It only feels like yesterday when I first started seeing those strange “Digg this” icons at the bottom of a few ‘cutting edge’ blogs and news sites.  To be honest, I first thought the word digg was a typo, until curiosity got the better of me and I clicked on one of the little suckers.

Digg.com has since become one of the net’s greatest success story, with some sickening amounts of traffic and revenue being generated from within the Digg community.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with Digg, it’s essentially a real-time portal that lists the hottest topics on the internet at any given time.  Digg users simply “digg” any URL that they think is digg-worthy, and the more diggs it receives, the more prominent it’s position on the Digg.com homepage will be.  In addition, Digg allows people with niche interests to filter through the Digg results and find specific topics matching their interests.

Digg has just released this great video, which not only celebrates 5 years of Digg, but also sheds a bit more insight into the history of the company and the successes they have had to date. Well worth watching, I say!

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It has been the topic of quite a few sessions at the pub with my mates lately….do you accept your parent’s ‘Friend Request’  on Facebook if they happen to pop up one day, unannounced, in your inbox?

I have heard many valid arguments for and against accepting your annoyingly-internet-savvy maternal or paternal figures as Facebook ‘Friends’.

And by all means, there is no right or wrong answer, as it is a decision left up to the individual based on their own circumstances and preferences. In fact, many people have specific criteria for Facebook friend acquisition. For example:

• - Over time it has become obvious to me, that some people choose to accept friends left, right and centre, to increase their friend stats in a meagre effort to portray their social standing (ironic, since one has have to sit at a computer alone for extended periods of time in order to achieve this).
• - Others accept friend requests for business or personal gain, in order to spread messages of relevance (pffft….losers!)
• - And then there’s those, (gulp), who connect with their ‘friends’ in order to do a little, ah, friendly Facebook stalking.  You know the kind I mean – the, “I wonder how Sam from my year 11 maths class looks, I mean is going, these days?…..(half an hour later and 14 boring albums of photos later)….Whooah, looks like she never shook that habit of ordering two meat pies for lunch.  Haha…..unlucky Sammy! “.  After all, that’s why Facebook was invented, right? RIGHT? (Why do I hear only murmurs of disdain?)

Of course, aside from an individual’s Facebook Friend acquisition strategy , there are certainly also other factors that influence one’s decision, such as…

• - emotional considerations
• - secrecy
• - guilt
• - geographical location
• - public perception (i.e. “eeek….what will my friends think”)

Personally, I believe a large factor in a child’s decision (and I use the word ‘child’ in the sense of ‘offspring’, of any age) on whether to grant their parents ‘access’ to their Facebook world, is based on their long withstanding relationship with their parents.  Kids who don’t encourage their parents into their ‘real world’ lives, are probably even less likely to accept their parents into their online lives.

Maybe I am just reading into it all too much, and we should all just bite the bullet and click the “Accept Friend” button. But then….what we have to talk about at the pub?

So it’s over to you Dad….what do you reckon about 2009 most talked about online predicament? From your point of view, is the decision to to accept a parent as a ‘Facebook Friend’ a moral dilemma, or merely juvenile concern?

(Stay tuned for the first round of the debate, or you can even subscribe to my RSS feed – as a response from my very own fatherly Facebook Friend will follow shortly…..)

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Augmented reality, also known by its product name as Total Immersion, has rocked the digital world during the past 12 months. Augmented reality technology, involves combining the real world with digitally created images, animations or text.  Often this involves the incorporation of a video-cam, either through a PC’s web-cam or the camera on a hand-held device such as an iPhone.  It’s futuristic, interactive, fun….and yet to be utilized to its full potential.

The question over the last 12 months and beyond has been, how this slightly gimmicky Augmented Reality technology can be harnessed for mass consumption?

Well, it seems that the world is making progress on the application of Total Immersion technology. I was delighted to recently find out that Topps, a well known producer of American sports collector cards which I haven’t come across in nearly 15 years, has found a way of using augmented reality to revive.  Sure, gone are the days when die-hard sports fans memorize their favorite players stats from the back of a sport-card (now, we simply Google for real time player statistics), but this adds some new and unforeseen appeal to the humble sports card.

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My father gave me some great advice many moons ago. He said “son, never stop learning“.

