Things that make me go “Hmmm”
In: Fascinating
18 Jun 2010What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:
This guy at the Twitter account @DavidOnDemand will apparently do anything (legal) that you ask him to do via Twitter. Seems a bit of a stretch realistically, and he’s getting a lot more requests than I’d think anyone would have time to do. Oh yeah, and he works for an ad agency and is doing this to get a free trip to Cannes. I’d guess he’ll have earned the trip. This is a search thread of the latest requests he’s receiving.
A few weeks ago reports came out about Android sales surpassing iPhone sales in Q1 of this year. Now the logically-ensuing usage stats. Most noticeable is the change in share of consumption. The charts are very simple and readable.
While email isn’t quite the killer app is used to be, it’s still highly relevant to most people, including teens. When the PEW research came out, there was a lot of buzz about the email stat saying only 11% of teens email daily. But it says more about their choice of communication platforms than anything, as even in 2006, the figure was only 14%.
I don’t doubt this for a minute. In fact, as the article states, it could be a serious underestimate. What this really means? That the online user experience is going to continue to fragment into more and more devices. These trends also show how computing is becoming less and less a work chore tool, and more and more a way of doing just about anything in life. So the heavy lifting of a desktop become unnecessary (along with the added expense).
My first reaction was, Why have the dock and not just use BlueTooth? Whatever, the point is well made at the end. That to realize the future potential of mobile, think way outside the current structures of content, search, and communications.
A nice animated info graphic featuring the top keywords Tweeted during given World Cup matches. The graphic style and animation of this is great. I think they need to filter out the more obvious words, tho, to make it more varied and tell a deeper story. Check out the England vs. USA match, when USA got their lucky break goal, and the term LOL pops up.
It’s been a little surprising that Twitter hasn’t integrated this long ago, given the rise of location based services. Bottom line is, Tweets can now be sources to a location if the sender OKs it. For a lot of location-oriented companies, there’s a lot of potential here.
The Web has always had more to offer individuals than corporations, and this is an interesting look at how social and mobile developments of the future should extend that trend.
Interesting use of texting to share information among bars, much like they track cheaters in Vegas. Of course, any time you have people sharing info outside the standard law enforcement practices, someone’s going to have issue with it. But I have to credit the police and bar owners for a creative solution to their problem.
Pete Cashmore on Twitter’s advertising model. He writes a good overview of how it works, although the service doesn’t seem that innovative to me. He brings up some good points at the end about how this really excludes the small marketer, and just applies to large brands willing to drop the large $ to get their presence on Twitter. And that’s an interesting distinction from Google, who broke new ground in advertising by doing the opposite. Enabling anyone to play, and on a level field. Understandably, Twitter’s trying to figure the whole revenue thing out, but at this point I don’t see their model as nearly as scalable as Google’s was right out of the box.
In: Fascinating
4 Jun 2010What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site
Creativing.com:
Ray Kurzweil needs to get the singularity happening STAT, while we still have time to make Betty White immortal.
I’ve posted a lot on Apple and Flash lately, but this is the read all to end all. Steve Jobs do a great job explaining why he doesn’t like Flash. Beyond that, he explains it in a way that anyone in the business of “using technology to market to people” should understand.
Watch this just for the scene about how IBM is using Second Life for virtual meetings. And before you dismiss what sounds like a goofball idea, listen to the research reports around how virtual meetings can impact future business dealings, virtual and in person.
This on the heels of the post above. Second Life has found a … second life, and now there’s news of another virtual world that’s not only pulling registrants, but making profits. Maybe I’ll see if my Second Life account is still active.
This guy’s doing a great job of lampooning BP PR on Twitter. And he notes the online marketing media are asking the question: “How should BP respond to him.” Really, BP shouldn’t be wasting any of their time responding to this. That’s taking their eye off the ball. They need to focus on the problem and let the surrounding noise take care of itself. Companies need to worry less on how they’re going to spin all their problems, and focus on solving those problems.
