Influential Marketing Blog

Marketing In The Age Of Disposable Email

Some guy named Bob probably hates me. I don't know him and he doesn't know me ... but he's the unfortunate registrant of Bob.com and has used his first name for his email address. Yup, you guessed it - that makes his email address bob@bob.com. That also happens to be the email address that I have used for the past ten years to fill out forms that require an email address that I don't want to give. For more than a decade, Bob has been getting my junk email and to tell you a truth, I feel bad about it. That alone isn't the reason I've had to give up my use of Bob's email, though. The reason is that I can't pick up those confirmation emails that you need to click on in order to activate an account.

Recently, I came across a site called Mintemail that has found an interesting solution ... disposable email. This is essentially what it sounds like - an email address that is good for four hours, usually just long enough to use to register for a site, get a confirmation email and pick it up. The service has lots of smart features built in, such as automatically saving the email address to your clipboard so you're ready to paste it into a form. Every once in a while, there is a solution so simple you wonder why no one else has done it first. I love seeing things like that and this definitely qualifies. If you have a form that requires your audience to enter an email address they are not interested in giving you, it looks like you won't be able to rely on the confirmation email to get you a working email address anymore. In the age of disposable email, it looks like you're going to have to work harder to earn the right to ask for a user's email address. I suppose the upside is that now those bogus emails will bounce after four hours. I bet poor Bob wishes I found this site a lot earlier.

Link Credit: http://www.vqcdesigns.com/blog/

The New Truth of "Circular Public Relations"

Everyone you talk to in the public relations industry knows that the field is evolving.  The most often cited proof people point to is the fact that consumers have more power to share opinions with one another and the idea that "media" is shifting to include content created by regular people.  If you do happen to work in the public relations field, and have your own blog ... you will likely be familiar with the very strange occurrance of getting pitched stories for your blog.  Usually in the PR industry, the only way that a pro could bring this type of experience to their job is by having been a journalist.  We have many team members like that, but once they choose PR, they usually give up their journalistic role.  Most bloggers continue to blog even as they do their day job.

This has led to a very interesting phenomenon which I would have to term "circular public relations."  Put simply, this is the idea of getting pitched by a media outlet at the same time that you are pitching them.  While it may not always be the exact same media outlet, the point is that in today's world of PR, you can simultaneously be focused on earning media while you foster your own role as a media creator and get pitched by other PR pros trying to get featured in the media you create.

There are three different ways that circular public relations happens:

1. Client coverage - This is the first and most obvious, which involves covering something that one of your client's is doing on your blog. It does raise the obvious ethical questions about essentially whether it constitutes a slightly different version of blogging for pay ... but happens frequently nonetheless.  I will blog about something that a client is doing only if I think there is a marketing lesson within it that will be interesting for the readers of my blog. Luckily, I think I'm also not famous enough to have lots of clients asking me to blog about stuff.
2. Media releases - Being included on media lists is an interesting experience with a good and bad side.  The bad, of course, is that you can end up with many clueless pitches that shake your confidence in whether smart PR people even exist.  The good is that you have a steady stream of content to learn from, as well as the knowledge of what is being announced in a particular industry (which is often useful competitive information).
3. Blogscratching - On its most basic level, this is the blog equivalent of backscratching (coined by Guy Kawasaki, I think) where I blog about your thing and you blog about mine.  It is essentially a trade, and though it may not happen on a one to one basis, this happens all the time in the blog world.  It is coverage based on content and relationship.  To a degree, it is this phenomenon of blogscratching that I am counting on to drive some buzz among my fellow marketing bloggers when my book comes out later this month. 

Being the owner of a media property yourself clearly offers a lot of benefits to any PR pro who wants to do his or her job better.  It gives you a chance to learn from other pitches, build relationships with other media that pitch you and give you a platform to help your client (assuming you are willing and the content fits).  I wonder why more PR pros aren't taking up blogging?

Inside the 5 Badges of the Conference Caste System

At every conference or tradeshow, you get a badge.  I have a box full of them on my desk, an increasing number of them with the title of "Speaker" affixed beneath my name.  I recently had a conversation with some colleagues about the importance of being a speaker at an event.  Often, the most important benefit is not just the visibility of speaking, but the license that speaker tag gives you to have a conversation with other speakers.  If you think about it, the badges at a conference are like a caste system.  Your badge identifies which group you belong in and can often dictate how people embrace or shy away from a conversation with you. 

There are usually only five types of badges that you can get at a conference (listed in order of importance):

1. Speaker
2. Media
3. Sponsor
4. Attendee
5. Vendor

Being a speaker is usually the best choice, because it positions you as an expert at the event and you also have a chance to demonstrate your expertise in front of a subset of attendees.  Media is usually second best, because just about all the sponsors and vendors want to get media coverage.  Last week at an event like the Consumer Electronics Show, however, most people would agree that media was definitely number one because of the relative importance of media coverage to that event.  The interesting thing about "media" at CES (as well as at most other large events today) is that this group is usually divided into two categories: bloggers and press.  For CES, the blogger badges were gray, and the press badges were red.  Thinking this would be a good chance for a bit of a social experiment, I went and got both badges ... the blogger badge by virtue of my blog, and the press badge as a result of my writing being republished by the good folks at Digital Media Wire (sorry I missed the Insider event, Ned).

