Meet Dave Lee

Project Garden Overhaul

2011-10-06T11:33:00.004+11:00

In the past 4 weeks, I've been spending every spare hour after work and weekends on my garden. The project started a good 12 months ago but never go around completing it. By the time the last winter came around and my weekly soccer matches, the weeds have overtaken all our hardwork.

This spring, my wife and I sat down to redesign our garden. Her goal was lots of vege patches and chooks... mine was lots of entertaining space and MUST have a fire pit. In the end, I managed to swing her over with I'll build you a brand new vege patch, new retaining walls for more vege patches and a place for the chooks.

Looking back at all the photos we took... I'm quite impressed in how far we progressed. This weekend is our daughter's 7th birthday which we're throwing a mini surprise party. I'm hoping to complete building a small pergola where she can call her own space in the garden.

BEFORE:

PROGRESS to where we are today!

Momo at Grand Hyatt - A personal chef experience

2011-09-01T11:07:00.006+10:00

In July, Grace and I played host to Tim & Ming of Nuffnang during Blogopolis.

Knowing Ming love for food gastronome, we decided to take him to Momo Restaurant within the Grand Hyatt hotel. We've been there before for a birthday dinner and it a very intimate restaurant. Food was of the highest quality and very delicate.

For Tim and Ming, I organised a personal chef experience with the Behind the Scenes option with Momo excutive chef Greg Malouf. Momo is different to other restaurants where it is a "Family Sharing Style" experience. The 4 courses are brought out one at a time which is then separately served to individual plates. The food is Modern Middle Eastern which has plenty of exotic spices and flavours in all their dishes.

Please forgive me that I forget what we had back in July but hopefully below are some photos to do it some justice!

After the first course has been served, we were handed Momo aprons to wear and invited to the kitchen to see first hand our dishes being prepared by Greg Malouf himself, his head chef and team. It was quite a personal affair where he took us through how each dish is prepared, how he grows his own flowers for the dishes and choice of music in the kitchen! After the tour, we were sitted back to our table for mains.

At dessert, Greg comes out to share a glass of red for the table and a whisky for himself. He talks about his different projects he works on with restaurants in Hong Kong, personally flown to London to cook for a private party, etc. Great stories!

The night finishes with each of us choosing one of his 6(?) cook books and coffee table books with a personalised autograph from Greg.

If you are lucky enough, I recommend popping into Momo for a great dinner night out!

Revival of Meet Dave Lee

2011-08-25T11:23:00.007+10:00

Hello again.

The team at Nuffnang has been hassling me to revive my blog which I feel it's a good thing. The lack of time has always gotten the better over the blog so now we have implemented a Nuffnang Thursday Blog Hour at 11am. Everyone shuts their email, the blog inspiration music goes on, silence in the office as we all type away to our weekly post.

Reading back to my old post, it's amazing how far blogging and Nuffnang has grown. This blog has been dormant for a good 12-18 or even 24 months. I remember in 2009 where we did a roadshow around Australia to explain the concept of a blogger community network and the visions of Nuffnang. I remember presenting the idea of blogging to a major corporate brand to explain to a room full of marketers what was a blog and why they should care.

Fast forward to today, I'm amaze and proud to see how active and vibrant the Australian blogging community has grown too.

Another great reflection is how more mature I have grown too. I find more maturity, stability and wiser in my decisions. I guess that comes with age once I've passed 30!

But enough about work, I've decided to switch the focus of this blog from social media (I get enough of this from 9-5pm 5 days a week!) to something more fun, lighter and spiritually positive - Food, Family, Fun.

I look forward to plenty of posts from our Nuffnang Thursday Blog Hour!

In the meantime, here are photos from last night's Nuffnang Oriental Tea House Dumpling Masterclass by Head Chef David Zhou and my kids (photos by my awesome wife)!

Okay... this blog is dead.

2009-07-28T09:03:00.006+10:00

It's been so busy here at Nuffnang I have neglected this blog so long that it's dead.