So HTML5 already is (ostensibly) less buggy, requires less bandwidth, has a higher image quality, loads faster, and is easier to develop in, and now it’s also considered more SEO friendly. That’s a pretty big dagger in the heart of Flash.
This type of thing has been done before, but of course, being an Angeleno, this is more relevant. It’s great to see publishers delivering information in ways that acknowledges their readership’s intelligence and curiosity.
This is a really well done product integration. Picking up a simple theme from their recent Super Bowl spot and applying it to an intro for Jimmy Kimmel. Well done.
No surprise here. If anything, it shows how quickly hot button issues can both rise up and fade. Especially with other events in the news. When our coastal beaches are turning into oil slicks, it makes privacy settings on an opt-in social network lose some of it’s urgency.
Think about printing, only out of the printer comes a physical, 3-D object. The home versions of these compositors start at around $750, which makes them remarkably accessible. These low-end machine’s kick out simple plastic objects. But Jay Leno has an industrial version ($27,000) that kicks out actual car parts. There’s an interesting site called Shapeways that features a lot of art for sale. It’s interesting that this technology could be a boon for sculptors and other types of 3-D artists who’ve never really been able to mass market their products before. And interesting that technology could enable them the same way digital recording and distribution impacted the music industry starting about 15-20 years ago.
In: Fascinating
28 May 2010What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:
RT @hodgman “Just out here retweeting.”
Craigslist never ceases to amaze me. For one, it’s ongoing popularity, despite a horrible user interface. But even moreso, the way it frequently extends directly into popular culture. The personals are read for entertainment, artists do visualizations of the “Missed Connections” sections, and now this. There’s a fairly personal nature to much of Craigslist content, from personal ads to what people are selling out of their garages, that helps people identify with the content.
Facebook responds to the privacy blowup. Given the speed of change Facebook’s been going through, and the Apple-esque disregard for outside opinion (some that’s both asset and liability for both), this whole scenario isn’t surprising.
More than anything, this really points to the role user experience plays in app and site development. Ignore it at your own risk.
With Foursquare all over the news, the big question is, What are the different ways brands will be using technologies like this in their campaigns? This example links print work to mobile, with mass transit posters prompting riders to ‘checkin’ on a give subject to support an environmental cause. One great feature is that they’ve taken a print piece and given it a highly-trackable action.
The Japanese have long been ahead of us in mobile usage, and this is a good topline of their user behavior and why it’s different from the computer-based Internet.
I’m seeing a lot of activity around the crowdsourcing/answers site format lately. Here, YouTube demonstrates again their value to Google in the way that Google can so quickly integrate many of their broad span of features into the largest video site in the world. In this case, I’m not sure video adds that much to answers, although given the power of video, it’s certainly worth Google trying. Bottom line is, there’s a lot of potential in answer sites, and that’s what Google’s trying to tap.
Clearly your site visitors are a valuable source of insights and information about what interests them and others like them. The question is, How do you gather that information? This is a list of 5 tools that can help you ask them questions, process the information, and even compare it to competitor sites for relative value.
Using a Twitter feed to create the content for a Google AdSense ad is a great idea not only because it’s new and innovative, which generally tends to do well for online marketing, but because it does two things at once. It provides the advertiser with an extremely simple content management system for piping fresh messaging into their ad, and it also prominently promotes their Twitter account, which is a strong conversion action for many marketers.
This is quite clever. A creative at McCann built his website in Flash, and for the image that loads incase you don’t have the Flash plugin, he’s inserted a photo of Steve Jobs giving you the finger. He’s offering the image to anyone who will install it, and I wouldn’t be surprised to find this image popping up across the Web.
Social gaming is red hot. And it seems such a natural for brands to get involved. An existing, highly-active audience. Relatively low production costs. And of course, it all ties in to their social media networks for sharing.
I’ve posted several things recently on Google TV, which is probably the most interesting happening around TV technology. Here are some early screen snaps from the experience. This is classic Google. Throw something out there early, it looks kind of ugly, but the upside potential is clear and massive.
In: Fascinating
21 May 2010What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:
From writer Kathy Hepinstall: “what happens in the gulf of mexico does not stay in the gulf of mexico.”
