Last week at BIMS—after speaking for 30-plus minutes about the vital nature of digital design and the reading revolution that digital has thrust upon us—Mario Garcia, a Columbia professor and author of the new book, The Story, closed his well-received keynote by saying: "The takeaway is if you have a good story, people will stay with you... I don't sit here and lament what was. I celebrate what is. These are the best times to be a storyteller, but you have to explore all that is there."

"For us, customer intelligence became the new currency internally. So every team meeting would start with an insight from a customer conversation, and people learned very quickly that if they really weren't having regular contact with customers, they really weren't having say in those meetings."

Don't wait for the customer to tell you when they need something new, urged Bill Fischer, professor of innovation management at IMD, and co-director of the IMD-MIT/Sloan Driving Strategic Innovation Program, in an article on Forbes.com last year. He finds that few companies are "really up-to-date with their customers' needs" and even less familiar with their customer journey.

The SIPA Annual 2018 Conference, which begins three weeks and a day from today on Tuesday, June 5, is designed to elaborate on the digital opportunities and to encourage innovation to help publishers monetize and grow. The list of industry people who are attending is impressive, and there will be plenty of time for networking and picking some knowledgeable brains.

The SIPA Europe Chapter met on Feb. 7 on Actionable Information: Reporting for Performance and discussed the business reporting that publishers and information executives need to help drive smart and efficient decisions.

Here's a story that hits a marketing sweet spot. John Downs, CEO of the National Confectioners Association (NCA), recently went on a "listening tour to hear members' concerns and share data that helped win them over [to a new industry standard]," reported Associations Now.