EDIT: It's no longer dead.

Speaking at AdTech Sydney 2009

2009-03-09T23:06:00.004+11:00

As you may or may not have known, I have been invited to speak at AdTech Sydney for 2009.

I have been chosen to moderate the panel for "Effects of Transparency: Dark Marketing & Cash for Comments" on Tuesday, 3.45pm. Given my experience in blog marketing, transparency and integrity is most important for what we do. I look forward to sharing my case studies, experiences, and views on dark marketing & cash for comments in the Australian digital scene.

I will also be joined by Julian Cole of The Population and hopefully Tim Longhurst (subject to technical AV issues).

Look forward to chatting and sharing your views as I will try to keep it open with audience participation.

My presentation will be uploaded after the panel finishes.

Agencies scrambling to be the social media experts

2009-03-04T08:37:00.004+11:00

More recently, I have notice there has been a scramble by agencies to do more "social media". There are numerous individuals claiming to be experts in the field who live and breath web 2.0 or writing great articles from well researched pieces.

But as the dust settles in the gold rush, I wonder which agencies will actually succeed in this area. It's something I have been debating with a few of my colleagues and the steps they should take to put in the right agency structure to lead in the social media field.

This morning I came across an article by AdAge who mentioned "scale is agencies' best weapon in the hotly contested battleground." They cite various examples of different agencies in the US, ranging from Edelman, Mediacom, to Leo Bernetts who have managed a social media campaign for their clients.
Let's look at the strength & weaknesses of each agency shops in social media:

PR Agencies
Social media is free media. PR agencies are experienced in managing free media. They have also built a business around free media so they know how to make money from their services. They know how to host PR events to create buzz within traditional channels. The evolution for PR agencies to include digital social media isn't a big step. Their problem lies in perhaps technology, measurability, and scale. They are trying with finding and trialing a few "big" bloggers and through random blog searches. But when it comes down to measurability on campaign results through their seeding efforts, I am not aware of any. Where social media also relies on scale, the time and resources involved is far heavier than a press release to News and Fairfax.

Creative Agencies
These guys are talented in building creative solutions. Creating buzz. Creating talkability. And the ability to build a platform for it. Some creative shops have found the right people to run with social media. They have the ability to build communities online through strategic insights, create something half interesting, and communities will come. If they hit in on the nail, they will come in masses. But when it comes to scale it may take time and that may not be soon enough for clients. They are interested in short term gains in today's market conditions.

Media Agencies
They have a tonne of tools. They have tools to find people. They have tools to tell us how many people who owns a Toyota, has an income of $100k+, and visited Facebook in the last 3 months. They have measurability, accountability, and scale. However, they don't have the ability to implement beyond media spots. I agree with Ad Age when they say "Most media agency-driven social-media campaigns look a lot more like traditional media with a social twist than they do created-from-scratch communities...". Fair point. This is due to core structure of media agencies whos revenue stream is predominantly media bookings. But one thing media agencies do have is scale - but how do you use that for social media strategies?

In my experience, although the best intentions of social media evangelists from each agency shops, they will struggle in social media because of simple business models. There needs to be closer collaboration between agency shops to use their stregths - which clients may struggle trying to manage them. This is where smaller boutique agencies has the ability to flourish where they could take the strategic and guide the shops to implement the campaign - no doubt with agencies kicking and screaming along the way!

Another interesting quote was from CEO Mike Lazerow of Buddy Media who builds social media applications, "It's hard to buy applications in a spreadsheet model," he said. "When you're buying impressions, where do you put the app?" A quarter of his revenue froms from media shops, another quarter comes from creative shops, and the remainder clients directly.

A bit of cerveat here, I am part of Nuffnang Australia which is a blog marketing network. This puts us in an interesting position because we have found we can plug the gap in what media, creative, PR and clients are after. We can offer scale. We can offer measurability. We can offer bloggers information which was never possible before. We help media agencies in implementation just like buying a media spot. We help creative and PR bring bloggers to events. We help clients build a blogger fan base.

