Jeff Cornwall, Belmont University entrepreneurship professor and longtime blogger (The Entrepreneurial Mind), recently invited Rex Hammock to appear on the video version of his blog — a show produced by the Nashville-based web video network, Talkapolis. In the 10 minute episode, Rex explains the customer media and content focus of Hammock Inc. — and our role in the context of today’s marketing landscape.

Earlier this year, Oracle created the infinity-loop graphic above to illustrate “The Customer Journey.” While customer journey mapping techniques have been around for years, our hats went off immediately to this illustration’s designer. Most customer journey maps we’ve seen in the past looked more complex and confusing than one of those infamously indecipherable Power Point slides created by the Pentagon.

[Hammock’s Current Idea Email was released yesterday. Subscribe now to receive your own issue, once every two weeks.]

 

Idea: Learn From the Moneyball Lessons of Bezos and Henry

During the past week, two of the geekiest (which we mean as a compliment) entrepreneurs of our era have purchased two of the most venerable (by which we mean, they were once worthy of compliments) newspapers in the U.S.: Jeff Bezos, the Washington Post; and John Henry, the Boston Globe.

It is almost a cliché for billionaires to make vanity purchases of media companies and professional sports franchises (indeed, Henry owns several).

In this case, however, the two billionaires have track records of revolutionizing industries by applying a unique formula that seems especially suited for helping traditional (venerable) media companies (and all companies) respond to the challenges (and opportunities) they face today. First, in their previous endeavors, they have obsessively searched for a means to understand and master the metrics that matter most in a particular marketplace; and second, they have passionately pursued a never-ending quest for insight into, and response to, the needs and desires of customers.

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While we moved our office to downtown Nashville a few months ago, all of us at Hammock have been anxiously awaiting the day we started renovating the space that will actually be our home.