The way we think about brands need to change. In the past, they were objects or concepts. You had a relationship with a brand. But in this social age, brands are the relationships. By defining a brand’s particular kind of relationship, companies can create greater engagement, differentiation, and loyalty.

What are the two most important principles for marketers looking to engage customers and grow revenue in the digital and social age? 1) Empower your customers to be brand advocates and 2) Treat your entire organization as your marketing team.

We normally think of insurgency in a political context, but today’s digital technologies are creating a similar dynamic in business. If you fail to listen, engage, and involve your customers—customers who are now co-creators and collaborators—you may find yourself with a customer insurgency on your hands.

How Nike, Kraft and other brands are following the principles of a gift economy to drive real customer engagement on social media—and why you can’t pay your movers with pizza and beer.

Every organization has its mission, goals, and strategies to tell people where to go. They also have rules, policies, and procedures that tell people what to do. But few organizations have comprehensive, communicated, and contextualized doctrine to empower decision-making across the organization.

How can you push decision-making closer to the ground while still ensuring that team members make the right decisions? Doctrine, a concept borrowed from the military, offers a powerful way to exert influence without centralized control.

Organizations today need to be big and fast. To mitigate the tradeoffs between size and speed, agility and scalability, many are shifting from hierarchies to networks, choosing a better leadership model for the 21st century.

To keep up with the pace of innovation and stay relevant to customers, top Silicon Valley marketers share the importance of the seven P’s of platforms: people, participate, personalize, product, process, pay, and partner.

Instead of The Internet of Things, leaders should be thinking about the Social Network of Things. But connected products aren’t the same as social products. The real revolution will come when objects are collaborating around a shared purpose.

How building a better platform and enabling others to create value will give you the competitive advantage. Lessons of Platform Thinking from leaders like Nike, Amazon and AirBnB.

Coupons. Gift cards. Loyalty points. These tried-and-true tools are now part of a new revolution in retail. When viewed and used together, they make up different forms of Branded Currency. 

Rebels and revolutionaries get a lot of attention, but catalysts should get more of the credit. In an homage to Apple's Think Different Campaign, we celebrate the catalysts who build bridges and transform the status quo.