A Few Tips on Media Buying and Advertising Strategies

Companies need to make money and that comes from the development of strong marketing campaigns that convert people's peepers into paying customers. It takes significant foresight to know how to spend marketing resources in order to ensure you are getting the best bang for your buck. Without customers you pretty much have nothing; or just a concept. Media buying strategies, executive frameworks and marketing evaluation can help in the development of your business.  

Media Buying Strategies:

Your company can't be everything to everyone so you will have to decide who you will serve. That  means you will differentiate between what channels are going to provide a high ROI and which one's will waste your marketing budget. Defining your target marketing is going to make a big difference in helping you select the right channels based on the best way to reach your potential customers. You can read more about buying marketing strategies in How To Build an Effective Media Buying Strategy During a Crisis

Organizational and Executive Alignment:

To create effective marketing strategies it is important to ensure that each of the activities within the organization are designed around core initiatives and strategic objectives. The more in alignment the organizations activities and resource, the higher the chance for success. Executives are often the ones who launch such initiatives and they are should be able to develop their domains of influence around certain marketing and value objectives. Think of total alignment around shared perspectives, activities and outcomes. You can read more about the importance of alignment of activities in Executive Alignment a Behavioral Framework.

Evaluating Effective Marketing Strategies: 

Once a company as implemented a marketing strategy and then in turn lets its run its course for a while it will naturally want to find a way to improve on those strategies. That requires a level of feedback on effectiveness that often comes in the form of return on investments (ROI), sales numbers, customer reactions, comparison and many other aspects. Online companies often look at clicks and conversion rates while brick-and-mortar businesses might think along the lines of visitors and average amount spent. The type of metrics one uses are many. You can read 7 Ways to Evaluate Your Marketing Plan

Allies Want US Weapons: Opportunity to Innovate New Systems and Sustainable Systems

The U.S. has opportunities to innovate and sell off its older equipment as new technology becomes available for military enhancement and defense. Economic development and military development can work together through shared technology lines. The war in Ukraine has taught us that value of high technology and mobility on the ground and that requires equipment that is much more mobile and effective than our enemies. 

When such new equipment is matched with good old fashion small nation warfare the combination could be very effective as we have seen in Ukraine. There has been some strategic changes in the U.S. by focusing on developing troops to be more mobile with versatile systems that can form up anywhere they are needed quickly. That all comes from research, training and cutting edge equipment development.

This is what I suggest based on my understand. The U.S. develop defensive equipment for our troops and to sell/lease to other nations when needed/beneficial. That will develop a defensive industry and proceeds can be used in clusters to continue to develop our own offensive and defensive equipment. Defensive equipment is always in need and can be a deterrent for cross nation aggression.

To keep feeding industry innovation (i.e. outdoor equipment, new metals, space tech., wearable industrial tech, education, pooled research, etc.), military development (Great Lakes ships building, new weaponry, etc.) and infrastructure (ports, rails, semiconductors, etc. i.e. Delta County transactional cluster prototype model) we can spur butterfly innovations in industries through new developments/research that impacts other products (keeping our economy strong through non military products) as well as infrastructure (improving the underpinnings of the economy that reduce transaction costs.)

If manufacturing improvements and military development earn more revenue some of that money can go back and feed the cluster to spur new research and development. Excess revenue can be used for other budgeting purposes such as DOD, infrastructure, education, healthcare, or whatever. Maybe even a large investment fund like a national endowment could be considered for excess revenue earned from new products (military and non-military products/services). 

To me the latest and greatest should always be kept in house and proprietary to the U.S. until it no longer has major advantages. Defensive weapons can be more liberally sold because they have passive and peaceful purposes. 

These are just a couple of ideas that aren't completely thought out but I would think in terms of creating sustainable systems that grow and reduce our dependency on debt and taxes. 

Allies push for US weaponry after seeing impact in Ukraine

President Joe Biden marks 21st anniversary of 9/11 attacks

September 11th marked a shift in our thinking as we begin to realize the dangers of extremism. January 6th taught us that extremism can be right here at home. No matter one's religion, creed, country, or other "ism" there is no legitimate moral or religious code that allows innocent people to be intentionally put in harm's way.

The sanctity of innocent life is a universal moral code that transcends all religions.

We have overcome one challenge and will overcome the next. It takes diligence to our core American principles and our oaths to our nation. We have something we can teach the world about how freedom is a blessing for any people who want to worship, live, and prosper in their own way. 