In revisiting Laurel Papworth's favourite Australian social media campaigns, it's interesting to see who led the thinking and, more importantly, the implementation of these campaigns. Media/Creative/PR?

i) Government - Future of Melbourne

ii) Education - Me.Edu.Au - a collaborative forum for teachers

iii) Venue - Powerhouse Museum

iv) Causes - Getup.org

v) Gaming - Australian military - DefenceJobGames

vi) Crisis Management - Department of Fisheries Avian Flu

vii) Media - Scorched.Tv - User Generated TV program

viii) Fitness - Blackmore's Be your Best Campaign

ix) Retail - Sportsgirl

x) Photos - National Library Picture Austraila Flickr Groups

xi) - Politics - KeepAdelaideAlive.com - David Campbell election campaign

If they can... so can YOU!

2009-02-26T13:50:00.004+11:00

I have been terrible in updating my blog. It has been a busy few weeks as we're growing the Nuffnang community. I've managed to secure a few clients (ANZ bank and Roadshow Films) to run a few campaigns with bloggers which have shown promising results in terms of high CTR and blogger response. Early days but positive.

In speaking to a few clients lately, most have shown continual active signs to explore Social Media. This is great news for us as Nuffnang is right in the mix of it with blog marketing in terms of resource, database, and access to 400 bloggers.

If there is anything more obvious to prove that Social Media has hit mainstream... check out this job ad by Hairfree Plus - Australia’s leading permanent hair reduction specialists. They are looking for a Social Media / Search Engine Marketing expert. Maybe come across as funny but... What are YOU doing for social media in 2009?

Thanks Tamir from FRANk thougths for the tip!

Budtrap - Dr Estebestaban solving tangled cords... socially

2009-02-09T13:03:00.002+11:00

I'm sure those who own an iPod have in one way or another managed to tangle their cords.

Dr Estebestaban of Budtrap.com are out with a cause to have "One less tangle, for Free". They are seeding this socially through Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/BudTrapcom-No-More-Headphone-Tangles/27102488134#/pages/BudTrapcom-No-More-Headphone-Tangles/27102488134?ref=s

2009 The year "social" becomes mainstream.

2009-02-06T13:53:00.005+11:00

In 2008, I'd see leading/edgier brands play within the web2.0 space. It was very much digital agencies educating and evangelising the social media platforms.

In 2009, I've seen a flip where clients are now coming to agencies asking for a social media solution. They have seen that it works. They want to be involved in that space. Perhaps they are more comfortable and no longer see this as a risky new world thing. "Bloggers...they are real people?"

It looks like the pack is shifting (or have shifted) to embrace social media strategies.

Congrats and good work to all the digital strategist, digital evangelists, digital media, and digital folks for a good 2009.

Cheers.

Street Fighter in YouTube

2009-01-30T10:25:00.001+11:00

Gadget Tribes - Which one are you?

2009-01-30T09:54:00.005+11:00

In world transformed in the last 10 years, we live in an "always on" community that is plugged into a social web. Like it or not, a peak into your shoulder bag, backpack, your home, your pockets, your Chanel hand bag, you'll no doubt find 3 basic devices that keeps you connected.

Boing Boing put together a great compilation of gadgets to identify your tribe.

I work off a MacBook Pro and addicted to my iPhone.... plus I just bought my MSI Wind U100 netbook on Wednesday. I'm scarily accurate a "Blogger."

Which one are you?

If you think you have tracked undiscovered tribes, tell Boing Boing (email: rob o' boingboing.net)

In our tennis spirit... a light hearted Friday funny video of Novak Djokovic Impressions

2009-01-29T20:45:00.001+11:00

Why I think Social Media, in Australia, has been all talk but little action.

2009-01-27T13:44:00.005+11:00

Apologies for the long gap since my last post. It has been a busy 2-3 weeks for Nuffnang with an Australia wide bloggers meet up in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. It was a great turn out and an insightful chat with the leading bloggers in Australia. I think we had around 40 people turning up at each event all with various backgrounds such as Social Media evangelists, Media, Pro-bloggers to Nuffnang bloggers. FYI - Nuffnang has since signed over 300+ bloggers... and it's still growing.

