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What Are the Benefits of Flexibility in the Workplace?

2022-04-30T11:30:00.001-07:00

This is part one in a three-part series about flexibility in the Canadian workplace which was originally published on TechTalent.ca.

Each year at The Canadian Workplace Culture Index, we conduct research and explore key trends to understand how Canadians’ experiences in the workplace differ. This year we partnered with researchers at UBC to enhance and improve our report.

As we prepared to conduct our 2022 research earlier this year, we wanted to analyze the workplace experience of Canadians while focusing on current major trends in people and culture including flexibility. In this three-part series, we’ll explore the benefits of flexibility, define modern flexibility, and explore what our data reveals about flexibility for different Canadians.

For any organization, providing flexibility requires a mature workforce and a level of trust between employees and leadership that is often lacking in some organizations and industries. If team members’ work can be measured and quantified it will be easier to provide flexibility while holding people to a standard of production. For those that are measured by revenue such as salespeople or those that are measured by billable hours, it is a lot easier for leaders to provide flexible options. Trust and communication are vital to successfully creating a flexible workplace.

Many leaders fear moving away from the usual nine to five believing that it will harm their business. However, studies into flexible workplaces show the opposite. A 10-year-old study by Stanford economist Nicholas Bloom of more than 16,000 employees found those who were able to work remotely reported higher job satisfaction and took fewer sick days than their office-based colleagues. Recently, Vodafone shifted to an agile working strategy and saw increases in productivity and employee engagement as a result. They’ve even gone as far as creating a mini Flexible Working eBook.

Offering flexibility in the workplace enables your organization to attract and retain top talent. The demand among younger workers for a less rigid work schedule continues to grow. According to research by Capability Jane, 92% of millennials selected flexibility as their top priority when looking for a job. Somewhat surprisingly, the same is true at the other end of the age demographic where a majority of those over 50 stated that they wanted to ease into retirement via part-time work first. Only 17% of those over 50 favour traditional retirement plans.

Often the benefits of having our teams on inflexible arrangements are taken for granted while the potential negatives are emphasized There are a number of proven benefits in providing flexibility. Flexibility offers employers a number of key benefits including:

Enhancing workplace morale and motivating employees
Encouraging employee loyalty
Attracting top talent

The benefits of flexibility for employees are also compelling and include:

Reducing burnout
Enhancing health and wellness
Boosting productivity
Improving morale
Prioritizing families

At the Canadian Workplace Culture Index, we recently completed our annual research into the state of workplace culture in Canada we asked a number of key questions about flexibility and then looked at those results through demographic lenses for ethnicity, age, location, and more. In a future post in this series, we’ll reveal some of the key insights and differences for Canadians when it comes to flexibility.

In part two of this series, we’ll explore exactly what flexibility means and what it looks like in practice. Here’s a preview of what we’ll explore in part three, the data on flexibility for Canadians. As you review these results consider the nature of the different types of employment that men and women make undertake in Canada. Men report having more flexibility in only one way when they work.

How are you experiencing the benefits of flexibility individually or in your team or workforce?

Company Culture Begins During Recruiting and Onboarding

2022-01-30T11:22:00.001-08:00

Originally published on TechTalent.ca

In the current employment market, company culture is an important differentiator for organizations looking to recruit and retain top talent. While this fact is well known, employees continue to feel overlooked, unappreciated, unheard, or even bullied. Companies, particularly in the tech sector, that work to foster a positive company culture will reap the rewards, experiencing improved recruitment and retention, higher morale, better teamwork and increased productivity.

A positive company culture, however, cannot simply be willed into existence. Each day, it must be defined, fostered, lived, demonstrated, and communicated. For new employees, this process doesn’t begin on day one, it actually starts much earlier.

Company Culture and the Tech Sector

The tech sector’s influence on company culture cannot be overlooked. Images of hoodie-wearing CEOs or high-paid employees huddled around the foosball table first served as fodder for pop-culture parody but were actually indicative of things to come. In the broader labour market, work-life balance has increasingly been prioritized by employees, while companies recruit for soft skills in an effort to foster a culture of collaboration and communication.

Defining Your Company Culture

It’s imperative that company culture be communicated to new or potential employees, but before this can be done it must properly be understood internally. Leadership should discuss it openly, and consult with employees throughout the company.

Does current practice align with stated goals? Oft-competing values and variables such as work-life balance, innovation, teamwork, process, chain of command, individualism and the leeway to experiment should be addressed openly and honestly. This clarity will inform the recruitment and onboarding processes.

Communicating Company Culture to Candidates

It is important that recruiting with company culture in mind does not become confused with recruiting for homogeneity. In one well known case study from the UK, a company removed all identifiable information including names and age from applicants’ submissions and kept things like hobbies. The existing team were largely cyclists and their human proclivity to homogeneity showed through as most new hires going forward were also cyclists. Study after study shows the cultural and economic value that diversity of culture and thought brings to the workplace. What is important, however, is that candidates are given a true description of what they can expect when they arrive.

Technology workers are often drawn to innovative, fast-paced environments, but this does not make them immune to burnout. What measures does your company take to ensure balance? Only when this is communicated accurately can both sides truly decide whether there’s a good fit.

Job descriptions must also be carefully constructed. Those who arrive at work and are surprised by the day-to-day nature of their job may be disillusioned, leading to poor morale and high turnover, to the detriment of the company as a whole.

Companies should develop unambiguous materials to showcase company culture in advance. This is done in two ways. First, the things within an organization’s control such as their website, careers page, job descriptions, and social media content they put out. Secondly, the things outside of an organization’s control must be considered, these include third party employer review sites like Glassdoor, employee social media, and product and service review sites like G2.

Ensuring that an organization is aware of these areas is especially important so you don’t get caught unaware by a well-researched and important hire. Many hiring managers will address negatives directly while aligning expectations with internal realities. Doing so will not only help both parties avoid disappointment, but can help the company stand out from their competitors and attract the interest of more high-calibre candidates.

Recruiting and Interviewing for Soft Skills

Recruiters have come to realize that it’s easier to retool for hard skills such as technical know-how than it is to instill qualities such as patience, communication skills, and the ability to work in teams.

Companies that know what so-called ‘soft skills’ they’re looking for in a candidate should be open about it with candidates and in job descriptions. Additionally, psychometric testing is being increasingly used to determine what personality traits candidates will bring to the table. This is another way companies can be proactive about company culture.

Promote Teamwork and Communication During the Onboarding Process

Companies that value teamwork and collaboration should demonstrate this during the recruitment and onboarding stages. Having candidates meet team members from various departments will give them a greater sense of company culture and will provide the company with additional perspectives on the candidates.

After hiring, new employees should be provided with information about the internal communications process and what resources are available to them should they have questions. Mentors and ‘onboarding buddies’ are valuable in helping people learn the ropes and develop professionally, both technically and culturally.

The more individuals a new hire meets in the early going, and the more they learn about the collaborative environment, the better equipped they will be to contribute to the team as a whole.

Company culture can no longer be considered a backburner issue, or something that just happens organically. Forward-looking companies in sectors such as tech will benefit greatly when the culture of their workplace is optimized for innovation, problem-solving, and collaboration. Working to achieve this is not an event, but an ongoing process. The earlier it begins, the better, especially for new hires.

Kemp Edmonds is the Managing Director of The Canadian Workplace Culture Index.

Workplace Trends Impacting Tech During The Great Resignation

2021-11-30T11:19:00.001-08:00

Originally published on TechTalent.ca

Canada’s tech industry continues to grow, as does its need for talent. According to a recent report by the Innovation Economy Council, the Canadian tech industry lost a big portion of its international tech talent due to pandemic border closures. Now Canadian companies are struggling to attract foreign talent to move North.

Understanding the trends impacting the workplace and the labour market is fundamental to remaining competitive in both recruiting and retention.

Decrease in Foreign Talent

Before the pandemic, international talent was flocking to Canada’s booming tech sector. Toronto had the second-largest talent boom next to Silicon Valley. Employees were becoming more and more attracted to Canada due to the country’s diverse and open reputation. However, the pandemic forced international borders to close for an extended time, causing this boom to slow down.

The pandemic also led to a large-scale career reconsideration, with record numbers of workers voluntarily leaving their positions. Reasons include backlogged retirements, burnout, trepidation over returning to the office and general ‘pandemic epiphanies’.

Recently, we at the Canadian Workplace Culture Index partnered with the Angus Reid Institute to poll employees across Canada from workplaces of various sizes and industries. One particular finding jumps off the page: 60 percent of respondents indicated that a 10 percent raise would sufficiently entice them to leave their current job for the same position elsewhere. Needless to say, this is a very concerning situation for CEOs.

Company Culture

Company culture can be a differentiator if it’s prioritized. Unfortunately, many companies seem unable or unwilling to do so. Thirty percent of respondents believe that people get away with bullying in their organization, while more than a third think that senior managers don’t make an effort to listen to, check in, or connect with employees.

Many companies find themselves in a vicious circle: exits leave them short-staffed, which leaves remaining personnel to deal with increasing workloads, leading to further burnout and more exits.

