Intermittent Blogging by Mark Logan

The Visual Web

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 22:12:00 +0000

I've been spending more time on Pinterest lately, and I'm becoming a fan. Beyond the food porn and eye candy, it feels like Pinterest is a harbinger of things to come. I have this sense that we are moving from a interaction model dominated by text and menus to one dominated by imagery.

I also really dig Pinterest's feeling of flow. In spite of the strict columnar structure of the interface, the flexibility of the content within those columns gives Pinterest a fluid feel. Fluidity also seems like an important contemporary paradigm for interface design. Perhaps we are shifting from a web of moments and discrete content units to one of flows. Facebook's timeline interface, imperfect though it may be, is another expression of this shift.

In addition to my own personal pinning, I've started to use Pinterest for Moonshot, the Innovation Lab I lead at Barkley. While it's not the usual food porn and home decorating fare that Pinterest specializes in, the board approach seems to work well for capturing the technologies, gadgets, articles and images that appeal to our emerging technology team.

If you're already on Pinterest or curious, come follow me or follow Moonshot. Happy pinning!

Social Shopping's Role and Importance Varies by Category

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 14:52:00 +0000

Just received an interesting email from Hearst Digital Media. It included a summary of a Social Shopping Study that defines the role and importance of Social Shopping across various consumer categories. I really like this more nuanced approach to understanding the impact of Social Shopping. HDM defined four primary reasons consumers engage in social shopping:

Purchase Confidence
Deal Discovery
Community Engagement
Trendsetter Status

The importance of these motivators varies depending on the consumer category being considered.

I think that's a pretty good start, but not necessarily a comprehensive list. I think Product Discovery is another important driver. Maybe that's assumed under Purchase Confidence, but I'd argue it stands on its own as a motivator.

Social Commerce Has Failed Me

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 14:42:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, I presented on the current state of Social Commerce at the National Retail Federation's Innovate 11 conference. This gathering of retail marketers was one of my favorite conferences last year, mostly because of the fantastic, original content provided by the speakers. So, when I was invited to lead a session on Social Commerce, I was both honored and intimidated. This group sets a pretty high bar.

When I first agreed to do it, I had intended to do a glowing update on the glories and potential of social commerce. But while I was doing my research, I stumbled upon a real-life opportunity to put Social Commerce to the test. To make a long story short, it failed.

And as so often happens in life, failure led to inspiration. The topic of my presentation became "How Social Commerce Has Failed Me," and it's an exploration of what we know and don't know about social commerce users and use cases.

I hope it's a worthwhile contribution to the conversation around Social Commerce. Obviously, we have a long way to go yet.

Social Commerce - Innovate 11

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Technology and Happiness: Empowerment

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 02:54:00 +0000

In reviewing research on the impacts of technology on happiness, I came across a study called "The Information Dividend: Why IT Makes You 'Happier'" published in may of this year by BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT. It's a far-reaching survey of more than 35,000 people around the world, in which they examined attitudes toward technology and the correlation between technology access and life satisfaction.

The study concludes that access to technology produces a "statistically significant, positive impact on life satisfaction," which is generally good news for us technologists. As reported in the Daily Telegraph, it also concludes that the correlation is most pronounced among women and among poor people. Qualitative research was done to enhance the quantitative study and one of the themes that emerges quite clearly is empowerment.

While it's somewhat obvious that disenfranchised people will derive happiness from the empowerment provided by technology, I think this finding points to a deeper principle that interactive marketers should seek to employ.

Too often, we see digital channels as means to tell a story to different audiences. But while storytelling is essential, it's not sufficient. In this era, if we want to earn affinity, we must provide empowerment. We must enable the people we reach to be more than an audience, we must enable them to achieve something that they would have been otherwise unable to accomplish or to accomplish it more easily than would otherwise be possible. And whenever possible, we should provide this empowerment in ways that inspire the delight that comes with the first realization of, "Oh! I can do that?"

Empowerment is the first principle of technological happiness, and evoking the delight of newfound power should be one of our highest objectives.

Does Technology Make Us Happy?

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 18:53:00 +0000

This year has been one of introspection for me. My Mom died in April, and in the long run-up to that event and in the months subsequent to it, I've spent a lot of time thinking about how best to live life.

My Mom always said that her greatest wish for her kids was that we be happy. As a young, ambitious teen, I always thought she was setting a fairly low bar, perhaps in the spirit of maternal nurturing, not wanting us to be too hard on ourselves if we didn't measure up to our own expectations. As an adult, though, I've come to appreciate what a lofty goal and a personal struggle that aim really is.

In the last year or so, I've been hearing and reading more about the topic of happiness, and it's become a personal passion of mine. It started with The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathon Haidt, a book I'd discovered on a tour of Zappos. It came highly recommended by Zappos CEO, Tony Hsieh.

Shortly after that, I picked up Happy at Last by Richard O'Connor, and I began to see some themes emerging about the kinds of things that provide lasting, long-term happiness.

Along the way, I also read The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr. And it was this book that really first prompted me to consider the connections between technology and happiness. Carr argues that our immersion in Internet media is making us shallower and perhaps more anxious. The massively hyperlinked, short-attention-span, shallow world of Internet media stimulates and strengthens parts of the brain that deal with fleeting stimulae at the expense of parts of the brain that process deep, linear, reflective thought.