I’ve posted several things recently on Google TV, which is probably the most interesting happening around TV technology. Here are some early screen snaps from the experience. This is classic Google. Throw something out there early, it looks kind of ugly, but the upside potential is clear and massive.
A remarkable story for anyone interested in cause-related marketing through social media. It really underlines the fact that successful social media campaigns are about big ideas. The ‘social media’ tools are just the distribution channels.
If you consider the popularity of sports, sports-related gaming, and social viewing (which is really best for live events, like sports), this seems like enormous territory. Actually surprised I haven’t heard about this before.
Several interesting things about this. 1. Foursquare is featured along with the heavyweights of social media (and note there’s not a single Google property), 2. The Facebook rules and regulations say you can’t pay people to “Like” something, but they’re offering rewards for liking things, and those rewards have value. Maybe they’ve found a loophole with “Rewards”, but it seems like a thin line. 3. The article speaks of “Liking” doing a makeover on the Nielsen ratings system. That’s a big indicator of the power of the “Like” button.
A lot of people wonder what the value is of all the behavioral data Facebook can track. This example of Facebook’s supposed ability to project the end or beginning of a relationship is all they should need. Imagine just from this info, the number of related businesses that could want to target messages to either party, going into or coming out of a relationship. Then extend that across all behaviors in your life, and there quite a lot of potential for marketers. All of this potential isn’t available to companies yet, but if Facebook’s recent trends about selling your info play out, then it likely will be.
More interesting events on the mobile front. While Foursquare only has about 1 million users, they’re certainly the type of people Starbucks wants. Early adopters, socially active, and willing to broadcast much of their brand loyalties throughout social media.
Booyah’s MyTown. The biggest mobile game you’ve never heard of. Already about 2x as many users as Foursquare. It’s interesting to contrast/compare with Foursquare, which is sort of a game, but not really taking the social gaming concept head-on, which MyTown is definitely doing.
A very well written lambasting of Facebook from a number of angles. Of course, right after this, Facebook inked a long-term deal with Zynga, the Facebook whipping boy in this article. Beyond the vitriol, Jason makes a far-reaching point about the very essence of the Web’s progress being about openness and existing outside any single company’s motives, that single company being Facebook.
Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t seem very concerned about privacy. At least not yours. However, it’s interesting to see people digging up all sorts of things from his past, like these 5 yr old IMs where he literally calls people ‘dumb fucks’ for trusting him with their information on Facebook. If he’s not responding to reporters questions about this, does it mean they’ve uncovered something he’s not comfortable with? i.e., Information he thinks should be private? Privacy advocates could start targeting him in much the same way they exposed Justice Scalia’s personal information after he opposed privacy laws.
At times, Facebook seems like a company moving so fast they’re going to meltdown, but then they pull moves like this and show how far ahead they’re thinking relative to the other majors, including Google and Apple. Social gaming isn’t even close to being tapped out, IMO. That’s why I’m impressed by Facebook putting together such an unprecedented (for them) long-term deal with a social gaming company.
In: Fascinating
14 May 2010What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:
A tweet from Ashton Kutcher where the TV start apologizes for you having to watch a commercial prior to viewing an online video. Research seems to reassure the ad industry that people accept interruptions for free content, but they obviously don’t have to like them, and that reflects on the receptivity of the message.
Shows you there aren’t a lot of limits on creative thinking these days. Whatever your thoughts about a burger-scented candle (not for me), they thought they had a two-month supply and sold out in 48 hours.
The term “slogan” usually drudges up images of Bewitched, and Darren’s one-lined wonders that solved all the clients problems. But in an increasingly fragmented media world, a simple phrase may be just the thing to get across a key thought. This is a good story on a headline that looks to be doing that against terrorism in NYC.
I figured this would happen at some point, but not this fast. This happened in Q1 of 2010. It shows the power of both getting your platform out to as many manufacturers as will carry it, as well as multiple carriers.
