4 Simple Questions to highlight the Importance of Online & Viral marketing
Traditionally people talk about their products and provide information on a corporate website and quite frankly people are not interested.
A sure fire way to stress to anybody the importance of online marketing is to ask them the them the following questions:
1/In the last 2 months have you or anybody you know answered a direct mail advertisement?
2/In the last 2 months have you or anybody you know used mainstream media to answer a question or researched a product or service?
3/in the last 2 months Have you or anybody you know used Google or another search engine to answer a question or researched a product or service?
4/ In the last 2 months have you or anybody you know used social media or a peer to peer network like e-mail, IM or facebook, to answer a question or researched a product or service and the answer came back was a URL that you linked to?
Chances are that you would answer a resounding yes to using a search engine and yes to being referred by a friend to a product or service via URL via social media but possibly to mainstream media and doubtful to direct mail.
A statistic that is backed up wholeheartedly in a May 2008 Nielsen Online survey that said Eight out of ten respondents who had recently made consumer electronics purchases in a brick-and-mortar store said they had visited the store's Website first. More than one-half said they purchased from the retailer on whose Website they had spent the most time.'
Conclusion is that potential customers today most likely have already researched what your company's products on your websites. And is much further along in the sales process than you might think.
The spread of idea's through viral marketing by social media and peer to peer networks has quite simply the power to transform an ordinary everyday products like toilets into some thing cool which gets people talking and when David Meerman Scott showed the below video depicting a Swedish self cleaning toilet at a recent Podcamp keynote address to a room full of B2B marketers the penny dropped.
So next time a business colleague talks about the problems they have marketing their product tell them to watch this video and ask themselves what they cool thing can they do to get people talking about their product. Ordinary everyday items never looked so good!
The Swedish self cleaning toilet viral video sensation viewed 2 million times.
Social Media-Think Micro interactions Think Real time!
If I had to think of a slogan to define what social media means I would say “Think Micro interactions and think Real time” David Armano puts in it in context nicely by defining by Micro interactions from his presentation 'Micro Interactions in a 2.0 world' (below) as follows: "We live in a world where the little things really do matter. Each encounter no matter how brief is an ‘micro interaction’ which makes a deposit or withdrawal from our rational and emotional subconscious .The sum of these interactions adds up how we feel about a particular product, brand or service. Little things. Feelings. They influence our everyday lives more then we realise." I love the analogy used by Randy Pausch in his great presentation'The Last lecture 'regarding the $100k salt n Peppershaker that he bought at Disney which was duly dropped and returned to the shop on the off chance they would replace to which they duly obliged. What sort of value can you place of great customer service like this? What a shining testament to the importance of 'micro interactions' .No matter how small any interaction customers have with your brand needs to be positive which will pay dividends.
Social media practices have also meant moving to engagement in 'real time' which if you stop to think for a moment we almost take for granted now. But to put things in context Think widgets, think mobile, think virtual worlds and think collaboration think conversation ecosystems like Twitter. These are all examples or real time engagement tools tailored to our increasingly individualised and more connected than ever before society. How else can we keep up with live events that unfold without tools like Twitter and Flickr to experience in real time the Olympic games in China with the threat of internet embargo being placed on Chinese websites?
Is it any wonder that 'citizen Journalism has just as much meaning in today's modern media? Never has been our thirst for information been so great and it will just become greater .All delivered in byte size chunks of text, images,video,and audio 24/7. In essence we are all information junkies. A product of the internet age. What does social media mean to you?
Mobile QR Codes are Revolutionizing the way we Connect!
A QR code as used on a billboard in the UK this Year
‘Scan with your mobile & Connect to the world’ is the promotional tagline for the latest mobile technology that allows user to use their mobile phone to scan a square black & white barcode called a ‘QR code” and be taken straight to the owners website on your mobile. So imagine your waiting at a bus stop. It’s cold and the bus is late again, a poster at the bus shelter for the latest blockbuster movie catches your eye, especially what looks like a small barcode. You grab your mobile phone and scan the code with your phone’s camera .This action instantly connects your mobile to a website where you can watch the movie trailer and video interviews with the films stars and find out where and when the film is showing that weekend. You are then prompted to sign up for a two-for–one voucher which can be redeemed at the cinema. Fanciful dreams by marketers they are not as this is reality for 90 million plus mobile phone users in Japan, a mobile phone mad society where consumers and advertisers (from corporations to the local store) have come to embrace these barcodes as part of everyday life. Whilst similar to barcodes QR codes contain much more information, including website addresses ,extensive text and phone numbers .A price barcode can hold about 20 digits but QR codes can hold up to 7000 digits and 4300 alpha numerical characters. This information is encoded into the square barcode and is decoded by a mobile handset that has the reader software installed .so as long as you have a 3G mobile phone with a camera and QR code reader you are ready to go. Developed by Denso Wave, a manufacturer of industrial robots and automatic data capture gear ,its first application was in 1994, when the mother company Denso Corporation, Itself a member of the Toyota Motor Group used it to track the auto parts it manufactured. After gaining a commercial foothold in 2000, it’s physical appearance quickly became something of an fashion item finding its way onto clothing bags, and other items. The latest version of the code ‘Movie QR’ incorporates to enable photos and moving images to be added to the code without losing information. Mitsusaki Senda of ad Agency Hakuhodo which co developed Movie QR says “I think in the future we will see QR code in digital signage and even holographs” Keen to experience this for yourself they why not create your own QR code and see what all this fuss is about then you can download the code reader software here and go to code generator sites such as www.i-nigma.com & www.kaywa.com
Check out the BBC's 'Click' Program QR code feature below
Lively by Google lets people create persistent virtual spaces on the web where they can express themselves and communicate with friends in a highly customized way. Users can choose an avatar, dress it up according to their tastes, and use it to make friends and chat. They can also create rooms, decorate them to their liking, and invite friends over. Users are free to move between rooms, have private conversations, or have group conversations and interactions in a given space.
