The Al Ries Challenge

15 Jul 09 - Arthur Einstein

Mark and I have a friendly, long-standing disagreement about marketing pundit Al Ries.  He thinks the guy is brilliant.  I think he’s a big blowhard.  But given Ries’s recent math bashing, I’m hoping Mark may be coming over to my side.

In the May 4, 2009 edition of Advertising Age Ries claimed that “determining the ROI of a marketing program is an expensive exercise with little or no value”.  He went on to decry measurement and claim that “an experienced marketing executive instinctively knows whether a marketing program is working or not”.