Blog - Ben Guttmann

Bluesky has the juice

After spilling a few thousand words on this topic, I don’t have much more to say about Twitter. But what is new and interesting is that, quite recently, we finally seem to see a coalescing around a replacement platform. It took two years, but Bluesky has the juice.

November 18, 2024

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Just email people

You should just email people. Go invite somebody to join your podcast. Ask a famous executive for advice. Offer to buy lunch for a writer you admire. This sounds like dumb advice. But sometimes, it really is that simple. Just email people and ask for the stuff you want.

November 4, 2024

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Check out Tony's Chocoloney’s brand guide

They’re doing great work fighting exploitation in the cocoa industry and pledge to make all their products “100% slave free.” And their product is bomb – check out the dark almond sea salt one if you spot it. But beyond all that, the cool thing about Tony’s Chocolonely for marketing and design nerds is their logo.

October 25, 2024

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Some actual good stuff from TikTok

I’ve spent more time on TikTok than I ever thought I would. I’m not particularly proud of it – I should probably be using those precious minutes on something more fulfilling, but what are you gonna do? The algorithm is too strong. But fortunately, not all of it is wasted. There’s some good, non-brain-melting stuff on there!

October 21, 2024

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Give people more days off

Years ago, when we hired our first employees at my old agency, we had to draft up an official holiday calendar for the company. It’s one thing when it’s just a couple of owners plugging away whenever we could, but we had to get our act together when it came time for running payroll.

October 14, 2024

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Temporal landmarks: Why milestones matter

Birthdays matter. Along with new years, new months, holidays, and even Mondays, these dates are known as “temporal landmarks,” days that help us portion out and mark the passage of time. And they hold a little bit of psychological magic.

October 7, 2024

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How would Ben & Jerry’s do it?

One of my first teenage jobs was working as a scooper at the local Ben & Jerry’s outpost. A few years later, in college, I had a marketing professor who used the brand as a model: If you’re ever stuck creatively, imagine what Ben & Jerry’s would do in that situation.

September 30, 2024

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The delight of chaos packaging

If you’re going to the store, grab me a box of water. And a tub of tampons. Maybe a metal jug of gin or a pump bottle of electrolyte mix. These oddball formats are being dubbed chaos packaging – selling products in containers that are normally foreign to the category. The result is surprising, delightful, and, most importantly, noticeable.

September 23, 2024

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Nobody ever gets talker's block

Writing can be hard. But it’s easy to talk. Once in a while, we might find ourselves “at a loss for words,” but just for a few moments. Never does our talker’s block last for days, weeks, or years.

September 17, 2024

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An early career cheat sheet for personal branding

This year, I’m giving my students the task to work on the most important client, themselves. They’ll have to get their image in order, begin building a network, and put themselves out there as creators instead of just consumers. By the end of the semester, they’ll be better set up for whatever path they want to take next. Here's the assignment.

September 3, 2024

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Thoughts.