[2013 trends] Who said magazines are dead?

Seven New Year's resolutions for a brand agency

[Natasha McClymont] 2012 has been a long year for everybody, ups and downs, good clients and... Um... less good clients, campaigns that ran smoothly and some that fell a little flat. So, as an agency, we are mentally preparing ourselves for next year by getting together some of our resolutions for 2013.

[2013 trends] Time of choices, decisions for strategic marketing management

Top six priorities for contact centres in 2013

[Ian Goss-Ross] If contact centres aren't preparing to embrace these six key trends, they have already fallen behind.

Playing the Cardenio right

Five smart CRM customisation tips to drive in more business

[Paul Anderson] The past few years have seen heavy automation of customer relationship management system. Both small and big companies have invested in customer relationship management (CRM) software implementation with a promise to offer better and personalised customer services.

SL 500 is a scorching good looker

New Year Revolutions: Taking the fight to self-control

[Chamendran Naidoo] It's a new year, my dear readers. A new year means a new diet, along with the other resolutions that find their way into our resolves with as much certainty as taxes and State of the Nation addresses. Just like the aforementioned annual customs (and in some cases because of them), the promises of the New Year rarely find themselves being followed through.

Mega shifts in global advertising, branding skills

[Naseem Javed] The world is passing through the eye of the needle and an all out digital transition is responsible for ushering us into a new era where new age media will demand new skills. So what will it take to prepare for such mega branding movements and what are the key facts? A new boom awaits...

A six-year-old debate: Internet versus non-Internet marketing

Adapted from: http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm

Why you should get proactive about privacy protection

[Steve Ferguson] The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPI), due to become law early this year, introduces legal protection in SA for the first time against the serious risks and harm arising from the unauthorised collection and abuse of personal information.

Google's best form of attack was defence?

[Llew Claasen] If you were Larry Page, how would you feel about the fact that Android's dominant position as mobile operating system of choice, 136 million Android handsets shipped between July and September 2012 (75% of smartphones shipped during Q3) - do not all result in a proportionate share of advertising opportunities for Google?

The conflict of being an entrepreneur in South Africa

[Allison Ross] My son recently acquired his driver's license after numerous lessons, countless hours of supervised practice and one mildly traumatic failed attempt. Although costly and stressful for both son and parents, we're now relatively confident in his ability to be let loose on the road.

Cloud CRM vs on-premise CRM

David Kramer plays the Kalahari Karoo Blues

TopTV on life support: Can it be saved?

[Avhasei Mukoma] The story of TopTV's chronic failure to capture the South African pay television market has its origins in the failure by the broadcasting regulator, ICASA, to open the subscription television market to competition. ICASA has failed dismally to enable the introduction of new pay-TV players to compete with the incumbent, the dominant MultiChoice, operating under the brand name DStv, which was launched in 1995, a decade after its parent pay-TV channel, M-Net, was launched in 1986.