associated with self-control (e.g. the prefrontal cortex) are the first to go offline when faced with triggers such as stress. Still, in medical school, I was taught to pass self-control rhetoric on to my patients. Need to lose weight? Quit eating junk food. Trying to quit smoking? Stop cold turkey or use a nicotine replacement.

When I started actually practicing medicine, however, I quickly learned that it doesnt work this way in real life.

Self-control theories have missed something critical: reward-based learning is based on rewards, not behaviors. How rewarding a behavior is drives how likely we are to repeat that behavior in the future, and this is why self-control as an approach to breaking habits often fails.

Over the past 20 years, Ive researched ways to create a better method by bringing the scientific and clinical practices together. My time spent studying the behavioral neuroscience of how habits form, and the best way to tackle them, helped me find a surprisingly natural way to do this: mindfulness.

By using mindfulness training to make people more aware of the reward reinforcing their behavior, I can help them tap into what is driving their habit in the first place. Once this happens, they are more easily able to change their association with the reward from a positive one to a more accurate (and often negative) one.

When someone joins our quit smoking program, for example, the first thing I have them do is pay attention while theyre smoking. They often give me a quizzical look, because theyre expecting me to tell them to do something other than smoke, like eat candy as a substitute when they have a craving. But because a reward drives future behavior, and not the behavior itself, I have my clients pay attention to what it tastes and feels like when they smoke. The goal is to make the patient aware of the reward value, or the level of positive reaffirmation they are getting from the habit they want to change. The higher the value, the more likely they are to repeat the behavior.

I see the same thing happen over and over again the reward value of the habit decreases because it isnt as gratifying as people remember. One client of mine, for instance, thought the act of smoking made her look cool as a teenager. Even though that motivation had dissipated in her adulthood, her brain still associated positive feelings with smoking. Hence, her reward value was high. When that same client started paying attention as she smoked, she realized that cigarettes taste bad, commenting, Smells like stinky cheese and tastes like chemicals. Yuck. This helped her brain update the reward value of her habit. She was able to get accurate information about how smoking feels right now, which then helped her become disenchanted with the process.

After seeing how effective this practice was with my clients, I decided to test it even further. My lab and I developed three apps that deliver this same kind of mindfulness training to anyone with a smartphone via short sequential lessons over a period of three to four weeks. The apps are designed to help people break bad habits such as smoking, overeating, and anxiety (which oddly enough, is driven by the same habit loops as the other two behaviors).

Tens of thousands of people from around the world have used these apps, and my lab has published a number of studies showing significant, clinically meaningful results: 5x the smoking quit rates of gold standard treatment, 40% reductions in craving-related eating, and a 63% reduction in anxiety. In a recent randomized controlled trial, we even found that our mindfulness app for smoking cessation taught users how to better control the part of their brain that gets over-activated by smoking cues and chocolate cravings.

While our research has been focused primarily on changing health-related habits, we believe it is highly relevant to the workplace. Our strategy can help workers up their productivity, morale, and overall performance by teaching them how to overcome the habits that may be holding them back from thriving. Heres how to get started:

Similar to the advice I give to people in my outpatient clinic, the first step to breaking a habit (no matter what it is) is to figure out your triggers. If the habit is procrastination or stress eating at work, for example, pay attention to the circumstances surrounding you when you do those things. Do you have a big project youre trying to avoid? Do you have too much on your plate to manage?

Once you know your triggers, try to identify the behaviors you engage in when you are acting out. Do you check social media instead of doing work? Do you snack on sweets during challenging assignments? You must be able to name the actions you turn to for comfort or peace of mind before you can evaluate their reward values.

The next step is to clearly link up action and outcome. Remember my patient who struggled to quit smoking? Just like I asked her to pay attention to the act of smoking, I am asking you to pay attention to how you feel when you partake in your habit.

If you stress eat, how does it feel to eat junk food when you arent hungry? How does what you eat impact the state of your mind, and body, fifteen minutes after the fact? If you procrastinate, what do you get from surfing the internet for pictures of cute puppies? How rewarding is it in the moment, especially when you realize that it isnt helping you get your work done?

Remember your answers to these questions, or write them down to help solidify them in your mind.

This new awareness you have developed will help your brain accurately update the reward value of the habit you want to break. You will begin to see that X behavior leads to Y consequences, and often, those consequences are holding you back from reaching your full potential.