Lately, there has been articles about Social Media is all talk but little action... and I'd like to share my views on it.

While chatting to some of the leading bloggers in Australia ranging from Fashion, Parenting to Food blogs... one thing kept coming up.

Australian media do not "get" bloggers.

They don't pay bloggers the respect that they deserve. To highlight some examples, big fashion bloggers from Melbourne and Sydney echoed the same experience that their blogs are being featured in Elle, Vogue, etc.... in Europe. They also see trends featuring in Australian magazines... a month after their post. They know some of their posts are influencing magazine contents too.

Which leads me to think, if the general Australian media does not understand bloggers or blogging... Can Social Media strategists effectively implement campaigns in Australia? In some notion, social media needs traditional media to lift it's profile. Australian bloggers are losing out to our European, North American and Asian counter parts. It is almost embarrassing that they know more about our own bloggers and their blogging talents when Australia turns a blind eye to it.

Once Australian blogger profiles are lifted, we will no doubt see more social media campaigns. I believe we have the talent in Australia... but in today's market, to most clients, blogging still remains a mystery. Unfortunate.

Through Nuffnang, I hope to start lifting the profiles of various bloggers. The challenge in a campaign that involve bloggers is finding, contacting, and managing them. You almost have to fly blindly because they can be hard to find and you don't know what sort of traffic they have. How accountable can you be for your client?

With over 300 Australian bloggers in Nuffnang's database, I can contact them, I know where they are based, I know how many readers they have, and best of all, they want to connect with brands.

'Old Media' leads digital conversations

2009-01-05T10:56:00.003+11:00

"Eighty-four percent of so-called 'digital influencers' are motivated to go online to seek information only after exposure to specific references in magazines, newspapers, radio and TV." - a study by MSL Worldwide has found.

It goes to show a cross platform campaign is still important delivering the message and encourage conversations...but will they talk about it? And, how are you managing these conversations?

Two very different skill sets and often lack cohesion.

4 day work week

2008-12-23T11:50:00.005+11:00

Is it possible to do an average 5 days of work in 4 days?

I think so.

Spend the other 3 days to re-generate and space for creative thinking.

If your current workload forces you to work beyond the 9-5 working hours. It only means your company is not working efficiently. Either under resourced or not valuing your work in the market place correctly.

Wouldn't we rather work more efficient and effectively so we could enjoy a longer weekend?

A concept worth thinking about.

Exceptional Customer Service or Gone in 60 seconds.

2008-12-23T09:51:00.005+11:00

While walking around doing my Christmas shopping, I came across this...

The origins of the word mortgage come from the ancient French words mort (death), and gage (a pledge). A home is a probably the biggest personal purchase for the majority of Australians. It's a life decision. It's a "Death Pledge".

I understand the need to drive sales. Bring revenue for the business. Have efficiencies in the sales process. Drive costs down. Etc.

I find it amusing when a kiosk can give me, in 60 seconds, an assessment of my "Death Pledge". What happened to good ol' fashion customer service? Does a kiosk care? Are shopping centres even the best time and place to talk about home loans?
There are times when digital solutions can help us. 60 sec credit card approvals are helpful. ANZ provides an easy hassle free way to apply something that is essentially straight forward. I've just applied for one today. It was fast, simple, and most importantly convenient. No waiting in line at the banks. No ridiculous 100 point IDs. No waiting on the phones.

On the flip side. MECU has been a fantastic bank to work with. It's the only bank I have EVER had the pleasure to deal with a personal banker. Jessica has been fantastic. I have her direct line. I call. She picks up. I tell her my login issue. She fixes it on the spot and shows me how to login. I didn't have to press 20 different digits before being placed on hold for 10mins and then speak to someone half way across the world to tell me I have to go to bank to wait even longer.