The tech industry is certainly not immune. While there may be no magic solution, communication goes a long way. Dialogue and resources surrounding mental health and Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) send a powerful signal to employees and can move the needle on company loyalty.

Remote, Hybrid and In-Person Working Models

Some prefer working from home, while others thrive in an office environment. One thing is for certain: everybody now has an opinion. Companies that lack flexibility will find themselves at a competitive disadvantage when recruiting.

Tech is ahead of the curve in this regard, with many in the industry already accustomed to remote work. While those in other industries fumble around with Zoom buttons, it may not be technical aspects that create a challenge within tech, but cultural ones. Communication, collaboration and teamwork are key, and companies must find successful approaches to facilitating them remotely.

Another consequence of the remote workforce is the untethering of physical proximity from recruiting. As a result, compensation expectations will become de-linked from geography.

Managing Five Generations of Workers

Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials and Gen Y are all present in today’s workplace. While tech is forward-looking by nature, it’s important to establish mentorships and facilitate the exchange of knowledge.

Equally important is providing each generation with a fulfilling environment. For all of the discussion surrounding generational differences, studies show that the desire for flexibility, work-life balance and employers who reflect employee values spans generations.

Evolving Benefits and Perks Paradigm

Benefits packages are becoming increasingly personal. Investment matching, personal development programs, home office budgets, child care and flexible vacation packages are among popular perks. When competing to recruit and retain top talent during an employee’s market, nothing is off the table!

Soft Skills are Hard to Ignore

It goes without saying that the technology industry requires technical skills. What’s also irrefutable is that much of this specific know-how has a shelf life. Like those in other industries, tech companies are wisely emphasizing softer skills such as communication, organization, problem-solving, project management and resourcefulness. Technology may impact the day-to-day operations of the workplace, but these aptitudes will continue to be relevant.

Though not simple, the path forward to creating a workforce that is resilient against the factors that have led to workplace attrition boil down to creating a bond between company and employee. Team members want to feel appreciated through salaries, creative benefits packages, JEDI initiatives, flexibility, and two-way communication and they want to know that the companies that they work for prioritize work-life balance and happiness. Those that do these things will position themselves as leaders in recruitment and retention.

Assessment and certification processes, like the ones we conduct at the Canadian Workplace Culture Index, can help measure and improve company culture. While there are unique challenges affecting today’s workplace, staffing chief among them, there are also incredible opportunities for those who rise to the challenge.

Kemp Edmonds is the Managing Director of The Canadian Workplace Culture Index.

Ideas Are Virtually Worthless

2015-07-15T17:05:00.004-07:00

We have all discussed great ideas with friends, family members, coworkers and acquaintances. A lot of folks think they've got the next big thing rolling around in their heads. I once thought that but I was living in a fantasy and was in my early twenties. Are those the same thing?

Ideas are meant to be set free

Since then I have had the chance to evaluate my own ideas, watch ideas bloom into successful organizations and have had the opportunity to advise a lot of other people on their idea or business. There's nothing that's more fun for me than assessing the business viability and path to success for an idea. Sometimes I have to share some frank thoughts on viability and market fit but sometimes I am wrong.

Sometimes people want to have signed non-disclosure agreements(NDAs) before talking about their ideas. Those NDAs are easier than ever thanks to services like Contractually so that's not the same issue it once was. This philosophy of coveting ideas has always stuck with me when it comes to coveting ideas...

This rings true with one of my personal philosophies about writing, publishing and blogging: If you don't share your knowledge no one will know that you have it. Another personal philosophy I've developed that I share with anyone willing to listen is that ideas are worth 1% and execution is worth 99%. This makes some people a bit sad but it rings true for everyone.

Execution isn't everything

There are virtually no new ideas and being first doesn't dictate success; being the best at execution however can. Apple didn't invent or ship the first MP3 players, smartphones or tablets. AirBnB wasn't the first solution to rent your property. Facebook was far from the first social network; Bebo, Hi-5 and Friendster all existed in 2001. These businesses executed better than anyone else but they also did something else to ensure their success...

The missing ingredient in my formula was something akin to timing but not quite. Something akin to market fit but not quite. I found my answer after reading another post on LinkedIn from David Allison about the idea that everything at work and in our personal lives should go through three stages: Vision. Alignment. Execution. Alignment is the missing ingredient. Whether we are deciding where to go on our family vacation, where to go for lunch or which software solutions to purchase as a company to execute successfully on our vision or idea we much find alignment before we execute.

Ideas are virtually worthless

I have a new philosophy: ideas are 1% of success while execution and alignment are 99% of success. Ideas are virtually worthless. Your great idea has most likely been thought of before and more than likely someone has attempted to execute on it but they have missed the mark on alignment and execution. That's where your opportunity and success can be found.

I am hopeful that you now have a much better idea of what goes into that red box. Thanks for reading!

I'd love to hear your thoughts, scathing reviews, corrections, ideas and questions.

Additional Reading: Ben Parr's astute assessment of the question: "I am creating the next Facebook and need funding. What steps should I take next?"

Case Study: Facebook & Labour Law in Canada

2012-04-24T18:33:00.000-07:00

This incredible story begins in Edmonton when a veteran worker began posting to Facebook about their direct management. Sometimes while on the job and sometimes from home.The statements were 'offensive' according to some sources. The employee may or may not have known but all of their posts were public based on their profile settings at the time.

This is how the posts were discovered by co-workers who communicated the nature of the posts to management. The posts were regarded as "reprehensible, grossly insubordinate, threatening, and openly defiant and contemptuous of management". Here is a small sampling of those posts...

The posts referred to one of the supervisors as "evil," a "bitch," a "hag," "C_unt" and "the devil". The other supervisor was characterized as a "yes man" and an "idiot". The posts also contained threatening language such as "DIE BITCH DIE" and "WRONG AGAIN BITCH you gonna be the one missing PERMANENTLY" - Field Law's Workwise Newsletter.

Around the same time... beginning in June of 2009 Facebook started experimenting with changes to the site that were altering user's privacy settings and started new users with 'open' profiles by default:

The Day Facebook Changed Forever: Messages to Become Public By Default -ReadWriteWeb, June 24th, 2009.
More Ways to Share in the Publisher -Facebook Blog, June 24th, 2009.
Facebook Privacy Changes Go Live; Beware of "Everyone" -PCWorld.com December 9th, 2009.

These changes may or may not have effected this particular user. That information remains unknown as the date the user started using Facebook and their original privacy settings are not known. The posts were so extreme that the employee was ultimately dismissed. The union representing the employee filed a grievance. The case went to arbitration and weeks later I received an email requesting my expertise. Honestly when I first received the email I had a hard time believing it.

Around this time I began working at BCIT and was appearing in the media speaking about the barefoot bandit, political social media gaffes and social media charlatans. I had also been lucky enough to develop courses at BCIT. These things and a strong LinkedIn profile along with an honest and transparent online persona spurred a law firm in Edmonton to reach out to me.

The conversation was interesting to say the least. The information communicated to me demonstrated that the need for individuals with the knowledge and skills to discover information about social networks in these types of cases is large and growing. Young lawyers may have used Facebook or Twitter since they were teenagers but they don't necessary understand these networks in enough detail to be of assistance in these detail orientated cases.

The work was around what's called an agreed upon 'Statement of Facts' that both the griever and the defendant agree to. I was tasked with analyzing and creating an accurate statement about the state of Facebook at the time of the incident. If the grievor challenged any items in the Statement of Facts I would be required to take the stand as an expert witness. This was an interesting position to be in. The other lawyer would be challenging me as an expert in the field while I was on the stand. The grievor eventual agreed to the 'Statement of Facts' and I wasn't required to testify.

I'd love to talk more about my opinion on the case and the circumstances surrounding it but I am unable to comment on the specifics of the case at this time as the decision may be subject to a judicial review(an appeal). It is therefore not appropriate to publicly provide my opinion on the outcome of the decision. Although I can share with you the case study as published publicly by the law firm I worked for. They also quote some of the posts made by the employee on the first page. Be sure to read it through as it is extremely insightful and interesting.

Arbitrator Upholds Discharge for Offensive Facebook Postings

by: Field Law LLP

This emerging and interesting new field of the law has definitely gotten me excited to do more work like this. It also spurs some interesting questions for me: What is an expert? What is a reasonable person? How would a reasonable person be expected to understand Facebook's privacy settings? Questions abound, but more importantly what do you think of the case?

Invasions of Privacy: Facebook Employee Passwords

2012-04-16T18:20:00.000-07:00

You're in a job interview; nervous and optimistic, when suddenly you are asked to hand over your personal phonebook, diary, scrapbook and family correspondance....

It's not quite like that. What people are being asked for is their Facebook login and password. This is an invasion of privacy. Job candidates and existing employees are put in a very compromising position when they are first asked. According to UK employment lawyers cited in the Telegraph prospective employees being asked for their usernames and passwords isn't illegal.

