CredSpark Blog

Demographic data and purchase history are not enough. Socrates understood the power of a question. You should too. Make sure you're leveraging the opportunities of querying your audience, and let them tell you their story.

Savvy marketers are now leveraging new engagement features to turn their narrative content into interactive discovery experiences and collecting actionable data and highly qualified leads in the process.

Do you think BIG Data is a BIG menace? Do you think it only applies to BIG companies? Well, read on. We may change a few of your perceptions.

We just got back from the Business & Information Media Summit (BIMS) and we saw something we hadn't seen in a while: Optimism. Media & Publishing is turning a corner. Here's how...

Long-tail content can be exceptionally relevant for readers. But we can't really expect them to slog through our backlogs of content to find what's meaningful for them. However, AI can help us find the needles in the proverbial haystacks that are exactly suited to our needs and interests.

How can making your content more interactive improve audience engagement, deliver audience data & insights, and dramatically improve your content marketing ROI? Well, forward-looking companies are doing just that.

During media’s recent Decade of Disruption, ad-supported revenue models have stumbled and legacy brands have crumbled.  But there’s been a bright spot: Events. But there's a dirty secret: Most events are a waste of time. Here's how to fix it...

People trust less and less in the media, institutions, & the government. Lev Kaye, CredSpark's CEO was interviewed on the topic by the podcast, Trending in Education. Can deeper audience engagement rebuild trust? Let's listen and find out.

The media circus around the Facebook scandal has died down and the news cycle has moved on. But the true impact of this and other data privacy scandals will last a long time and will be widely felt. This is about to get real...

HQ Trivia has been lauded for its mastery of real-time, quiz-based engagement. But any media or marketing team can learn and apply lessons from HQ's success.

The publishing industry has taken a beating of late. But there's one segment that's beaten the odds. And there's a way they might just build the future of the industry.

Natural Language Generation (NLG) is a lesser-known branch of Artificial Intelligence. But when combined with asking questions of individuals, NLG can deliver highly impactful personalized recommendations for events, learning, content and more.

Publishers and media companies have a big problem: Digital advertising is too cheap. So what caused it? And what can be done about it?

Influencer marketing is growing rapidly and clearly hitting a tipping point. But is its future growth and success being held hostage? What will free it? Audience data holds the key.

How much more might you enjoy Netflix (or any streaming or shopping service) if they took a moment to ask you some direct questions?

Gilbert Gottfried rose to become a successful comedian during the 1990’s, known for his tendency to get audiences’ attention through shockingly inappropriate jokes. Gottfried’s career recovered from an infamous joke he made in NYC about the 9/11 attacks--only two weeks after 9/11. But it did not ...

Recently I spent the weekend with a newly-single friend who, after 17 years of marriage, finds himself once again 'on the market'. Having not dated since the last century, he's getting a crash course in how much being single has changed, due to technology. If you've been 'off the market' ...

My extended family includes a few psychologists, from whom I've picked up a few nuggets on the human condition. One of them goes like this: "Depression is anger turned inward." OK, not the most uplifting way to start a blog post, but stay with me a second. What's interesting is ...

Many things in this world are scarce. Content is not among those things. As content distribution costs have gone to zero, content has flooded the world. Which makes it hard to find exactly the content you need. Over-abundant content - User-generated, curated, "fake news", etc. - has simply created a ...

In school, you always knew where you stood. But in the workforce, it's a lot less clear. As a student, your knowledge was checked on tests and quizzes multiple times per month, perhaps even a few times per week. You probably didn't love being tested; but along with grades, all ...

Part I: Media's Crisis and The Way Forward Media firms face a true existential crisis: What is their purpose ? Why do they exist? For about 150 years, Media businesses were the only way to get messages, both non-commercial (news) and commercial (ads), in front of large groups of specific ...

Back in school, we spent our days listening to teachers. Now--consciously or not--we spend our days listening to brands. Is your brand just like that boring, ineffective teacher you used to have (and couldn't stand)? Here are 5 warning signs. Your Brand Lectures Endlessly. When Hollywood shows a terrible teacher, ...

College degrees that impress employers are harder than ever to obtain and afford. Could innovations in testing level the playing field? Flashback to America in the late 1950's: A grandchild of immigrants, raised by working class parents, is bright and motivated. He studies hard and earns good grades. Despite his ...

Marketers: It's time to ditch a marketing relic. Give your audience something far more engaging and powerful. "Sign up for our free webinar!" Do those six words make you feel excited? Intrigued? Doubtful. You probably feel some combination of bored, burdened and "Blech!" Why? Because like most people, you secretly ...

Who's more valuable to your organization: Someone who can 'wear multiple hats' or someone who's very talented at one thing? How would you advise a student looking at college options: Pursue a degree that exposed her to a range of disciplines and taught her to think critically in different contexts, ...

Delighted to be featured in Forbes.com this month, for my thoughts on how to create great content that teaches people. Can't re-post the article here yet, but here's the link. Hope you enjoy! - Lev

Your palms moisten with sweat. You cast furtive glances at others around you, to confirm you're not the only nervous one. The clock tells you it's almost 'go' time. Your heartbeat rises in your chest as you try to squelch a voice inside your head saying, "This could be baaaad..." ...

The following post authored by Lev Kaye originally appeared here in Entrepreneur Magazine on May 29th, 2014. It is reprinted here with permission. Startups and yoga are two cultural phenomena that have become mainstream over the past decade. There's a 20 percent chance you've tried a startup, a 40 percent ...

My late grandfather, Saul Kaye, was among the millions of Brooklyn kids raised by hardworking immigrant parents. He came of age during the Depression, studied hard, served in the U.S. Army during World War II, and spent his postwar years doing his part to build America into a powerhouse, while ...

Working on a startup is the new graduate school--you learn a lot, and you hope it will pay off someday. I've learned a ton from my startup experiences, but I'd like to share one of the most important concepts to which our software engineers recently introduced me. It's called Test-Driven ...

The Concept of 'Tight Talent' You're probably familiar with the term "fracking," shorthand for hydraulic fracturing. It involves extracting oil and gas that's locked inside rock formations, and it's the biggest innovation in the energy sector of the past twenty years. Though the practice is controversial, the fracking process contains ...

Imagine you're considering hiring me. Does it matter to you what I know? (I'm guessing it does.) So, how do you know what I know? Think about that one for 4 seconds. You can look at my degrees and academic transcript, but how do you know what I actually learned ...