What did I learn?  Probably not surprisingly, the blogger badge got a lot less attention and special treatment.  It was an odd feeling to walk through certain booths first with my gray badge and then switch to the red one.  There were different rooms for bloggers versus press, and in the press room there was real food (not just snacks), rows of press releases that you could pickup and many invites for private parties or events.  Clearly, there is a gap in perceived value between bloggers and journalists from the organizers of CES, as well as many of the vendors exhibiting at the event.  It really is no different than a caste system where individuals are judged based on the color of their badges.  The question is, when will we see this situation change?  Already, there are signs that it is changing.  Most notably, the fact that there is a blogger room and blogger credentials at an event of this size at all.  The way I see it, in another few years, events like this will start to embrace bloggers and media on the same level and apply a similar criteria to who gets credentials.  This means the real metric will be audience and reach.  Regardless of whether you write for a blog or something else, your credentials will be based on the number of people you reach.  It's just a matter of time before it happens.

The PR Revolution Amazon's Kindle May Be Bringing

Do you have a Kindle yet?  All the buzz about the Wii aside, the most lusted after gift this holiday season for media pros may just be Amazon's new digital content reader called the Kindle (which sold out within 5.5 hours upon first release a few weeks ago).  The device may not have an Apple-esque level of sex appeal, but it does represent a huge shift in thinking that may just propel portable digital content and ebooks in particular to the kind of widespread adoption that digital music has already enjoyed.  For that reason, many people are calling the Kindle the next ipod.  If you are like me, you're probably fed up with hearing about how everything new is about to "revolutionize" the world of media.  Let's take a little reality check.  Not everything has the impact that they think they can have on the world of media.  There are a lot of voices out there. 

So what makes the Kindle different?  More importantly, what makes it something that you need to pay attention to today?  Here are four reasons why the Kindle may be bringing a PR revolution (for real):

1. It makes RSS a necessity. If you have managed to get by this far without using RSS feeds (or offering them to your content if you are a content publisher), those days will soon be over.  The way that Kindle users subscribe to new content is by adding RSS feeds, similar to how you can download music or subscribe to podcasts on iTunes.  This means having a web site is no longer enough.  If your content is not available in RSS format, you may soon be invisible.
2. It finally integrates the reading experience.  The problem right now with magazines, newspapers, blogs and books is that most exist in their own channels when it comes to reading.  This means you may subscribe to RSS feeds from a newspaper and blogs, and get a magazine and still buy books ... but you have to carry all of them.  With the Kindle, you can buy all or read any of these in the same place ... and even send your own documents to the Kindle so you can read them on the go.  It really can be a house for all documents of any kind.
3. It is puts a premium on real time information. For most of us, the types of devices we are used to using all synch with your computer.  In that sense, they are nothing more than glorified hard drives.  That's all the ipod is.  But the Kindle has built in EVDO wireless connectivity which means users are never left looking for a hotspot to connect and always have the latest information from their favorite media sources.  Think about this for a second ... if all media can be updated real time, then editorial errors can be corrected (rather than publishing apologies), and users have an increased appetite and expectation of media that is never out of date.
4. It takes advantage of Amazon's Library. The important thing not to forget about the Kindle is that it also has immediate full access to the full library of Amazon.com ... which means just about every book.  And with a direct tie-in to a user's Amazon account, you can purchase just about any book or piece of content Amazon sells instantly.  From an on demand resource shelf, this is phenomenal (imagine having the AP Stylebook available at a moment's notice). 

If you put all these pieces together, the interesting conclusion is that the Kindle may represent the first real product that challenges our perceptions about how people are consuming content.  Once this starts to change, the way that media publishers create and distribute their content will really change ... thus creating a new environment for PR pros to operate within.  Are you ready for a real time rss-based always on media landscape?  If not, now's the time to start.

Note: This post is republished from the original that was written for the 360 Digital Influence Blog.

Announcing The Ultimate Marketing Bookstore

Several months ago I participated in the LitLiberation Blogger Challenge launched by my friend Tim Ferriss to try and raise money for DonorsChoose.org (a site which allows teachers to submit funding proposals to ask for help doing something they don't normally get the funding for).  Around the same time, I started playing around with Amazon Affiliate links and made more than ten bucks on links by just using a few links on several blog posts.  That's only a small amount of money, but it got me thinking about the potential of using an affiliate program to generate money for charity in the marketing world.  Over the time that I was away from blogging, one of my side projects was to start contacting several influential people to see if they would be willing to participate in a new kind of bookstore - which I called The Ultimate Marketing Bookstore.  Today I am launching it (although I will resist the temptation to call it a "Beta launch").  Here's how I described the purpose of the site and what makes it different:

This site is different because it features all the reading lists of marketers that you already know and respect in one place.  From CEOs to marketing directors to top marketing bloggers - The Ultimate Marketing Bookstore lets you see and shop from all their reading lists ... and all for a good cause.

The way most of us find out about great marketing books is the same way that we learn about great products ... through recommendations from people we trust.  Most online bookstores are just categories of books selected by one or two people.  They are great if you trust those people, but they are not comprehensive. 

