In the new world of marketing and advertising, it’s not as much about your message as it is about engaging your audience in a dialogue about your message. Long ago marketing was all about exposing a product to the public. As competition grew and more products and services continued to vie for our attention, exposing a product was no longer enough. Marketers then began positioning it within a category or industry. They strived to place products in the minds of consumers by creating an unique promise, claim, or even story. But in today’s social-media drive culture, position is not enough. Consumers want a conversation with their favorite brands. Consumers now want, and will soon demand, marketing that gives them a chance to dialog with their brands of choice. It’s not enough for us to know the story behind our favorite car, soap, or burrito. We now want to be able…

Yesterday was an interesting day. I spent most of it carrying a mannequin around downtown Nashville in sub freezing temperatures. I carried “Pat,” our androgynous articulated dummy, through busy streets for a video shoot. For this piece, we placed Pat strategically around crowds, street corners and traffic and filmed “life” happening around a stiff, gray representation of a man (even though Pat is technically a woman dummy dressed like a man, but I digress). While I knew people might find the whole scene curious, I didn’t expect it to open the doors for a faith conversation. Periodically throughout the day someone would approach me and asked what we were doing. “Do you ever feel like life is passing you by and you’re paralyzed or stuck? People come and go but you’re not moving?” Most just shook their heads in agreement. “This mannequin represents us when we feel stuck and in…