“I think it’s very dangerous and unnecessary to start asking people for access into their personal lives. Once you start asking people to reveal everything about themselves, which is irrelevant to their ability to be able to do a job, you are getting into a tricky area. It’s the equivalent of getting people to spy on prospective staff down at the pub before hiring them. It’s also quite a lazy way by bosses to get a full picture of somebody and shows that their interviewing process is unsatisfactory.”

- Sarah Veale, Head of Equality and Employment Rights, Trades Union Congress.

It's a quagmire for both employees and their employers. Both groups should be most concerned with
what can be seen by others on the Facebook page. A simple Facebook search can help with that. Organizations shouldn't be asking employees for this information unless it pertains directly to the job or the employee has/is publicly bashing employers past, present or future. What matters is:

Is the employee publicly connected to the organization?
Does the employee talk about specific work related business on Facebook where others can read it?
Does the use of Facebook effect the relationship between the employee and their work?

Saying yes to each item makes what is done publicly matter to the organization and for good reason. Organizations are overreaching requesting administrative access yet potential and existing employees are not getting hired and losing their jobs. Facebook has chimed in on the topic and in no uncertain terms says that it doesn't support this practice:

"In recent months, we’ve seen a distressing increase in reports of employers or others seeking to gain inappropriate access to people’s Facebook profiles or private information. This practice undermines the privacy expectations and the security of both the user and the user’s friends. It also potentially exposes the employer who seeks this access to unanticipated legal liability.

The most alarming of these practices is the reported incidents of employers asking prospective or actual employees to reveal their passwords. If you are a Facebook user, you should never have to share your password, let anyone access your account, or do anything that might jeopardize the security of your account or violate the privacy of your friends." - Facebook.com

In the United States spotlight grabbing politicians are pushing the Feds to investigate this issue. Some originally insinuated that Facebook would take legal action against employers who asked for logins and passwords. This was recently rebuffed by Facebook. According to some less sensational reports the practice is pretty rare, for now. In Canada the practice may be even rarer as the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms prohibits this type of request based on discrimination. According to the Spec:

"There is no law that particularly prohibits an employer from asking for that password. It does not specifically violate any privacy legislation. But, by asking that question, employers expose themselves to complaints of discrimination under human rights legislation.

Both the Ontario and Canada human rights legislation prohibit discrimination in employment on the basis of, among other things, race, ancestry, place of origin, ethnic origin, citizenship, creed, sexual orientation, age, family status, marital status or handicap. That’s a long list of things you wouldn’t usually learn during a job interview. It is contrary to human rights legislation to ask questions with respect to these issues." - TheSpec.com

I will soon be publishing a case study I worked on recently where an employee was fired for what they posted on Facebook. The dismissal was supported by a ruling by an outside arbitrator. Asking for your Facebook login and password is a preventative measure in the minds of some of those who ask, but surely over steps the bounds of human rights and common decency. Would you want to work for an organization that demanded your login and password for Facebook?

Maturing at the Lectern: Confidence

2012-04-14T12:06:00.000-07:00

photo by: @jeremylim

Confidence. The word itself is powerful and complex. The concept maybe even more so. It is said the greatest fear people have is public speaking. For others it's not only a fear, but a thrill, a joy, a privilege and a delight. Recently during a day of back-to-back speaking engagements I started to feel something more than at ease in front of the audience. I felt able and prepared to lead a learning exploration. To field their questions and prepared to go 'off track'. Most of all, I like the audience to be in control.

The following presentation was prepared as a Professional Development lunch and learn for a real estate development firm in Vancouver. The audience was great and the boardroom was packed full. The presentation has a Personal/Professional Development focus. This presentation was created from scratch specifically for this purpose.

Networked Social Opportunity

Earlier that day I had the opportunity to speak to Health Care Professionals at the Four Seasons Hotel in Vancouver during a health care Quality Forum as part of 'Health Care Social Media Camp'. This is the kind of work that I do upon request. The following presentation was designed to incorporate some older elements of my 'intro to social media' presentations. I also brought in a strong focus on health care with specific items around policy and a complete section of examples of implementations for health care in social communications...

Health Care Social Media Camp - Twitter Presentation

Standing in front of both audiences I felt an unusual sense of calm. Nervousness when speaking in front of people often drives my presentation energy. In these cases I felt confident that I could deliver on the expectations of the audience while allowing them to guide the presentations. Being prepared and knowing the audience ultimately helps lead to that confidence. It's different depending on what capacity one is speaking in and what kind of event it is. What do you find as an audience member? As a presenter?

Google+ Copies Facebook: Or is it Us?

2012-04-12T20:25:00.000-07:00

Besides having the heads positioned in an opposing fashion there is little to nothing that's different about these two profiles.

Similarities

The new 'banner' image is fully replicated.
Vitals directly below the profile pic.
The tabbed options look and function similarly but there are different.
Timeline style profile - industry standard.
Positioning of the top right settings and account menu - industry standard.
Position of logo on the top left - industry standard.
Position of search field: this is an industry standard.

Differences

Where Facebook has ads; Google+ has ominous white space.
Google+ has profile style tabs; Facebook integrates that into an extra row on the profile.
Google+ clearly displays the nav bar on the left hand side - industry standard.

Are we as humans that predictable that everything on the top of a web page should obey a certain order? Maybe, yes. Are we heading to a face off between these platforms? Yes. May other platforms out there be different and present differently? Yes. You be the judge of the majors by telling me - @kempedu - if you believe LinkedIn or Twitter are operating on the same user design principles for profile pages.

For me the most interesting contrast between all of these profiles is how they attempt to get new users to sign up. When I captured these shots I logged out. Facebook doesn't allow non-users to see my profile unless they login or sign-up. It's not hard to tell who understand that users are at the core of almost everywhere iteration of computing technology. The bottom line is...

Users Rule

Research: Building on Shared Experience

2011-11-30T15:24:00.000-08:00

Hand talking

Learning about your audience before you meet them and before you speak with them is key. Whether meeting your new girlfriend's parents for the first time; spending eight figure marketing budgets or beginning work for a new company this is where research becomes so important. Consider researching the past and the future of an organization, new in-laws or your next employer.

If you are delivering a presentation to a group it's best that you take the time to learn about them and learn as much as you can. Tailor your message for that group and understand them enough so that you can make the experience special for them and yourself. Also keep in mind that your assumptions may not be accurate. Gauge your audience before you begin. This can be done by tracking a #hashtag at an event, sitting in the audience listening to the chatter or meeting and mingling with people when possible.

I watched one of the internet's top speakers give a talk in Vancouver last year. It was sad to watch as they fell on their face with a poorly planned talk that meandered aimlessly and talked down to the audience. At one point the speaker said that it was best to dress like your audience. If you are under-dressed it looks like you don't respect your audience while if you are over dressed it can look as if you are superior to them. The funny part was that this speaker was under-dressed therefore insinuating that they didn't respect us. This speaker has one of the most powerful voices in the social web; yet misses connecting genuinely with their audience in real life.

For me connecting with your audience, understanding them and being able to change your presentation on the fly to move with them help guide presenters to effective public speaking. Recently I had the opportunity to present one of my main talks to students at Kwantlen University. This is an evolving talk that I've given three or four times now. When using material that's been presented before customization is essential.

Getting on the Bus: A Social Media Story (Student Edition)

Speaking: The greatest audience is the toughest crowd

2011-08-14T20:47:00.000-07:00

I love speaking. To any audience. Whether they love what I am saying or don't get it I learn an amazing amount about myself and about other people everytime I have the opportunity to speak in front of more than a few people. When different groups ask me to speak I am quick to accept which often makes for challenging times; both in regards to the availability of time and the time to prep for your audience.
This summer I was lucky enough to speak to a variety of different groups. Two audiences really stuck out for me this Summer. One was possibly the toughest audience I've spoken to and the other may have been the audience I was most nervous to speak with.

Nufloors and Social Media

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds

The first was a talk on a Sunday morning at the end of Nufloors Canada's Conference in Courtney on a Golf Course. Perfect setting smart event. I was treated to arguable the most authentic stand up routine in all of Canada. The audience was franchisees of NuFloors flooring stores across Canada.

Technology and Enablement in the Social Age

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds

When I went into speak at the Disability Resources Network BC Conference at the Planetarium I was more nervous because I didn't know what to expect. The group was a bit of mystery to me, but through a few quick questions and a broad, diverse engaging presentation, I was able to deliver a great session. Attendees were given a chance to share their successes and best practices I only wish I had more facilitation power to ensure that everyone got a number of takeaways tailored to the session and not my prep(the presentation).
This is being published late, but I am fired up to deliver Fall highlights in a post soon. Leave me your feedback or queries always up for a good thought.

TMI: Too Much Information

2011-07-05T11:11:00.000-07:00

Decades ago (2 or 3 decades to be exact) we couldn't get enough information. When the Encyclopedia Britannica person came to our door we couldn't wait to buy the $1000+ set of soon to be outdated books.

