QUEENS COLEGE LAUNCHES NEW BUSINESS CERTIFICATE PROGRAM TO HELP COMPANIES INCREASE SALES

-- Institute for Competitive Excellence, Founded by Award-Winning Marketing Expert Howard Moskowitz, Brings Proven, Science-Based Research to the Bottom Line --

FLUSHING, NY, February 17, 2010 – Despite its acronym, the new Institute for Competitive Excellence (ICE), which will offer a certificate program in Manhattan this March through Queens College, plans to warm members of the business community to the idea of using a novel science-based marketing concept to dramatically enhance revenues.  Called “Addressable Minds,” this unique approach is a distillation of science and marketing principles that has expanded sales of many products, including Prego Spaghetti Sauce, Vlasic Pickles, Swanson Frozen Dinner, and Maxwell House Coffee.

ICE is the brainchild of Howard Moskowitz, an internationally recognized experimental psychologist (BA, Queens College; PhD, Harvard) in the field of psychophysics.  Moskowitz has published 20 books and more than 400 articles in the fields of food, financial services, public policy, and innovation tools, including the best-seller Selling Blue Elephants: How to Make Great Products that People Want Before They Even Know They Want Them.  The president of Moskowitz Jacobs, Inc., the market research firm he founded in 1981, Moskowitz has won numerous awards – including Sigma Xi’s 2010 Walston Chubb Award for Innovation, an award that honors creativity among scientists and engineers.  He also holds the 2005 Charles Coolidge Parlin Award from the American Marketing Association, considered the “Nobel Prize” of market research, for lifetime achievement.

Stephen Onufrey, the institute’s executive director, spent 38 years with IBM during its period of mega-growth, where he marketed business solutions to retail banks.  The founding partner of the Onufrey Group, which focuses on applying the science taught in this course, Onufrey has helped 42 countries apply the latest technology to business.  He also co-authored several papers with Moskowitz on its practical applications to the business world.  Recognizing a natural synergy between Moskowitz’s capacity for developing innovative concepts and Onufrey’s sales acumen, a mutual acquaintance at the Wharton School brought them together three years ago.

Onufrey explains that by having a prospective customer respond to a few specific questions, “Addressable Minds” can determine which of a number of carefully researched “segments” that individual falls into.  “You can then communicate with them in terms they consider most relevant and important,” he says.  Using this concept, the charitable organization Stand Up to Cancer was able to “sequence their messages to maximize donations” during their September 2008 telethon.  “We calculated that in one hour, instead of $70 million, they pulled in $100 million,” says Onufrey.

Moskowitz sees ICE as filling a void in the business world.  “Very few companies have a systematic way of discovering what the customer wants,” he says.  “ICE graduates will be able to take what they learn from this program and  make it part of their intellectual property and marketing arsenal for years to come.”

ICE will begin classes on March 15 in a to-be-determined Manhattan location.  The fee for the program, which meets for eight weeks from 7 to 10 pm on Monday evenings, is $2,500.  Students will receive lectures, hands-on computer lab training, and homework assignments on how to successfully incorporate “Addressable Minds” into their own businesses to bolster their bottom line.  The certificate from this program will be issued by the Queens College’s Continuing Education Programs.

For information on registering, contact Josephine Gesuale at Queens College:
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