Carr's arguments made me wonder whether there might be a negative correlation between technology use and happiness. Obviously, for a tech evangelist like me, the mere existence of this question amounts to a crisis of faith of sorts. And while I was starting to ponder this question, the following video made the rounds.

So there we have it, technology doesn't make us happy, at least according to Louis CK. Perhaps, as he says, because we are the greatest generation of spoiled idiots.

But as it turns out, there's more to the story. Technology does have the power to help us attain happiness, not just the fleeting, ephemeral joys of gadget lust, but by leveraging the factors that research shows contribute to real, lasting happiness.

I put some of my research together into a presentation last month for my keynote speech at the Philly Awards. The presentation is a little hard to follow without the narrative that goes with it, but it basically boils down to four key principles for using technology to create happiness:

Empower
Be Social
Do Good in the World
Cultivate Gratitude

I think these four principles may become the cornerstones of a new technology design philosophy for me. I believe that by focusing on creating happiness for users, I can be more successful and happier in my work. I intend to explore this idea more fully in future posts, and I invite you all to follow along and help me develop this happiness-based approach to interactive marketing and technology development.

Does Technology Make Us Happy?

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Amazon.com Widgets

Nike Plus: The Downside of Platforms

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 30 May 2010 14:57:00 +0000

This weekend, I received an object lesson in the downside of a digital strategy that I've long advocated. What happens when a brand offers to provide a fun and valuable service that complements their product and your lifestyle, and then fails because the technology is unreliable?

I have long been an admirer of R/GA and their philosophy of "apps not ads." This phrase expresses their strategic intent to focus on creating long-term platforms for brands, not just quick-hit interactive ads.

The example that best illustrates this approach has been Nike Plus, an electronic pedometer that connects with some versions of the iPod and iPhone or with a new, lightweight wristband, which can be plugged into a USB port to track the distance, pace and time of running or walking workouts. Great stuff for the tech-oriented runner. Workout data can be uploaded to the Nike Plus website and shared with the Nike Plus community, further enhancing the value and experience of the product.

I've admired Nike Plus from afar for a couple of years. I've coveted the technology and wanted to try it out. After doing some research this week for a fitness brand, and with a half-marathon coming up next weekend, I thought "What the heck? I'll try it."

To make a long story short, the technology failed. After discovering that the sensor wasn't compatible with the iPhone 3G (inexplicably, it is with the iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch, but not the 3G), I went back and bought the sportband. The sportband software proved to be unreliable. Sometimes it read the workout info from the sportband, sometimes it didn't. Sometimes it connected to the site. Sometimes it didn't.

The site itself was slow and glitchy. Sometimes it would load, sometimes it wouldn't. At one point, Nike posted a maintenance page, saying the site was down and they were working on it.

"OK," I thought, "Maybe they're just having a bad day." I decided to see if other people were having similar issues, and I checked the Nike Plus forums.

Not only were other people having problems, but it turns out the problems had been ongoing for many months. What I read didn't exactly inspire confidence that I'd made a good purchase. Even worse, there seemed to be very little useful response from Nike staff. Many questions went unanswered or were given a useless "try-it-again-later-sometimes-it's-glitchy" response. It gave me the impression that this wasn't just a bad day for Nike Plus. It was par for the course.

Now, maybe my experience wasn't typical. Maybe the vast majority of Nike Plus users have a positive experience. But what I read gave me plenty of reason to think that my experience wasn't unique. I saw several exasperated posters saying they were trading their Nike Plus devices in for Garmin GPS devices. I decided to follow suit.

In addition to leading me to purchase a different product, my unsatisfactory Nike Plus experience made me realize the critical importance of technology, infrastructure and service support in pulling off a digital platform play. "Apps not ads" is still good strategy, but the ongoing consumer experience matters more than the initial inspiration and buzz.

BTW, I bought a Garmin Forerunner 110. Took it for a spin this morning, and it worked flawlessly. It fits nicely into dual passions of technology and running, and is another example of the fascinating intersection of the digital and physical worlds. More on that to come.

SXSW - FAILS and WINS

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:48:00 +0000

My second SXSW is coming to a close. There have been some great moments, and it's been nice to reconnect with some of the Digerati I met last year. On the whole, however, my Sophomore South By didn't quite achieve the rosy glow of geek nirvana that I experienced last year. Maybe a sophomore slump is to be expected. Sequels generally suck, after all. But still, I've been sifting through the things I liked and didn't this year, and I've started a short list. Maybe it'll help me get more out of next year's event. And, while I could've done this in a more nuanced/shades-of-gray manner, it's a geek-fest and a binary Win/Fail format seems more appropriate.