As the years move on, I have slowly began to realize how important these few words are.  To learn, is to keep your mind active, to keep your outlook on life fresh, and to prevent becoming a stale and dry like an old piece of pita bread left in the cupboard for a week (if you’ve ever seen my pantry you’ll understand the relevance of that comment).

Sometimes you get caught up in routines and occupations that are so process-driven or time intensive that opportunities to learn new things are placed out of arm’s reach.   After all, you need at least a few minutes spare each day to learn something new, right?

Wrong! Learn something every day allows you to quickly absorb an interesting and valuable fact every day of the year, through it’s visual and entertaining layout, pictured below.  And if you are absolutely smitten with any of the facts you learn, you can even buy a tshirt adorned with your newly learned fact!

So now you can follow the advice of a wise man, and learn something every day without interrupting your day job. Live long and prosper my friends!

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Working in a digital agency provides constant challenges, particularly when dealing with client expectations.  On occasion, one has to exercise extreme caution and develop a profound ability to bite their tongue , in order to maintain relationships while also trying to convey that a request may be unreasonable.

However, sometimes there is no option but to be blunt when responding to unreasonable client requests. Being a creative industry, being blunt can be also be a little bit of fun, as this hilarious example of an unreasonable client’s email interaction with a potential service provider illustrates.

Here’s a little snippet as a teaser:

You can read the rest of this email chain here (a word of warning, some of the language is as colorful as the slices of the pie charts).

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Time has just released their top 50 websites of 2009.

When I first glanced at this list, I was immediately skeptical that the list was more of a “top 50 sites that the author of this article owes favors to”, as coming at number at #2 was a site I have never heard of before, California Coastline, with hugely popular sites such as Facebook nowhere to be seen within the top 30.

On closer inspection, after investigating sites such as the aforementioned California Coastline, I realised that the author has done a great job of  thoughtfully collating a list that not only contains mainstream high-usage sites, but sites that represent great value to users.

California Coastline, for example, contains thousands of helicopter images of the Cali Coast,  indexed through a searchable interface, as well as integrated with Google mapping technology.   This site is like a private extension of Google Earth, the difference being the entire project is funded out of an individual’s own pocket, which is really great to see  ( … and not only is it great to see that, but now I can spot all the best surf breaks in California thanks to this great aerial photography! ) . There are other sites likes this within the list too, sites that are the hard work of private individuals, rather than just a bunch of links to high profile, high budget corporate-backed websites that are over-hyped and offer little long-term value.

My only criticism, is that the Best 50 Website of 2009 list is quite U.S. centric, which I assume is because Time Magazine is of course a publication hailing from the Unite States.

To give you a bit of a taste, here is the top 10 websites of 2009, as nominated by Time Magazine.

1. 1. Flickr
2. 2. California Coastline
3. 3. Delicious
4. 4. Metafilter
5. 5. popurls
6. 6. Twitter
7. 7. Skype
8. 8. Boing Boing
9. 9. Academic Earth
10. 10. OpenTable

You view the rest of the top 50 here.

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Google has just launched a new initiative merging offline media with its existing Google Maps system.

They new concept falls within the existing concept of Google Maps Favorite Places, but incorporates the use of QR Code stickers (those crazy looking black and white speckled squares of code unreadable to the human eye).

These Google Maps QR Code stickers are plastered onto the windows of selected outlets chosen by the Google team due to their popularity within the Google Maps application, and can be scanned by any internet enabled device with an internet connection (such as an iPhone) to gain more information about the store.

To see the QR codes in action, it’s probably easiest to watch the video below.

If you want a chance of receiving a  Google Maps Favorites window sticker from Google, you must first make sure you are registered in the Google Local Business listings registry. If you’re not, I suggest you click here now to register your business with Google!

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I stumbled across this awesome presentation earlier today, produced by well know digital agency Razorfish.

The Digital Brand Experience report, which you can view below, highlights some extremely useful statistics which any marketer worth their salt should be considering during their upcoming digital campaigns.  The report also reveals a couple of the international brands who have successfully promoted their brands using digital channels. The report is written entirely from the perspective that for a brand to be successful in the modern age, it must be experiential in nature.