The world has changed. I remember over a year ago when I turned a fellow instructor at BCIT onto Twitter. He was super excited to start. He couldn't get enough. When he didn't have time to read stories he would 'favourite' them on his Twitter app. One day he turned to me in passing and said, "Hey, Kemp when do I read all these great stories I found on Twitter?"

"Uh-oh" I thought. How do I break it to him? How do I help someone who was desperate for more information in the before (the 1980s) understand what the reality of too much information means in the 21st century. I decided to put it to him straight...

"It's time to give up," I said.

It was true. He had to change the way he thought about information. We all do in a world where we can search for the latest links on education in an instant. I had thought him how to tap into the latest news on social media, technology and digital media, but was it for the better? Or for the worse? He now had access to more information than ever before but he had to sift through it. He had to evaluate it and he had to decide if it was worth his time to read.

The reality like my current favourite read: "The Shallows" states quite clearly is that our brains are going through a transitional phase. We are building new pathways to move from spending tons of time in the stacks finding relevant information in books. To moving through the digital stacks learning how to find, filter and evaluate information. This is our future or the future of our media consumption.

More than a year ago when I was employed part-time or a student I had time to do these three vital tasks: find, filter and evaluate. Now that time no longer exists. I rely on Techmeme, SmartBrief, Summify and others to do those tasks for me. Lucklily for me they do a damn good job.

What will the future hold? As many have said the ability to curate and filter the best content will remain vital for people like me. But who will do the best job and as a recent article in Wired stated can a computer do it for me based on my previous posts to social networks like Twitter and Facebook? I sure hope so because I don't have the time, but I need someone to do the job. If you have anything to add I am dying to hear it so don't hesitate to tell me how you deal in the age of Too Much Information.

The State of WebTV in Canada, Part II: In the Trenches

2011-06-14T10:29:00.000-07:00

Newcomers take aim at the incumbents

I've always been a huge enthusiast for WebTV: television programming that can be watched/streamed on demand through the internet. I haven't had cable TV for more than 2 years. I know some of you are saying wow while the rest are saying that you have never had cable or that you never watch TV; you my friends have already won. For everyone else in Canada there is a different reality.

If you never watch TV and you are still reading this post I salute you! I've spoken previously about the big three network holders in Canada: Rogers, Bell and Telus affectionately known at Rogebellus by some. Others add regional players Shaw (West) and Quebecor (East). This is the reality. It is not a problem. These organizations exist the way they do partly because as Canadians we built them to and we need them to or think we do.

Web television in Canada has come of age although it suffers from major flaws. Each of the Cartel members has associated content networks and broadcast channels, but they don't share; for the most part they covet and hold onto control to their detriment.

Telecommunications company Telus Corp. is urging the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission not to allow its competitors to horde the content for the exclusive use of their subscribers. The company is the only one of the major telecommunications companies that does not hold television networks as part of its assets. This year, Bell Canada Enterprises Inc. bought the television network CTV, while last year, Shaw Communications Inc. purchased the television and specialty channel division of Canwest Global Communications Corp. -4.28.11 Source.

The federal broadcast regulator moved to block telecommunications companies from locking up their video content for their own wireless subscribers. -3.7.11 Source.

This is the biggest problem we are going to face in the future. In the US because of the vastness of the country and the multitude of providers this problem doesn't exist in the same way. Yes there are large content networks but they don't own all of or almost all of the means of distribution. In Canada the cartel does own those networks and they use that power to hold Canadians to the fire regularly.

Any Canadian internet connection/IP address in Canada can go onto CTV.ca, GlobalTV.com, MTV.ca or CBC.ca and watch any program that is made available on demand. Sure the quality isn't HD, the ads are incredibly repetitive and sometimes it stops working in the middle of show. On the other hand I don't have to watch 3 minutes of ads, I can watch programs whenever I want and only have to be able to access the internet to do it. This is the reality modern people want. Our lives don't dictate availability at certain hours. We are dedicated to them. If you want people to watch your content make it accessible and charge a reasonable price.

There is freedom given to the viewer by PVR, Netflix and other ways of viewing media on your own schedule. This is what iTunes, Amazon and others who are making serious gains understand: the delivery system is just as much, if not more important than the item of delivery. Most media companies have realized this and they are turning the corner but what the future holds is uncertain and none of us can predict what will happen.

In part three of this series we'll chat about the current realities and possible futures of the state web television in Canada. In light of SOPA, PIPA and Bill C-32 concerns are growing about the state of freedom on the internet and how that effects all internet users. Canada continues to exist as an experiment in telecommunications marred by challenges. I love my country. I love my Canadian telecomms. At this point I wouldn't have it any other way. Can it get better? Yes. Will it? I and many others have already given up cable and a home phone line.

It already has.

Sharing Information + Diverse Audiences

2011-05-08T11:09:00.000-07:00

The State of WebTV in Canada, Part I: Opening Salvos

2011-03-14T10:55:00.000-07:00

To Americans Canada is like that cousin who lives outside the city and sadly doesn't have access to the same great things as you. In Canada we once longed for Target and TiVo now we have those 'great' things and more. Sadly the Google Chromebook is skipping us on it's initial launch in favour of more European markets. That's ok, but that's the way it is and once that's the way it was with everything. The iPhone didn't come here for at least a year after its launch in the United States. Canadians have long made trips across the southern border to acquire some of those things that aren't available in Canada. Whether it's Trader Joe's or Duty-Free liquor, which happens to be 25-50% cheaper.

This post isn't about that inequality it's about the inequality presented by our archaic, controlling, short-sighted telecommunications providers. "The Cartel" as we call them are Bell, Rogers and Telus. There are a few larger regional players (Quebecor and Shaw), but for the purposes of this post let's focus on the offerings of the big three. Many people globally have long been downloaders of content that they cannot otherwise access whether because they lack Cable TV or the content isn't available in their country. Most of these people want to pay for that content they want to ensure that those that create the things we enjoy receive funding to continue to create that content, but content distribution is the bottleneck in viewers ability to do that.

Hulu and Netflix have been creating strong digital content distribution channels in the US for years. Netflix in Canada is like dial-up internet compared to Netflix in the US which is comparatively like ultra-fast internet connections of today. Our Netflix has almost zero new content and when movies come their either from the archives are straight to DVD. Yes there are the rare high production value films in there, but it's nothing compared to what is available in the US. This is only the start of the problems presented by the current structure of the cartel's telecommunications Oligopoly in Canada. In the next part of this 3 series we'll get into the trenches on state of web TV in Canada.

In the meantime read this follow-on post from Jesse Brown: Honour among thieves: the only way to the best selection of television show and movies [in Canada] is to steal them.

Social Media in Law: A 2011 Report

2011-02-11T02:28:00.000-08:00

This is part one of a multi-part series about the crossroads of technology and the law.

Messages we write down have been an integral part of the law since the beginning. The value of our digital trail is increasing daily. How we manage our online communications is key to steering clear of the newly formed legal pitfalls of the web.

This series of posts will focus on North America and will draw mostly on existing case law, some anecdotes and a few cases that cannot be discussed in detail due to existing NDAs. For the most part I will reference cases I have been following and how they are slowly drawing the lines in the sand around labour law, privacy and rights.

As the year progresses I will continue to keep you updated on the effects of social media on litigation both civil and criminal. I am currently working with some people who are experiencing the heavy cost of divorce in the age of digital connections by ghost writing their story. I will also explore existing intellectual property cases, discuss defamation and cover labour law in detail. I'll root out where the lines are and where they are moving by drawing on cases that are happening now.

Today I'll be giving an overview of Defamation, Uttering Threats, Insurance, Divorce and Labour.

Defamation: Anonymity Unveiled

In August of 2009 Google was ordered by a New York court to hand over the identity of anonymous blogger accused of libel* a type of defamation* for comments they made on a website called NYC Skanks, that was hosted on Blogger, which is owned by Google. The judge in the case quoted a ruling by a Virginia court stating that "anonymous online taunters should be held accountable when their derision goes too far." -Full Story

In Vancouver in late 2010 a case regarding a beauty salon where they had to file court orders with both Craigslist and Shaw, an ISP, to find out who their anonymous online defamers were. Both Craigslist (handed over the IP addresses) and Shaw (handed over the customers names associated with those IP addresses) have complied with those court orders. -Anecdotal at this time.

Whether it's magicians in Vancouver, Courtney Love or two organizations trying to help dogs the age of internet defamation and the resulting lawsuits is upon us. Here's a great overview from a lawyer about how defamation works in the law. Remember legal claims of online defamation are on the rise.

Uttering Threats, Digitally

In January of 2010 Paul Chambers, 26, was supposed to fly out of Robin Hood Airport in the UK when his flight was canceled. He went to Twitter to vent his frustration about the closure of the local airport. He was headed to see his internet girlfriend in a tropical location when ash from a volcano in Iceland postponed his trip.

The tweet that cost $6000

His Twitter account was public so anyone could search it and a savvy airport personnel member spotted the tweet threatening to bomb the place and reported it to authorities who were obligated to act on this threat as if it had been phoned in. He was quickly arrested. Paul received some internet celebrity status and a $6000 bill for his indiscretion. He also lost his appeal.