SXSW FAIL - Badge QR Codes

SXSW WINS:

AT&T - no major coverage problems. They won't get any credit for not sucking, but it's a welcome change from last year.
Power - Thanks to Chevy and others for ensuring abundant power outlets
Dan Roam - Favorite solo presentation of the year
Dan Ariely - Great stuff I've heard before, but got more from in person
Stephen Anderson - Loved "The Art and Science of Seductive Interactions" session
Johnny Lee - "Beyond the Desktop" the best panel and Johnny Lee was the best panelist
"Social Search" - Well-run panel, smart people, good content, quick pace
SXSW Runners - Loved this group. Wanted to run again on Tuesday, but I let the rain deter me.
SXSW Pocket Guide - still the best way to decide which panel to go to next.
UPDATE: I posted this before the AMAZING #interinfo session. Definite WIN with lots of amazing, interactive data/eye candy. I'll post more on that topic soon.

SXSW FAIL:

Keynotes - Note to future self - don't waste time watching the keynotes
Programming - Too many lame sessions. Maybe the crowd-sourced model isn't the best way to ensure great quality. How about a little more curation next year?
Ad Sessions - Every single ad-related session I attended and every one I heard about shared something in common. Suckage.
QR Codes - I love mobile tech, but I think the QR code badge thing was a complete failure. I tried it a few times. It was way to cumbersome, and it seemed to have an iffy success rate.
SXSW Mobile App - Bleh. Nowhere near useful. What a disappointment. I hope they work hard to refine it next year. How about some time-sensitive features or location-awareness? The number one use case is: What session should I go to next? Solve for that next year.

My hope for next year: Come up with a better way to predict the quality of a session, so I can pick the best one; and create transparency for sessions in progress, so if I decide to bail, I can make a good choice re: plan B. Maybe there's an app for that?

Thinking Visually at SXSW

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 15:40:00 +0000

I've been at "South by" for two days, so it's time for a little half-time report. For me, the best session so far has easily been Dan Roam's "Blah Blah Blah. Why Words Won't Work." I've been curious about Back of the Napkin, but it's now jumped to the top of my want-to-read list along with his follow-on book, "Unfolding the Napkin."

I'm a fan of visual thinking and communicating through drawing, in part because I'm not very good at it. I'd like to get better, and I suspect that by absorbing some of Roam's ideas, I may gain a lot.

Among many interesting parts of his presentation, his work on communicating health care reform through pictures really caught my attention. It's earned him seven minutes on Fox News and a trip to the White House to discuss communicating HCR. Check it out.

Healthcare Napkins All

View more presentations from Dan Roam.

Innovate '10 Wrap Up

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:02:00 +0000

Conference season is in full swing. I haven't had time to really put my thoughts together from Innovate '10, and I'm heading off to SXSW tomorrow. Yikes! So, for the record, here are my big takeaways from last week.

Mobile and Social

Or maybe that's mobile vs. social. In some ways, the two memes seemed to be slugging it out for supremacy at the conference. In one instance, a panel of venture capitalists was asked which field retailers should invest in first, social or mobile. For the record, the panelists all agree that social merited first dollar. Later speakers from Best Buy and Sephora, however, made a strong case for investing in mobile now.

Mobile is Finally Happening Now

A couple of speakers in particular really did a spectacular job of making the case for mobile. Tracy Benson from Best Buy spoke of the electronic retailer's efforts and learnings in the mobile space. She kicked it off with this video, which articulates Best Buys' POV on mobile.

Cyriac Roeding offered an info-packed and persuasive presentation about why the oft-promised mobile revolution is finally happening. A few key points that stood out for me:

Online's influence on offline purchases is growing at 19% per year. By comparison, ecommerce is growing at 12% per year, so not only do our online marketing initiatives have a bigger impact offline than online, but the gap is widening, not shrinking.
Mobile is the primary technology agent facilitating this growth of online influence. It is the glue that binds the digital and physical worlds. In other words, mobile is the key to cross-channel retail.
Offline is the future of online. As more consumers adopt mobile technologies and integrate them into their lives, the concept of a separate online domain ceases to be relevant.

Cyriac also offered guidance on the four key things that mobile should do for retailers:

Enhance the in-store experience
Improve close and basket metrics
Drive loyalty
Enable consumers to “acquire” other consumers

Let the Outside In and the Inside Out

Several speakers sounded this theme of bridging the digital and physical worlds. A few examples:

Best Buy is using QR Codes in store to allow consumers to quickly get product ratings and reviews.

Sephora posts consumer reviews on in-store signage and encourages users to visit their mobile site to get more information.

SunGlass Hut is testing a social shopping application called Social Sun that allows customers in store to take pictures of themselves trying on sunglasses and get feedback from their friends on social networks.

Social Marketing is Big for Female-Focused Brands

There were two great back-to-back presentations on social marketing from Diane Von Furstenberg and Sephora. Both of these brands have enjoyed significant successes with social marketing, and have spent a good amount of energy not only reaching, but getting to know their brand fans online. It struck me that social marketing may be especially effective for brands whose primary audience is women, given the patterns of activity and adoption we typically see in our analysis of the most popular social networking platforms. Here are a couple of interesting nuggets from these presentations:

Diane Von Furstenberg's Social Media Mantras

Friend your Fans – Don’t treat social as a broadcast medium. Have real, human interactions with the people who are your fans.
Go Local – DVF has enabled all of their stores to have Twitter accounts.
Cross the Channels – Use multiple social media channels, cross promote in them and encourage your fans to connect in more than one channel.
Create Consistency – Do things regularly, e.g. every week, so that your fans know what to expect.
Inspire Interaction – Try to get your fans to interact not only with the brand, but with each other.

