By Leo Valiquette
A company name that is a mashup of the founders’ initials. A company name drawn from the item the first business plan was sketched upon, or where the founder was enjoying a cocktail when they struck upon the idea. Even names arbitrarily plucked out of thin air without any intention of there being any kind of profound or clever meaning.
I’ve seen it all with over 13 years as a business journalist and marketing and PR consultant. A company’s name is not the company’s brand, but the two do enjoy a symbiotic relationship. A name is a point of reference, an introduction, which may or may not make a direct reference to what the company does.
But a name alone does not sell products, win customers or grow market share. These things are accomplished through the hustle of the team members, how they treat their customers, how they research the market to understand to whom, and in what form, their product or service delivers value, and how they execute on that intelligence.
Read More
By Jeff Campbell 
The behaviours and acts of Rob Ford that are being amplified by media outlets around the world are comical at times, misguided for certain, illegal and problematic. But are they really problematic in terms of the job he is to perform or simply so opposite to the behaviours we expect of a leader that we immediately deem them problematic? Don’t get me wrong — Rob Ford is definitely behaving inappropriately. If, as Ford maintains, he continues to perform his job and is producing better results than his peers and predecessors, should we attempt to distance the personal behaviours from his role and track record as a leader?
What I wish to focus on here is not the sordid and incomprehensible behaviours of the mayor of a truly world-class, and Canada’s largest city, Toronto. Rather, I wish to shine the light on start-up leaders who behave badly.
Read More
By Daylin Mantyka 
It’s Friday — which means that it’s time for the great articles weekly roundup. This week. we selected worthy content from Fast Company, Under 30 CEO and Marketing Tech Blog.
First, an article that dives into the definition and value of a misfit entrepreneur, followed by a post on how to achieve success through innovation. Next, we selected a slideshow that outlines how to create the optimal marketing organization. Closing the roundup for this week is some real-world advice on developing a unique content marketing strategy in a dev shop.
A brief manifesto for misfit entrepreneurs
Sunmin Kim defines a misfit entrepreneur as a person who has shifted from her or his formal training, such as engineering, to explore other industries by means of developing a business. In this post, Sunmin explores whether or not career pivots offer an edge on the competition or act as a hindrance to progress.
Read More
By Francis Moran
I’d be a semi-rich man if I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard someone point to one of the spectacularly successful companies that have exploded onto the marketplace over the last few years and say, “They didn’t do any marketing. They just …” and then fill in the blank with some seemingly trivial thing, like “They just went to South by Southwest,” or “They just did social media.”
I heard it again just last week when I guest lectured to a University of Ottawa MBA class, with Twitter and Facebook held up as the examples of companies that “didn’t do any marketing.” As I told the students, Twitter and Facebook are no more examples of predictable startup success than buying a lottery ticket is an example of sensible retirement planning. I drew a bell curve in the air and said that if that bell curve described the distribution of success for a given collection of technology startups, then Twitter and Facebook — and here I moved several meters to the right and stretched my right arm out — are way over here. They’re not even outliers; they’re in a completely different orbit.
And still the mythology persists. I can understand it. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat are all wildly successful companies, and who wouldn’t want to emulate them. The truth is, though, that most who do, fail. We hear about the (very) odd one that succeeds but, by definition, we hear nothing about the failures, of which there are countless.
Read More
By David J French
A recent story published by the Ottawa Citizen on Nov. 7 tells of an individual named as an inventor on a patent for foaming alcohol hand rub who feels he has not received just treatment at the hands of his employer:
“Engineer sues company he says pressured him to give up his rights to foaming hand sanitizer,” by Robert Bostelaar.
“Francisco Munoz, a chemical engineer who came to Canada from Mexico, is suing former employer Deb Brands, alleging the company unfairly pressured him to surrender his patent rights to foaming hand sanitizer.”
