David Bell

Digital transformation is moving fast. Businesses must embrace the changes or risk getting left behind. David R. Bell, a pioneering aficionado of the digital economy and a specialist in how to integrate the digital world with the real one, is helping companies win in today’s evolving marketplace. An award-winning researcher and teacher, Bell holds the Xinmei Zhang and Yongge Dai Professorship at the Wharton School, where he created the school’s first MBA and executive education courses on digital marketing and e-commerce. His engaging and provocative style is popular with students and business leaders alike – in both the physical and virtual classrooms. More than 550,000 students worldwide have signed up for his online marketing management course on Coursera.org. Offline he has taught thousands of executives and students not only at Wharton, but also UCLA, MIT, INSEAD and the Indian School of Business.

Bell’s best-selling book, “Location Is (Still) Everything” (New Harvest, 2014), focuses on how we use the internet to shop and search for information. Its key thesis – that real world factors systematically drive virtual world behaviors – is reinforced though rigorous analysis and countless practical examples. Most recently, he co-authored “Pharma 3D: Rewriting the Script for Pharma Marketing in the Digital Age,” an e-book discussing how pharma companies can capitalize on patient engagement through digital marketing.A sought-after advisor and investor, Bell consults with such transformative brands as Bonobos, Harry’s, Jet and Warby Parker, among numerous others. He received his PhD from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business.