The final step to creating sustainable, positive habit change is to find a new reward that is more rewarding than the existing behavior. The brain is always looking for that bigger, better offer.

Imagine you are trying to break a bad habit like stress eating at work, and willpower hasnt quite worked out for you. What if, instead of indulging in your candy craving to counteract a negative emotion, you substituted it with curiosity about why you are having that craving in the first place, and what it feels like in your body and your mind?

The reward value of curiosity (opening yourself up) is tangibly different than stress eating (closing yourself down) in this instance. Ultimately, curiosity feels better in the moment and is much more enjoyable than the rumination that often occurs after giving into a bad habit.

To tap into their curiosity, I teach my patients a simple mantra: Hmmmm. As in, be curious about your feelings. What does this craving feel like when it first arrives, before I have decided to indulge it?

People often learn, pretty quickly, that cravings are made up of physical sensations and thoughts, and that these come and go. Being curious helps them acknowledge those sensations without acting on them. In other words, they can ride the wave of a craving out by naming and sitting with the thoughts and feelings that arise in their bodies and minds from moment to moment until those moments pass.

If youre curious to see how well this might work for you, now is a good time to give it a try.

The next time you find yourself indulging in a bad habit, take a moment to pause and consider using mindfulness to help you overcome it. Your behaviors may not change immediately but stick with it. If you can hack your mind using our methods, you will eventually be able to break free of unwanted habits and comfortably watch your cravings pass by.

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How to Break Up with Your Bad Habits - Harvard Business Review

by Kirk KardashianDec 04, 2019

In the past 20 years, social media has emerged as one of the most pervasive and influential forces in society.

As of March 31, 2019, Facebook alone reported having 1.56 billion daily active users. By 2022, the total number of social media users is expected to grow to 3.29 billion, representing about 42 percent of the global population. Those legions of users are not just visiting social media platforms to stay in touch with friends and family. Social media has become a digital commons where people and corporations share ideas, sell their wares, make political arguments, and even start revolutions.

Social media has become a vital marketing and communications channel for businesses, organizations and institutions alike, including those in the political sphere.

In The Future of Social Media in Marketing, a paper forthcoming in The Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Tuck assistant professor Lauren Grewal examines social media from the perspective of a marketer, discussing nine themes that will arise in the short, medium, and long terms. To craft this conceptual/theoretical paper, Grewal and her co-authors Gil Appel (Marshall School of Business), Rhonda Hadi (Sad Business School), and Andrew T. Stephen (Sad Business School) had conversations with executives from a wide range of companies and examined recent research in the fields of digital and social media marketing to understand what we do and dont yet know. It is important to consider the future of social media in the context of consumer behavior and marketing, they write, since social media has become a vital marketing and communications channel for businesses, organizations and institutions alike, including those in the political sphere.

While all nine themes are important in their own right, we challenged Grewal to choose the three most relevant social media considerations for 2020, a year when a presidential election will take center stage, and when people will continue to make sense of the costs and benefits of our hyper-connected and tracked world.

Barack Obama in 2008 was the first presidential candidate to leverage social media to help win an election, using it to connect with voters and urge them to get out to the ballot box. Two years later, social media was a critical driver of the Arab Spring. During the 2016 presidential election, social media was usedby legitimate and illegitimate actorsto influence voters opinions in ways that have caused concerns for their effects on democracy. Now, social media remains in the spotlight as a new presidential election is taking place and people are skeptical of the truth and authenticity of political speech on the internet. Twitter recently announced it would not sell political advertisements because it couldnt verify their truthfulness, but Facebook declined to take that step.

Platforms decisions are going to significantly impact our coming election, Grewal says. Social media platforms like Facebook have a lot of power here, and for those that choose to show political ads, not being able to fully understand the algorithms behind the ads, and who sees whatit could exacerbate the echo chamber effect, wherein people only see content they agree with or believe to be true, even when its not. The ramifications of what type of information is offered, and how its shown to various people, could be huge.