One of the highlights of the report for me, is the statistics surrounding Facebook users welcoming brand advertising  within this popular social networking platform, provided their is some sort of experiential incentive to do so. Personally, I was beginning to think that plastering your brand into a Facebook group was a waste of time, but the statistics in this report show that Facebook can be used to benefit your brand, provided you put some thought into your strategy and objectives.

Another key point I gleaned from this report, was that 97% of internet users have searched for a brand online. So it’s a no-brainer that every brand should have an online presence!

One final important point that I noted from the presentation, is that digital channels should be used as contributors in creating your ‘experiential brand’, and should be tied in with offline campaigns such as events (like Red Bull’s extreme sporting events), or with tangible response-based incentives, such as a Facebook poll to choose the next flavour of Baskin Robbins ice cream. I guess the point I am trying to make here, is that digital channels will never be the be-all-and-end-all of your marketing campaigns, there still must be some ‘real world’ tangibility to any online campaign you undertake.

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A colleague recently passed this Socialnomics video presentation on to me.  It’s well worth watching if you are a marketer, as it shows how some of the biggest marketing campaign successes in the past 12 months have been influenced or entirely attributed to various social media channels.  Included in the presentation are companies such as Ford, Burger King, as well as charities, so it just goes to show social media is can be appropriate for any audience or market, it just has to be used in the appropriate way.

Check it out, just click the play button below:

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If you’re chatting to a non-internet marketer (a.k.a any ‘normal person’) and you start dropping phrases such as increasing website traffic, or unique visitors, even page impressions, it is inevitable that your mate’s eyes will start to glaze over with disinterest.

Let’s face it, website statistics are only of interesting to nerdy website owners (<gulp>, I had to swallow a bit of my pride typing that).  Normal people don’t care how that your website visitation increased by 23% in comparison to the same period last month, or that your bounce rate decreased by 7.8% resulting in a significant rise in conversions. Apparently, normal people have better things to do.

Well here’s an interesting concept, called One Million Hit Wonder.  It actually turns the usually dry subject of website statistics into a commodity of public interest and appeal.

The aim of the One Million Hit Wonder  ’experiment’, to eventually attract one million visitors the homepage of One Million Hit Wonder each week.   The experiment aims to bring more awareness to the general public of the basic principles of website traffic, in a light-hearted fashion. One Million Hit Wonder achieves this, because it’s website statistics are completely transparent to website visitors, being published to the site’s home page and updated in real time.  It’s really quite addictive watching the numbers go up (…nerd alert!).

Seriously , click here to see yourself as a website statistic…and don’t tell me it wasn’t strangely satisfying!

Advertising on One Million Hit Wonder

Another interesting aspect which has been incorporated into this site, is the inclusion of a single advertising slot which spans for 7 days.  By having just one advertising slot available on the homepage in a very noticeable. To add further intrigue for advertisers, the advertising slots are only available for purchase via a weekly eBay auction.

And the icing on the cake – whomever is the current advertiser when the site reaches it’s goal, will retain the advertising slot for a 3 month period, probably providing them with more advertising exposure then their wildest dreams!

If you have a few spare moments, take the time to check out One Million Hit Wonder.  The site will be evolving during the next few weeks with some additional ‘hooks’ to keep visitors coming back , so it is sure to be a very interesting experiment as time moves on.

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I don’t know about you, but I certainly like hearing complex concepts explained in simple terms.  Better yet, I understand new concepts far better when they are spoken in my language (that is, minus all the unnecessary technical jargon).

Google Wave is one of these complex applications, and it’s all over the news at the moment.   And with all of the hype surround the release off the app, it’s difficult to work out exactly what the original point of Google wave is!

I’ve come across a great description of what Google Wave sets out to achieve.  It’s a YouTube clip, narrated by a chap who sounds like his day job involves cruising the beach in Southern California.

It’s a great video, and I think this style of information delivery should certainly be adapted by other application developers, as it’s certainly a more effective way of getting a message across in an engaging and entertaining way.  Check it out by clicking play on the movie below….

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We all love gadgets.  And we all love re-living the delights of our childhood.

Remember the days back when you were a kid, and spent hours upon hours building elaborate spaceships and ridiculous rally cars made from those colorful little building blocks  that we will also remember fondly as Lego.

C’mon…as if you don’t feel all warm and fuzzy thinking about how cool your best Lego creations were (and how distraught you were when your next door neighbour ‘accidently’ crashed his toy tank into that amazing Lego car you painstakingly took 3 days to assemble !).

