Yum! Brands Launches FeedBags to Help Americans Eat More Fast Food

New Wearable Feedbags Let Americans Eat More, Move Less

"Insurance Company Rules"

Viral Policy Advocacy. It's going to be interesting to see how issues are fought over in the future. Expect a lot of YoutTube...

BTS at Womanly World Magazine

How Sweet the Idea, Verizon Wireless!

Of all the emerging digital platforms, the one that is least intuitive for me is mobile. I know the stats, I know what's going on, and intellectually I understand the power behind it. But it's tough for me to feel it because for me a cellphone is a utility, not an entertainment device.

But when I saw the "How Sweet the Sound" Gospel promotion from Verizon Wireless, I could finally feel it. I am a gospel fan, though perhaps surprisingly I am not a terribly religious person. But anyone who has visited a large black church (I prefer "urban contemporary" or "black" gospel, but there are four other subgenres with their throngs of devotees) with a good choir knows that you don't need to "believe" for Gospel to put a smile on your face and lift your day.

How Sweet the Sound is a gospel choir competition in which choirs record vids of their choirs and submit them to the contest. there are two tiers:

Small/medium choirs of 6-35 participants
Large choirs of 36-100 participants

Piloted last year in Memphis only, HSTS is now a national program. Any church-related choir can participate - the church needs to be a 501c3 nonprofit. Choirs are judged on a battery of criteria -- here is the list.

In the first round, 5 minute vids are submitted and a subset will be posted for consumer voting. From there, the semifinalists will be judged by professionals. These regional winners will be selected at an in-person event.



From there the regional winners advance to an in person national event. Verizon Wireless will be videoing the winner, and making the video available as part of its popular VCast entertainment offering. Additionally, they'll be offering downloads and ringtones, to make it a truly mobile-integrated program.

What I like about this program:

1. It is a music program beyond the kerplunk hip hop music competition genre that has been adopted as the defacto way of reaching an African American audience. I am not disparaging hip hop but rather saying this to celebrate Verizon Wireless's wisdom in finding other genres where its program can stand out and reach a broad audience.

2. It has online, mobile, and in-person components. Ya gotta have in-person because there's nothing like gospel in person, and it will give Verizon Wireless opps for signage, messages, and sign-ups.

3. It reaches out to (mostly) black churches -- there is a lot of research that suggests that black churchgoers are highly brand loyal and reward those firms who support their organizations with purchases and brand loyalty. Basically what Verizon Wireless is saying with this program is that they want to be part of this massive and eminently positive network of organizations that are firmly connected to thousands of communities across the country.

4. It is commercial but respectful. It invites people to use Verizon Wireless, but it doesn't demand it. I bet loads of people will accept the nice invitation.

5. It showcases VCast and the plethora of mobile phones they offer that provide good sound fidelity and streaming video.

6. It recognizes the absolutely gigantic gospel fan community -- with one in four Americans being "born again," you better believe that there are throngs of people buying albums, MP3s, and ringbacks.

This is a great program, and I bet it really pulls in the subs. People like companies that support what they love. I'll bet a lot of them'll be saying ATT can keep its iPhones. ;-)

I'll leave you with a bit of Yolanda Adams. She's got pipes -- and should be on that playlist of yours.



Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Meetro Post Mortem - Go Look...

You should have a wander over to the Meetro post mortem page. Meetro was a location based social network that connected you to nearby people who might interest you. What;s interesting about the post is both that it was done and also the honest and forthright analysis of the challenges of location based social media.

Here's an excerpt to tease you into going to visit this final post of the company.

We launched our product and got all of our friends in Chicago on it. We then had the largest papers in the area do nice detailed write-ups on us. Things were going great. We had hundreds of active users and you could feel the buzz around it. We threw a few parties that continued to support the good mood all around. Hell, our CTO Sam even met his current girlfriend at one of them.

The problem we would soon find out was that having hundreds of active users in Chicago didn’t mean that you would have even two active users in Milwaukee, less than a hundred miles away, not to mention any in New York or San Francisco. The software and concept simply didn’t scale beyond its physical borders.

The piece also puts forth some interesting thoughts and predictions that you should check out.

And it was very classy of them to post this fascinating and insightful piece. It musta hurt to write it...

