constant partial attention

What consumers really want from brands online

Wed, 30 May 2012 14:11:19 -0700

Businesses broadly misjudge what consumers want from them online. In particular, marketers often believe that consumers interact with them on social media to join a community and feel connected to the brand. But consumers have little interest in having a relationship beyond the merely transactional.

Their top reasons for connecting online: to get information and discounts, and to buy things.

Source: HBR

Exactly —> Make things people want, don’t just...

Sun, 27 May 2012 22:37:19 -0700

Exactly —> Make things people want, don’t just make people want things. (Fantastic deck: The Future of Marketing: Make Things People Want or Make People Wan…)

"Randomly drop yourself into new parts of the terrain, and when you find the highest hill, don’t..."

Fri, 25 May 2012 10:36:52 -0700

“Randomly drop yourself into new parts of the terrain, and when you find the highest hill, don’t waste any more time on the current hill no matter how much better the next step up might appear”

- Chris Dixon on finding the right career. (Climbing the wrong hill)

Four types of mobile apps

Fri, 25 May 2012 10:33:00 -0700

Four types of mobile apps:

1. Time wasters: used for short bursts when you are waiting in line

2. Core utilities: map to deeply engrained use patterns that usually existed before modern smart phones

3. Episodic utilities: typically aren’t on the home screen but are extremely useful in certain situations

4. Notification-driven apps: an emerging category

/via Chris Dixon.

"Thousands of people at big agencies want to innovate, but the structure fights against the..."

Thu, 24 May 2012 23:17:08 -0700

“Thousands of people at big agencies want to innovate, but the structure fights against the innovation itself.”

- 3 Lessons (And Warnings) For Agencies Looking To Emulate Startups | Co.Create: Creativity \ Culture \ Commerce

"Up to 40 percent of our traffic comes from social feeds. You can’t force that. Social isn’t just a..."

Sat, 19 May 2012 10:48:31 -0700

“Up to 40 percent of our traffic comes from social feeds. You can’t force that. Social isn’t just a way to get something from the user; it’s a way to give value to the user. The traffic will come when you deliver a great experience.”

- Fab.com relaunches, and it buries other social shopping experiences | VentureBeat (via betashop)

Cognition & The Intrinsic User Experience

Thu, 29 Mar 2012 15:09:24 -0700

Cognition & The Intrinsic User Experience:

"If you don’t know what you want, you end up with a lot you don’t."

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 16:04:28 -0700

“If you don’t know what you want, you end up with a lot you don’t.”

- Chuck Palahniuk (via fred-wilson)

“You can never be overdressed or overeducated.” -...

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 13:37:38 -0700

“You can never be overdressed or overeducated.” - Oscar Wilde #truth

This is what I used to do. How times have changed…

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 11:29:23 -0700

This is what I used to do. How times have changed…

"With the emergence of platforms and APIs across the web, content is now being disaggregated, broken..."

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 11:17:40 -0700

“With the emergence of platforms and APIs across the web, content is now being disaggregated, broken down into it’s smallest components, and being reaggregated and reformatted in many other places.”

-

Forget destinations. Your brand is everywhere and nowhere. » THINK OUTSIDE IN

The World’s Population in One City

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 10:12:53 -0700

The World’s Population in One City:

If the world’s 6.9 billion people lived in one city, how large would that city be if it were as dense as…

"If traditional agencies want to be the future of digital, I think they need to invest in experience..."

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 16:16:00 -0700

“If traditional agencies want to be the future of digital, I think they need to invest in experience design and experience strategy.”

- Jordan Julien, Digital & social strategy consultant & UX Architect for BMW, Coke, Telus, Dove, Canadian Tire, AT&T, Microsoft, Cineplex, VISA, Toyota, GE, P&G

Talking SoLoMo

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 09:00:00 -0800

Last week I was asked to provide my perspective on what SoLoMo means for marketers. It was a great conversation to have. These technologies — social, mobile, and location — are such an important part of peoples’ lives. And, if properly understood, they represent a huge opportunity for brands.

This post is a summary of what we talked about. A lot was covered, so I’ve tried to group each part of the discussion with a sub-heading.

What SoLoMo Means to Marketers

SoLoMo is about more than having a presence in those channels. That’s because people don’t think of SoLoMo in terms of channels or technologies; they are a seamless part of their day-to-day lives. Like water or electricity, SoLoMo enables us and makes our lives better, all while hiding in the background.

To have an impact in this space, marketers must take on a new role: instead of merely delivering messages, they must be orchestrators of shared value. In doing so, they have an opportunity to form relationships with customers in ways they couldn’t before.

