The best marketing today doesn't look like marketing anymore. It looks like leadership. And most organizations are still looking in the wrong place. This week I wrote about why that gap is widening, what Tim Cook's departure actually signals for brand strategy, and why the CEO is increasingly the marketing strategy whether they know it or not. It's in The Real Brief, my weekly newsletter on marketing, brand and leadership. Link to read and subscribe in the comments. https://s

The worst part of being wrong in public isn’t the mistake itself. It’s the spiral that comes after, the part nobody talks about, where you’re replaying it all evening and in the middle of the night and wondering if everyone in that room is now quietly revising their opinion of you. I’ve been there… So many times! And the thing I’ve noticed is that most leadership advice on this topic is actually about managing the optics. Own it quickly, move on, don’t dwell. Which is fine as

Saul Goodman is an excellent marketer, and that is exactly what makes him so uncomfortable to watch. The mechanics he uses are not unfamiliar to marketing: attention, urgency, emotional need, credibility, timing. The problem is not that he understands persuasion. The problem is what he does with it. This week in The Real Brief: why persuasion and manipulation share more DNA than most marketers would rather admit. Read the full piece and subscribe below. https://shorturl.at/LV