The story is essentially that of an employee who was asked to sign a piece of paper transferring to his employer rights in an invention for which he was a co-inventor. He signed as requested. Apparently, his employment was terminated shortly thereafter and six years later, with the invention having proved to be a substantial success, he is claiming that he has been taken advantage of and seeks compensation. But it’s more complicated than that.
Normally, in the absence of a written agreement, regular employees who make inventions own the rights to those inventions. They owe nothing to their employer unless, as a special case, they have been hired to invent. Engineers who are working in order to achieve a specific goal would normally fall into this latter category. The duty of such an employee hired-to-invent includes signing written confirmations of the employer’s ownership of any patent rights that he may generate.
Read More
-
Entrepreneurship: It isn’t really about the money
November 19, 2013 by Leo Valiquette
It’s Entrepreneurship Week.
There are events aplenty to recognize, celebrate and wax philosophical on what it means to be an entrepreneur, what it takes to be an entrepreneur, and how entrepreneurs should be supported, encouraged and nurtured […]
Read more... -
What gets in the way of a great presentation?
November 18, 2013 by Anil Dilawri
I learn a lot from my clients. Recently, I witnessed a couple of clients who had dramatically improved their presentation effectiveness. Their delivery was good, their engagement level was good, the content was clear, but do you know what the secret sauce was? […]
Read more... -
-
Great articles roundup: Content strategists, equity, content distribution, social media and startups
November 15, 2013 by Daylin Mantyka
Friday is the day for our weekly content roundup. This week, we’ve read and shared a number of interesting pieces published in Fast Company, Techvibes, Forrester Research, SmartBlogs and Forbes […]
Read more... -
Angel investors can’t sit on crowdfunding sidelines
November 14, 2013 by Francis Moran
The biggest mistake Canadian angel investors could make if and when equity crowdfunding is made more widely available in Canada “is to sit on the sidelines and do nothing and let crowdfunding pass them by,” says one of this country’s leading legal experts on the subject […]
Read more... -
-
‘Digital media’ evades easy definition, and so proper measurement
November 13, 2013 by Maurice Smith
Define the term “digital media.” Easy, right? It’s all about tablets and smartphones and the super-duper things we can do with them[…]
Read more... -
Build more than just a great product
November 12, 2013 by Leo Valiquette
It’s been top of mind for me the past couple of weeks while wearing one of my other hats – editor of the Ottawa Chamber magazine, the Voice. The next issue of The Voice will serve as a takeaway for the Best Ottawa Business Awards gala taking place in Nov. 21 […]
Read more... -
-
Join Startup Canada for an entrepreneurial invasion of Parliament Hill
November 11, 2013 by Francis Moran
By Francis Moran In a just over a week, the largest-ever contingent of Canadian entrepreneurs will congregate at the seat of Canada’s government, on Ottawa’s Parliament Hill, to engage in a national celebration of Canadian entrepreneurship. I’ve been proud to be associated with Startup Canada since its genesis more than 18 months ago and I […]
Read more... -
Great articles roundup: Social media, creativity, startups and productivity
November 08, 2013 by Daylin Mantyka
It’s Friday again, which means we’ve compiled a short list of the top articles we read and loved this week […]
Read more... -
Twitter
Tweets by @FrancisMoranRecent Comments
The Future of A&R – Walabe : [...] http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/top-10-questions-every-strategic-communicator-should-ask... [...]
Traditional Marketing is Dead – Long Live Bikini Waxer Marketing | Scalexl : [...] pointed out by Alexandra Reid on the Francis Moran website content marketing is becoming more and more like journalism. So, it is not just about the content, [...]
It’s Summertime…and the Networking is Easy? | THE MERRAINE BRAIN : [...] In fact, summer is perhaps one of the times least used to network, yet at the same time has shown to be the most productive time to network. People tend to be in a brighter mood compared to during the gloomy winters-especially where I am from in England! Networking needs to be fun and not approached as another chore, like mowing the lawn. (http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/social-media-strategy-why-meeting-in-the-real-world-matt...) [...]