We have work to do and need everyone rowing in the same direction. There are struggles we still face and when we work together as equals we can achieve almost anything. That applies here at home and globally.

 Remember the past and draw whatever strength you can from it as to the necessity of preserving democracy for the future. If we lead other nations will follow.

CIA Says Russia Heavy Price: Could Russian Loss Be an Opportunity for Russia to Reengage Democratic Free Market Principles?

Russia is loosing its grip on Ukraine and that will likely have some serious repercussions for Russia on an economic, political, and military front. Even if Russia looses the war there are some opportunities for Russia to reconnect with the world and democratic free market principles under certain swift changes. That might take some real effort by many Russian leaders that haven't bought into the war hype.

(Always a word to wise. Ukrainians should be prepared for retaliatory measures and push back from Russians. This would be a good opportunity for Russian leaders who want a strong and healthy nation to remove those Cold War elements/mentalities that caused so much harm and get on with prodemocratic free market reforms.)

Let us play out a quick scenario. I got things going on today so I'm not going to waste a lot of time. Just be mindful that there are lots of different things going on and different options and routes people/nations can take. We don't know what we don't know. 

Scenario: Russia looses badly and the Oligarchs (especially the ones who know people who have been thrown out of windows, disappeared, "got sick", etc.) and more committees successfully replace Putin. With a regime change and more assurances from other Russian leaders that they will reinitiate reform that might go a long way in the UN (Yes they were initially afraid to stand up to Putin but it could sort of create a sign of relief the whole country doesn't follow such tactics.)

While it will certainly take time to return Russia back to a trustworthy world player it is possible with new leadership, new strategies, and changes that include checks n balances. That time is likely to be shorter than doubling down on an existing bad strategy that hasn't worked out well already. Isolation isn't going to do Russia any good. So they have to make the necessary steps to engage positively the world community. Quick withdrawal and reoperations might help in a good will gesture.

(It is also an opportunity for the U.S. leaders to reflect on the importance of building a universal democracy we can sell to other nations and not blindly following key personalities {especially ones bent on control versus guiding} and/or political factions. We can be smarter and wiser by becoming a learning society that watches what happens in the world and then looks over the horizon and be proactive.  💁) 

Little Miracles of Moral Conscious and Empathy As Tools Against Hate: Path to Economic and Human Capital Development

Hate is something we have come to accept and more times than not its not taken seriously by law enforcement or the court. I understand that what I'm saying isn't going to sit well with those who caused the problem and those who support the problem. Tacking the normalization of hate is important because tackling it is one of the only real ways to truly overcome our divided societies. It is also the fastest path to national rejuvenation based on where we are right now and the untapped resources in our national mirror.

Thwarting hate is also one of the only ways to enhance our economic development with broad based human capital development. Engaging different peoples with different backgrounds to help us solve our national problems is important and an underutilized national asset. Doing the opposite has done us harm and deep down we know we were not always right in our perspectives.

If I'm ever in a position to influence others I will encourage fair treatment between peoples so we can put to rest these generational issues and encourage people to become part of the same national family. I really dislike politics and really feel as though its not always serving any of our best interests as people pander to their networks agenda but not necessarily the deeper needs of the nation and what will most likely be fruitful. That would also include encouraging our political parties to focus more on middle ground. 

We are divided in this country by different peoples because we don't always respect the strength of diversity. There are some people, officials, and groups that feel hate is the right answer and they will pervert the enforcement of laws to ensure that certain groups get preferential treatment. It makes no difference how wrong those groups are or how destructive they become if we dont have checks and balances.

We have a lot of people upset by the way they have been treated and by the historical consistency of hate and the seemingly lack of good solutions. It has hit us broadside in the January 6th insurrection and still we are highly confused on how to thwart it in the future. People are still getting free passes for things that should have been tackled and settled a long time ago.

For those of us who have been the target of hate our confusion is much less. We see it occur, recognize it, defiant against it. We see that the laws often turn a blind eye to it and we see its difficult to thwart with out support from out courts. When officials should have done the right thing they instead looked in the other direction for fear they may be rejected by those groups.

I'm on a new path in the second half of my life and I feel like its a good opportunity to serve my country, community, others and people through being a better person than those who hate and those who gave a free pass to hate. There are economic innovation and human capital aspects to my theory (Not bad for a person whose others thought was too stupid and a dreamer to go to college.). There are opportunities to tackle these types of issues and greater opportunities to learn from the mistakes of others.

