It’s November, which predictably means two things. First, I’m being forced to sit through episodes of the X Factor whenever I’m at home, which inevitably means I spend more time in the office, and second: the Christmas email newsletters have begun. {Tweet} If you’re reading this in the US then it may be the case that marketing teams Stateside have still got a couple more big retail days to go… read more →

In a world where we are increasingly social and inter-connected, the concept of social proof in marketing has been talked about more and more. As a concept, social proof is one we all probably recognise. In short, it’s the phenomenon centered around the fact that individuals often do the things they see other individuals doing. Why does social proof marketing work? To some extent because we want to fit in… read more →

We’ve been talking a lot of the Rippleout Blog recently about consumer psychology, and how important other people, and trying to understand them, is to a small business. However, whilst this is always really interesting, it’s also somewhat blue sky. So, for this week, we’re going to bring it a little bit closer to home and discuss internal linking within websites. Internal linking is one part of SEO over which… read more →

A couple of weeks ago in this blog we covered a concept called reciprocity – essentially, a common mental trait among humans which means we are prone to reciprocate gifts given to us, whether we expected to receive them or not. Normally, we’d leave this topic for a while, but it has recently been covered in detail in some of the more mainstream press, particularly in America, and so we’re… read more →

Use of the anchoring effect in marketing takes advantage of a flaw within the human mind which means we do not consider the value of an option based on its intrinsic value. Rather, we compare different offers against one another; we make decisions based on comparative values. In short, through the anchoring effect, we ‘anchor’ our decision making process to the surrounding situation, rather than thinking rationally to make the… read more →

Reciprocity is a potentially powerful tool in the marketing toolbox for any small business owner – it is something that affects the vast majority of people each and every day, but which is often overlooked by those without a basic knowledge of it. As such, we’ve created this short guide to reciprocity and small business marketing in order to explain the concept, and suggest some potential uses and pitfalls. {Share… read more →

In recent weeks I’ve been carrying out some interviews to help select a new member of the marketing team for a company I work for an awful lot. Something I’m always interested to know for more junior roles is the extent to which the candidate is actually receptive to and aware of marketing in their day to day life, and so I often ask if they have a favourite advert… read more →

We’ve been talking about blogs a lot recently here at Rippleout – with three successive posts covering the format in terms of content creation, re-cycling and engaging visitors. However, our Lead Consultant has just come back from Budapest – a brilliant city with a fantastic atmosphere and lots and lots of bars! So, as a change, we’re going to look at one of the more interesting movements currently happening in… read more →