"Efficiency and Effectiveness: The customer is best served when the organization is efficient; the organization is effective when it puts the customer first." - Idris Mootee

Personal Brands of Blogs

2008-12-18T09:44:00.003+11:00

Working as a Community Manager role within Nuffnang Australia has been an interesting experience. In the last month, managing expectations of over 250 bloggers (and still enjoying daily growth rates) has been challenging and rewarding. We're already reaching close to 2million impressions per month and over 25,000 daily visits. Not bad considering same time in November, we had zero.

The role of a Community Manager is much like a humble mayor that listens to hundreds of views and opinions from everday people, managing expectations, ensuring lines of communications are open, show that we are listening, and most important, we are doing. Now and then, there is the odd individual that don't share your views and voice their negative opinion, and that is fine. We have to identify if this is the view of the majority or just an isolated case. Because we are representing over 250 bloggers in Australia, it is vital we listen and do what is best for the collective.

What I have been coming to understand in managing a community is each indivdual blog is their own brand.

Each blogger writes reguarly and passionately about various topics. It is an outlet for bloggers to share their opinions and stories. And each blogger has a fan base. Each blog has the ability to influence their fans. They could have 10 or 10,000 readers a day, it doesn't really matter, because we're driving word-of-mouth.

Some great Personal Brands in Australia include Karen Cheng, who writes about parenting and fashion. She has a significant and passionate following. Grab Your Fork writes about the great foodies experience. One Red Robin beautifully presents craft ideas.

Because they are a personal domain and personal brands, we have to respect that. Anything we do, we seek to consult the brand custodian (the blogger). But what is great about Nuffnang bloggers is they join us because they want the opportunity to connect with marketers and brands they are passionate about. Bloggers want to talk about their favourite Brands.

Our Work is Theatre... but what happens after?

2008-12-13T09:42:00.003+11:00

It's been a busy 2-3 weeks and I've been neglecting this blog a little. I can feel my blog biceps sagging a little with Bob & Jillian yelling at me to get back on the treadmill!

Yesterday, I spent the morning at my daughter's first Christmas Concert at her pre-school. It was a beautiful, hilarious, and proud event for me as a father. The kids had a ball dressing up with their parents' 100% attention on them.

It was an amateur production but fantastic result. The parents were singing praises for the teachers, school, volunteers, and the kids for putting on a great show. They were talking about it long after the concert had finished. Loads of pictures and videos recorded a memorable event.

On reflection of our own work in marketing - Our work is theatre. We use to focus so much on putting a great show with big budget beautiful ads such as the Qantas - Australia Home, Barclay's Waterslide, and our famous Carlton Draught's Big Ad.

Paul Isakson mentioned:
Which rings true. A communications campaign can be amateur production made from card boxes with sticky tape and still be a hit with our consumers.

I'm not saying don't spend money on big creatives. The Qantas and Big Ad has been a stellar success. But think about how your campaign will allow your audience to create their own stories.

Various agencies have their own methodologies. Naked's approach is Transmedia planning. Some just came from a result of great creative thinking talent - Boom chika wah wah and Bond's Commercial promotion with So You Think You can Dance. Both created buzz by their audience and created a cult following.

Maybe for each campaign, start focusing beyond putting a great show and ask "Will they talk about it?" The answer can be found from insights and strategy.

Using Search to Predict the Future

2008-12-09T10:39:00.003+11:00

I've been using Google Trends for a while now for all my client's work. I find it's great to look at historic data and pick up future trends.

Great example is a recent campaign I ran for a travel client. Through historic data on Google Trends, we noted a peak in travel search inquiries during the Christmas & New Years break. As such, we developed a strategy around capitalising future sales.

Further thinking has led me to perhaps look at Search as a future indicator for human behaviors. Could we use Search to pick up market activity weeks before it occurs? I think this could work for long purchasing decisions. Such as real estate markets, travel purchase, car purchase, etc.

Matching search with trends is not a new thing.