Uttering threats on Facebook is dangerous business as one Montreal man found out in the Fall of 2010. He also showed that when uttering threats online it's best not to be doing other illegal things. In 2008 a Canadian student was charged with uttering threats for posts he made on an internet forum threatening violence against his school.

The lesson? Threats on social networks must be treated as legitimate by authorities. Hide your tweets by making them private or don't tweet threats. Most of the answers to how to avoid the pitfalls above is 'common sense'. The challenge is that many people aren't aware of those things. Worth studying.

Insurance Fraud?

Insurance lawyers are accessing Facebook photos more tenaciously than is imaginable and have been since before 2008. One of the most famous cases in Canada started in November 2009 and involves Nathalie Blanchard who had been out for a year-and-a-half on paid long-term sick leave (disability) following a diagnosis of severe depression. Then her insurance company, Manulife, got their hands on some photos she had posted to Facebook. The photos show her smiling while at a birthday party in a strip club and on a vacation on the beach.

Manulife took these photos to mean that she was no longer depressed and able to work. Blanchard responded by saying that she was 'happy in the moment, but before and after I have the same problems'. The video below runs through the whole story if you'd like more details and some honest opinion.

A video of the same story with some opinion.

How did they see those photos when her profile settings were totally private? She had made them her profile pictures something that Facebook lets anyone on the internet see. More information: Depressed woman loses benefits -November 2009. Depressed woman fails first try to recoup benefits -December 2009. Related: Manulife posted $1.8 billion in profits for 2010.

According to the Telegraph using social networks could eventually raise your home insurance premiums in the UK by as much as 10%. This is because people who use these networks are seen as 'more at risk' to be broken into due to their posts. For example, if you checkin to FourSquare you most likely aren't at home.

I have searched for more stories about insurance, law and social media but haven't found much more. Although there is even more cases like this out there. Where are they? Please Tweet @KempEdmonds or leave the links in the comments, thanks!

Divorce in the Social Age

The American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers responded in a recent survey that 81% of them have seen an increase in the number of cases where social networks are referenced in the last five years. This statistic has been widely misreported as 4 in 5 divorce lawyers say that their cases involve social networks by many major networks including MSNBC. I found this out after using the stat myself and then wondering if it was totally accurate. This misuse of statistics is a major pet peeve of mine, but that's for another time or another blog.

Facebook is a divorce lawyer's new best friend
Facebook doesn't cause divorce- spouses do
Divorce attorneys catching cheaters
Wife betrayed on Facebook: "Terrible beyond belief."
Facebook and divorce airing the dirty laundry

Most of the existing stories about the use of Facebook in divorce is around catching cheaters. This is a strong investigative use for lawyers in a bitter divorce battle. Divorce and separation online is a touchy and challenging new dynamic in our social structure. I can't begin to imagine factoring in children. When I dig more into divorce I am going to try and talk about it from a few different angles.

While I am covering divorce later on in this series it will be about the human story of creating intertwined lives and social networks and then going through a divorce. What do you do? Unfriend everyone? Don't post anything about your feelings during the divorce? There are no easy answers to this new challenge that faces those who are divorced in the age of Facebook.

Part two will be coming soon!

Meme of the Year Part II: What's in a Meme?

2011-01-14T23:36:00.000-08:00

If you haven't read "Meme of the Year Part I: What's a Meme?" reading it first will help in understanding the origins of memes and what they mean to human communication. This year has been all about video memes. Video memes have aided in bringing memes to the mainstream, although the word isn't in common usage... yet. Internet memes are viral, but viral videos aren't necessarily memes.

Let's go back... Way back to 2007. Facebook only had 20 million users worldwide Sometimes it's the act of watching the particular video that is the meme. Today Rick Astley is famous because people are tricked into watching this. The action of tricking someone into watching the video was "Rick Rolling". Here is the origins story of this famous meme from 2007:

Have you ever wondered about the origins of FAIL, Owned or All Your Base are Belong to Us? Well wonder no longer. The following video from my favourite series on modern memes "Know Your Meme" will explain it all. Following this video are the two winners of Meme of the Year...

The first internet meme of the year for 2010 was Double Rainbow. Let's call it our first runner up. Now there are two winners: one from the Organic section and one from the Inorganic or manufactured section. Let's take a look at the Organic winner first...

This meme of the year was produced professionally by a news crew, but it was the video's star Antoine Dodson who has shot to stardom. Bed Intruder was introduced to me on the annual fishing trip I take with my brothers and my father to a fishing lodge where there is no cell coverage, television or internet. My younger brother kept telling to "Hide yer kids, hide yer wife, hide your husband they be raping everybody up in here." These is half of the phrase that made Antoine Dodson and international star. Below is the original news clip:

This video has 7.3+ million views while the second video of the meme based on the song created by remixing his statement has 68+ million views. Antoine Dodson went on to team up with two guys simple known as Autotune The News who took his voice and made a short 20 second sample to get his approval and gauge interest. This was quickly followed by a full length song which has gone on to sell 500+ copies. Here is the song:

Antoine used his cut of the money for the song (50%) to buy his mom a new home among other things. He has been offered a reality TV show, been asked to appear at parties for $20K and appeared on television programs all over the world and the internet. The local news and a guy 'climbing in your window snatching your people up' could lead to such fame. His 15 minutes were topped when he one the first award for Meme of the Year. Here is his acceptance speech.

The third meme is Old Spice guy. Old Spice guy falls into the category of a marketing meme created and then given validation by consumer response, think Super Bowl ads. BUD-WEIS-ER. I will let his video speak for itself and end with an infographic regarding how much of an impact the multi-million dollar social media and television campaign made.

Til next time!

Meme of the Year Part I: What's a Meme?

2011-01-01T15:17:00.000-08:00

Memes are something that have been around since the beginnings of communication. Although they were only recently conceived and defined by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene as a concept for discussion of evolutionary principles in explaining the spread of ideas and cultural phenomenon.

A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena. It identifies ideas or beliefs that are transmitted from one person or group of people to another. The word is a blend of "gene" and the Greek word mimetismos meaning "something imitated".

The name comes from an analogy: as genes transmit biological information, memes can be said to transmit idea and belief information. Early memes were likely used to communicate the presence of predators or the need for food among early life on Earth. Examples of memes include melodies, catch-phrases, fashion and urban legends.

The term Internet Meme is used to describe a concept or meme that spreads via the internet. They have taken the digital world by storm and 2010 has definitely been the year of the internet meme. Some people refer to memes as viral videos or image macros. Many are born from a site called 4chan. The success formula of viral videos has often been said to be WTF, OMG and LOL. Try to make people say "What the F?", "Oh My God!", and get them to "Laugh Out Loud".

by: Christopher Harrison used under Creative Commons.

The first meme of the year, Double Rainbow, was created by a regular person using simple equipment and it makes people say all three: OMG, WTF and LOL. Double Rainbow is a video recorded by an interesting american known as Bear in Yellowstone National Park as he awoke one morning while camping to see a Double Rainbow 'all the way across the sky'.

Indeed the two rainbows can be seen to have spread across the sky and represent a rare occurrence. Although not something totally unheard of (as seen by the photo above from a search on Flickr). The video below tells the story of how Jimmy Kimmel's viewing and tweeting of the video helped it go from 800 views having being online for 6 months to a whopping 23 million views in the next 6 months. On January 9th the original video will have been online for one year.

This is part one. Click for part two.

What made this video go viral was a combination of the man's reaction and the discovery of the video by the Jimmy Kimmel Show. What makes this video's rise to fame most interesting is that until it was picked up and tweeted by Jimmy Kimmel it was unheard of. What happened over the next few months few expected and none could have predicted...

note the flatline initially

The timeline of what became of the three minute video is even more interesting. Double Rainbow become a song on iTunes that has sold more than 300,000 copies, probably more by now. The song was created at the right time and has nearly 20 million views compared to 23 million on the original video.

The Double Rainbow guy (affectionately known as "Bear" or "HungryBear9562" his YouTube channel name) has since appeared on television for interviews and a commercial for one windows product and another. He also has his own iPhone App complete with an ad; a lark which for a dollar will overlay a double rainbow on any photo you take. This meme birthed so many different products, but most of all showed that for a video on the web to truly hit the big time it needs help from the mainstream media.

This is my personal favourite riff on the meme partly because I have a soft spot for 'sandwiches' made entirely from breaded deep fried chicken, bacon and cheese but also because someone replicated the original video in such great juxtaposition to fast food:

See you soon for Part II of Meme of the year.

Tracking a new media artifact

2010-12-02T02:06:00.000-08:00

How was I paid by British taxpayers to be in an ad for an American bank?

Modern digital multimedia has given way to a whole new world of digital scrap-booking* and record keeping, but in a digital world where some memories are video, images, audio and text n digital form. These artifacts are then used to make great creations, presentations or web experiences. Digital hoarding* is another thing many of us do without even noticing. I started digital hoarding way back in the days of BBS* and still have the burned CDs to show for it. What about that book review I did on Amazon in 1999? It's still there, but sadly m Geocities* site from the late 90s has been tossed.