Consumers are increasingly concerned that companies are buying, selling, and using their personal data. In her paper, Grewal cites one study showing that nearly 40 percent of digitally connected individuals admitted to deleting at least one social media account due to fears of their personal data being mishandled, and that nearly half of the surveyed consumers believed brands to be complicit in negative aspects of content on social media such as hate speech, inappropriate content, or fake news. The takeaway for businesses is that they must hold social media platforms accountable, work hard to develop transparent policies for consumer data, and take steps to rebuild consumer trust.

Its reasonable to assume that hyper-connectivity to others via the internet would engender feelings of belonging and community. And yet, over the last 50 years in the U.S., rates of loneliness and isolation have doubled, and Generation Z (those born between 1996 and 2010) is considered the loneliest generation in history.

If its used too much to avoid negative aspects of life, things may eventually become worse as everything will eventually come to a head.

The role of social media in this loneliness epidemic is being hotly debated, the authors write. The research results are mixed. At the extreme end of the social media use spectrum, people report higher perceived isolation, loneliness and depression. On the other hand, social media can have positive benefits, such as developing socialization skills, providing access to information resources, and giving people the opportunity to meet likeminded friends who might live far away.

This is a difficult area, because the same thing can be a positive or a negative, depending on how its used, Grewal says. If youre using social media as a release or an escape, that can be a good thing depending on a persons situation. But on the other side, if its used too much to avoid negative aspects of life, things may eventually become worse as everything will eventually come to a head.

Excerpt from:
Three Social Media Themes to Watch in 2020 - Tuck School

INTERNATIONAL. Entries are now being invited for The Moodies, the seventh edition of the prestigious annual awards that spotlight digital, social media and marketing excellence across the airport and travel sectors.

The Moodies awards this year have been expanded to embrace the entire travel journey from booking through to end destination, including: travel agents; online booking sites; airlines; airports (including but not confined to shopping and dining); airport advertising; rail stations; train operators; ferries and cruiselines; hotels; tourist destinations and bureaus; and other travel-related operations.

This year the awards feature several new categories, designed to showcase the best of the evolving digital, social and marketing landscape. These include:

We invite entries for all of the categories above from all stakeholders in the travel journey.

Entry for the awards is via self-nomination and will be charged at140 per submission, payable at point of entry (see below).

Award entries are being invited from today until the closing deadline of 14 February 2020.

Upon completing the online entry form, entrants will be provided access to a Google Drive folder, where they can upload supporting documents, information, images and video.

Last year the winners were drawn from almost 200 shortlisted finalists across 21 categories.

The Moodie Davitt Report Chief Technology Officer Matt Willey said: Last years winners represented a masterclass of digital innovation and excellence. They also underlined some pivotal trends in the industrys use of digital media.

Digital is now fundamental to the performance, promotion and reputation of businesses across the entire travel sphere and The Moodies aim to represent the ultimate showcase for evolution and excellence in the sector. By including the entire travel journey, we recognise the inter-reliance of all sector stakeholders.

The judges will be looking for clear objectives, creative and effective implementation and tangible and demonstrable results in the campaign award categories.

They will also consider the structure, presentation and clarity of each entry.

Entries should not exceed1,000 words in total and should relate to work undertaken between January 2019 January 2020.

Each entry must include information under the following headings:

Total budget & objectives

Target audience & strategy

Implementation & creativity

Results & evaluation

Quantifiable impactJudges will use quantifiable yardsticks to measure the impact of each nomination. For instance, nominated Facebook pages will be rated by the number of likes and check ins; YouTube presence will be rated by the number of views; and the number of followers generated by a Twitter account will be noted. For airports, annual traffic will be taken into account when assessing the number of likes, views or followers their social media presence generates.

Customer engagementMany companies are present in social media, but often they fail to update that presence or use it to create a meaningful relationship with their customers. Our judges will rate nominations according to how well companies engage their customers through digital and social media, the level of interaction they achieve, and the quality of the conversation they are able to generate.

Visual appealVisual quality and impact is critical across all categories, and especially for the crucial Best Concourse Advertising Campaign and Best Use of Digital Media In-store categories. Our judges will look for creativity, quality of imagery and excellence in execution.

Quality of contentThe ways in which companies use digital and social media vary considerably. Our judges will focus on originality and breadth of content, and on the methods employed to win the travellers attention. Extra merit will be earned by companies which aim to do more than merely sell a product or service, but use new media to create excitement and interest in the location in which they operate.

