Still doubt mobile is important?

According to Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google, if you weren't already aware), people have stopped sitting around the TV with their laptop and have started using their phones to access the information that an advertisement sparks interest in during a viewing. For example, during the Super Bowl (perhaps the last relevant real-time TV program left, from an advertiser's perspective):

1. Mobile searches on Chrysler went up 102 times, compared to 48 times on desktops,
2. Mobile searches for GoDaddy increased 315 times, compared with only 38 times on desktops

Additionally:

1. More than 200 million YouTube videos are viewed on a mobile device daily.
2. 78% of smartphone users use their phones to access information while they are shopping.
3. Between one and two billion people without Internet access will be connected over the next few years, many of them solely over a mobile device.

Growing Pains

The one thing that has attracted me to the emerging media industry so strongly in the last few months is the sense of opportunity that surrounds it. As I've gotten deeper and deeper into the "social media" world (quotations because that means so many different things to so many different people) the more I've realized that nobody really has any clue what they are doing yet--or if there is someone who knows what they're doing, you have to look really, really hard to find them. Many PR and advertising firms have just sort of ad-hoc added social media to their repertoire of skills without taking into consideration what that really means, much less putting in place metrics to figure out how they're doing and what success really means. It feels like we're coming into (or are we already there?) a new age of how companies and consumers relate to one another, and it's really exciting.

That being said, considering the importance that social media is going to have in the coming years, it is shocking that UNC isn't taking steps to address it in its academic curriculum. I have heard of two classes that address it in depth, both taught by Gary Kayye, and both through the Journalism School. Even at the conference I attended on Sunday, the attendees kept being generalized as "PR and journalism students". It made me want to raise my hand and point out that other people besides those in the J-School were concerned with social media and the direction it was taking.

The topic was mostly given lip-service in my intro to marketing class. And with good reason; why should we expect professors to teach us about topics that 90% of companies and corporations have yet to figure out?

UNC Social Media and Related Technology Conference: Takeaways

I attended a five hour social media-centric conference today. I have mixed feelings about it because, although it was a great conference filled with great people, I wasn't exactly its target audience. The subjects were more geared towards social media novices trying to leverage the tools to build a career, and very few speakers approached the subject from a business perspective, my primary interest in the topic.

Maybe the funniest moment of the day was when Jeffrey Cohen from Howard, Merrill & Partners used Google's caching service to bring up Marvin Austin's tweets from over the summer, discovering: "I deleted my txt messages foolz, how they gon git me now!? #unc". Obviously, they still got him.

Live from UNC SMART Conference

I'm currently at UNC's SMART (Social Media and Related Technologies) Conference, the first social media-centric conference to be hosted on campus. I'm learning a lot so far--topics covered have included blogging, location-based services such as Yelp!, and the path of social media from 2007 to the present. Topics yet to come include Twitter and the future of social media. I'm excited about some of the speakers coming up and I'll be back later in the afternoon with some key takeaways from the conference. Follow me on twitter @taylor_w_smith to see constant updates under #uncsmart.

Pauly D Bashes Miracle Whip, Kraft Aims to Whip Up Supporters

I've never professed to be a fan of Jersey Shore. I think it's fascinating from a purely academic and pop-cultural standpoint, but the actual people involved in the creation of the show disgust me (full disclosure: I must admit that I am incredibly jealous/depressed that Snooki is a New York Times best selling author, thereby making her more successful from a commercial writing standpoint than I will ever be). Even more fascinating is that Miracle Whip has enlisted the aid of one Pauly D in order to sell its product.



Apparently, Miracle Whip is not up to Jersey standards. This is an interesting campaign: on one hand, Miracle Whip is actually paying a celebrity to bash its product on an open forum for discussion. On the other hand, why would any company want to be approved of by a Jersey Shore cast member.

I hate mayonnaise (or "sandwich spread", as Miracle Whip prefers to be called, as it can also be used as salad dressing) and have never purchased any for myself, so I personally cannot speak to the quality of Miracle Whip. However, the fact that Pauly D hates it makes me like Miracle Whip more. After all, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Miracle Whip has invited viewers to comment on its YouTube page expressing either their undying love or burning hatred for Miracle Whip. With 76,000 views as of this writing, it will be interesting to see whether Kraft can spark the sort of discussion/argument they seem to be picking. Might Miracle Whip supporters take to the streets in support of their beloved spread? Mount an internet campaign against Pauly D? Let's see just how passionate mayonnaise fans are.