Dave Olson's podcasting talk, Fresh Media Conference 2009.

I am constantly inspired to do amazing digital scrap-booking by two friends of mine. Dave Olson* is a classic northwest storyteller: think Jack Kerouac + Hunter S Thompson + Walt Whitman, that's Dave. Rick Chung* is a classically trained web savvy journalist. Dave is more of an old school storyteller and creator. Rick has a journalism background and writes and uses photos is such an amazing way to tell real his stories.

Digital photography will ultimately change childhood as photography had previously. Now instead of a few shots of us as babies and kids; parents, relatives and the internet will already have a thorough record of our early days. When generations change their practices somethings are forgotten only to be repeated.

photo by: iciskaye. used under creative commons license.

I am referring to the great depression* and the modern great recession*; both resulted from overreaching on behalf of financial markets. Modern banking is a game of measured risk. Players act in the interest of profits and revenues. Sometimes at the expense of those they serve. This photo contrast below demonstrates how prosperity can't last forever and the only constant is constant change. In the 60s the US made the vast majority of motor vehicles sold within it's borders. Today that is no longer the case and this has effected major economic centers that once depended on the auto industry.

This is the same neighborhood. Note the square building in the lower center of both photos. (Detroit 1961 and 2006)

Economic devastation runs deep these. So how did this happen? Think of globalization and international trade as the ultimate long term equalizer. As much as the emptiness of Detroit is a tragedy, somewhere else in the world auto workers are making cars and creating prosperous cities to support those efforts as Detroit once did.

What happened? How did this occur? We hear a lot of different things about Credit Default Swaps and Collateral Debt Obligations. If you seek answers to these questions this video is a well done explanation of the current financial situation.

The Crisis of Credit Visualized* from Jonathan Jarvis*.

Early this year I received a strange call from a representative of Charter One Bank requesting my approval for them to re-air an ad from 6 years ago, a smart and cost saving tactic. Thanks to Google I was the first one she found. I waited a few months for them to contact the others from the video and decide whether or not to proceed with re-airing the commercial. I was happy to receive a cheque in the mail for three times the amount I had originally been paid in 2004. Catch me in the blue jacket and green hat at 8 seconds.

I was part of this commercial because at the time I was a volunteer with the VON's Meals on Wheels a program that produces and delivers healthy meals. The commercial was made in Canada but for a bank in the US. The video is meant to highlight the ways the bank helps in their community as each program is something that the bank contributes to.

The commercial was created when Cleveland-based Charter One Bank* was taken over in 2004 by Citizens Financial which has been owned by the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) since 1988. In 2010 when I received that phone call the British Government was a majority stakeholder in RBS due to bailouts in late 2008*.

Billions of pounds of “toxic” sub-prime mortgages were bought by Royal Bank of Scotland traders in a spree that was not disclosed to the bank’s board. -March 2009, The Telegraph*.

Charter One was one of many banks born from the US banking system*. The realities in a 50 state nation meant that system evolved as was necessary to enable a balance between competition and stability. The Free Banking* era in the mid 1800s and the deregulation of the 1980s have helped lead to today's situation. This deregulation was dangerous in a nation where barriers to entry were low and the market increasingly unregulated.

Critics have pointed out that the federal government's attempts at deregulation granted easy credit to federally insured financial institutions, encouraging them to overextend themselves and fail. -Wikipedia*.

As the British government is a majority stakeholder in the Royal Bank of Scotland which owns Citizen Financial Group which is represented by Charter One Bank it can be inferred that I was paid by British taxpayers to appear in a commercial for an American bank. Did I really get paid by the British taxpayers to promote an American bank?

No the cheque said Charter One Bank on it. Tracking a media artifact can lead down interesting paths and should be done more often. Digital scrap-booking? What's that? It's exactly what we do everyday we use or input information into anything digital. Now the real challenge is what's better than a blog to organize that content? How will we curate our digital content? How will we allow access to it? What are your thoughts?

Facebook Ad Rates are the Cheapest. Here's Why.

2010-11-17T16:04:00.000-08:00

Thanks to one of my favourite e-newsletters. The Silicon Valley Insider Chart O' D' Day -or in less irish terms "of the". Today's chart confirm something I've suspected all along: Facebook might serve up more display ads than anyone else, but they are the cheapest. The next cheapest? Email.

Thanks to a chance phone call from Richard at the Goodline Group I was reminded of the power of permission marketing. Beyond permission marketing is a strong strategy for the customer focused businesses of the future. Today organizations are clamouring just to get people to see them in a world full of marketing and advertising.

photo by: Doug Wheller. Remixed under creative commons licence.

That means getting a chance to have eyeballs see your brand, product or services and hopefully click a few things can be costly. See the chart below to see the most expensive and least expensive types of sites to advertise on. The rates are in CPM or cost per thousand impressions. That means about 2000 eyeballs had the chance to see an ad. It doesn't even mean that they saw the ad. It may cost you significantly less on Facebook than on any other site to get the chance to be seen but low prices reflect users likelihood to ignore your advertisement.

-comscore.com and Mary Meeker's awesome presentation.

The reasons for the differences in the costs of online display ads are complex and I don't pretend to know all about them, but after using Facebook ads over the last 2+ years I've learned a lot and watched as the average cost of a click has triple and quadrupled. Still it has the lowest cost of online ads because of the users habits and nature of Facebook ads.

Some users ignore them entirely. Some users click them all the time with no intention of taking any further action. Some users are playing games when they click an ad and really just want to back to their game. Some users are doing research on your use of the ads and where you direct them with that ad. Some users genuinely connect with your brand. It's challenging but at this time and when used right represents strong current and better future marketing value.

photo by: Penny Higgins. Remixed under creative commons licence.

On the bright side some users read ads and don't click, raising awareness. Using a strong brand image can help to build familiarity of that brand and cut through the generic ads. You get great metrics, but have to draw some of your own conclusions.

It was announced today during Zuckerberg's Web 2.0 interview that 250 million facebook users are daily users. 50% of users come back everyday. Last I hear the average user spends almost an hour on facebook each day. I like Facebook advertising and I advocate it for many reasons; especially targeting and related brand awareness. For more on this please see Facebook Advertising: Beyond the Click. Below I have embedded Zuckerberg's 60 minute 'interview' at web 2.0 today.

skip to 7 minutes for the 'confrontation'

Internet Marketing Workshop

2010-11-16T08:38:00.000-08:00

Internet Marketing is not totally different from traditional marketing as it is the process of marketing of products or services over the internet. The internet allows us to reach a global audience. Internet marketing is by its nature an interactive medium which provides instant responses this is unique to internet marketing. Using Analytics and feedback loops we can analyze and improve our internet marketing efforts. According to Wikipedia Internet Marketing includes:

Display Marketing
Email Marketing
Interactive Advertising
Social Media Optimization
Web Analytics
Cost per impression (CPM)
Cost per action (CPC or PPC)
Affiliate Marketing
Contextual Advertising
Revenue Sharing
Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Paid Inclusion
Search Analytics
Mobile Advertising

That can seem overwhelming, but thanks to Wikipedia you can find out all about each of these internet marketing tactics and the differences, just click through and see what each item is about. Before we get started with all of these amazing tactics let's take a look at one of my favourite web-based tools: Google Docs. Google Docs is a cloud-based office suite of software that allows you to have a secure mobile office. If you don't have a Google or Gmail account please sign-up for one now. If you already have one let's head over to docs.google.com and check out the features of this amazing free set of tools.

There are two reasons I want to show you Google Docs. The first is to show you the ability to create documents on the go no matter what computer you are using. Google Forms is the second reason. Creating feedback loops is a key part of internet marketing. There are two ways you are going to be able to analyze your online visitor behaviours: analytics on your site and by creating feedback loops. One way to create feedback loops is to create short surveys. Please take some time to fill out my survey below ahead of our Friday class on Social Media:

The above survey is a longer Google Form and can help to bring me some valuable information in preparation for Friday's class. I strongly recommend asking 3-5 short questions for short surveys. If you would like to do a longer survey be very thoughtful about the questions you choose. Asking people for too much information will turn people off. If you would like to ask a lot of questions you should incentivize the completion of the survey by offering a deal or gift card to those who fill it out

We need to start by looking at the roots of our internet marketing strategy. The roots are made up of:

Research - Situation, competition, audience
Strategy - Attract, engage, convert, multiply
Branding - Focused, clear, brand message, compelling
Content - Relevant, benefit driven, organized, unique & valuable

-mainlinemedia.com

These items should sync with your business strategy with a focus on conversion and retention of visitors in your system. Let's look at a number of tools that can be used to analyze and research other sites before you start building yours:

Tracking everything:

o Compete

o Alexa

o Quantcast

o Google Alerts

o Social Mention

o Google Insights

One should also try to have more than one or two conversions on a website. What's a conversion? Conversions can range from very soft conversions to very hard conversions. Here are five conversions from soft to hard:

Facebook like or Twitter follow
Blog subscription via email or RSS
e-newsletter sign-up
Request a quote, Inquiries, email, phone
Purchase

Don't give people too many choices as this can overwhelm and put visitors off. Let's look at a few sites who are trying to serve so many customer groups that it can be challenging to navigate their websites. According to the tree chart above the website has two parts which will stem from the roots: research, strategy, branding and content.

