In a time where anyone with a smartphone can become a news aggregator or citizen journalist, corporations appear to following suit, and are coming down with a serious lack of continuity in their communications. I'm talking about how understanding what some companies are trying to stand for these days has become an impossible task.

As a marketing professional, there is nothing I hate more than receiving any form of communication (email, Web experience, social media, mobile, whatever) and not see an obvious place where I can either opt out of the communication or protect how much information is being captured. As a consumer, I probably hate it more.

Yahoo's CEO Marissa Mayer feels that without physical interaction in the workplace, employees are missing out on important collaborative experiences and more importantly, the company is missing out on new ideas that spring from the collaborative process. What Mayer is missing with her edict is the fact that bringing people physically together does not solve the communication or ultimately collaboration problem. Collaboration leads to innovation. Without innovation, every company, small and large, from tech to manufacturing, will not survive the next century.

We have created a political system bent on sound bites and quick hitting verbal assaults. We like the one-liner and a good zinger. But as leaders, this is not realistic. We need people to stand up for integrity. Without it, there is no trust, and without trust there is no real communication.

Many people do not realize that there are some cardinal rules of giving and receiving feedback. Many years ago, I developed an acronym for a client who asked me to provide a keynote for their leadership team on Effective Feedback. It goes like this.

Vulnerability is a business skill that every leader should consider in good times and bad. It's not weak. It takes greater strength to recognize and acknowledge criticism than to will it away. It's not submissive. It's about taking responsibility and being accountable. It's not being afraid to make tough decisions. It's about recognizing the impact of them.

All too often, marketers of all industries will look at one piece of measurement and decide whether a campaign was successful or not. If sales are up, the campaign worked; if sales didn't move, the campaign flopped. But how can you measure the success of each of the campaign's elements? How can you make sure you're getting the most bang out of each of your marketing bucks?

A collective identity is the organizational DNA that gives people a common sense of culture and belonging, and allows them to feel that they are part of something bigger than themselves. It's one of the reasons why we hear so many people say they love their company or profession and talk about it as a lifestyle. As the next generation moves into the workplace, a generation that is more connected through social media than any other, here are a few tips for corporate leaders to develop and foster a collective identity in their organizations.

When it comes to running a business, one of the most important skills is keeping in touch with your customer base. Sending out a regular e-zine/newsletter is an effective way to keep in touch with your customers, and is a useful tool to recruit new ones too. Follow these tips to effectively communicate with your clients.

Of all the stories that interest me, the ones I follow the closest are the stories that last. I watch especially closely when those stories are pitched out by a brand. In today's incredibly rapid and completely democratized media landscape, there are a small number of campaigns that manage to create a lasting impact, and they are able to do this because they follow a solid recipe for success. Here are that recipe's four key ingredients:

When delivered at the right time to the right person, using these five keys creates a strong and successful influence that will work for you many times over and might even turn you into the next President!

Internal communications can be one of the most complex pieces of an organization and yet, it is one area that everybody thinks they understand -- simply because they are an employee. No one would ever suggest that it's not important; however, the lack of understanding also causes some disparity in what is required in order to do communicate properly.