unlike Second Life, Lively doesn't require you to download new software. All you need is a browser plug-in. The service is also more distributed than Second Life: Its rooms will live on Web pages on Facebook and other sites, so you might stumble across them when browsing the Internet. Rooms can be private spaces, with entry by invitation only, or open-topic rooms, where you can meet people interested in discussing topics you love.
It also ties into other Google services. You can stream YouTube
Cinema is one of the oldest mass audio-visual mediums. It is also as passive as media consumption gets. However The imagination of digital marketers may change this with a new digital application that allows a new form of in-cinema advertising which combines mobile and social-networking applications to test an interactive polling program in American movie theaters.
According to the
Cinema Advertising Council the sector is one of the fastest growing in paid media. Overall, cinema ad revenues saw a double-digit increase last year, jumping nearly 19 percent.
In a dealstruck between Verizon Wireless and the cinema-advertising network, Screenvision and Verizon began rolling out their polling program last Friday in movie theaters in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.
The spots ask audiences questions related to their musical preferences, and results appear on the screen. Participation is possible across all handsets and carriers. Also featured was a Verizon-branded short film directed by Spike Lee that posed content questions to the audience. Results were unavailable at press time.
One goal is to keep consumers engaged long after the final credits roll. "What you start to do is you raise the engagement level of your moviegoer," said Mike Chico, evp of sales at ScreenVision . "So, you have people at the very rudimentary stage who are gaming or polling and the next step would be to ask, 'Would you like to learn more about our product and enter our rewards program?' National Cine Media (NCM) is testing AudienceGame, in which movie crowds act as human joysticks to collectively control the gaming elements on the screen, thanks to motion-sensor technology installed in the theater. It hopes to launch the program by early next year, at which time advertisers will be attached.
One of Brand Experience Lab's first tests, separate from its deal with NCM, took place last year with MSNBC.comThe online news organization was looking to create some buzz around its first brand campaign, "A fuller spectrum of news" and paired with BEL to create NewsBreaker Live, which it refers to as the "first interactive cinema crowd game." Launched with the summer 2007 release of Spider-Man 3, NewsBreaker Live used similar motion-sensing technology to create a game in which the audience caught falling news headlines to win points as a group.
Catherine Captain, vp of marketing for MNSBC.com said the site's strategy was to align with blockbuster movies to capture an audience already in a cheerful mood. Measured results showed 71 percent unaided recall of MSNBC.com as the sponsor of the game, according to Captain. Other measurements indicated 78 percent of moviegoers played the game and 93 percent wanted to see more games being played in theaters. Another 93 percent said they would prefer to play a game than watch a commercial before show time.
"We believe that interactivity will enhance the moviegoing experience, offer brands an interesting way to engage consumers and create a fun atmosphere in the cinemas," said NCM's Marks. "We are hopeful that it turn this will bring incremental media dollars to the medium too, but it is too hard to project the financial viability of these types of new products until we learn more and see how consumer reaction is to the ideas we bring them."
Watch out for interactive cinema coming to you in the next few years!
Branded MySpace pages are old hat, but the latest marketer to set up shop in the Web's largest social network is not like the others.
Famed French jeweler and watchmaker Cartier has chosen to kick off an online campaign for its latest collection, Love by Cartier, on MySpace. For the next year, the campaign is running in five languages across eight countries, including France, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Japan, China, the United Kingdom and the U.S., at www.myspace.com/lovebycartier.