The two parts of the website are development and design. Development should involve rich media: video, photos and sound where appropriate. Development should be scalable. What if your site is a great success? You need to be ready to grow when your user base is ready to (See: Facebook, Twitter, etc.) Your design elements should be usable, straight forward and flexible. Imagine that a visitor of average intelligence reaches your website, will they know what to do? This is what I call the LCD factor and it's something that I tried to incorporate into most of my thinking about marketing.

When building your website start from the top three things you would like visitors to do when they get to your site. Those things can be: call us, sign-up, subscribe or learn more about the company. The site should be framed around your goals. In the beginning of websites we want to put as much information as possible online. We were thinking that's what users wanted from our sites and in the late 90s it may have been, but in reality too many options and too much information can cause visitors to get lost on your site.

Create some funnels or buckets for your website and try to keep the initial options for your visitors to five at the most. Your website will need to be optimized for search engines. There are number of levels to SEO or search engine optimization. SEO is the process of improving the visibility of a website or page in search engines via un-paid search results. SEM or search engine marketing targets paid listings.

You can spend hours or thousands of dollars working on SEO. It is recommended that you build your site with SEO in mind but don't spend too much time on this initially as you will learn more from your site over time. Today let's look at keywords, link building, backlinks or inbound links and page rank. Here are some tools for link tracking and SEO:

10 Link Building and tracking Tools for SEO
Google's Webmasters Tools - Need a Google account
Yahoo! Site Explorer - Need a Yahoo! account

The most basic level is keywords or how people search for your site. This can be optimized with tools like Google Seach-based keyword tool or Google AdWords: Keyword Tool. Each of these tools will help you to learn new ways that people find your products or services. It's very important that your content reads naturally and doesn't seem jam-packed with keywords for search. The ability of a blog to keep fresh content on your site and increase the frequency of keywords is important. For more on SEO and SEM be sure to see this massive list of blogs about SEM and SEO and here are 150 more.

This just brushes the surface of SEO; a deep and complex science when a company can afford it. Next look at Monitoring and Measuring everything you do online. This is a vital part of using the web effectively. The first thing I want to do is a short lesson in tracking everything. Click here to get started.

Monitoring and measuring

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds.

The most valuable thing you can do is track everything that you do to analyze the usefulness of each tactic. The first and most important part of this tracking is ensuring you have analytics on your site. Let's go through how straight-forward that can be. The next most important thing is URL Shortening

These are tools you can use to analyze your own efforts. Let's talk about measuring and monitoring all of your activities online with these tools:

o Google Analytics

o Google URL Builder

o URL Shortening http://j.mp/, http://bit.ly/, http://ow.ly/

o   Analyze your efforts http://grader.com/, Analytics
o   Google Alerts
o   Social Mention

Email Marketing is a very important part of your internet marketing strategy. People who have subscribed to your email newsletter are the most likely to make a purchase from your organization. The name of the game with email marketing is value. You need to provide value in your e-newsletter. If you don't provide value and continue to hammer your list with pushy sales messaging you will lose those subscribers over time.

What is value? It depends on your audience, but if you are real estate agents it could be 5 ways to increase the value of your home before you sell or 5 ways to quickly inspect a potential home before you bring in the professionals. If your audience is mothers then your value will be different. Front load your newsletter with the valuable information and supply more conversion opportunities throughout. These could be a survey, a coupon, an invitation to find you on Facebook or follow you on Twitter. Mail Chimp is the best free tool for email marketing and Constant Contact is the best paid email marketing tool.

Landing Pages are a very important part of any internet marketing campaign. A landing page is a webpage specifically designed to receive visitors from a campaign or ad. It is often said that "A homepage is where clicks go to die." Most often this is because we are trying to serve so many different customer groups on our home pages that visitors from ad campaigns don't know what to do when they do when they get there.

Now that we've talked about the free methods let's look more closely at the kinds of internet marketing we have to pay for. Today we will be discussing the following:

o Display Ads
o Web TV Preroll

o Affiliate Links

o Google AdWords

o Facebook Ads

Blogging and why it's so important to your site. Blogging is a word that has had it's day. The word originated from it's initial meaning of "web log" which was shortened to "Blog". A blog is a publishing medium for ideas, opinions and thoughts. Some people blog about their personal life or interests while others use blogging to discuss ideas in their work and bring together insights gathered from others. The name of the game is value, provide it. Don't know what it is? Ask your audience. The largest blogging platform isWordpress.com and it is the recommended option. I use Blogger because it's what I am used to and it works for my purposes. Advanced users or those with access to capable technology professionals should use Wordpress.org. The major differences between Wordpress.com and .orgare listed here by Wordpress.

Your blog should be consistent and consistently create value for your target audience(s).

Blogging: Beyond the Post - Tips and Tactics

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds.

Social Media Marketing and it's uses will be covered in detail in Friday's class.

http://www.hubspot.com/internet-marketing-whitepapers/ - hubspot
http://mashable.com/ - The Social Media Guide

Social Media Workshop Part II

2010-11-08T12:34:00.000-08:00

Blogging is a word that has had it's day. The word originated from it's initial meaning of "web log" which was shortened to "Blog". A blog is a publishing medium for ideas, opinions and thoughts. Some people blog about their personal life or interests while others use blogging to discuss ideas in their work and bring together insights gathered from others. The name of the game is value, provide it. Don't know what it is? Ask your audience. The largest blogging platform is Wordpress.com and it is the recommended option. I use Blogger because it's what I am used to and it works for my purposes. Advanced users or those with access to capable technology professionals should use Wordpress.org. The major differences between Wordpress.com and .org are listed here by Wordpress.

Today's Link Pack:

Hubspot - Free info packs, white papers and more.
Grader - Grade just about anything and get free tips
Quantcast, Alexa, Compete - Analyze big sites traffic
Tweetstats - Enter a username and click 'Tweetcloud'
TagDef - #hashtag Definitions
The Twitter Guidebook
Tweetbeep
The Facebook Guidebook
Facebook Insights
Facebook Badges
Facebook Advertising: Beyond the Click
Register Facebook Page's Username - Must have 25+ fans
Involver - Free Facebook Page Tabs
Wordpress FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions
Wordpress.com
Blogger.com
Wordpress.org

A blog is what you make it. For businesses as we talked about last week a blog can be used to provide value, build loyalty or answer questions your audiences may have to name a few uses. The most important thing is to get started with your blog and write some content before you start to promote it to the world. The best thing about a blog is that you can edit and update your post when necessary or when you see an error.

Whatever you are doing online to drive business having a focus on conversion is vital. Whether your conversions are very soft (Facebook Like or a Follow on Twitter, etc.) or very hard (transactional) moving your audience from one end to other should be a focus of your efforts. Mostly these things can be fulfilled best through LANDING PAGES. Again landing pages will require you to have access to capable technology professionals or be proficient at using Wordpress, Blogger or HTML yourself.

A blog is a very important part of an online profile for business or personal use. A blog is so vital because Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook don't allow for the kind of publishing necessary to convey ideas to your publics. A blog compliments your other efforts on social networks and can lead to writing work for other publishing mediums whether online or print. This is an important way to leverage the content you write on your blog to publish in other places whether you blog for a business or yourself. Your blog also feeds other online efforts by backing up your insights and ideas with more concrete examples with links and references to supporting documentation.

Seth Godin Marketing Guru's List from 2006 is still bang-on today.
CopyBlogger's post on how to get subscribers will help if that's your goal.
Here are 50 creative tips to get blogging.
SEOmoz has this great post: 21 tactics to increase blog traffic.
ezine articles is great for info. 16 ways to drive traffic to your blog.

Blogging: Beyond the Post - Tips and Tactics

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds.

Facebook is different than other social network because it is more about staying connected to those who we already know in our lives. This isn't true for everyone and lots of people use it to connect with new people. For businesses and organizations the Facebook Page has become the place to communicate with Facebook users. If you are looking for a thorough walkthrough for using Facebook Pages and Facebook in general I recommend this web-based one from Mashable.

How you choose to use it is up to you, but those who know you are definitely those most willing to read what you write, offer advice and encourage you on your journey whether for business or personal purposes. It is important whether using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Blogging that you seek out friends, mentors, peers and allies who will honestly critique your work and help guide you to where you want to be with Social Media and Networking.

It's important that we don't overwhelm people on Facebook or Twitter with posts all of the sudden or all at once. Just like when we change our behaviour with our phones. I stopped answering my phone every time it rang. At first people were annoyed as they'd come to expect that I would answer immediately. In time they became used to expect me to not answer and they were fine. This change took time and some people may have stopped calling. This is possible with changing the way you use social networks.