How Sephora Uses Social Media

Support big company initiatives, e.g. product launch, introduce new brands and products
For timely information. For example, they used social media to let clients know when weather delays hit their distribution centers.
Put Face on Facebook – Sephora profiled 12 staffers on their Facebook fan page, so that those staffers could interact with Sephora fans as individuals.
Pay Attention - Really know who your top users on facebook, twitter, etc. are. Reward them personally.

There's a Lot More

This is a pretty small subset of the information that was presented, the NRF Blog has a much more comprehensive wrap-up plus links to great content. It was a great conference loaded with great content. I'm sure it will provide fodder for future posts and conversations. Unless, of course, the info-blast that is SXSW overwhelms my brain's ability to retain and process new stuff, which is fairly likely.

Retail in the Age of Mobile Empowerment

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:42:00 +0000

Last week, I got to attend the Retail Advertising and Marketing Association Innovation and Marketing Conference. It was a very worthwhile event with thought-provoking speakers and sessions.

I led a lively roundtable discussion about the impact of emerging technologies on retail. Several people asked for digital copies of the handout I prepared, so I thought I'd post it here, in case it's of interest to others as well.

It's a completely subjective compilation of mobile apps that have the potential to change the way we shop. I'll grant the skeptics argument that none of these are mainstream enough to have a big impact yet, but it's not too hard to imagine the impact they may have in the near future.

Retail in the Age of Mobile Empowerment

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Ad Age: How Mobile is Changing Shopping

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 00:54:00 +0000

A friend forwarded me this Ad Age article about Mobile's Impact on Shopping. Phew, glad I got my blog post on the topic done last week. And while I selected different apps than the Ad Age author, we're both clearly thinking along the same lines: mobile technology is going to change the way we buy things.

Skeptics in the Ad Age comment section dismiss the impact of these new generation of apps, saying that smart phones have limited adoption and any individual app has less than that. They're right. Clearly smartphone apps aren't poised to make an immediate impact.

Still, if you're concerned with what happens in the next 24 - 48 months, it's not hard to imagine these technologies having a big impact on retail in the near future.

Mobile's Impact on Retail

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 18:23:00 +0000

Somewhere along the way, I picked up a good rule of thumb for life:

"Act as if everything you do will eventually become public knowledge."

Today, that advice rings true not only for individuals, but for all types of businesses, and most especially for retailers. We've entered an era where mobile devices give consumers unprecedented insight into products, pricing, locations, service and even social currency -- right at the point of possible purchase.

Since December, I've been taking a look at the impact of mobile applications on retail. I've been looking not only at retailer apps, but also at apps that are likely to have an impact on retailers. The field is fascinating, and I suspect that most retailers haven't really begun to grapple with the impact that these applications will have.

Here are few of my key takeaways:

Pricing Transparency

Applications like ShopSavvy and RedLaser give consumers an easy way to check prices through their camera phone. Consumers not only get access to online pricing, but can check prices at local competitors as well.

Retailers: Assume your consumers know exactly how your prices stack up against your competitors.

Ratings and Reviews

There are tons of mobile apps that provide ratings and reviews. Where, Yelp and UrbanSpoon have all been longtime residents on my iPhone.

Yelp's Monocle feature, an Easter Egg unlockable on 3GS iPhone, allows shoppers to display restaurant ratings and reviews over a real-time street view on their phones. This Augmented Reality first underscores the power of these applications to influence impromptu decisions. Retailers not only need to be concerned about whether their storefront entices shoppers, but also how their storefront appears through the filter of a heads-up display.

Retailers: Product reviews are likely to have as big an impact in your brick-and-mortar stores as they do online.

Value Alignment

As if pricing transparency and ratings weren't enough to contend with, retailers must also consider how their products, suppliers and their own brand is viewed through the filter of social responsibility. Applications like the Good Guide give shoppers ratings on the environmental, health and social responsibility of products and companies, simply by scanning a barcode.

Retailers: The additional context of environmental and social responsibility is now visible, and it may just matter to enough people to impact your bottom line.

See & Shop

Lastly, and maybe most significantly, mobile applications are making it easier than ever for consumers to gratify their impulse to acquire. A number of applications have emerged which allow consumers to take a picture of a product, get information about it and, if they really want it, to buy it on the spot. Applications from retailers like Barnes & Noble, Sears and Nike all cater to this "See & Shop" mode. Other applications, like Google Shopper and Google Goggles, have the potential to create a new mobile commerce marketplace based on visual shopping.

Retailers: If you're not making it this easy for your customers to shop with you, somebody else is.

There's More

Of course, these apps are just the first wave. The clear consensus I've gleaned from the stories and reports I've read is that mobile retail has a long way to go. Retailers are beginning to dabble in mobile applications, mobile marketing and mobile commerce, but I suspect the biggest impact on retail may be created not by retailers themselves, but by the application developers who change our purchase behaviors by integrating useful technology into our purchase process.