Incentive to spendHow are airports and operators using digital and social media to win spend from travellers? And how are they ensuring that those travellers become loyal customers? Our judges will look in detail at the methods deployed to encourage spend and their effectiveness.

Impact on the traveller experienceToday most travellers use mobile devices when they travel. The Moodie Davitt Digital Awards will look at how airports and retailers have tapped into the SoLoMo Social, Local and Mobile trend to make their customers experience easier and more enjoyable, whether through practical information, gift incentives or other initiatives.

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The Moodies 2020 Shining the spotlight on digital, social media and marketing excellence across the entire travel journey - The Moodie Davitt Report...

Using emotions for marketing comes with its share of risks. There's no predicting how the audience will perceive an appeal to emotion.

The biggest issue with using emotional marketing is that if it misfires, it could cause irreparable damage to a company's reputation. Social media outrage has made the marketing environment a minefield, especially for businesses trying to capitalize on causes.

Despite these risks, there have been several widely publicized, successful emotional marketing tactics in the recent past. Thirteen members of Forbes Communications Council delve into some of these emotional marketing campaigns and examine the factors that made them successful in such a volatile marketing environment.

Members share some of the most effective emotional marketing campaigns they've seen.

1. The Anti-Plastic Straw Movement

When we deploy marketing, we want our audience to act. That requires motivation. Take the Anti-Plastic Straw movement. It was struggling to gain traction with the facts about the Great Pacific garbage patch but once the video of the turtle with the straw in its nose was released, the visceral emotional impact caused outrage followed by action. Harness the anger and you'll have the action. - Patrick Ward, Rootstrap

2. Heineken's Worlds Apart

Heineken's Worlds Apart campaign was brilliant. The campaign promotes openness and explores how common ground can unite people. It's not about pushing your brand message but more about being invited in by consumers. Talk about something that's relevant and important to them. You need to take risks to build your brand. - Molly Biwer, Hallmark Cards

3. St. Jude's Hospital Marketing

Some of the most emotive and memorable marketing is for St. Jude's Hospital. It puts a face on incredibly important work in helping children facing severe health issues, shares their mission and reminds us that the families will never pay a penny. Showing their patients and hearing the testimonials of the family members is moving. We can all learn to develop our messaging with purpose. - Jeff Fleischman, Altimetrik

4. Geico's Hump Day

For emotional marketing, tear-jerking campaigns are impactful, but humor can provide just as memorable a message. Consider Geico's mega-hit Hump Day commercial and its star, a gregarious co-worker camel. The ad took a preexisting cultural catch phrase and presented it in a new way. Find those universal concepts, rethink how to express them and you, too, can have a "Hump Day" win on your hands. - Melissa Kandel, little word studio

5. ASPCA's Arms Of An Angel

The ASPCA's Arms of an Angel commercial hooked me long ago and they've been receiving my $18 donation for years now. The campaign was such an effective emotional message because it didn't shy away from the ugliness of the work they do; it included a very easily achievable request ($18/month donation); and it provided me with an orange rubber band that would trigger conversations with others. - Ryan George

6. Dollar Shave Club's Humorous Campaigns

When we think "emotional," heartfelt images come to mind. However, let's not forget some of the most effective marketing has come with laughter. This is where viral videos and campaigns can take off. The Dollar Shave Club campaignsare a brilliant example of this. Even Super Bowl ads lean on humor. Of course, this all depends on your brand and product. But there is something about well-crafted comedic marketing. - Shannon Bex, Vooks

7. #LikeAGirl From Always

The brand Always has outdone itself with their campaign #LikeAGirl. The campaign marvelously explored the feelings of its target audience to present its idea of stereotyping the term "like a girl." This shows how negative emotions can be a great deal of success in marketing campaigns if brands present them by involving the core audience in a real setting. - Haseeb Tariq, Fox.com

8. Wealthsimple's TV Ads

Wealthsimple's recent TV commercials strike an emotional chord. One featured a man working in a restaurant kitchen, shot documentary-style. You couldn't see his face, but you got a glimpse of a photograph of his wife and child -- the people he was working so hard to take care of. It was a great example of putting the customer at the center of their story, and showing rather than telling. - Amrita Gurney, crowdriff.com