While I proposed a good solution it wasn't good enough because it would have required a level of accountability. That is sometimes something that is unacceptable even though it would ensure that other people are not targeted and it would help create a better atmosphere for future community investments. I can't snap my fingers and make others see what I see.

(Let me add that there has been overwhelming love and support from people in our community that know what happened was wrong and immoral and likely corrupt. They give me nods of approval, put their hands on my shoulder, and welcome me when they see me. I know they understand the story even though we don't talk about it or they don't understand all aspects of it. Those are the good people who want a free society where we are all part of the same community as a connected people. 

Then there are those who continue with hate, spread hate narratives, who misuse their connections to law enforcement, and who are "better than" others. Even though not all hard core members of this group haven't fully learned their influence in distorting others is declining through defunct rumors and the lamp of truth. In many ways hate has backfired in its cleansing orientation and while its not overtly spoken people understand what happened and how it was wrong. This is where miracles can happen when moral conscious tugs at peoples souls {on a more spiritual than religious level} You can't force a judgement on peoples deeply held beliefs on the value of human life.

While coordinating stories and aggression and misapplication of justice may occur on one level the wrong has become part of the collective conscious. People know the groups loud arrogant entitled behaviors, know I'm a good person, and know that what I ask is reasonable because it helps the perpetrators solve their issues, requires a level of reform to protect the public, and improves the system. My input pushes our society forward and if we are not ready to handle that on a legal level we must come to accept we just aren't ready for the next stage of human capital development {Meaning we still have different laws for different people}.

A bad call through improper legal manipulations, coordinated testimony/aggression, and greed is a step back in our democracy but the very act has created more fuel for future momentum of change; an undercurrent of society embedded into its symbols and unwritten shared understandings. Meaning that the next time people watch poor treatment and corruption, the next time someone is targeted in our community, or next time this group goes after someone people will be much more likely to understand and help. I suspect the involved members and the trust of the institutions that support that behavior went down just a little in the community {That isn't my fault I have asked for good things. It is the fault of those who played games with the law}. There really is no free pass because it just changes and creates opportunity. Too bad we can't get more of our leaders to see the importance of change and the value of human life; assuming our systems didnt step up to the challenge of truth, law and moral conscious. ) 

My plan and path is to be polite and not passive and help others learn about hate and how it is ripping at the soul of our nation. How free passes do cost us and while we are starting to grow as a country on an economic level we are not growing on a human capital level as fast as we should. We must first respect all life and then work toward treating that life as worthwhile.

To truly fulfil our national destiny as a free democracy where anyone with the right grit and values can succeed requires a level of change. Our leaders, judges, and politicians must stand for something greater such as the inherent rights written into the Constitution; even if it doesn't support their particular race, religion, clan, party or social group. They are the legal guardians of our cherished values.

I applaud wiser people who know the difference between right and wrong and want a great nation with a great future for the next generation (All of our youth no matter their background.). In many ways I do believe that even if we corrupt aspects of a system and give free passes for bad behaviors good people with good moral conscious will overcome those distortions. There is something magical in American democracy as a system that can self correct when darkness seeks to snuff out the light of our future and the futures of the next generation.

We can put in place the infrastructure but without putting in place the incentives and broad based human capital adjustments we will walk with a limp. Soon will be the time for Americans to run to ensure we maintain a strong nation based on its principles. A nation competitive against the growing power of other nations and ideologies. We have to get through some basic foundational work first and that starts with understanding the purpose of our nation as it relates to human dignity and putting in place the right resources i.e. infrastructure and universalized institutions that enhance the best of our peoples.

Let us wait and see what happens.....

Ukraine Retakes Land in Kharkiv Region: Always be Prepared

Based on some strategies for small countries seeking to defend their country from much larger countries that were developed by the U.S. we are seeing some solid successes. Waiting until the supply lines are stretched out, before troops are dug in, hitting strategic command posts, neutralizing artillery and plane bombardment, kill zone tactics and other chaos creation method they now have a good chance. 

I have to admit I was on the fence with this one. Just remember its not over and while a switch in tactics, equipment, and supplies makes a difference because Russia is slow to adjust, poor morale, and relatively untrained does not mean there are not plans to counter again. Ukrainians should be prepared to switch strategies once more if necessary and slow down a counter offensive by the Russians. 

