iGen or  Generation Z is the generation who has been born in digitalization age with smart phones in the hands. iGen is independent, stubborn, pragmatic and always in a rush. Marketers are facing problem in understanding their interest, hobbies and attitude. Gen Z wants to know everything about a product before buying. They trust friends, strangers over advertisements, blogs or information on the net. In an article by Joan Schneider (CEO of Schneider Associates), shares some tips on how to market iGeneration:

·         Personalize Everything.

·         Connect with them through social media.

·         Be strategic with advertisement.

·         Excite I Generation with content.

·         Use mobile to reach I Generation.

Marketers also need to be social, transparent and personal with this generation. To know more about this generation read an article “How to market to the Generation I” by Joan Schneider at: https://hbr.org/2015/05/how-to-market-to-the-igeneration

Every businessman wants to enter into new market for growth or better opportunities, but most of the time they won't able to succeed because of competition. An article by Samit Varma (CEO of Pizza Studio), discusses about three components which can help organization to enter into the new market:

·         Focus on consumer impact: Provide high quality, consistent product. People buy products based on their initial experience, so try to make a positive impression. Customer satisfaction is the only key for success.

·         Allow for customization: Today’s customers believe in customization, so to succeed in new market an entrepreneur need to provide customized product with quick delivery.

·         Streamline for predictability: Consistency in operations is very important for timely delivery of products. Implementing forecasting and planning can help entrepreneurs.

Read more at:   http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245813

In today's world, brands need to stand out and do something different. So, a new concept has come up. It is the concept of placing your brand in a subscription box.  Subscription box is a box that is received by subscribers periodically and contains products and samples. They can be used for customized market research and provides information about products and packaging. According to Euromonitor International, using subscription boxes will help to retain customers. Using this subscription box can reduce your marketing expenditure and help a company to reach a national audience, increase social traffic and sales. To know more about subscription box and its benefits, read the article linked by Aihui Ong (Founder and CEO of lovewithfood.com) at:  http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245753

According to Chris Golec (founder and CEO of Demandbase), innovations in marketing technology are solving many critical issues of B2B marketers. These innovations are taking place in advertising, personalization, conversion and measurement which are helping marketers in driving and engaging present and potential customers. Future of B2B is maintaining continuous and long term relationships with customers. Three areas where innovation in B2B taking place:

• Accounting Based Marketing (ABM): It provides a vital strategy for companies that want to create sustainable growth and profitability within their most important client accounts. ABM focuses explicitly on individual client accounts and their needs. More importantly, it is a collaborative approach that engages sales, marketing, delivery, and key executives toward achieving the client’s business goals.

• “Always-on” advertising & subscription model: B2B organizations need to advertise on a regular basis and for attracting right companies, you need to have the right content on your website.

• Best of breed vs. Single vendor: Best of breed is better because it provides best solutions for each problem.

Read more at: http://venturebeat.com/2015/04/30/the-future-of-b2b-marketing/

According to Lauren Jung (Co-Founder of Theshelf.com), customers believe influencers over Facebook, twitter post for getting information about new trends, innovations and advice for buying products. Influencers are individuals who have the power to affect purchase decisions of others because of their (real or perceived) authority, knowledge, position, or relationship. In consumer spending, members of a peer group or reference group act as influencers.

Here are some tips to make influencer marketing effective are:

•         For making influence marketing successful align with influencer who have the power to influence the buyer’s decision or inbound interest.
•         Tailor your strategy based on the influencer.
•         Try to maintain a relationship.
•         Encourage content creation from brand evangelists.

 Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245757

Mobile commerce (m-commerce) is a type of e-commerce conducted through mobile devices such as mobile phones and other mobile devices with a wireless connection - including smart phones (iPhones, Google Android), tablets (iPad, Amazon Kindle) and notebooks. M-Commerce also brings new opportunities for selling online, and mobile marketing can be used to extend online reach. Four things a company must consider while developing m-commerce marketing strategy are:

·         Reach: Tap into the uniqueness of mobile-first consumers.

·         Curate: Trigger impulse purchases through well-crafted offers.

·         Entertain: Make shopping fun and easy, not just cheap.

·         Lock in: Capture the loyalty of mobile shoppers early.

Read more at: http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/consumer_and_retail/learning_from_south_koreas_mobile-retailing_boom

According to Burton White (Vice President of the Industry Supply Chains at Chainalytics), for retailers and e-commerce firms, developing an effective and efficient supply chain strategy is challenging. To make last-mile delivery as their core supply chain strategy, they have to provide right inventory at the right time at the right place in the right form.
Some tips to be considered while developing a supply chain strategy are:

• Never lose sight of what actually matters to the customer
• Explore innovative approaches, like to bundle product shipments.
• Explore non-traditional distribution capabilities.
• Optimize transportation solutions to meet last-mile demands.
• Consider the inventory’s form, function and placement within your supply chain.
• Focus on returns management efficiency.

Read more at: http://www.industryweek.com/last-mile

The Journeyman is a person with multiple skills. They are "highly skilled" labor in any field of manufacturing. Apprenticeship training is used to train journeyman which combines on-the-job training with academic instruction for those entering the workforce.  It is also known as dual-training program.

The advantage to this type of training is that the manufacturer will make an investment in a program that pays the workers while they are in job training. Some ways to eliminate the shortage of skilled labor are:

• Make a contract with workers who want training.
• Offer job security and long term employment.
• Provide apprentice training with job security.