As incongruous as the partnership might appear, cultural trends demanded that Cartier respond with such a campaign, according to its director of international communications, Corinne Delattre. "Blogs, group(s) or individual Web sites are no longer the signs of a new era, but are an established reality for a whole new generation," Delattre said. "As a large brand, we must be able to communicate to this new generation of adepts of the digital world." Dedicated to love, Cartier's online experience includes 12 exclusive songs--composed especially for the occasion by artists such as Lou Reed, Marion Cotillard, Grand National and Phoenix--along with exclusive interviews and photos. The global Cartier campaign also highlights several charities, in particular Action Against Hunger. According to a recent Forrester Research study, only a third of the world's premium brands sell their goods online. But that's a mistake, Forrester concluded, as about 80% of high-net-worth consumers--with annual gross income and assets of at least $500,000--use the Internet daily, and regularly buy products online. Some analysts, however, are finding the venture hard to swallow. "This is the digital platform version of when Wal-Mart advertised in Vogue, because that's where their audience was," recalled Robert Passikoff, president of New York market-research firm Brand Keys. "You know what they got? Laughed at." If nothing else, MySpace is using the deal to highlight its global reach. "Cartier's international campaign is a great representation of how an international brand can create relevant and local experiences," said Travis Katz, international managing director for MySpace. In its first few days of existence, Cartier's MySpace campaign has attracted some 100,000 visits, and "friends" like Sting.
The Internet Piracy Debate Rolls On-Pirate TV Anyone?
Hardly a day seems goes
past without another contentious story surrounding issues of piracy and Peer 2
Peer file sharing rearing its ugly head. Whilst we still have record companies
are talkingtough by getting into to bed
with ISP's to combat what they call 80% of internet traffic being controlled by
10% of users on the web-the most recent case of which has seen Video Egg being
sued by EMI for copy right infringement-Pirates and P2P file sharer’s on the
other hand argue that file sharing is a natural way to share and promote music.
Indeed the latest artist to
come out of the closet last week and lend their support to the piracy cause was
Joss Stone who went as far as to say that "Piracy is brilliant and a great
way to share music". This week has seen Jesse Anderson, the executive producer
of the popular TV-shows 'Heroes' and 'Lost' and Matt Mason, author of 'The Pirates Dilema ' go a step further and launcha new TV-show about piracy. The show aims to show how important piracy
is and how it shapes our future.
As the great blog Torrent Freak rightly states “Pirates are innovators;
they signal market problems and lead the way to new business models.
Nevertheless, they are often tagged as thieves. In many cases, piracy is
helping old businesses to innovate, and it helps to create new legitimate
market spaces.”
You can also see Matt Mason
also talking about piracy in a video for the BBC Radio 5 live -Blogs & Podcasts to help
you make up your own mind below.
Whatever your position on
the subject it does challenge you to ask some interesting questions on this
issue which promote further dialogue such as how should we respond? Do we fight
pirates, or do we learn from them? Should piracy be treated as a problem, or a
solution? To compete or not to compete perhaps that is the question all copyright owners and media companies should be asking themselves before they get left behind in our 21st Century Digital world.
As Henry Jenkins outlined
in his book ‘Convergence Culture ’ What we are experiencing right now is a
series of revolts and revolutions before both sides can start renegotiating and
each party values what the other is bringing to the table. Hopefully this will
start sooner rather then later.
It's only been out for a week
but 1,000,000 beasties have already been birthed using the Spore Creature creator , with the community site sharing taking place at a rate of two
creatures every second.
Spores 3D Creature creator
For those outside the
gaming world ‘Spore’ is the latest project from Will Wright one of the game
industry's most fertile minds and the creator of the groundbreaking SimCity and The Sims, which has to date sold over 100
million copies worldwide.
"The response to the
Spore creature creator has been overwhelming," said Lucy Bradshaw,
executive producer at Maxis.” The creativity and passion that the community is
putting into their creatures is spectacular. The development team has spent the
last 24 hours checking out the amazing creations racing in from all corners of
the globe - with peak volume hitting more than 1000 creatures being shared a
minute."
The Spore Creature Creator
was released last Tuesday and lets you get to grips with perhaps the most important
part of the evolution-based game ahead of its most eagerly awaited 5th
September release.
Asked what he wanted people
to get out of spore Wright said, “One of his goals for this whole thing has
been to give somebody an awe-inspiring global view of reality, almost like a
drug-induced epiphany with a computer. The kind of, "Oh, man, what if we
were a molecule inside of a galaxy?" type thing. Can we transfer that
experience -- that, I don't want to say drug-induced, but I guess it is, or
almost theological meaning-of-life-type experience -- into an interactive
computer game?
Either way If week one
figures continue at this rate then ‘Spore’ will no doubt replace ‘World of Warcraft
’ as the number one single player online fantasy game. It will also features a soundtrack
from Brian Eno whom he also collaborated on the project.
You can download a
cut-down version for free and then Share your creature with other Facebook users .
Check out the video demo of the game which Wright
presented to The Long Now Foundation with Brian Eno in 2006 which as been downloaded 187,000 times below