Clan or Country? Our Nation is Built from Many Small Choices

What if you knew before you targeted minorities in your community you were getting a free pass? The power that comes from clanmanship and social connections is a powerful one so powerful it sometimes skews everything around it. We see it playing out in our politics and hometowns throughout the nation. Even after it was well known that mixed race children were put in harms way and the initiators were doing so because the target was a "Muslim" and there were opportunities for financial gain for engaging in these behaviors they persisted.

 (They came and told me they were doing this to my family because we are Muslim.). 

There were further indications that behaviors were coordination with close friends functioning within a local law enforcement agency and in turn a large scale attempt to harm, discredit, and intimidate through potential violence/intimidation tactics (They didn't succeed because I have seen this before and sort of knew what expect. Yet in many ways I believe they are buying their time and with a free pass we may see more emboldened behaviors in the future.)

Such behaviors do not appear to be spontaneous but instead well worn path of group bullying and ethnic/racial/religious intimidation of others (I'm unlikely the first they tried to intimidate but maybe for that group the first minority they went after. It wouldn't be impossible to postulate that some of the officers who coached these members may have targeted minorities in the past and knew what they were doing it and it was illegal. It looked like they were very skilled at it and it was practiced.). Most people know the group and seem to understand their aggressive behaviors and the free passes they have been given at other times and places.

You would have to sort of step back and scratch your head if such behaviors were true and there wasn't any real level of accountability or improvements. There are lots of people upset in our nation over disparate treatment as we become increasingly diverse with each generation. Laws that apply to one ethnic/racial/religious group in ways that don't always apply to other groups is risky (I hope this isn't an example of that. I don't believe so but there is always a little risk.). So much so that hundreds of thousands of people went into the streets to demand fair and equal treatment (It makes no difference if you agree or disagree but that it is the perception of a large percentage of society. It is more of a factual statement based on social perspective.).

 (I support police 100% and civil rights 110% and haven't changed based on this situation. Lots of great officers in our country. That includes disagreeing with free passes for criminal targeting as well as in turn targeting police by far left and far right extremists. In modern societies we can resolve our differences peacefully but that takes commitment by societal stakeholders to a greater purpose. 

However, if such distorted beliefs make it into our court rooms to legitimize the "illegitimate" behaviors we have looming problems that will be troublesome in the future if experienced by a lot of people. Just think about it for a moment and why our country was started and what issues of unfairness led to our nation forming. That include suppressing religious practice, silencing/ignoring truth, search and seizure by the British, lack of representation for the colonies, and other behaviors that are wholly against our historical values.) 

Now let us say it doesn't matter what one does, or they had wink and nod agreements, or that there was some indication of prior history of such behaviors. It comes down to some very fundamental questions of the value of human rights on an actual, realized, local level where social networks risk taking precedence over good moral judgement and conscious. It is a backsliding on some important democratic principles as they relate to our core American values (I can't say with surety. What I can say is there is a high potential of risk that it could have happened.)

 Its not my failure but it is something that indicates our nation is not ready to universalize its values to put itself into the highest possible economic and international position through walking the talk of human capital development and opportunities for all of us (I also understand the risks of becoming a highly overeducated dishwasher for standing up for what I believe are American values and increasing risks to a free and democratic society.). 

There might need to be greater state and federal protections in place to ensure such free passes don't occur (If they did at all which I can't say they did. It just really looks like it.). We should ensure that if local justice does fail (Not saying it has happened yet but there is some indication its possible; maybe likely.). The concepts of federalism is designed to ensure that local interests of a small sect of people don't supersede the general rights of the nation and its people. There were a lot of people who fought and died for those rights so we must have protections in place to ensure local justice doesn't skew to one racial, religious, social, ethnic or political leanings (No one is immune from wanting to be reelected. Its a pressure that must be dealt with. That is also why we want people to take positions in which they can stand against local social pressures or see through coordinated actions/dishonesty for the best interest of society. Again, I'm not saying any bad decision was made because I really don't know. )

See, I can accept a bad judgement or one in support of one's social group but will society accept it if it is experienced in many places around the nation. Its not about me so much as it is about understanding how these things work in "real life".  I have long forgiven my transgressors but I have an obligation not to forget such destructive behaviors. I owe loyalties to my nation (as defined by the Constitution and Bill of Rights), all of our diverse peoples (all of the people that belong to different races and religions), our institutions as long as they are generally doing the right thing (I think they are trying in most places but certainly some changes are needed.), of course to my kids as a parent protecting them from manipulative bigots and bullies, and to the rest of the nation (and next generation) that runs the risk of being bested by other countries/ideologies if we don't understand the bigger picture (Why I encourage leadership to think about the bigger picture and find better leaders if they can't or don't have the moral or mental faculties to do so.)