9. Ram Trucks' God Made A Farmer

God Made A Farmer premiered at Super Bowl XLVII and Ram Trucks has continued to set the bar for emotional marketing; finding inspiration in real stories from real people and leaning into the power of brand storytelling and music to make their impact. The lesson being that there are living examples of your brand story already out in the world -- find them, tell them and celebrate whats real. - Wayne Leeloy, G7 Marketing

10. Samsung's Good Vibes App Campaign

Creatively use your services to help an underserved part of your client base and create a campaign around the solution. Samsung's ad for its Good Vibes app for deaf-blind persons is a good example of an emotional marketing campaign done right. Most of Samsung's consumers aren't part of the app's target market, but the campaign created an emotional appeal that rippled across their client base. - Karla Larraga, Champions School of Real Estate

11. Burger King's Day Without Whopper

I love Burger King's Day Without Whopper campaign to support McDonald's Children with Cancer Day promotion. Every Big Mac sold on this day goes to charity and it's pretty commendable for Burger King to help its competition's fundraising. The ad visual was extremely eye-catching. It was a great form of emotional marketing that was really well-executed and received a lot of positive publicity. - Lori McKnight, CSI STARS

12. Shelter's Animal-Friendly Policy Campaign

It's always good to look at your customers' interests outside of your product or service. I volunteer with a local nonprofit that provides shelter to those escaping abuse. Last year they ran a campaign focused on the shelters being animal-friendly. Donations increased significantly, and they've since incorporated more pet images in several outreach campaigns because of this shared interest. - Jonathan Bacon, SureCall

13. Pet Protection Agencies' Campaigns

Leveraging emotion in marketing can be tricky. When we try to leverage emotions that cause someone to be sad or angry, it is a fine line. I find that many pet protection agencies do a good job targeting the heartstrings of animal lovers. They are able to show something abysmal, but then show what can be accomplished with "your" support. The end result must lift us. - Heather MacLean, Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of New Brunswick

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13 Examples Of Effective Emotional Marketing (And What Your Business Can Learn From Them) - Forbes

The Outdoor Industry vs The Digital World

Unlike any other, the outdoor industry provides a real chance for a lifestyle business of entrepreneurial dreams.

Like many, I started my own business for the freedom of creating my own destiny, the autonomy to go where I want to go, when I want to go. To create a business that mirrors my own values and would have the culture I sought but did not find at other places I previously worked.

For me, this meant creating a values-based agency focused on helping great companies with a mission to achieve both profit and impact. Over the last six years, we have found a values-alignment with companies across a wide array of industries with one clear standoutthe outdoors.

Entrepreneurs and their teams working in outdoors have come to this business out of their passion to be outside in the beauty and serenity of natureriding bikes, hanging at the mountain, rafting down the river, camping and drinking beer at the outdoor pub. A rich, full, community-filled lifestyle leading as their most important values.

It wasnt until I moved my family (and my digital agency) to the outdoor mecca of the Rogue Valley, Oregon that I began to see I had been missing the mark on this thing called life. The 10-12 hours a day sitting inside, at my desk, staring at a screen, running social media & digital marketing programs for big sports and entertainment properties, and tech companies satisfied my bank account but not my soul.

As my team jumped into working with outdoor companies like my husbands bike bling e-commerce business AVT.bike and MTO EDU member Revant Optics, I realized a tension point between the pull of outdoor professionals to be well, outside, with the push to move fast into digital.

The growing need to connect with modern day consumers, the fierce competition of big box retailers with hundreds of millions in digital advertising dollars, and digital-first, direct-to-consumer brands popping up seemingly out of nowhere felt at complete odds with the intention of the teams who work in this arena.

A conundrum, indeed.

And then, a point of clarity.

I saw the light of what happens when it all comes together. The seemingly opposite dynamics, coming together, juxtaposed into a perfect yin-yang balance.

And its when this balance strikes, the dream lifestyle business comes into play. Entrepreneurs, this is the promised land.

The outdoor industry values of community, connection and experiences are a perfect pairing with great social media and digital marketing. The resultthe important interconnection between our physical and digital worlds, where online-offline communities coalesce into meaningful experiences, events and yes!: social sharing, evangelism and sales.

And heres the real magic (and the reason for my personal passion)the people who are stuck looking at a screen all day, like I was, are all in desperate need of more time outdoors, whether they know it or not.