As I describe above, all the proceeds from affiliate commissions that this site generates will be donated to DonorsChoose.org on a monthly basis and I plan to try and spread the word in the marketing community about this new bookstore and will be adding new names on a weekly basis.  Here are a few reasons why I think this idea can work:

1. Collects a central hub of reading lists from marketers that are currently widely distributed online. 
2. Encourages marketers who are not sharing their reading lists to do so in an easy way.
3. Makes great marketing books easier to find and buy.
4. Creates a community of marketing book readers and allows them to contribute to a good cause
5. Offers a platform for new marketing books to get promoted to an interested audience

That's the initial idea, but I'd love to hear some feedback on what you think could make it better.  I am still reaching out to marketers to add their book lists, so stay tuned in the next few weeks as I will likely be adding lots more names to this list, and I plan to publish updates with money raised and associate this bookstore with a challenge on DonorsChoose.org so the amount raised (and what the dollars are being spent on) is highly visible.  Blog badges and other tools to promote the site are in the works as well.  Any other suggestions?

Note: A big thank you to all the people who responded to my LinkedIn question about which charity could be the best to support for this.  DonorsChoose.org was the most popular suggestion.

Guest Post: The Added Value of Social Networks in Pitching

By Lee Odden

Several times a day a pitch comes in via email, Facebook message or other means (Twitter) announcing an event, a new venture, to review some new sort of software or "in case you are interested and would like to speak to one of our executives about this exciting news..." ugh.  Some are cut and paste pitches from PR reps, some are from companies trying to promote their own message and some are from industry associates that feel they have something special to share.

Even when an announcement seems interesting, more often than not a post won't be created for it since our Online Marketing Blog doesn't really cover industry news. Unless it's a topic that's spot on and can help fortify a post that's already in the works, there's little if any chance of getting covered. As much as I'd like to give in and do a "links post" or a quick news bite, I normally don't. However if it's really good, I do something much better.

As important as search is, links can no doubt carry a lot of value, but if a pitch gets the attention of an enthusiastic social networker, would it be better to gain a single mention/link or an endorsement to their network?

Getting that link is a certainty that can send traffic and offer a signal to search engines for improved rankings. However, getting a pitch or story introduced to a social network via bookmarking, posting, news submission or other means can mean a big boost in credibility by association as well as links from multiple bloggers that see it.

A direct pitch to bloggers via email isn't the only way to get a blogger's attention. For example, Monday I noticed visitors to Online Marketing Blog from a recent article posted by Aaron and Giovanna Wall, "The Blogger's Guide to SEO". After reading it and liking it, I immediately bookmarked it to Del.icio.ous and posted to my Facebook network of 420+.

As expert internet marketers, Aaron and Giovanna certainly didn't need my help promoting the article, but I can't imagine it hurt getting exposure to another influential network. Plus, that network was exposed to a really useful resource.

Does this mean media relations and pitching efforts need to shift to asking influencers for an announcement to their social networks? Not at all. This is simply an explanation why we don't take so many of the good story ideas and resource tips sent our way and make "links" posts with them or news posts. If they're really useful, they'll get shared with our networks which is likely worth far more than a mention and a link in a single blog post.

Building social networks is an investment in time, energy and when you factor in offline networking costs of going to conferences, a lot of money. From both a personal and a marketing perspective, social networks are only as valuable as the value you bring to the community. Jepordizing that by sharing information and resources that don't really offer value will only alienate network members. "Poof" goes the social and marketing value if you start to get too "marketey" on your network.

With the fantastic audience Rohit has attracted on this blog, I know I am preaching to the choir when I say, the best insurance towards helping great content travel to social media and networking sites is to build your own network and share relevant content that offers value.  PR practitioners need to look for more than just a passing mention by offering truly relevant and unique resources. That content will travel as far as it is useful.

If you're in the media, blogger or "influencer" relations business, that may mean including with your pitch, links to resources that include easy to bookmark/share buttons. Let the recipient make their own decision to pass it on, but make it easy for them too.

Lee Odden is CEO of TopRank Online Marketing and writes Online Marketing Blog.

Guest Post: The Art & Science of Story

By Kevin Dugan
Story telling has made me a better communicator. It’s even driven my latest impulse purchase.

Even the discovery of the Romulus and Remus Grotto provides a timely example of the power of story.

Rome was founded by Romulus. He, along with his twin brother Remus, was nursed by a wolf (Oy, Freud would have a field day). This story has evolved into a far-reaching, Roman icon. As an example, I submit this picture taken recently in the hills of Cincinnati, Ohio.

In A Whole New Mind, author Dan Pink reminds us of the importance of story to underscore the rise of right-brain skills in the workforce. Fast Company has explored story telling in business for years. But it was this book that sparked my renewed obsession with story.

Whether you're left brain or right brain, here are some links to inspire your story.

Stories Persuade: The Elements of Persuasion defines a story as “a fact wrapped in an emotion that compels us to take an action that transforms our world.” The book uses this basic definition to show how stories can persuade your audience.

Stories (Don’t) Write Themselves: Story telling doesn’t require the use of words. But the better your writing skills, the easier it is to craft an effective story. Writing more frequently helps improve your chops, writing less makes your work more efficient and effective.

Stories Show: From the increasing popularity of comic books to photo sharing sites like Flickr and the slick tools created to wade through them all, a picture really is worth 1K in words.