Ok, enough of the reflection time, it’s time to bring Lego back.  And what better excuse than the Lego USB hub.

After all, everyone needs a USB hub, right? So you may as well get one that’s a bright colour, so you don’t lose it.

Actually, come to think of it, you may as well get a couple of USB hubs just in case….oh wow, look, they even fit together – look, I just made a cool little aeroplane.   And I guess you can’t fly an aeroplane without a driver, I’d better go grab the little lego man with the pilot’s goggles. And his friends, so they can join in…..weeeeeee! Oh @#$%, the boss just walked in. “What’s this silly lego contraption doing in my hand? Oh this thing….don’t worry, it’s just a USB key boss, as if I’d bring silly toys to work…..”

Release your inner child – and go grab yourself a Lego USB hub

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If you call yourself a digital expert, you should be very aware of the impending updates to the Google algorithm.  A new Google is on the way, code-named Google Caffeine.

There has been a lot of debate in recent months about how different the new Google Caffeine will be to the current Google algorithm.  Apparently, the new Google will be faster, and reach even further into the beast we know as the internet.  This means that social media channels will become more prevalent than they are currently, in Google’s search results.

This is all well and good, but how does the new Google affect my current search rankings?

Well, I’ve been told that if you’re using white hat search engine optimization methods, you won’t have too much to worry about.  But I wasn’t satisfied with that, so I went and did a bit of research and came across these two handy tools.

Choose your weapon for the battle: Google Caffeine up against the current Google

1. Split screen comparison tool

This is probably the most straight forward method of measuring the impacts of the new Google algorithm versus the old Google algorithm.  It splits the screen into two sections, one with SERPs (search engine results pages) from the old Google, and one with the SERPs from the new Google.  It’s very handy, as you can compare the results of each algorithm side by side.  I typed in the keywords “bread digital” and was pleasantly surprised to find that I ranked in the first page of the new Google, but not in the old. Thumbs up Google Caffeine

2. Keyword comparison tool

For those of you who have optimized your website (or individual pages within your site) based on specific keywords, this tool will be of interest to you.  Like the previous split screen comparison tool, this one returns results for both the old and new versions of Google on-the-fly.  The difference with this tool, is that it displays your ranking for each version of the search engine straight up, rather than returning the full set of search engine results for you to have to painstakingly search through .  As I mentioned earlier, this makes it a great tool if your sites are currently finely tuned for specific keywords and you want to validate the effects of the new Google algorithm.

If neither of these tools float your boat, you can always do your own analysis of the new Google Caffeine algorithm using the old and faithful method of opening two separate browser windows.  If this is your desired approach, here is a link to preview the new Google Caffeine – http://www2.sandbox.google.com. You will notice that the User Interface is almost identical to the old version…it is behind the scenes that the big changes have apparently taken place.

If you have any more insights about the new Google, I’d love to hear them, just leave a comment below.

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The iSaw USB Powered chainsaw has to be one of my favourite ‘products’ for 2009.

I mean, look at it…. it’s a chainsaw, that has to be plugged into a USB slot to run.  Awesome!  Who needs a USB-powered coffee cup cooler when you can have a chainsaw on your desk. And at only 3.7kg, suitable for home or office use, and the ability to cut through any type of wood – how can you go wrong?

Well, you haven’t even seen the most radical part yet!

The iSaw is actually a crafty website-based viral campaign. When you opt to pre-order the saw for a meagure $59.95 (plus shipping, of course),  you are presented with a little surprise.

The iSaw is in fact a spoof product, designed to remind you that each time you print a page in your home or office, that your PC is actually already a chainsaw, chopping down tree after tree.

It’s a well executed campaign don’t you think (however I must say, I was a little excited about the prospect of having a chainsaw sitting on my desk).

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A new British public service movie aimed at young drivers is currently receiving hordes of viral attention. The movie, shot in a countryside setting in the UK, shows the dangers of sending text messages while driving (you can view the movie at the end of this article).

Despite being a little graphic, I found this movie to be highly watchable, and it is certainly effective in communicating the tragic consequences of careless mobile phone usage while driving, at any speed.