Facebook insights are an important part of analyzing your use of Facebook for business purposes but when combined with URL shortening that analysis will help you judge the effectiveness of your efforts. If not many people are clicking your posts on Facebook there are two things to look at:

How many people 'like' your fan page or are your friend on Facebook? If this number is low then your efforts should be spent growing the number of people who like your fan page. Advertisements are the best way to bring new fans on and is recommended to grow your page initially. People won't know about it unless they are searching for it (unlikely), a friend invites them to it (more likely) or they see an ad for it (most likely).

Before we move on I'd like us all to take a look at Facebook Ads and walk through creating an ad together. We will then look at the data and statistics that Facebook gives us access to through some ad campaigns I've run in the past. I've written a post called Beyond the Click which discusses the benefits of Facebook advertising beyond the click.

About 20% of Facebook users or 100 million people don't have privacy settings on their Facebook accounts and when they post things Facebook logs that and makes it searchable. I often use this when media ask about a story and want to see people's reactions, but it can also be used to see what's being said about a restaurant, business or organization.

Go to Facebook, Log-in and search for a term or string of terms. Remember your AND, OR, "" and -. Once you've searched, click the "Posts by Everyone" button on the bottom left of the screen as below. Let's all try it together and see what we find. Try out a Facebook search of your own.

The 8 Success Criteria For Facebook Page Marketing

View more documents from Jeremiah Owyang.

Facebook for Business

Facebook Groups Versus Facebook Pages

Facebook is a powerful tool for gathering and enabling your personal or business connections. Sometimes a page is best (are you a business or organization?), sometimes groups are best (are you a group or club? Do you need to send messages directly to your group members?), sometimes a personal profile is best (politicians aren't always 'liked' but people want to know what they are up to).

Twitter for Business

Twitter can be used for business important that when using Twitter or Facebook for business that oyu understand how people want to interact with businesses and brands in these spaces is much different than their normal interactions (buy & inquire). Those things should happen on your website, a custom FB tab or in store. The focus of Facebook and Twitter is to build relationships with prospective customers. The job of your website, email, phone and shop is to facilitate the transaction.

Gathering Intelligence

The power of combining online and offline networking tools whether through learning more about someone before you meet them or trying to figure out how your competitors are connecting so well with their publics can yield powerful results for your organization. (see:TweetCloud or TwitterSheep).

If you don't have a LinkedIn profile yet be sure to set one up and and get started on completing it. On LinkedIn the system will guide you to completing your profile with a progress bar. Once your account is 85% complete you will need to reach out to 3 people to give you recommendations. Be sure to send a custom message to these people when requesting a recommendation of your work. If you are attending a conference that is on LinkedIn look at the other attendees and try to connect before the event with plans to meet. You don't have to do this through LinkedIn as many users also use Twitter, a blog or Facebook and can be contacted through those mediums.

As we move from meeting to phone to email to social networking it is important to maintain that you are human and so are the people you are interacting with. The same rules apply with both online and offline social networking: Be yourself, be generous, provide value, contribute and share.

Monitoring and measuring

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds.

Social Media Implementation: Plans, Goals and Strategy

View more presentations from Kemp Edmonds.

Case Studies and Examples

The Mashable Collection

150+ Social Media Policy Examples - DATABASE

Social Media Workshop Part I

2010-11-01T12:23:00.000-07:00

The workshop will be structured into two halves. The first half will focus on personal social networking and social media skills like tracking and search. The second half (next week) will focus on the business of social networking, tracking and analytics we will also dive into how businesses are using and quantifying the use of social technologies.

LESSON #1: Shortening your links to track their effectiveness. http://j.mp or http://bit.ly

The purpose of this format is to demonstrate the many parallels between personal and business use of social networking. This format also helps to show the differences for both personal and business social networking. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have at any time. Answering your questions and inquiries is my number one priority as your instructor.

Why I don't blog here these days

2010-10-15T17:05:00.000-07:00

I am sure that everyone reading this is on edge ;) wondering if I've disappeared into the wilderness of the internet. Well the truth is I have. Most of my time is spent developing curriculum for courses and workshops at BCIT. I am currently teaching two classes and a workshop that runs two Mondays November 1st and 8th at BCIT's Downtown campus from 1pm to 5pm. There are still a few seats available and it's an incredible value. If your curious about the classes I am teaching here they are:

MDIA1045 - Intro to Social Networking - Course Blog - Starts again in January
MDIA2045 - Social Media for Web Dev - Course Blog - Currently available in the full-time program

I am volunteering with the The Violence Stops Here, a campaign engaging men to help stop violence. We need your help as we are currently attempting to secure funding from the Aviva Fund. We need you to vote today so please take a few moments to VOTE. Please know that you can vote each day so we need you to return daily after 9:01 PST and vote again. Together we CAN make things better.

Check back in November for some new content. Also watch for a new blog about Social Media Education I am writing with Capilano University's Jess Sloss: @thattallguy. I am also developing a podcast and radio show with @SmuttySteff of Blog fame for UBC's CiTR radio!

Now for a treat... This is my American Television debut! Can you spot me? HINT: It's early on.

True North Strong and Free

2010-09-24T09:49:00.000-07:00

True North Media House is virtual initiative which started at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics by media makers, enthusiasts and leaders from Vancouver's grassroots technology community. The idea was to aid media makers and documentarians with information, assistance and community events. When I heard about it I had to be a part. My greatest regret of these games was not taking the two weeks off work to enjoy the festivities and create more media! I did alright and was able to enjoy my time but my advice to others interested in documenting any great human event is to drop everything and soak it up.

Two of the leaders of True North Media House are heading to London to present about outsiders, online and social media. They will specifically be highlighting True North Media House, something that helped me stay in touch with the awesomeness of Vancouver's Olympics and allowed me to be part of something from wherever I was taking in the festivities. I wrote a few posts and put up a bunch of photos during the Olympics. Here is a wrap-up:

The Essential Apps for iPad & iPhone

2010-09-15T01:01:00.000-07:00

Apple due for a correction but going strong

The iPad has hit the world and adoption is high for an expensive tool. Not to mention being locked down in AppleLand (see: MappyLand) but to be fair I'm happy being 'locked in' to Steve Jobs' world. For now.

Apple Fanboy Since '91 still seeing PC

The design of these products is unmatched. Apple's dedication to put user experience first has been ahead of it's time since the beginning. It is only now that the majority are catching up after spending years frustrated by Windows and PCs with cheaper parts in them that broke down more often. At first when I got my iPad I could only marvel at it's design and the art of it's construction. Thin, light, sleek and minimalist the iPad is seeking to move towards a time when we will interface with nothing but a screen.

The best thing I have found with my iPad is that because I cannot open tons of windows and tabs and programs I am more able to concentrate on the work at hand and get it done. Although most of us love to think that doing 10 things at once on a computer makes us more productive the reality is that all of this switching from one application and task to another ends up making things take significantly longer than they should.

For now I will go with what works best and the convergence of some features is making working on multiple platforms nearly seamless. Here is my list of apps that make my iPad, iPhone, MacBook Pro world work together. I could link to these through iTunes and get some resi

Information
Good Reader - This is a great tool for collecting and downloading PDFs to your iPhone or iPad. You can easily download any PDf if you have the URL you can also import PDFs from emails and from the safari browser.
Instapaper - Read things later saves links to a cloud bookmark system with an app for iPad and iPhone as well as an online version this is a great way to save stories from your day for reading at a more convenient time.
NewsRack - RSS Reader
Amazon Kindle: still kicking iBooks butt
Free news apps: NYT, Globe and Mail, etc.

Productivity
iThoughtsHD - Mind Mapping made easier. Still not totally simple.
ToDo: Currently $5 for iPad + $5 for iphone (originally $10 for iphone)
Pages, Keynote, Numbers
Screenshot: Hold home and press power. Grab any image from any tool (video, web, etc.) Then trim it for use in Pages or Keynote
There are better apps for trimming screenshots but CropforFree is free and works.

Social
Twitter - Choose your poison:
Twitter: It's now a native iPad app but it performs well and feels kitchy blown up on iPad.

Hootsuite (New iPad App coming soon) although the iphone app performs much better on ipad. on the iphone it's too much information in a small space for me and I only used it to schedule tweets once in a while.
Twitterific: Native good free for one user and has ads.
Tweetdeck: Native, Unstable but awesome looking and good for devotes\es

Facebook - iPhone is ok but there are only sad alternatives for iPad
Facebook hasn't released a native iPad app although the imitators are hitting the app store hard right now

Entertainment

TuneInRadio - The best Radio app for English stations. Every major city's radio stations from Canada are available.
Netflix - For $8/month and a nice, not huge selection of on demand movies, tv and documentaries it's perfect for me. Requires either or all of: iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, PS3, Wii, AppleTV and soon Xbox360.
AirVideo - watch video from your computer on your iPhone or iPad.
Games - that's a whole other post!

I missed tons of great apps and I want to know what you love using on your iPhone or iPad. Please drop me a comment with your favourite apps!