I’m told that while Flickr boasts 2 billion images served, Facebook serves up 4 billion? Anyone that can confirm or deny this, please comment below. But this reinforces that visuals are easier to create than ever and they are critical to the future of written communication.

Stories Make a (Power) Point: Is PowerPoint an Intel conspiracy to encourage computer upgrades? Maybe not, but SlideShare reminds us of Powerpoint’s value and Russell Davies tells us how to make your next set of slides bearable.

These are just the tip of a Google search. What’s your story?

Dugan is author of Strategic Public Relations and The Bad Pitch Blog. By day he is Director of Marketing Communications at FRCH Design Worldwide.

Romulus and Remus uploaded by prblog
tags | public relations | PR | Romulus and Remus | marketing | SlideShare | Flickr

Spamments and Spamversations: How Do You Stay Out of Unwanted Conversations?

There has been a firestorm of discussion lately after Chris Anderson, editor of Wired Magazine and author of the long tail recently "outed" all the PR professionals that had been contacted him with anonymous spam style "Dear Editor" communications.  On a day where he had more than 300 of these, he finally decided he had enough and fired off a post banning those PR folks from contacting him and adding him to his blocked sender list.  The conversation has now been discussed to death on all kinds of blogs with most people essentially taking one of three viewpoints:

1. PR people are spammers and they deserve it.
2. Chris makes a fair point, but its unfair to publish people's email addresses or offer them no way to get off the list.
3. Chris is a self-important blowhard who should get used to the email because he's an Editor of a major pub.

At this point, I really don't think there's anything I can add to the conversation ... especially because I don't consider myself a PR pro in this sense and have never actually pitched a media person for anything.  I am a marketer, and the concept we deal with all the time is spam - or more broadly speaking, unwanted conversations.  It got me thinking about the different types of unwanted conversations we all must deal with today in a world where conversations are happening all around us and often directed to us whether we want them or not.  In my estimation, there are 5 methods of dealing with these unwanted conversations:

1. Filters, blockers and blacklists.  These can be a combination of automated features and manually set up lists.  Chris Anderson noted in a follow up post that he manually blacklisted all the emails of the PR folks that had sent him unwanted emails.  Personal blacklists in your email can be a great way to do this.  My blog also has a list of blocked words for comments like "viagra" and "casino."  Spam filters are increasingly standard to catch the usual spam phrases about body part enlargement and the like.
2. Barriers, verification and validation. The next stage of automated checking are CAPTCHAs, requiring a login in order to comment, or using some other method to verify that there is a real person trying to connect with you.  It is commonly used on blog comments to make sure there is a real person behind the conversation.
   
3. Ignoring or screening them. This is the time honored way, and usually works.  The only downside is that if the volume of these conversations is very high, it can get tougher and tougher to do this.  The other negative is that it is not very satisfying, as you don't get a chance to let someone know that their message was irrelevant and ignored.
4. Selective friending. With the growing number of social network profiles we all have, the real problem with unwanted conversations is that they can often come from "friends."  Once you have granted someone access into your circle, you have unwittingly given them permission to start an unwanted conversation with you.  The only real way around this is either to be more selective with your friending, or to take the rude route and either ignore the conversation or (gasp!) "de-friend" a frequent offender.
5. Closed Responses. This is often the last resort for unwanted conversations, and one that most of us probably find ourselves using more and more.  Closed responses are the ones that answer a question, but leave little room for follow up.  They are the best way to deal with conversations that you may be baited to join (by people trying to pull you into controversy) or conversations that for whatever reason you are not completely involved or interested in.

What do you think about these methods?  Are you using them all equally or is there one that you rely on more than any other?  Or perhaps there is a sixth method that I missed ...

The Future of PR Means Dumping The Inferiority Complex

Last week on Thursday I spent the day at the TurnPROn event in San Francisco focused on the future of public relations.  It was hosted as part of the Online Market World conference, and a relatively small and concentrated event.  Despite the small size, the lineup of speakers was surprisingly good, and included folks like Erik Hauser, Brian Solis and Tom Burg.  Through the event, the topics ranged from the obvious to the controversial.  Some speakers did spend time talking about the future of the press release (BIG yawn) ... but for the most part the event fostered some great conversation about where PR is and where it needs to go.  Here were two key highlights I took away from the day about what the future of PR may hold:

1. Closer alignment with search.  Given the power of search engines and the increasing role that search agencies are starting to play in the marketing mix, there is a natural allegiance that needs to form between search and PR.  Merging editorial calendars and key messages with the nuances of search marketing (both SEO and paid search) was a topic that several speakers mentioned.  It may seem relatively obvious, but based on the number of times I have seen search marketing teams work independently from PR teams is stunning. 
2. PR pros need to shun their inferiority complex. One of the common threads that manifested itself throughout the day was the inferiority complex that many PR professionals have in relation to other marketing pros (especially peers in advertising).  Having worked on both sides, I know that the budgets can be mismatched, but that at the smart agencies, PR is starting to stake more ground.  This is not about taking orders from clients, it is about more powerfully articulating where a client needs to go and becoming the partner that gets them there.  I happen to think this is an obvious and natural place for PR to be ... but PR pros need to shed their inferiority complex and take that leap.