Mr. Splashy Pants, or How I Learned to Give Up Control and Love the Conversation

Alexis Ohanian, the founder of popular news aggregator site Reddit.com, has a great TED Talk concerning social media. It's not very long, you can watch it here, and I'll discuss it after.

Measuring Social Media ROI by Argyle Social

Short post today. Just wanted to give a shoutout to Argyle Social who recently published a great white paper on measuring social media ROI, which expounds upon many of the ideas of theirs that I discussed a few days ago. It is a great read and has been well received by the larger community. It comes with my highest recommendation.

--Taylor

just split the sky and free me to be golden

The Boundaries of Private

Nir Rosen, a former New York University fellow, resigned today over an offensive tweet he made regarding the sexual assault of CBS reporter Lara Logan in Cairo on Tuesday.

The Logan story has been repeated ad nauseum by this point, so I'll spare you the gory details. What I'm more interested in is Rosen's understanding (or lack thereof) of the boundaries between private and public comments on the Internet.

Rosen seemed to suggest over his Twitter account that Logan would enjoy the attention she would get over such an incident, perhaps even showing up touted newsman Anderson Cooper. When he was called out on his offensive statements, he remarked that "it would have been funny if it happened to Anderson too".

Rosen deleted both tweets, but to no avail; his comments were saved for posterity via the ubiquity of the Internet, and presumably saved in the Library of Congress.

Rosen later apologized, saying he "forgot that Twitter is not exactly private".

This seems like a 'well duh' moment. However, the quick pace of Twitter bears special notice. Facebook posts are somewhat different; although someone could take a screenshot of a status update and share it, Twitter has the unique capacity through its retweet function to make a post go viral almost instantaneously.

Sysomos has published that Twitter users are generally connected by five degrees of separation; the average US adult stands, on average, six degrees from another given individual. This speaks volumes of the reach that a single tweet can have in a very, very short amount of time. As seen today, this capacity can have devastating effects on lives and careers.

I am not trying to condemn Mr. Rosin; there is no doubt in my mind that similar (or worse) jokes were made in frat houses, living rooms, and on more anonymous message boards over the course of the past twenty four hours. We all make mistakes and say things that we probably shouldn't, myself included. However, we must utilize extra caution when posting things to networks such as Twitter. A seemingly harmless post meant only for our friends and family can quickly rocket out of control.

Thanks to Mashable for providing information for this story.

--Taylor

let it warm us from within

A Bit of a Leap, There

Russell Brand has a brilliant stand-up bit where he reads hate mail from angry viewers aloud to his audiences. He reads profane insult after profane insult, he finally reaches a segment that claims he supports "terrorists who destroy the world," causing him to proclaim, "A bit of a leap!".

I had a similar reaction to Twitter CEO Dick Costolo's keynote at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

He claimed that Twitter has become an ad-hoc partner with television, allowing viewers to comment on what they are seeing in real-time with people across the country. This has helped make television shows events again and emphasized the importance of watching television in real-time, rather than recorded on the DVR, that bane of networks that allows viewers to consume media and skip over advertising.

Even more promising, Costolo claimed that Twitter activity feeds support the notion that viewers are sticking around for the commercials--and not just on Super Bowl Sunday.

OK. I can dig it. We've already heard stories of people going on social media blackouts to avoid ruining the end of a favorite TV show or the result of a missed sporting event. As Twitter continues to grow and swallow up more channels of information, it will become more and more important to make sure that we consume information at the same time as everyone else to make sure that we are up to speed. Makes sense.

Costolo compared Twitter several times to water, calling his website "a utility so useful and ubiquitous, we almost forget it's there".

A bit of a leap!

Although I applaud Twitter for resisting the urge to copy Facebook's every move (Costolo has proclaimed that there will be no Twitter phone), the service is hardly ubiquitous. In fact, it seems to be all but useless to most users--Sysomos estimates that 22.5% of users account for 90% of Twitter's activity. It is a service that seems to be of great value to some and of very little to others. Doesn't sound like a great description of water to me.