Beginner's Mind

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:37:00 +0000

In the beginner's mind, there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few.
Shunryu Suzuki

img credit euart

One of the great benefits of being in a technology related field, is that we are frequently forced back into beginner's mind. There are constant changes, and everything we thought we knew yesterday, may no longer be true today.

I believe very strongly that a key to survival in any technology related field is the ability to set aside your own expertise and begin again with a beginner's mind. That nimbleness of mind becomes harder as we mature in our professions; we tend to lean more readily on our body of knowledge and our reputation.

One of my personal goals this year is to rely less upon things I already know and to open myself up to new ideas by renewing my own beginner's mind.

Mean Something

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 17:15:00 +0000

Lately I find myself climbing up on my soapbox with increasing frequency. I find myself getting cranky at the misuse of language, or as my friend Mary says, "Agency Whack-Whack."

One of my pet peeves is the term "Relationship Marketing." 99% of the time, when marketers use that term, they're not talking about anything remotely resembling a relationship. Relationships are human-to-human connections. And no matter what the Supreme Court believes, companies (and brands) aren't human beings.

The best actual relationship marketing program example I've experienced in the last couple of years was a Christmas card and free coffee coupon from my local coffee shop. It was at the counter waiting for me when I came into the shop after the holidays. It didn't happen because they have my name in a database (they don't). It happened because the baristas know me by name and thought of me as a good customer. The gesture was a simple, human gesture based on actual relationships. It brought a smile to my face and made me feel more loyal to the people at that coffee shop.

In contrast, the barely targeted coupons I get in the mail or by email from brands I buy from have nothing to do with an actual relationship. It's just database marketing. It doesn't bring a smile to my face or make me feel more loyal. Best case, it makes me think, "Oh, I could save some money on dog food."

The same thing peeves me when it comes to social media marketing. Conventional wisdom among marketers and social media devotees is that social media marketing is about relationships. I don't buy it. Most social marketing programs have nothing to do with relationships at all. They're about using social technologies as to push out promotions, coupons, sweepstakes and other marketing detritus. Calling this uninspiring state of affairs a relationship is an insult to relationships.

There are exceptions, of course, but those exceptions are almost universally built on programs that put real people at the forefront of their relationship marketing programs and then encourage those real people to foster real relationships with customers. Again, these are the exceptions.

And this brings me to my latest cringe-inducing phrase: "Social CRM." Ugh. This one is already a clear candidate for the Agency Whack-Whack Hall of Fame.

I get the vision--tie your marketing database together with your social network to form an über-powerful, all-knowing, profit-generating, marketing machine. It may turn out to be the Holy Grail of Marketing once someone defines what it actually means, what it actually does and whether it actually creates a profit for anyone who attempts to implement it.

All that is great, but in the meantime, can we at least drop the pretense that this has anything whatsoever to do with relationships?

Social Media for Non-Profits

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 03:17:00 +0000

As I'm getting ready to present on Social Media Marketing for Non-Profits tomorrow at Philanthropy Midwest Conference, I've come across lots of great research and not all of it glowing in terms of social media's impact on the non-profit sector.

A recent report from Philanthropy Action titled "Social Networking and Mid-Size Nonprofits: What’s the Use?" calls into question the value of social media for mid-sized non-profits.

Can there be any doubt given these examples that social networking and social media are must have tools for nonprofits?

Actually, yes.

In terms of fundraising and attracting volunteers, metrics that most nonprofit boards and executive directors highly value, the available evidence suggests that social media is not very effective.

While there are ample stories of non-profits achieving success through social media, this study is worth a read. Among other things, the authors rightly question the durability of relationships formed through social media, noting that psychologists and sociologists know that durable relationships are based on shared sacrifice, not merely information exchange and that organizations who get participants to become physically active in supporting their cause create much deeper engagements than organizations whose outreach is primarily based on "slacktivism."

Social Marketing and Small Business

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:26:00 +0000

Last week, I had the privilege of presenting to the Helzberg Entrepreneurial Mentorship Program on the topic of Social Marketing. While the bulk of my day-to-day work entails helping larger brands engage consumers through digital channels, including social media, it was fun to spend some time looking through cases about smaller businesses.

I'm indebted to a timely article on the subject from Mashable, as well as an older, but still relevant series on small business social media from Jason Falls. Their sharing definitely made it easier for me to compile material for the presentation.

After giving this presentation three times in one afternoon and having really engaged audiences each time, I've come to a few conclusions:

There is a huge hunger for good social media training in the entrepreneurial community.
Small businesses have a real advantage over larger enterprises in pursuing social marketing strategies. It's easier for small businesses to be real and human.
Being in a room full of successful, motivated entrepreneurs is an incredibly energizing experience. I think next time I feel a case of the business blahs, I'm going to crash an entrepreneurial retreat.

Here's the presentation. Let me know what you think.

Social Marketing

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Social Shopping Gaining Momentum

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 19:14:00 +0000

The launch last Friday of My.Zappos.com is the latest sign that the era of Social Shopping is underway. Social Shopping technology is spreading from destination sites like Kaboodle and Polyvore and being integrated into retail sites like Wet Seal and Zappos.

But while the trend seems to be gaining momentum, and while I'm generally enthusiastic about it, I have questions about how it all shakes out and how many of these Social Shopping initiatives are going to pay off. Some will, I'm sure. Some won't, I'm equally sure.