While I can accept such a judgement (assuming a judgement was made. I'm not in the privy) I do believe the facts would not line up to support a free pass in this instance. I also believe that what I have proposed was reasonable, keeps people out of jail, no one is in trouble (Even though me and my family took all he risks that someone intentionally put on us for racial, financial, reputational and religious reasons) maintains integrity of the local system, and ensures that more people don't get harmed in the future by "normalization" of hate (Community complaints, repeated patterns, etc..). My obligations are likely different than many of the other people involved.( I'm just not sure what obligations others have and how those different values factor into this situation.)

I will put in a word of caution out there. History sometimes has an interesting way of changing what we believe in real time limited perspective into something more accurate through hindsight objective analysis (That applies to me as well so I recognize I don't know what I don't know but can use experience and logic to lay it out as to what seems to fit as a current explanation. It is always possible other explanations come to light. I certainly could be wrong about a great many things but I'm trying to stay as close to perceived truth as possible based on evidence that I have witnessed.) 

So I hope and pray they made the right call based on our social contracts, evidence based decision making, and good moral conscious/judgement. Under a worst case scenario knowing that you were getting a free pass and then allowing that free pass to happen would put a lot of people at risk without considering the needs of the victims (Its not a fact it just has a statistical possibility.) We should all be striving for a stronger nation that ties as many people as we can to a shared and universal perspective.

My plan? Be polite but not passive. To encourage truth and good moral conscious (I'm not a perfect person but I'm a pretty good person no matter if I have a "Muslim" sounding name or my children are not part of the "right" crowd. Even if we are seen as second class citizens it does not mean the people who judge us to be "less worthy" are accurate in any way, shape or form.). To encourage our nation to adapt to a higher plane of existence that will help the next diverse generation is important. I'm not sure what our politicians, judges, and leaders plans are but I suspect different people have different goals (Some good and some distorted). That isn't for me to say precisely. Its not easy to stay faithful to a higher understand when so many people have a vested interested in ensuring their "world view" is the dominant "view". 

Let us step back, not make any quick judgements, think through the many different possibilities and focus on maintaining a sense of objectivity. I do trust that most judges are trying to do the right thing based on their understanding of events. I'm also aware of a history of bad calls at various times and places by some judges. Sometimes doing the right thing can be difficult but with perseverance we can see our nation grow, adapt, and get stronger (I guess that is dependent on what your vision for the nation is. Me? I see it as adapting to the next rung but cannot say precisely when. It will likely be decided in this decade. The economic side has already begun changing. The alternatives are not the best path forward. If it doesn't adapt there are risks it will decline, breakdown, and get into lots of political, ethnic/racial, and religious turmoil.)

This might be a good test case for students and professors to analysis in hindsight in terms of how it relates to Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Speech (We put in place constitutional protections to ensure we have strong feedback loops to help us become a learning society based on evidence and logic. While each generation has gotten better we have to be concerned about backsliding and our duties to guard against it.). Just like its a learning opportunity for the agencies involved it might also be a good learning opportunity for policy development (i.e. Michigan Track and Resolve). I know I have learned a lot and I hope you have as well. (Even if my future is a glorified dishwasher for having values I learned that I now doubly respect others who encourage our society to have good values and those within our histories that taught us something about ourselves. i.e. the local college that said I was more than qualified and then "ghosted" me because of their racial and religious hiring practices and false bigoted rumors.). Thoughts? Are we able to live by our essential values? 

(The people who started this knew they were being dishonest and aggressive and the people around them supported that. They intentionally put people at risk and they tried to get as many people involved as they can through misinformation. The same thing we see in third world countries and the same thing we have seen in our histories where hate was not tackled while it was occurring. Almost no one stepped up to do the right thing. So if we are to give them a free pass I think it says an awful lot of where we are right now and the values we support; at least locally. While it may be inconvenient to have values sometimes I think its important. Its a question that must be answered by others.)

Again....its not about me...its about a bigger principle.