To know more about apprenticeship training and ways to eliminate the shortage of skilled labor follow:  http://www.industryweek.com/recruiting-retention/kind-training-we-need-manufacturing

A data lake is a storage repository that holds a vast amount of raw data in its native format until it is needed. According to Gartner, the advantage of Data lakes is: helps in addressing the old and new problem by providing the relevant set of data for analyzing the situation. Disadvantages are:

• Lack of data quality.
• Security and access control.
• Data Lake requires proper infrastructure.

But using purpose built cloud systems security, access control and scalability problem can be solved, but data quality is not good.
 To know more about Data Lake and its advantage and disadvantages, read an article Data Lakes: Emerging Pros and Cons by Joe Panettieri. Link: http://www.information-management.com/news/Big-Data-Lakes-Cloud-Computing-Analytics-10026889-1.html

According to Kevan Lee (Content Crafter, Buffer), testing phase in a social media marketing is an important phase, which include "What to test" and "how to test." Some questions you should ask yourself while testing are:

• Which one thing you will be testing?
• What metric will be my best measurement of success?
• Do I have enough data to assume this result will be true and repeatable for everyone?

In this article, the author writes about some tips for improving social media marketing test. They are: testing one variable at a time, look at the right data, compare consistently and check for statistical significance. 

To know more about the test used for various social media marketing sites, read on: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245478

For any business, demand forecasting is an important function. Demand Forecasting is the activity of estimating the quantity of a product or service that consumers will purchase in near future. It helps you to order inventory and arrange staff for fulfilling customers need.

According to Peter Daisyme (Co-founder of Hostt), some ways to make demand forecasting more accurate are:

• Use the right set of data for making decisions.
• Consider the variables like the seasonal trend, random trend, economic conditions, etc.
• Know your customers and business.
• Each year, you should refine your demand forecasting technique.
Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/244823

For long term survival of an organization, they need regular and loyal customers. According to Brian Horn (Author and Co-Founder of Authority Alchemy), for building long term relationships with your customers, an organization needs to build trust. Following are the ways to build relationship and brand loyalty: • Offering returning customers a discount on services.
• Giving rewards for references.
• Offering updates.
• Really caring about your customers.
Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245439

According to a survey, for hiring a customer service worker, an employer approximately spend $8800 on hiring and training and 70% of customer service worker leave a job within 1year. Some steps for employee retention are: • Provide training to workers and motivate them.
• Evaluate the performance of the employees and give feedback.
• Implement the customer service training software.
• Give employee work from home choice, this will reduce cost per employee up to $2000.
Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245524

According to Gideon Kimbrell (CEO of InList.com, Founder of Syragon), for developing a successful multi marketing strategy an organization need to follow some steps: • Take a decision with influencers or consultants who have experience. You can also choose social media influencers for posting information.
• Have complete knowledge about your customer’s behavior, which can be used in making marketing strategy and use CRM
• Business earns loyalty by engaging customers, so use high visibility placements.
• Asses your present and potential customers value.
For building a good marketing strategy, an organization needs to focus on the customer. Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245360

Big Data as a Service (BDaaS) means outsourcing various big data functions to the cloud, which includes supply of data, analytical tools to interrogate and analysis the data. Advantages of outsourcing your analytical activities are:

·         Organizations can save money spent on components and infrastructure and time.

·         Storing large quantity of information requires an ongoing investment of time and resources.  But by using BDaaS, organizations can concentrate on business only.

·         When data is stored on a BDaaS service provider server they are responsible for it.

·         Pay only for services you use on the basis of time used or the cost of compliance and data protection.
Read more at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2015/04/27/big-data-as-a-service-is-next-big-thing/

Procurement officer works in the field of purchasing and focus on reducing costs for purchased material and services and thus ensuring timely delivery of goods and services. But, now their role is becoming more complex. They need to guard the brand name, use sustainable business practices and find innovative ways to develop new products and services. They also need to adopt a holistic strategy. Procurement officers need to establish collaborative outsourcing and service acquisition models and also need to find & nurture the next generation. Read more at: http://www.industryweek.com/procurement/procurement-2025-10-challenges-will-transform-global-sourcing

Change management is a systematic approach while dealing with change, both from the perspective of an organization and on an individual level. For successful change management an organization needs the satisfaction of employees. According to Jeffrey Liker (President, Liker Lead Advisors), most of the organizations are looking for lean transformation and they are facing problem while transforming as they focus in reasoning process. Read more at: http://www.industryweek.com/change-management/change-management-and-lean-transformation

According to Sujan Patel (Contributor), companies before analyzing big data, must understand the company's goals and mission. In a survey by Price Waterhouse Cooper, only 44% of companies feel that they have the right talent to capitalize big data. When any company chooses tool for data analytics, focus should be on team needs and solution and the team must know how to use that tool. Read more at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/sujanpatel/2015/04/22/how-fortune-500-companies-are-building-big-data-teams-and-how-startups-can-too/

According to Brian Sutter (Director of Marketing, Wasp Barcode), small business owner need to think strategically for long term survival. They should know how to use employee's time and skills effectively. Business should use CRM software for accessing customer data and analyze performance and business metrics for spotting pattern and trends. Small business owner need business intelligence tools for quick decision making, analyzing business opportunities and threats and improve management of the business. According to a recent report, 56% of small businesses plan to invest less than 3% of revenue on marketing. But, small organizations should use email marketing for maintaining long term relationship with customers. Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245386

According to David Shulman (CEO of Digital Agency Organic Inc.), nurturing young talent is important. Young talent is important because the investment you make today will pay you in future. There should be a connection between all executives and employees. Juniors also should get a chance to work with senior staff. It's good to have a clear regulatory for employees, but the organization should promote and reward fresh and innovative ideas. Read more at:  http://adage.com/article/agency-viewpoint/effectively-manage-talent-life-cycle/298136/