An award-winning humorist, entrepreneur and recovering corporate marketer, Michael Katz translates his unique view of everyday life into useful, authentic and entertaining business insights.
As Founder and Chief Penguin of Blue Penguin Development, Inc., Michael is a recognized expert in the development of electronic newsletters, and helps clients significantly increase sales by showing them how to build on their existing relationships.
Since launching Blue Penguin in 2000, Michael has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Business Week Online, Bloomberg TV, The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald and other national and local media.
He is the author of three books, and has published over 195 issues of his "E-Newsletter on E-Newsletters," a biweekly with 6,000 passionate subscribers in over 40 countries around the world.
Michael has an MBA from Boston University and a BA in Psychology from McGill University in Montreal. He also has a second degree black belt in karate (Kempo), a first degree black belt in parenting (three children), and is a past winner of the New England Press Association award for "Best Humor Columnist."
Early one morning in November of 1998, I was sitting in my office putting together my department's budget for the coming year.
At the time I was working for a national cable company, as director of marketing for its high speed Internet service. I was responsible for growing our customer base, and for increasing profitability along the way.
As I looked at the plan for the coming year however, it suddenly dawned on me that I was making a big mistake.
Despite the fact that we already had over one million customers for our cable TV service, and despite the fact that my product was being sold as an add-on to those very same customers, almost all of the tactics that I was using treated our customers as if they were strangers.
95% of my department's resources — both financial and human — were dedicated to direct mail; TV, radio and newspaper advertising; telemarketing; online banner ads and sponsorships; and even door-to-door sales. Not one of these tactics did anything to either strengthen or leverage the relationships and history that we already had with our own customers.
So we made some changes. We took active steps to create and benefit from strong relationships with our customers and potential customers. In the process, we saw some incredible results:
In short, what we learned was that stronger relationships lead to more profits, faster.
Today, Blue Penguin Development, Inc. is focused on helping clients apply these same principles, and on achieving their own equally impressive results. We do this primarily through the development of customized, interactive, high quality electronic newsletters.
As an E-Newsletter consultant, I do one thing and one thing only: I work with professional service firms to develop effective electronic newsletters.
My approach is based on the concept of nurturing relationships to achieve greater visibility, higher trust and increased sales.
If you're looking for help in launching (or improving) your company's newsletter, take a look at my website, http://www.bluependguindevelopment.com.