What's in it for consumers?

For some people, putting items into a wishlist or online closet and sharing them with their social networks is intrinsically enjoyable, but for a lot of us, that's just not enough to justify spending time with a site or application.

Sites like Kaboodle and Polyvore have developed enthusiastic followings by allowing people to create their own styleboards or sets as an expression of their personal style. Other sites, like DPReview.com, provide real expertise, demos and first-hand accounts for products that warrant in-depth research. Retailers rushing to jump on the Social Shopping train need to think carefully about how their Social Shopping implementation will benefit their consumers.

What's in it for the retailers?

Wet Seal's Fashion Community is reportedly responsible for a 10% increase in sales and a doubling of conversion rate. Those results make sense to me because Wet Seal's implementation of Social Shopping is based on creating ensembles, and it's not hard to see how that approach leads to cross-selling opportunities.

Does it fit?

The Fashion Community function makes sense for Wet Seal, because their inventory includes a wide range of products. Retailers with a more narrow range of products, may be better served by integrating their products into a Kaboodle or Polyvore to become part of the mix. Likewise, Social Selling seems to fit Zappos, whose brand DNA is tightly linked to social media. Social Selling probably isn't going to be a fit for all retailers, however.

Still, the Social Shopping train has definitely left the station and is gaining steam. It's going to be interesting to see where this one goes.

Social Media and Ecommerce

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 20:01:00 +0000

The last few months, I've spent a lot of time researching brands who excel at both social media and ecommerce. The first product of that research was a presentation on social media and ecommerce I gave last month at the RAMA CMO Summit, a gathering of key decision-makers from retail brands. It was a great event, and I learned as much from my co-presenters and attendees as I imparted.

My presentation covered five brands -- Zappos, Dell, Best Buy, Wet Seal and Build-A-Bear Workshop. Each is unique in their approach to social media and in the way they integrate it into their ecommerce operations.

Social Media & Ecommerce

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You can download the PDF. Let me know what you think. If you're involved with any of these brands, I'd especially love your input. Did I get it right?

SXSW Recap

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 21:43:00 +0000

For everyone who unfollowed me or defriended me for my incessant Twittering during SXSWi, please accept this as my apology gift. I present for your consideration, my recap of the SXSW sessions I most enjoyed. It's a small slice of SXSW, but I hope you'll find it of some value.

Download PDF Version (with notes)of SXSW Recap.

SXSW Recap

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Link, Poke & Tweet

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 15:53:00 +0000

Last night, I had a great time at the AD2 event "Link, Poke, Tweet - Amping your personal brand." Presenting with John Kreicsberg from Bernstein Rein and Joe Grigsby from VML was a treat, and the audience was great. John took the time to post the presentation on his blog, and I'm reposting for your digital enjoyment.

Link, Poke & Tweet: Amping Your Personal Brand, Digitally

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SXSW - Boring Geek Sex

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 13:21:00 +0000

Bring on the Orgasmatron! That's what I was anticipating from the panel on Virtual Touch and Intimate Computing. It sounded like the perfect thing to spice up my last afternoon at SXSW.

One of the pieces of advice I heard frequently about SXSW was to take in sessions outside your area of expertise. That's one of the reasons I skipped the Agency Integration Models panel and attended the panel on Vitual Touch and Intimate Computing instead. Plus, as an added bonus, I had the pleasure of sitting next to Ariel Waldman, she who blogs about tech, space, sex and cupcakes. What could be better?

As it turns out, agency integration probably would have been sexier than the panel I attended. Sad, but true. The panel was rambling, disjointed and essentially unmoderated. Still there were a few interesting nuggets that came out of the talk, and I thought they'd be worth passing them on.

OhMiBod has been around for a couple of years, but somehow I managed to miss it. The OhMiBod product line allows you to Tune In, Turn On and Feel the Music. It's a personal massager that plugs into your iPod and its vibration varies with the beat and volume of the music.

Syncing stimulation with audio is one thing, but it's generally believed that men are visually oriented than women, so for the guys, there is the Virtual Sex Machine. It syncs stimulation with cues embedded in video files.

And lastly, there is The Real Touch. I can't decide if this device is real or a hoax. It's a USB device, supposedly created by a former NASA engineer. It allows you to experience the physical pleasures of virtual interactions, and that's all I'm going to say about it. The site is Very, Very Not Safe for Work, in case you're tempted to Google it.

So, I guess we're not all that far from the Orgasmatron after all. It still amazes me though, that a panel could take material that is so inherently interesting and controversial and turn it into one of the least interesting sessions of the conference. As Ariel pointed out in a tweet, it served as an object lesson to presenters, don't rely on your topic to keep your presentation interesting.

One last note, the field of haptic feedback, wearable computing and virtual touch is a lot broader than teledildonics and pornographic appliances. At least a couple of panelists attempted to explore the artistic and emotional dimensions of virtual touch. Unfortunately, they were rushed at the tail end of the presentation. I would have liked to hear more from these folks who were actually developing interesting projects and prototypes in wearable haptic devices. Oh well, maybe next year.