There is no doubt in my mind that Twitter will continue to innovate, add features, and grow in importance. But until then, Mr. Cosotlo would do well to avoid such grandiose statements and gestures.


Thanks to CNN and Mashable for providing information for this post.

The Tracking Problem

Eric Boggs from Argyle Social came in and spoke with us the other day about the importance of tracking where exactly your traffic comes from, especially with regards to Facebook and social media.

Whenever you see a ? followed by a string of numbers and letters after a URL, that is a tracking code in order to tell the website you are visiting where you are coming from so that the website can correctly monitor its traffic. If you click on a link after a search result from Google or Bing, this string of characters does not appear; the website doesn't know the difference between that and you just typing the URL into your browser and visiting that website directly.

The problem is particularly evident when using Facebook. When you click on a link from Facebook, those tracking characters disappear. To the website you are visiting, it can tell that you are from Facebook, but it can't tell exactly how you got there from Facebook. You might have clicked on a link on a friend's wall, or one of the posts from your brand's news feed. Obviously, these are very different leads that should be treated differently, and without this information, you are unable to differentiate between the two. There are several problems with this.

One, this offers no way to tell which of your social media campaigns are being productive and driving the most traffic to your website. This is a huge issue from a marketer's perspective, as those sorts of people generally like to know which expenditures are generating the most return on their investment. If traffic from Facebook is all just viewed as "Facebook" and not broken down into individual posts, contests, or status updates, then it becomes very difficult to monitor the ROI of specific activities or campaigns. This makes it almost impossible to optimize one's Facebook promotional activities.

This problem grows even more complex when one views it from the vantage point of a mobile device (specifically, a mobile device using a Facebook app, not visiting m.facebook.com from a cell phone). If one clicks on a link from a Facebook app, that website has no idea where you came from. You are an "unattributed user," and there is no difference between that visit and just typing the website URL into your browser directly. Considering that the percentage of social media consumed over a mobile device is already substantial and predicted to grow drastically, this is a significant issue.

Argyle Social comes into the picture as a developer of software that allows firms to track exactly which posts (and authors) generate the most traffic. This is incredibly helpful information, and marketers who try to measure ROI without capabilities similar to the ones provided by Argyle are kidding themselves.

On a more sinister note, the availability of this software coupled with the general newness of the social media industry provides for a moral hazard. Marketers have an incentive to not use tracking software such as this, because once they do they have to start being responsible and accountable for the traffic that they generate. If they don't use the software, they can simply point to friend counts and follower numbers--look at how popular we are! But, of course, this isn't a measure of ROI. At the end of the day, marketing is about selling something. As I read somewhere, "if you just want to talk to somebody, become a secretary".

Not that talking isn't important--I've devoted the past two days to talking about talking to people--but what is your end goal? As a company, it is to increase your bottom line. The way in which one goes about doing that is drastically different than it has ever been before, but let's not lose sight of that goal.

For a more in-depth (and no doubt more intelligent) review of Argyle's software, please refer to Jay Dolan's work over at Anti-Social Media, which is a great and hysterical blog in its own right, even if I am the sort of person and blogger that Mr. Dolan hates.

--Taylor

and then i woke up

This is a new one

The fashion industry continues to be at the forefront of innovation when it comes to using newer social media tools such as Foursquare and Twitter.



Swatch ran a promotion in which they covered a model with over 100 watches, with the catch being that if a partygoer tweeted @swatchus with an appropriate hashtag, the model would remove a watch from the dress and give it to them. Predictably, it took just under an hour and a half for the model to be stripped bear of watches, revealing a Swatch-promoting cover underneath. Pretty clever.

Courtesy Mashable.com (http://mashable.com/2011/02/14/swatch-girl/#10031-1)

Three Criteria of Leadership

"Most leadership that we're doing is about finding a group that's disconnected but already has a yearning, not persuading people to want something they don't have yet"

Seth Godin points out in the video that I discussed yesterday that all leaders challenge the status quo; in essence, they are heretics. They are unwilling to accept things the way they are and are willing to stand up for that one thing that is important to them and find others that agree with them.

Apple does not sell computers. Apple sells a way of life. Apple says to its consumers, "We think differently. We challenge the status quo. We are unwilling to accept the standard conventions of computing and we are willing to push the boundaries of aesthetics and performance until we reach a sublime merger of art and personal technology."