A great example is the Starbucks mobile app. The app enables mobile payments and integrates with the Starbucks loyalty program, My Starbucks Rewards, which is itself connected to Facebook. By bringing all these components together, they create a relationship that builds value – for both the business and the customer – over the long-term. And that’s what it’s all about.

SoLoMo and Our Relationships with Brands

Yes, SoLoMo has transformed people from passive consumers to mobilized actors. But even though marketers don’t command the undivided attention they once did, brands still play a big role in how people define themselves. People continue to use brands to express their values and as entry into a group they want to be associated with.

When thinking about “social,” it’s very much about identity and self expression. What we share defines us and it connects us to the people we care about. This is especially true for young people. Their identity is in a constant state of flux, and they use their online presence as a test bed to gauge reaction. For example, they might start following a brand on Tumblr for a while and reblog a few of their posts before they make the commitment to purchase something and really “badge” themselves as part of that tribe.

The other important implication is that an increasing amount of noise is being created. Sharing is expected to double each year, and because of that, people are getting good at filtering what they see. So, it’s no longer enough for brands to broadcast the right messages in the right places — that simply doesn’t scale. Instead, marketers need people to spread information on behalf of the brand. To achieve this, they must understand how the brand fits into their customers’ lives and conversations.

Again, it really comes down to having the right value exchange. It’s asking ‘what role does our brand play in strengthening the identity of our customers?’

SoLoMo Requires Marketers to Make a Shift

When it comes to engagement, I agree with Paul Adams, who says, there needs to be a shift from thinking inside out to thinking outside in. What that means is it’s less about crafting your story and pushing that through your channels. It’s more about looking at existing communities (groups of people connected by shared interests) and finding ways to add value there.

That means at least three things for marketing programs themselves:

Moving away from the “Hollywood model” of promotional bursts, and towards evergreen programs that create shared value and are self-sustaining.
Weaving in promotions in smart ways. That means targeting and using promotions to activate word of mouth.
Using partnerships to align with specific communities. That includes partnerships with emerging tech startups and even “partnerships” with memes and pop culture. (A great example is lululemon‘s Shit Yogis Say)

Getting Ready for the Shift

The shift has already happened. Today, marketers are competing for attention with the Angry Birds, Instagrams and Pinterests of the world.

To really excel in SoLoMo marketers need revisit their internal structures and processes, and they need to have the right goals in place — goals that sit above campaigns and drive decisions that increase customer lifetime value. That means less focus on quick hits, more focus on long-term relationship building. That means getting away from siloed thinking, and moving towards systems thinking. And finally, that means not planning around channels, and instead planning around customer and community needs.

[This post was also published on the Blast Radius blog.]

Also: This is beyond cool. signalfound: First responders....

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 15:09:17 -0800

Also: This is beyond cool.

signalfound:

First responders. Military. Pornographers. Research. Retail. This changes many things.

- Jan Chipchase

Love the business model innovation. (Subscriptions to the...

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 11:00:27 -0800

Love the business model innovation. (Subscriptions to the rescue!) And the content and branding.

CEO and founder of Dollarshaveclub.com, Michael Durbin, has created the perfect business designed specifically to save you cash. With prices starting at just $1 a month, members of the club can have blades shipped to their house on a monthly basis.

Dollarshaveclub.com

/via moneyisnotimportant whereisthecoool

"Oh, yeah, Facebook is required for both of these apps to work."

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 08:32:29 -0800

“Oh, yeah, Facebook is required for both of these apps to work.”

- Get used to it. I’m not sure any social app has a chance without it anymore.

The Two Hottest Apps You’ll “Run Into” at SXSW - The Next Web

Rules of a Creator’s Life

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 13:07:34 -0800

Rules of a Creator’s Life

The Scale of the Universe 2

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 11:59:22 -0800

The Scale of the Universe 2:

Talk about keeping things in perspective. This absolutely blows my mind.

How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 11:40:11 -0800

How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love:

One of the interesting things about success is that we think we know what it means. A lot of the time our ideas about what it would mean to live successfully are not our own. They’re sucked in from other people. And we also suck in messages from everything from the television to advertising to marketing, etcetera. These are hugely powerful forces that define what we want and how we view ourselves. What I want to argue for is not that we should give up on our ideas of success, but that we should make sure that they are our own. We should focus in on our ideas and make sure that we own them, that we’re truly the authors of our own ambitions. Because it’s bad enough not getting what you want, but it’s even worse to have an idea of what it is you want and find out at the end of the journey that it isn’t, in fact, what you wanted all along.