The second point is particularly relevant, as this is something I have steadily noted about the PR industry after spending more and more time recently at inter-agency meetings where PR professionals (from our agency and others) come together with media planning agencies and Ad agencies.  No one is going to hand PR folks their chance to speak up or offer them a leading role.  We have to take it.  The open question here is perhaps about ego.  Are there just bigger egos in other types of agencies?  If not, what else is it that often keeps PR in a subservient role to other types of marketers?  These were the sorts of interesting questions raised during TurnPROn.  Finding the answer seems like the real key to the future of PR. 

Influential Marketing Blog Featured in Wall Street Journal

Many of you may have already caught this yesterday, but this blog was cited in the Recommended Reading  section of the Wall Street Journal yesterday in an article by Keith Huang.  As Jay Berkowitz from Ten Golden Rules shares on his team blog, my blog was one of 60 resources that they recommended to the journalist as part of their reading list and was selected from that list as a recommended resource for companies looking to "optimize their online presence."  Here's the writeup:

Influential Marketing Blog, rohitbhargava.typepad.com
Rohit Bhargava's blog is intellectual and educational. In a recent post, he discusses the art of stamp collection and how, even today, many smaller countries use stamps as a key marketing tool. He writes, 'Next time you pass a post office in any country, pay attention to how they are using their philately to promote the country, cater to tourists, or commemorate moments of significance.'

It is a great media hit and to be selected from a list of what I am guessing were 60 stellar resources is flattering.  I'm in awe at being included among the other bloggers and authors mentioned in the article - including Seth Godin, Steve Rubel, Matt Cutts, John Battelle, Chris Anderson, Joseph Jaffe, and Danny Sullivan. Thanks to Jay for including me in this great list, and to Keith for selecting to include my blog!

The Ogilvy Blogger Outreach Code of Ethics (Beta Version)

One of the recent threads of conversation you might have picked up on in several circles is a backlash from bloggers against marketing and PR folks who are pitching them all sorts of irrelevant news items and worthless products.  Lots of bloggers are sick about it, and though I'm probably more forgiving than other bloggers because I understand why I get these kinds of pitches, there are days when I am frustrated about some of the clueless pitch emails I get as well.  In our Digital Influence team at Ogilvy, we have learned a lot from doing outreach to bloggers over the last several years (some successful and some not so successful).  It's time for us to share some of our learnings to show that not all PR and marketing folks are clueless email spammers hawking their products.

To that end, two of my colleagues in our team have developed a first draft of our new Blogger Outreach Code of Conduct which they just published on our team blog.  This is our first stab at creating something transparent that could rebuild some credibility in the eyes of bloggers who have had to hear too many clueless pitches from inexperienced PR and marketing folks.  I am reprinting the elements of the code of conduct below and I encourage you to check them out and leave your thoughts on our original blog post over at the 360 Digital Influence blog.

Ogilvy PR’s Blogger Outreach Code of Ethics (Beta Version)

1. We reach out to bloggers because we respect your influence and feel that we might have something that is “remarkable” which could be of interest to you and/or your audience.
2. We will only propose blogger outreach as a tactic if it complements our overall strategy. We will not recommend it as a panacea for every social media campaign.
3. We will always be transparent and clearly disclose who we are and who we work for in our outreach email.
4. Before we email you, we will check out your blog’s About, Contact and Advertising page in an effort to see if you have blatantly said you would not like to be contacted by PR/Marketing companies. If so, we’ll leave you alone.
5. If you tell us there is a specific way you want to be reached, we’ll adhere to those guidelines.
6. We won’t pretend to have read your blog if we haven’t.
7. In our email we will convey why we think you, in particular, might be interested in our client’s product, issue, event or message.
8. We won’t leave you hanging. If your contact at Ogilvy PR is going out of town or will be unreachable, we will provide you with an alternate point of contact.
9. We encourage you to disclose our relationship with you to your readers, and will never ask you to do otherwise.
10. You are entitled to blog on information or products we give you in any way you see fit. (Yes, you can even say you hate it.)
11. If you don’t want to hear from us again, we will place you on our Do Not Contact list – which we will share with the rest of the Ogilvy PR agency.
12. If you are initially interested in the campaign, but don’t respond to one of our emails, we will follow up with you no more than once. If you don’t respond to us at all, we’ll leave you alone.
13. Our initial outreach email will always include a link to Ogilvy PR’s Blog Outreach Code of Ethics.

This is a rough first draft and something we are experimenting with before calling it "official" in any sense.  Please share your thoughts on the Ogilvy DI blog about it and help us make it better.  Let's stand up for our reputation as marketers and do things right.

Rohit Bhargava: Social Media Today Podcast Just Launched!

Last week I was invited to do a podcast interview as part of the Social Media Today Weekly Podcast series being put together by Maggie Fox.  I am part of a group called the Social Media Collective which is a group of bloggers that write often about social media and it's impact on business and marketing.  Our content is republished on the Social Media Today site and it is a wonderful collection of writers and thinkers in the social media space.  During my brief conversation with Maggie, we had a good dialogue about the future of blogging, social media marketing, effective techniques and a few thoughts about social media optimization.  You can check out the podcast on the original site or on Maggie's Blog, or you can download it direcly from here. 