This FCC approval sounds pretty crazy. With new set top boxes enabling on-demand services, content owners will be able to remotely turn off features of your TV to prevent people from copying the content their streaming.
This makes a lot of sense, especially when you see the screen grabs. Most shopping research still takes place in ‘search’ mode, but consulting your social circle is growing in influence. Bringing these two together right now is big. And it’s interesting that Bing beat Google to the punch.
Digital storytelling is taking on all sorts of forms, much of it using a mashup-format where people take existing elements and simply combine them in interesting ways. That’s the deal here. It’s worth a look, but probably not an hour of your day.
Just based on my experience with the iPhone makes the idea of physical keyboards going away entirely plausible. I’m sure at one point people accustomed to typewriters didn’t like typing on computer keypads.
Both funny and insightful, Facebook has applied sentiment ratings to entire countries. The results may not surprise all that much, but as new types of info like this become more immediately available to marketers, it will inevitably start to shape their communications.
An short, impressive demo of how Google’s mobile app Goggles can translate text on an image. I can see how this would be a great feature for travelers. The big story here, though, is that it’s not available on the iPhone. At least not yet. (Maybe their waiting on Apple to approve the app.)
In: Fascinating
16 Apr 2010It’s Tweets of the week this week, picking up a trending hashtag #songprequels. Some funny stuff.
If you have any doubts about iPad or any other slate’s ability to transform the publishing, and specifically the book industry, this 45 second video for the iPad ebook version of “Alice in Wonderland” is a must see. While it may seem like it plays the same trick over and over, keep in mind this is the first attempt and within the first couple of weeks of the iPad’s release.
It’s 4/16 today. 4 squared. Get it? So in cities around the country, Foursquare users are getting together to celebrate post-tax day. About 150 businesses are giving Foursquare users special deals. There’s even a badge for it. McDonalds is getting involved.
What’s remarkable is that Foursquare the company had nothing to do with it, other than just making the badge. Probably took them an hour.
Most companies would die for this level of momentum.
As Foursquare starts to go more legit with companies actually paying to play along, this type of enforcement was just a matter of time.
At the moment, I’m interested in anything happening on Foursquare. You can’t get much farther out on the edge than a location-based social gaming platform. Pairing the History Channel and the latest technology is interesting in it’s own way, but I do like the functional, or at least educational, aspect of this. It definitely adds a needed dimension to ‘checking in’, which is getting a little old and I think has people starting to ask “OK, What’s next?”.
Just in case you haven’t seen a screen grab of Twitter’s new ad platform, Promoted Tweets, here you go. Note the tie-in between the hashtag and the content of the Promoted Tweet. Curious how many brands will be able to find that much context in the stream of Twitter conversations.
A good overview of how Virgin America is using the new Twitter Promoted Tweets ad platform. And VA appears to be doing a great job with this opportunity to participate in the launch of an ad platform. My question is, How mass-scalable is this (I can’t imagine Twitter is thinking this won’t be a mass advertising model). My questions are more around the average advertiser’s ability to use this ad model as judiciously as VA is. I don’t see most advertisers being anywhere near as creative, and certainly not as restrained. So I still have a lot of questions about how this opens up to a much larger base of advertisers who aren’t so much concerned with reputation as they are with reach. Of course, I’m sure Twitter gave that a thought or two before launching, so I’m curiously watching.
Where’s Twitter headed? Or where’s the business or creative opportunity around Twitter? As Fred Wilson says, It won’t be in the same sandbox everyone’s already been playing in.
Very interesting idea here of customizing products for a given TV show. Sure, there’s a certain cringe factor, but it’s a great way to get on a TV show in a more organic way and also tap the world’s insatiable desire for anything celebrity.
Talk about nudging your way into a niche. This is a smartphone app that’s been downloaded 50 million times, and it’s nothing more than a link directly to Facebook’s mobile site (not the Facebook app). Also, jargon alert: MSS = Mobile Site Shortcut. I didn’t realize we needed an acronym for that, but WTF.
There's so much digital marketing info flying around the web that sometimes it makes my brain hurt. This is where I process it, and you're welcome to join in.