SXSW - Costs of Losing My Keys

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:34:00 +0000

Lost my car keys in Austin. It was an expensive mistake.

$120 - towing car from airport to dealership
$110 - cut replacement keys
$130 - programming replacement keys
$36 - rental car for one day
$25,000 - removing fork from eye after hotel calls to say they found my keys after all
$40 - overnighting my original keys

SXSW - Straight to the Brain

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 17:13:00 +0000

Yesterday was full of sex, weirdness and puppies. And that was just the panel discussions.

I kicked things off with a panel on "Presenting Straight to the Brain," hands down one of the most interesting and stimulating sessions I've been in. The moderator was Jared Goralnick, who organized the SXSW Runners Group on Facebook, which btw, turned out to be a fantastic way to meet and talk to people. One of the participants dubbed it sweatworking.

The whole panel was great, but Kathy Sierra of Creating Passionate Users was my fave. Her section can be summed up in the phrase, "Present to the brain, not to the mind." The mind may be interested in rational things, but the brain still thinks we're living in caves and is mostly concerned with the basics of survival--feeding, fighting, fleeing and having intercourse. And also, puppies.

The panel's main line of argument was that if you want people to retain information that you present, you have to stimulate the primitive brain, otherwise information cannot pass from short-term memory to long-term memory.

Another panelist who absolutely rocked that session was lawyer Craig Ball, whose skill at creating courtroom presentations that help jurors retain information was a great antidote to some of the self-obsessed geekdom. Standing in front of the SXSW crowd in traditional attorney attire, Ball said, "This is a tie, for those of you who live in Austin."

Ball demonstrated motion path animation techniques done in Powerpoint. Yes, Powerpoint. And his demo of how magnetic storage works was an amazing example of simple, brilliant didactic presentation.

My second session was a Virtual Goods panel. It was a lively discussion with panelists Susan Wu and Susan Choe unafraid to contradict and engage each other, eliciting numerous amused tweets from the crowd.

One of the interesting nuggets from that panel included Choe's revelation that MMOG platform Outspark enjoys an Average Revenue per User (ARPU) of over $50 a month! That's a huge number, since the average ARPU for players in this space is $20 - $30 per year, according to Wu.

I was also intrigued to hear that Hi5 has not only launched a virtual currency, but has developed an API to allow developers across social media platforms to tap into their virtual currency. This could be a huge play, and I'm left to wonder if a common virtual currency will come into being. Lots of interesting questions around that one.

The third panel of the day for me was Kathy Sierra redux. I sat in on her "Making Breakthroughs Happen" session, and it was fabulous. Sierra outlined 15 ways to make breakthrough progress rather than incremental progress, and it was one of those sessions that really makes you rethink your approach to work. That session deserves a blog post of its own, but one of the recommendations that resonated most for me was "Change the EQ."

Sierra talked about how most companies play around with sliders, they tweak the quality, price, features, etc. Companies that achieve breakthroughs don't just change the values on the existing sliders, they add new sliders.

In addition to the sessions, panels and keynotes, there were, of course, the parties, hallway conversations and miscellaneous encounters that make SXSW so legendary. Those are too numerous and too random for me to effectively describe, so I'll wrap it up here.

I leave you with an image of my buddy, @zenaweist rocking the hot new Dell Adamo with @richardatdell.

SXSW Sunday - Fiero!

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 22:14:00 +0000

Apparently, the Italians have a word for a particular kind of fun. The word is "fiero," and it expresses the rush we get from overcoming a challenging situation. Lots of games depend on fiero as their primary driving force, but there's no word for it in English, so I'm adopting it and plan to make use of it.

I have Nicole Lazzaro of xeodesign to thank for my expanded vocabulary. She introduced me to fiero during a South By Southwest panel on Lessons for Interface Design from Games. Lazzaro talked about the various emotional states of engagement that are evoked by successful games. Besides Fiero, the other three are Amusement (people fun), Imagination (easy fun) and Relaxation (serious fun). Lazzaro translated Fiero as Hard Fun. There's more good stuff from Lazzaro at xeodesign's website.

I also briefly sat in a discussion about Social Patterns and Anti-patterns. The session was led by Christian Crumlish and Erin Malone, who are working on an upcoming book entitled "Designing Social Interfaces:
Principles, Patterns, and Practices for Improving the User Experience." The session was a great primer on the established patterns and principles of designing social software. It's useful stuff for UX, design and development teams involved in the creation of social sites and applications. Crumlish and Malone have created a Social Patterns wiki, which outlines many of the established patterns. Crumlish is also the curator of the Yahoo! Design Pattern Library, which looks like an awesome resource for guiding interaction design decisions.

I also got to sit up front for Nate Silver's keynote interview. Silver is the driving force behind fivethirtyeight.com. Silver talked about getting started because he was frustrated with poor coverage of polls by the media, and he wanted to provide some empirically sound analysis of all the poll data as an antidote to the poor reporting about polls. While Silver's political prognostication last year was nearly flawless, he admitted that his first foray into entertainment prediction, this year's Oscar contest, was not as sound. On his pick of Taraji Henson for Best Supporting Actress, Silver said that he knew the prediction was wrong and that he knew Penelope Cruz was going to win, but the model said otherwise. His prediction violated the first rule of predictions:

Never come out with a prediction you know is wrong. If you know it’s going to be wrong, keep working on the fucking model.