Google knows of a correlation and have a Google Flu Trends initiative.
If we could match Search trends and business data, it becomes a powerful tool in a rapid response strategy. A business that can be mobile and adjust according to foresight opportunities will sure benefit in today's rocky markets.

Small Wins in a Downturn

2008-12-04T16:08:00.003+11:00

I was walking along Chapel St with Tamir to have lunch at our favorite Saigon Rose, and we came across a pop-up store.

Over the recent years, I've been seeing more and more pop-up stores appearing around Melbourne. It has been covered by Trendwatching and they've termed it Pop-Up Retailing.

It's a great concept. A brand moves into a temporary vacant building to promote and sell their wares.

Advantage:
- Lost cost
- Low risk
- High profile areas
- Short term
- Generate buzz
- Great story
- And, most importantly, I would tell other people about it.

It is a rapid response strategy. It is small wins. It works in a downturn market. It is guerrilla. You don't need $500,000 to fit out a store.

Why not give it a shot?

Melbourne Homeless World Cup 2008

2008-12-04T10:48:00.002+11:00

Love it! Love it! Love it!

Football is my passion. It's great to see football being used for good - supporting the homeless. A great story. A great experience.

Please go check it out.

http://www3.homelessworldcup.org/

The site looks well built. It has a YouTube Channel. I'll be supporting the competition this week.

Audience & Performers

2008-12-04T09:30:00.005+11:00

In a theater, there is the Audience and there is the Performers.

The Audiences are typically sit back and enjoy the show. They usually make a judgment of the Performer's work. It can be critical. Engaging, Riveting, Good, Bad, Boring, Not for Me, or just plain B-Grade.

The Performer puts together the show for the Audience. They could be the director influencing their work and stitching together the performance. The performers are Audience facing and seek to engage them, tell them a story, or immerse them through a remarkable experience.

What is your role today?

Mumbai Attack

2008-11-28T14:34:00.003+11:00

A tragic and sad event.

Especially when innocents are needlessly hurt.

I'm also keeping up to date with the amount of live, vast, graphic, and raw content that are out there. Everyday bloggers are feeding real emotions in covering the attack.

It's a contrast to how I had TV as my main source of news during the 9-11 event. Scripted and control tone. I still remember standing in my lounge room watching it live on TV when the 2nd plane hit.

Now I'm sadden by live Tweet by Tweet news and minute video updates from YouTube.

My prayers and well wishes to the families who are suffering from the Mumbai attacks.

Stop. Breath. Think. Did we forget someone?

2008-11-28T09:21:00.009+11:00

Sometimes, we get bogged down in thinking internally that we forget about our customers all together.

We get intensely involved in the operations, revenue, sales, cost, and targets of the business that we lose focus of what matters most to the success of our business. Our Customers.

Idris Mootee once wrote of 4 modes of thinking patterns that we fall into.

1. Proactive Thinking
2. Reactive Thinking
3. Passive Thinking
4. Dormant Thinking

Proactive thinking forms the basis of econometrics and lateral approach where we use logical and mechanical thinking to manage future situations. This works in a predictable business events. It is what we use often doing strategy work.

Reactive thinking is the most efficient way to approach a situation. It is a cause and effect reaction to an event. This is largely found in large corporations where we deal with events as efficiently as possible.

Passive thinking is used when dealing with large amounts of data or work. It recognises patterns and situations. It relies on our sensing abilities.

Dormant thinking uses the meditation approach. The ability to filter out any noise, ill-will, negative people, worries, restlessness and cultivate qualities such as concentration, awareness, intelligence, will, confidence, clarity to lead us higher wisdom of the situation.

So maybe take an hour off today.

Enough Proactive, Reactive and Passive thinking for the week.

Spend some Dormant thinking time.

Maybe spend that time thinking about your customers.

Happy Friday and time to add your blog to Nuffnang? :)

Our planet is fucked

2008-11-27T16:22:00.002+11:00

Serious hail at Prahran. They're about 2cm wide. All happened in 10 minutes. I'm drenched.