Intel Launches Chinese Language Technology Blog

Intel, a current Ogilvy PR client, has just launched a new Chinese language blog focused on technology and is generating some great conversation through comments already.  Unfortunately, automated translation software cannot provide a coherent picture of the content yet - so you might be out of luck with getting much from the content of the blog, but it's a great example of a company building out their global strategy when it comes to social media and providing an outlet for more smart minds within the company to share their voices, regardless of the language barrier.  A bit of insider info ... coming soon will be other multilingual blogs from Intel designed on bringing out even more of the expertise from individuals inside the company from other countries. 

Note of Attribution: The Ogilvy PR Digital Influence team works with Intel on social media strategy and marketing but was not responsible for building and deploying this blog.  For the inside story behind the launching of the new Intel China Blog, you can check out the launch post on Textura Design. 

Corporate Bloggers and the Rise of the Accidental Spokesperson

In the world of public relations, a spokesperson can sometimes seem like the most important element of any campaign.  Though I don't quite understand some of my colleagues necessity to always propose a celebrity in this spokesperson role, I do understand the very real need to establish credibility and a spokesperson can be a great way to do that.  One interesting situation that the rise of social media is bringing up, however, is the increasingly common phenomenon of the accidental spokesperson.  These are the individuals that are working for an organization and blogging, but are not considered official spokespersons.  Most of the time, they don't have any media training and that combination is a situation PR teams at most corporations spend a long time trying to avoid.  Having "regular" employees thrust into the role of spokespersons can result in everything from small mishaps to large scale missteps.  Every PR pro has a ready story of horror to share if you ask about what happens when you get inexperienced and unauthorized employees speaking intentionally or unintentionally on a company's behalf.

It's no wonder many corporate PR teams view blogs with a mixture of distrust and fear.  Particularly when it comes to dealing with employee bloggers.  The real difficulty, however, comes when one or more of these employee bloggers starts developing a following.  As their audience rises, so does the importance of their unofficial role as a spokesperson.  In effect, they become an accidental spokesperson.  Robert Scoble is probably the highest profile example of this phenomenon during the time that he was at Microsoft.  Steve Rubel during his time with Cooper Katz seemed to have a similar situation (though now at Edelman he is far more "official" as a company mouthpiece).  I suspect that a survey of business bloggers in a variety of industries would turn up hundreds of bloggers that fit this category of accidental spokespersons.  As more bloggers focus on building their microbrands - the question of how their professional profile merges with their personal one will continue to be a challenge for bloggers and communications teams alike.  Some bloggers will likely resist their roles as accidental spokespersons for the organizations they work for, while others will embrace it.  Either way, it seems a phenomenon that will only continue to happen more frequently, and most corporate PR teams would be wise to develop a strategy for embracing and leveraging bloggers in this role.  This is an opportunity to build on, not something to be afraid of.

Top 7 Marketing Trends for 2007

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As the year comes to a close, it's time to look forwards to next year and what are shaping up to be some key trends for marketers to track through the year.  To add to the already vibrant discussion of trends to pay attention to, here is my stab at a few top marketing trends that I will be watching in the new year (in no particular order):

1. Sharing a Corporate Personality - For too many years, large organizations have focused much of their marketing and communications on becoming "faceless" - yet the danger of facelessness is now becoming better understood.  In short, companies cannot connect with customers in a meaningful and emotional way without having a personality.  As more organizations realize this fact, we will continue to see more "corporate bloggers" and more touch points for customers to interact with the true personality of a brand.  Look for social media to play a bigger part in overall marketing strategy as a result.
2. Widget Marketing - A trend I have been following since earlier in the year, widgets have made significant strides as an accepted marketing technique in recent months.  Many new blog oriented services are launching Widgets in Typepad's gallery, startups offer their own widgets as a quick way of introducing their service, and new products like Chumby (a compact clock-radio-like product that has a wireless connection) are bringing widgets out of the online world and into the real one.  For marketers looking to offer a quick introduction to their service, or those seeking to create an online connection with customers - widgets will find more users in 2007. 
3. Social Media Optimization - Originally introduced just a few months ago, SMO has rapidly blossomed into a movement in the online marketing industry worldwide.  Primarily being driven at the moment by those in the search marketing industry, in 2007 I suspect SMO will continue to get broader use from marketers interested in building traffic and buzz online, moving far beyond linking strategy and smart SEO into the marketing mainstream.  Hooks to allow site visitors to easily share and bookmark content may become more commonplace than those ubiquitous "email a friend" links.
4. AutoTagging and AutoSorting - I have written often about the trend for visual search and how companies like Riya are leading the way for photo recognition technology that allows imagery on the web to be more effectively tagged and organized.  In 2007, we will see more solutions like this that offer autotagging, autosorting and the next extension of this technology ... auto recommendations, where new content of any format can be recommended and people can find new content more easily.  This will continue to create waves in how users watch video online, find music, and browse the web.
5. Human Filtered Search - One of the effects of the personal media revolution is an exponential increase in the amount of content online.  This will continue to lead online users to search beyond the algorithm for new ways of finding information.  A key method for this is human filtered search, where people are sorting content on the web, creating their own groupings and sharing that with others.  Just as Jerry Yang initially built Yahoo as a directory to help him and friends sort through the exploding amount of content online, now sites like Squidoo and Rollyo are offering alternative ways of finding information online.  The human side of search looks set to become a force in 2007.
6. Contentcasting - Putting content online, and then trying to spread the word about it is so 2006.  Contentcasting is set to be the new standard, enabled by RSS and a growing number of online users that are finding the only way to keep up with all the news and information they care about is to subscribe to feeds and access it that way.  Contentcasting will relate to videoblogs, audio podcasts, and frequently updated content in any area of the site - from a blog to a newsroom.  Got content that you want to spread around?  Don't just market it -- broadcast it and let your users/customers pick up the feeds.
7. Online Identity Shifting - If you add the success of Facebook, Myspace, Vox, Second Life, LinkedIn and Flickr together - you would come to a single conclusion: that having and sharing your identity online is hot right now.  This is not about blogging or about uploading your photos online, this is a phenomenon of having an extension of your personality online to share with friends, family and colleagues.  With the number of assets we can now create - from photos and videos to full podcast programs about our lives, the appeal of sharing this with those you care about will continue to represent a force in driving more people towards social media.  Within these online representations of self, brands and products will continue to play a large role.  People will talk about products they like and don't like - they will share brand experiences, and they will even become brand ambassadors for products and services that they care about.  In this world where individual lives are shared online, there will be huge opportunities for marketers in 2007.