Silver was a hit with the geek grrls at SXSW. I had the pleasure of sitting next to Rachel Sklar for Silver's interview, and after following her on Twitter, I noticed one of her first tweets was "OMG Nate Silver is hands down the hot stud of #SXSW. " A couple of hours later though, she was ready to dump Silver for @garyvee: "Holy moly, @garyvee may have just knocked Nate Silver out of the King of SXSW spot." Ah, how quickly SXSW love fades.

Still, I'm definitely glad I met Rachel. Her tweets are great, and I'm going to look forward to reading more of her in the days to come. SXSW has been great like that. I've met a lot of people I've been following for a while, and many others I'll be following in the future.

And lastly, I took a quick turn the Screenburn Arcade and developed a serious case of technolust for nvidia's geforce 3D Vision system I'll wait 'til the price drops, but these are definitely on my geek wishlist.

The Feet! The Feet! Impressions of SXSW

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Logan) — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 03:28:00 +0000

It's 10:30 pm on night 2 of SXSW. I'm sitting in my hotel room, feet propped up trying to ease the ache after many miles of walking or running and many hours of standing. Yes, I should be out still schmoozing and boozing at the infamous SXSW parties, but my introversion is kicking in, and it's time to recharge with a little solitude.

I've been hearing about and wanting to attend SXSW for many years. Having been here once, I will definitely make every effort to attend in the future. It's wonderful to be surrounded by so many people who speak geek in all its various dialects.

My brain is overstuffed, but I wanted to jot down a few of the fabulous things I've experienced and people I've met. In no particular order, here are some of my impressions and experiences after two days.

I enjoyed Alex Bogusky's talk yesterday on bringing bike sharing to the U.S., but mostly because the said the CP+B has done away with timesheets. Woot! Too bad he's signed off Twitter.

Had a blast at a core conversation about Dating in the age of Social Media. There were hilarious conversations about the social etiquette around updating Facebook relationship status, when to put a pic of you and your significant other as your Facebook pic and how to sniff out married guys on Match.com. I heard an apocrophal story today that the reason Match.com won't include videos is that it would scare off the married guys who currently use it. I guess that must be a sizeable portion of their customer base. Don't know if it's true or not. Just the gossip this morning.

AT&T's reputation is in the crapper at SXSW. At the biggest conference of the tech community, it's impossible to get Internet service through the iPhone. All us geeks with our iPhones have overloaded the AT&T network. Maybe someone at AT&T should think about this before SXSW next year, so that AT&T doesn't fail so publicly and painfully among the digital influentials.

Got in a great run this morning with the SXSW Runners group (one of the reasons my feet are so tired tonight). I'm going to give them a rest tomorrow and hit it again on Monday.

I was really impressed with Scott Belsky of Behance. The presentaiton was "How to Make Ideas Happen," and it was full of really substantive best practices for productive creative teams. I'm very intrigued by the Action Method, and will be following up to see if I can incorporate it.

The was much love for Facebook at the Searching for a more Social Web session. Facebook seems to have stepped it up with opening their APIs and has taken a big step forward in making the social net ubiquitous. The new Facebook Connect for Mobile (esp. iPhone) is going to be hugely popular. Several game developers demo'd just released games for iPhone that use Facebook Connect for mobile social gaming.

Tony Hsieh from Zappos has built an incredible organization around customer service. Zappos is going to be one of those legendary customer service retailers, like Nordstroms. For such an accomplished person, he looked and sounded visibly nervous on the stage. The crowd loved him, though. He's clearly a sincere, committed leader.

I sounded like an idiot when I tried to defend advertising at the Suxorz panel. Jeff Jarvis made the claim that ultimately all advertising was indicative of a failure, that if a brand is good enough (ala Zappos) people will love it and become its best advertising. I tried to point out that advertising has its place. The point I was trying to make was that if you look at many successful social campaigns and sites, they depend on advertising to drive acquisition. I cited Subservient Chicken, meaning to talk about the fact that it was one of the most succesful viral campaigns of all time, but that it was kicked off with a broadcast campaign. But as soon as I got the words Subservient Chicken out, the crowd laughed, presumably at the ad guy who thinks Subservient Chicken is current. Arrgh. That's what I get for violating my own rule about never, ever, ever talkin about Subservient Chicken. My point still stands, however, mass advertising can and does drive huge spikes in awareness, traffic and trial of social media services.

Huge gratitude to Ryan at Revision3 for getting me VIP access to the Digg party. I got to hobknob with the Internet famous, and the rock concert atmosphere was ridiculous. The Diggnation guys packed the yard at Stubbs. It was amazing to see two geeks get such adulation, albeit from other geeks.

Brian Brushwood is one sick (and fabulous) performer, but Mr. Happy Pants is downright scary.

When you're cruising SXSW, it really helps to have a wingbuddy like @zenaweist who knows all the digerati. I wouldn't have met half the interesting people I did if not for her.

That's enough for now. There's so much good stuff coming out of this, I just hope I can put some of it to work in the coming year.