Think about why Apple's MP3 players have been wildly successful and have become an integral part of American pop culture whereas Dell's MP3 players have failed on a very fundamental level. At first glance, it doesn't make any sense. As one of the leading computer manufacturers of the 2000s, Dell is arguably much more qualified to make MP3 players than Apple is. However, think about the message each company presents to consumers:

Dell: "Our MP3 player has 80 GB of storage. It costs two hundred and fifty dollars. Would you like to buy one?"

Apple: "We have created our MP3 player out of frustration with the current state of the world of technology. We have blurred the lines between art and technology to create an experience that is at once engaging and simple. Join us."

I would hope it's obvious which pitch is more compelling (I took the brunt of this argument from this TED Talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action.html).

Godin asks us to view leadership in light of three questions:
1) Who are you upsetting?
We can't change anything if we aren't challenging the established way of doing something.
2) Who are you connecting?
People yearn to be connected--Godin points out that the thing people want more than anything is to be missed. Tribe leaders can fill that need.
3) Who are you leading?

Finally, leaders:
1) Challenge the status quo
2) Build a culture
3) Commit to the tribe

Many people object to a leadership position because they don't think they have what it takes. Godin notes that although all leaders have charisma, leadership does not require charisma; rather, leadership inspires the leader with the confidence they need to become charismatic. Charisma is an afterthought of leadership, not a prerequisite.

Social media gives us an unparalleled opportunity to connect with those that think like us. Brands have the incredible opportunity to become tribe leaders, and far too many simply use the medium as an extension of the traditional television message-pushing role.

What would it mean to challenge the way your customers think? What would it mean to step up and become the leader of your tribe?

--Taylor

i asked you not to keep me waiting

The American Stages of Thought Leadership

Seth Godin is a ridiculously smart and talented fellow. In my research on social media, he has been a wonderful resource on the impact and forces affecting social media. In particular, I have been grooving on this particular TED Talk of his, from which I am gleaning these particular insights: http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead.html

While there are countless insights crammed into this 17 minute video, I want to focus on the points he makes at the 4 minute mark, which revolve around the evolution of leadership in America.

He begins with the factory cycle, in which leadership centered around increasing efficiency of labor and machinery in order to "change the fabric of an entire country". The problem, as Godin points out, is that we are running out of both cheaper labor and faster machines--foreign nations are out-competing us in both regards.

The introduction of television changed this. Instead of leveraging cheaper labor and faster machines, we leveraged giant amounts of money in order to push our ideas onto the world. Volume ruled; as Seth notes, the marketer acts as a sort of king, deciding what ideas go out to the peons below him. One's level of influence is only limited by the amount of money he or she is willing to spend on advertising.

The advent of social media has completely changed this dynamic. No longer are consumers limited to the messages that marketers push on them; they are empowered with the ability to join in the conversation and connect with their peers in order to develop a message themselves. One needs only to look as far as the BP disaster this summer to see this effect at work. No matter how many ad spots BP bought pushing their message of apology and renewed environmental responsibility, they were not able to swing the dynamics of the conversation away from a witty guy (or gal) with a Twitter account named BPGlobalPR.

And thus, we are introduced to the newest stage of marketing and thought leadership, one that Seth Godin calls that of Tribes. Humans have always gravitated towards those with similar interests as them, be it through churches, political parties, book clubs, or bowling leagues. What the Internet has done is make it ridiculously easy to find those similar to us, no matter how niche or unusual our interest, or assort ourselves into Tribes, if you will.

In this stage of leadership, we gain traction not by pushing a message out onto the masses, but by stepping up and volunteering to take ownership over a preexisting tribe. Godin points to the Beatles and Bob Marley as two Tribe Leaders; they did not invent their respective followers, they merely volunteered to become a figurehead for similar ways of thinking.

Think about nearly every social media campaign you have ever seen. What was its purpose? Most likely, its aim was simply to be an extension of a TV advertisement, pushing out a brand message onto Twitter followers or Facebook friends. The companies that truly connect with their followers inspire tribe-like fellowships. See: Apple, Zappos, Toms, et al.

The next time you see a social media marketing campaign, look at it critically. Does it inspire conversation? Divergent thinking? A cause higher than selling something?

--Taylor

is my life about to change? who knows? who cares?