As part of my current role with JSA Digital’s Middle Eastern office, I currently live in Dubai, and commute to Abu Dhabi along one of the world’s most dangerous motorways each day (there was a 200 car pile up last year, with over 300 people inured). I see the wreckage from many accidents on most trips, and firmly believe that many of these accidents could be avoided with the appropriate educational campaigns such as this (particularly since this region of the world is renowned for their extremely high mobile phone usage).

This movie is a great case study for several reasons, as it manages to provide a service to the community using simple online technology.  It also further illustrates that it is important to find out where your target audience is ‘hanging out’ online (in this case, younger audiences who are inclined to use SMS message a lot, are also inclined to use YouTube frequently).

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Microsoft recently held a competition aimed at promoting their new “Google-killer” search engine, Bing.

The competition required entrants to write a jingle, with an accompanying movie clip, about Bing.  All entries were posted to Bing’s YouTube channel (which is a bit of a slap in the face for Google, since Google owns YouTube!).  The movie with highest number of views and rates was deemed the winner.

….ahem….can you believe that the below movie, by Jonathan Mann, is now the official jingle for Bing?

Terrible isn’t it?

But also terribly viral, particularly since it has already been deemed “worst commercial ever” by a couple of large and extremely influential technology blogs.

Hats of Microsoft, you’ve done really well to create some viral stir for Bing, while also introducing some long overdue light-heartedness to your marketing message. This campaign also goes to show that your own marketing department really don’t need to lift a finger (and can get back to more important things, like their game of solitaire

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I came across another great online presentation this week.   What’s Next in Marketing and Advertising 2009 offers some great insights into the demise of traditional advertising mediums, and the rise of new marketing techniques that are more personal and engaging (such as online and interactive marketing channels).

My favourite slide is slide 9, below.

To view the rest of the presentation, just scroll down and click play.

I’d love to hear any opinions you may have, so feel free to leave  your comments!

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If you are vaguely interested in the field of social media, in any capacity whatsoever, this movie is a must-see.

Titled What the F@#k is Social Media, the movie below not only presents some hard data about social media usage, but it contains some key insights which are fundamental principles for any organisation looking at implementing a social media campaign.

I’ll let the movie do the talking – click Play on the movie control panel below to get started (during the movie you might need to pause here and there, as some of the frames scroll through very quickly!).

Enjoy the learning!

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I’ve started to notice a trend in YouTube based websites.   And no, I don’t mean websites that contain YouTube movies.

I mean Youtube movies that are actually functioning websites, in their own right.

These movies are based upon a multi-level website architecture, just like a normal website.

The front-end design (otherwise known as ‘the movie’)  is embedded with navigational elements, just like a normal website.  For example, “About Us” and “Contact Us” buttons are built into the movie itself, which link to other ‘pages’ within the YouTube-based website (these ‘pages’ are actually other movies uploaded to YouTube).

And the end result, is that you can watch, an interact with the YouTube movie, just like a normal website!

If you’re still a little confused, as I was, check out the new YouTube-based ‘website’ for online marketing agency Boone Oakley at the end of this post. Yes, this movie as actually what appears when you key their domain, booneoakley.com, into your browser.

The benefits of using YouTube based websites to communicate your marketing message?

1. Free web-hosting – Uploading movies to YouTube is free

2. Alternative source of  high-quality traffic – YouTube is considered the second biggest search engine…second of course, to Google…however the ‘type’ of traffic on YouTube is generally more engaged than your typical Google web surfer

3. Viral potential – People are more  likely to embed YouTube movie links into their online social portals, such as their Facebook profiles, their Twitter accounts,  and blogs

4. Optimisation and streaming - In comparison to other animated website techniques (such as Flash animations), YouTube movies are optimised during upload to stream as efficiently as possible, so that the end viewer has a pleasant viewing experience

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The SEO Rapper is a highly entertaining American chap who raps about various online marketing concepts. To date, he’s written and busted out lyrics on paid-search, conversion, and effective website design, just to name a few.

Rap, or hip-hop, is a form of spoken word performance often accompanied by a beat and some catchy little melodies. So yes, it goes without saying that traditionally, online marketing concepts and grungy backbeats don’t go hand in hand.

For those internet marketers who fancy a bit of ghetto flavour every now and again, you’ll get a kick of this – I sure did! Check out the SEO Rapper in the video clip below (you’ll find more of his work on YouTube).

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