Of course, this is the exact point of REIs annual Black Friday #OptOutside campaign (feel encouraged to enjoy this instagram feed of over 14 million amazing outdoor photos using the hashtag).

Its this potential for creating change, for impacting humans on a deeper level where the outdoor industry has a profound opportunity.

Its going outside, connecting with other humans and waking up to the majestic world nature has provided that is the antidote to our addictions to technology and the dopamine fix of social media.

But for the industry to reach its full potential, for outdoor businesses to connect to consumers in this increasingly digital world, to outcompete Amazon and Backcountry.comwe need to overcome the resistance and avoidance of learning and investing in the powerful tools of data-based digital marketing, social media and e-commerce.

For business owners and marketers who would rather be outside, these key insights need to be screamed from the mountaintop.

Business Owners - I know theres a tendency for CEOs, GMs, and Owner-Operators to think this digital stuff is for their marketing team to cover and not something you need to concern yourself with. Thats a mistake. Just like you have to understand whats happening in ops and finance and management, you also have to understand the impact of digital and social media, too.

You dont have to be a pro but you do need to know some things. You need to understand the potential for your business and the path to get there. You need to know what resources and expertise you need to tap, and who can do what in-house vs what you can augment with agency and contractors (Hint: keep community managers in-house, outsource senior strategists and subject matter experts). You need to understand how much to invest and where, and you need to know how to know if youre getting a return on your investment.

Too often business leaders do not have this knowledge and they hire young people who also do not have this knowledge. I see this so much, Ive written a whole blog on the topic. If youre not able to give them the guidance and management they need, likely, nobody is. And it likely means youre investing in the wrong things and NOT showing a return on your investment. Theres a big difference between getting likes and increasing revenue.

As the business leader, these are the absolute most basic requirementsfor those that dont want to just operate at the baseline, the next step is to actually become a social leader. All the data shows this is a beneficial and profitable investment of your time.

Seventy-eight percent of people prefer to work for a company whose leadership is active on social media yet only 20% of CEOs have a social network account as of January of this year.

From more than a decade of teaching social, this boils down to a lack of understanding impact, prioritization or paralysis. To combat this, when I teach executives how to do social media, I teach them with the intention of getting it down to one hour a week. One hour a week can make an enormous difference, when you have a clear path and training. Once you know how to do it, its just like that time you finally figure out how to not catch an edge on a snowboardsuccess and bliss.

Outdoor Marketers - Oh, boy do I know youre busy right now, having just got off the Black Friday and Cyber Monday train. And now, its time to jump right into the holiday sales craziness to finish Q4 strong. For retailers, the last quarter of the year should deliver your biggest revenue with the first quarter a close second.

One of the biggest challenges I see with outdoor industry marketers the most is doing all the things, especially when it comes to those of you in retail: in-store, POS, email, advertising, email, print and sometimes also working the floor and/or customer service.

Its a lot and requires you to be a generalist. Generalists are great but in this competitive environment, subject matter expertise is clutch. The big box retailers and big direct-to-consumer brands have whole teams and agencies dedicated to channel specific marketing. You dont need a full-time team of ten to thirty marketers to compete, but you do need to be able to tap into experts when you need them most.

And while you are likely under-resourced (most small-to-midsize businesses are), youre probably having trouble proving out your need for more resources. Its hard to handle so many initiatives and also be deep in the data. At the same time, its the data that proves whats working and whats not. Surfacing up whats working with hard numbers is what gets you more money and your programs better funded. I mentioned the work my team does with my husbands bicycle company and it wasnt until his mentor said I pulled your advertising report this month and you should triple your ad budget. AVT is one of our smaller clients and as a marketer himself, hes also a tough sell. But good, clear data makes it easy for anyone to decide to invest more money into whats working.

And most importantly of all, what I see so frequently with all the marketers and business owners in our online education program is the strong need for connection and comradery with others working through the slog of constant promotions, content distribution, data digging and day-to-day tactics. The industry is so focused on community, those doing all the marketing need that, too.

The good news is that the entire outdoor industry is absolutely in this together. Everyone has to work through this friction point, but those who do, have the potential to do something really impactful and of course, winning the digital marketing game gets you where you want to be mostoutside, taking those awesome selfies from epic locations!

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The Outdoor Industry Vs. The Digital World - Forbes