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many execs say it's impossible to draw direct correlations between stunts and sales. Most clients seem satisfied with generating high levels of social sharing, with online views providing substantial savings compared to paid media. "From our perspective ... it will more than pay for itself in earned media and 'share of conversation.' That, in turn, translates into brand worth, which in turn drives sales," says Thomas Moradpour, vp, global marketing at Carlsberg. "We won’t be able to track a direct bump—too many variables—but we’ll measure the impact on brand health and equity through our brand trackers in all of our key international markets."

many execs say it's impossible to draw direct correlations between stunts and sales. Most clients seem satisfied with generating high levels of social sharing, with online views providing substantial savings compared to paid media. "From our perspective ... it will more than pay for itself in earned media and 'share of conversation.' That, in turn, translates into brand worth, which in turn drives sales," says Thomas Moradpour, vp, global marketing at Carlsberg. "We won’t be able to track a direct bump—too many variables—but we’ll measure the impact on brand health and equity through our brand trackers in all of our key international markets."

marketers are staging "pranks on steroids," upping the ante in almost every imaginable way and probing darker territory—with the sponsor's name attached. Scenarios that trade on fear, death and danger test the limits of personal privacy and social acceptability. The genre, he says, represents "the dark side of the constant drumbeat to enhance consumer engagement."

Believe it or not, your prospects won’t remember how long you have been in business, how many trucks you have, or how big your building is, but they will remember how fast you responded to their request, or how your top sales person went above and beyond to help them. In fact, if your stories are crafted correctly, if they are about your prospects, and if they have elements of remarkable in them, your customers and prospects will share those stories with everyone they know.

This exercise isn’t only for marketing people. If you see the example above, operations, finance, sales and leadership need to be part of the conversation and the work to operationalize any remarkable aspect of your business.

consumers looked at native ads 53% more frequently that display ads, and 32% of respondents said they would share a native ad with a family member.

Does that mean those consumers will buy more of the products being advertised? The report claims an 18% lift in purchase intent for native advertising vs. banner ads. Cristina Heise, VP of ad agency gyro Cincinnati, says that ringing up a sale isn't necessarily the purpose of a native ad. "Most of marketing is about repeat exposure and conditioning associating an experience with a brand," she says.

Heise's view, native advertising "goes native" in the sense that it adjusts to its surroundings. That doesn't mean a BuzzFeed ad unit necessarily, though. Heise says a compelling fashion ad in Vogue could be considered native advertising.

Check out this demo of Wikitude, an augmented-reality travel guide, if you want to see what the future of mobile search looks like. By combining the camera on the phone with the built-in GPS and some fancy-schmancy programming, the Wikitude folks have come up with an application that gives you information about whatever you're pointing your phone at. In effect, your phone can become a virtual "window" on the world that merges the information about your location with the actual image of your location.

The applications for travel and tourism are obvious. You no longer have to blindly wander around a strange city wondering what you're looking at. Just point your phone at the monuments and buildings you see, and poof! There's all the historical information (and possibly even dates, times, and ticket prices) that you'd need. Analog and digital reality combined. Of course, the marketing applications for this are just as big. Systems like these (and I'm betting that they're going to be ubiquitous in new phones within a year or two) would allow marketers to place virtual "billboards" or information displays anywhere they want. Point your phone at a restaurant to get the times when it's open, a menu, and (with the touch of your finger on the display) make a reservation. Point your phone at a movie theater to get show times and buy your tickets with a tap of your finger. Look at a retail store and get a list of items on sale and even special "augmented-reality user only" coupons.