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A Recap of 2006 on Influential Interactive Marketing

Let's start with a warning ... this is the "clip show" post where I recycle a lot of old material so if that causes you extreme pain, please close this window now and come back tomorrow.  For all the rest of you, it's the holidays and a quick glance around the marketing blogosphere will show that these clip show posts are in right now.  With nearly 400 post on this blog already, there is lots of content to choose from ... allowing me the luxury to conveniently ignore those posts from the past year that are outdated or that I just don't like anymore.  Here is a sampling of the rest:

Concepts & Ideas:
This is a collection of concepts and ideas that were introduced or discussed on this blog and then travelled virally to other blogs and were discussed elsewhere in media.  A good collection of ideas, many of which I still hope to implement on a client campaign (but haven't yet).

• Soundbombs
• Virtual Hugs
• Placecasting
• Widget Marketing
• Text Messaging Customer Service
• Tagging with Domain Names
• Social Media Optimization
• Automated Blog Translation
• Photopedia
• Human Search Filters

Rules & Guides:
These are a group of "Guy Kawasaki style" posts written in list format as guides to various topics from SMO to viral marketing.  It's a format I have always liked and you will probably see many more posts in this format going into 2007.

• Avoiding the Dark Side of Social Media
• 5 Rules of Social Media Optimization
• Signs Your Viral Marketing May Flop
• 7 Tips on Pitching Bloggers
• Golden Rules of Blog Etiquette

Presentations & Published Work:
Links to presentations given at industry events as well as guest contributions to other blogs.  There is some good powerpoint link bait in here, useful for those who are interested in any of these topics but couldn't make it to the events referenced.

• 7 Rules for Getting into Search (Search Engine Strategies Conference)
• 7 Tips on Pitching Bloggers (White Paper)
• The Human Side of Search (Search Insider Summit)
• Guide to Blog Marketing (SixApart Seminar) 
• Finding your Personality in Personal Media (Guest Column on Strumpette)

That's it.  Look out tomorrow for an all new post about what I think the top ten marketing ideas to watch will be in 2007.

Quantcast Offers Free Audience Data on 20 Million+ Sites

Yesterday I had a chat with Konrad Feldman, one of the co-Founders of a company called Quantcast that quietly launched an online measurement tool about two months ago which is currently in beta mode.  The tool is one of the first free resources I have seen focused on offering a complete picture of audience composition for just about any site.  In the past, I have found Alexa.org (the main competitor for free data) to be notoriously unreliable, and other options such as Nielson Netratings and Comscore are wonderfully thorough - but often out of the price range for many smaller organizations and clients (and therefore not as widely used).  The beauty of Quantcast's solution is in the dashboard view (see screenshots below) that allows you to now compare sites large and small to one another.  In speaking with Konrad, a key challenge he noted for advertisers is finding large pockets of a particular audience on sites beyond the top tier media properties.  For smaller publishers, the corresponding challenge is that they cannot field a large sales force to promote their sites and therefore must rely on online channels.

Good media planning is an art - but when it comes to interactive many media planners are taking the easy way out ... simply skimming the surface, picking the largest sites in a particular category without much thought.  Aside from the inventory glut this is creating on the largest players, it is also leaving a large number of sites either ignored, or only approached by the saaviest of interactive media planners.  The mission of Quantcast, as Konrad described, was to even the playing field by allowing advertisers easier access to consistent data, and giving publishers more visibility from advertisers and the chance to be judged based on metrics and quantifiable data.  Taking Quantcast for a spin, it's obvious there is lots of potential in this tool.  As Quantcast gets more sites to become "quantified" by registering their site and adding a tracking GIF - this data will continue to improve.  In the meantime, the site is already a very useful tool for anyone looking to better understand audience figures across a range of sites and verify the inflated numbers some sites have put out to entice advertisers.  Keeping publishers honest and helping advertisers think outside of the box ... seems like a great combination to me.

