EEA – THE BLOG
France: The Engagement Paradox
Anyone who has visited France lately and keeps up on the country’s politics cannot but be amazed at the country’s engagement paradox. On the one hand, France’s investment in infrastructure puts the U.S. to shame – the average state of the country’s highways and secondary roads far surpasses that of the U.S. All major cities […]
Achievers’ Valuation Promising for Rewards and Recognition Firms
The report that Blackhawk Network paid $110 million cash for Achievers was good news for the private equity companies moving into the rewards & recognition industry (and the broader engagement space), as well as for the owners of such companies, since that valuation appears to be well beyond the standard 5-times EBITDA of most businesses, […]
Special Offer for EEA Community for E2MA 2015 Red Diamond Congress, July 20-22, Quincy MA
As indicated in the chapter on Trade Show Engagement in the 2nd edition of Enterprise Engagement: The Textbook, trade shows have become a critical tool for engaging not only customers, but also employees and vendors. This year’s Red Diamond Conference, produced by E2MA (the Exhibitor and Event Marketers’ Association), will have a special track on […]
7 Big Lessons From Blackhawk Acquisition of Achievers
The news of the Achievers sale has already spread across the incentive and recognition business. Here are some initial thoughts: Blackhawk is poised to become a major player in the incentive and recognition business. It is one of the only publicly-held company in the field (Aimia being another), based on its enormous gift card business. […]
The Other Side of Corporate Social Responsibility
Over the last 20 years, many organizations have adopted Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives aimed at allocating some corporate profits and resources to address social, environmental, or other issues important to the community. In a recent TEDx talk entitled “The Social Responsibility of Business,” Alex Edmans, Professor of Finance at Oxford University in Great Britain, […]
Still Questioning Whether or Not Engagement Is Mission-Critical?
What great timing for Engagement University. The EEA has been on what does feel like a long mountain climb with many false summits, and this indeed may be another. But as we convene with many of the people who helped us create and test the first-ever formal curriculum on engagement – long before anyone else […]
The Most Overlooked Competitive Advantage: The Human Factor
I am always amazed about the extent to which organizations overlook the impact their employees have on their brand, productivity, quality and performance. While companies often publicly disclose their expenditure on advertising – the process of making promises – I don’t think I’ve ever seen a company disclose a budget for keeping promises – i.e., […]
Customer and Employee Engagement Featured in New Brand Journal
We’re glad to see that the new Journal of Brand Strategy includes two critical subjects taken verbatim off of the publication’s promotional material: • Customer engagement • Branding and employee engagement This underlines what we’ve been saying all along: employee engagement is a branding (hence a marketing) issue.
New Book by @eholtzclaw Turns Consumer Analysis Inside Out
Erick V. Holtzclaw’s new book, Laddering: Unlocking the Potential of Consumer Behavior, takes on the traditional process-oriented approach to understanding customers. The term “laddering” refers to the author’s step-by-step approach to rewriting the way organizations understand and dialog with customers and use data to develop products or other initiatives. Holtzclaw argues that technology and the […]
Enterprise Engagement: The Textbook Focuses on Using Engagement to Achieve Business Goals
Enterprise Engagement Textbook: From the Public Policy Perspective Enterprise Engagement is a new field that responds to the growing outcry for a more humane form of capitalism, while remaining true to capitalism’s goal of maximizing profits, because it proves that the two are not only compatible but are actually better for shareholders over the long […]
The EEA Social Footprint