Note: For a more PR centric view of the potential uses for Quantcast, check out my post on the Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence blog.

Screenshot of Audience Data for www.dooce.com:

Screenshot of Comparison Data for ESPN, Paypal, MTV, Macys and Target:

Screenshot of Audience Data for YouTube.com:

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Umbria Provides Marketers with Blogger Lists for Sale

On Monday, Umbria announced a new service that helps marketers to answer what is becoming a more and more common question - which bloggers are most influential for my brand or industry?  While there are many tools and methods that can be used to uncover these bloggers, the Umbria Connect service promises to provide marketers with "a monthly list of bloggers (URLs) based on your selects for age and gender that spoke either positively or negatively about your topic of interest."  Similar in scope to what email list providers have been doing for many years now, it seems to be positioned as a quick and easy solution for organizations to skip the time consuming research phase of identifying key bloggers and focus their efforts on engagement.  To ensure quality results, Umbria describes a methodology of "cleansing the data using a 3-step process that includes using machine learning algorithms and human review to remove spam, false positives, and other data that aren’t pertinent to the clients defined topics."

As a tool, I see a lot of promise in this new service - assuming it is coupled with a smart social media marketing strategy.  Just as with email lists, you need to understand what you are purchasing and what the rules of engagement are.  Blindly reaching out to any list of bloggers provided in a report by anyone is unlikely to work - and more likely to result in backlash.  Umbria Connect offers a great way to save time, but not at the expense of ignoring the first principle of pitching bloggers ... reading their blogs.  Regardless, it will be interesting to see if bloggers in particular industries start to see an increase in attention from marketers and advertisers as a result of tools like Umbria's.  Assuming it leads to more ad dollars and better pitches, that could be a good thing.  Let's see if it turns out that way.

(Via MarketingVox and BtoB)
 

Ideas for Marketing with Fantasy Games Online

On Friday last week, there was a great piece by Julia Beizer in the Washington Post Express about a different category of fantasy games that offer an alternative to Fantasy Football.  Now officially giving up on my Fantasy Football team after losing my two star players in back to back weeks to season ending injuries, I may just be seeking an alternative fantasy league myself.  For those readers of my blog unfamiliar with the American phenomenon of Fantasy Football - the premise is very simple: choose a player at each position from any team, and each week your "fantasy team" gains points based on how each of these individual players performs.  In this way, you can combine the best players from multiple teams and have a stake in multiple NFL games as you watch how each of your players perform.  As I have commented before on this blog, it's a brilliant brand extension strategy for the NFL that keeps it's brand front and center during the football season, and leverages the statistical element of the game to deepen it's relationship with NFL fans.

Now, however, the idea of fantasy gaming is starting to travel beyond football ... and even beyond sports.  The Tabloid Fantasy League is a great example, allowing people to choose their roster of stars and win points each time a star appears on the cover of a tabloid or gossip mag.  Of course, you lose points if your stars are busted by the cops ... or the fashion police.  The rise of concepts like this raises an interesting truth about the power that fantasy games can have to raise an individual's personal stake in just about anything.  In each case, the core benefit is engagement at a deeper and more personal level.  In a way, this is the reason why online stock trading has become so successful.  By removing the barrier to trading and watching investments, you can come up with your own "fantasy portfolio" with real money, and track your investments real time.  Here are a few other ideas for how fantasy games could be used by real world marketers to extend their brands and engage customers:

1. AMC Opening Weekend Fantasy - Each weekend, you can bet on the movies that will have the largest opening weekends.  Tie this into movie marketing and viral campaigns already being launched for many movie openings, and this could be a big idea in Hollywood.
2. Technorati Blog Fantasy - Despite the often discussed inconsistencies in how Technorati reports inbound links to blogs, tying a fantasy game into the currently existing Blog Favourites list could offer a great hook for users to continually check back into Technorati.  Readers could get points based on how many inbound links posts from their favourite blogs get over the course of a week.
3. AllRecipes/Whole Foods Food Fantasy - One of the best recipe sites out there, AllRecipes, could launch a fantasy game that lets site visitors select products to add to their fantasy lineup and win points based on how many views of recipes that use those ingredients get, or even tie it into sales data from a large grocery chain such as Whole Foods to win points based on bestselling items. 
4. PRWeek Fantasy Placements - This one is likely to get us in trouble, but what if the entire PR industry could select fantasy teams based on clients, stories, and PR agencies?  All readers of PRWeek could choose which clients, stories or PR agencies are likely to get prominent news placements on online and offline media and win points based on the favorability and prominence of the placement.

I am sure there are lots more ideas for how fantasy games could be used for marketing, though my favourite so far comes from the civic sector.  The Fantasy Congress (mentioned in Beizer's original piece), is a site where you can "draft" senators and representatives and earn points as they introduce legislation and make law.  As one of the founders of the site says, "if people cared about government as much as they cared about sports, we'd have a much better government."  I'm heading to the site right now to choose my fantasy congress.  Unfortunately, the way my luck has gone for Fantasy Football, I wouldn't be surprised if I lost my chosen Senator to a season ending sex scandal before too long ...

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Using YouTube to Launch a Global Movement: The Story of Free Hugs

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