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Netiquette and Brand Reputation

I have been thinking a great deal about brand reputation management this week. One of the things I've found on the topic that I liked a lot was this piece by Will Beresford, Strategy Director at Beyond Analysis. Entitled "Social Netiquette for Brands, - A 10-Step Guide To Winning New Friends On the Social Web," it outlines -- you guessed it -- ten simple and telegraphic steps to better build and preserve your social aura online.

Check it out.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

TypoTrawler and TypoTracker - Arbitraging Text Mistakes on eBay

I am an eBay buying nut, so when I heard about a bizarre app/community site called TypoTrawler, I had to have a look.

If you are not much of an eBayer, let me tell you one little secret. Pricing in an auction is directly related to the searchability of a listing. If the would-be seller uses the right brand name and descriptive words, the listing comes up in searches more frequently -- and higher. More top spots in search results? More bids!

But when - it's not an if -- a seller makes a mistake in typing the descriptive text of an item, then the listing won't appear in search. Meaning a heckuvalot fewer people will actually see the listing. The result? BARGAINS!

The trouble is, how do you search for the unsearchable? What keywords do you use for misspelling searches. Misspelled ones of course, but that would be a lot of trial and error.

Enter TypoTrawler. using this app, the buyer inputs what they are searching for and the system finds misspelling of the query. Users are invited to thumbs up or thumbs down listings based upon whether the typo appears to be having the desired effect on the bid price.

Is it unfair? I am sure some sellers will think so. But if you view eBay as a gigantic flea market, it's the equivalent of picking up an original Renoir for $4 from someone clearing out the garage. ANd I don't see many sellers stopping an auction that's going wild by saying, "Enough, everyone, that's all it's worth!"

It's not magic. Obviously it's catch as catch can. Services like this have appeared in the past, but these searches appear to be a little better.

Choose TypoTracker if you know EXACTLY what you want, and TypoTrawler if you are just browsing. Either way you may -- or may not -- find a bargain. But if you're a heavy eBayer, it's worth a flutter!

And the thing is, the key reason to go to eBay is to find bargains. So sellers...better check your spellings. And buyers? Surf on over imemdiately.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Is It Time For You to Get Hitched at SharedWeddings?

With Cory and Gretchen's wedding last month, weddings have been on my mind of late, and one fascinating social/nuptial site called SharedWeddings has definitely gotten my attention.

It's also an Irish start-up, which helps me fulfill the promise I made to an expat to review more Eireo 2.0 companies in the next week.

But regardless of where it's from, SharedWeddings is worth your attention. But first a little wedding background.

Weddings are big business. Actually they are huge business. This article from Black Enterprise says that every year wedding companies of all shapes and sizes chalk up between $38B and $42B annually. You've got venues, photographers, videographers, tuxes, invitations, dresses, food, bouquets, liquor, bands/DJs, and of course the cake, which can routinely run you $15 a slice. The average wedding, I am told, goes for about $20K.

So it's not at all hard to understand why there are many digital companies in this space.

SharedWeddings offers a comprehensive communications solution for weddings. With it you can:

Make a free password protected wedding website for your personal nuptials, including a choice of templates
Avail yourself of wedding planning tools so you know what to do when
Inform guests about your wedding details, pre-wedding events, directions, maps, etc.
Use their free blogging platform
Guests can RSVP online
Create multiple photo albums
Offer an entertaining wedding quiz and poll
Display your registry information
Collect and display user comments
Visit and participate in wedding forums

In terms of looks, the templates are attractive but very much focused on functionality versus bling. Having seen some wedding sites out there, I think that is a good thing. Anyone, from webizen to Great Grandma can figure out these mini sites.

Now it's time for the usual OLDMTA refrain...I am not sure what the revenue model is...I don't see ads though I would imagine their either they or CPA referral services to venues, dressmakers, planners, etc. are in the offing. Happily for SharedWeddings, there are no shortages of revenue opps in the wedding sector. It's a nice product, and of course free which makes it even nicer.

Now, there are probably those who think that couples would be fine blowing a couple hundred on Flash site templates at one of the many paid wedding hosting sites out there. But I think there are millions of customers that want to control costs any way they can. And for them...SharedWeddings is a great opp.

And if you are a wedding marketer, it'll be a great community to be a part of.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Larry "I have a wide stance" Craig - Oh This Was An Unfortunate Thing to Say

Thanks to Talking Points Memo for finding it.

Copy Genius

If there is a prize for best online copy - 10 words or less - whoever wrote this Ragu banner should be the winner.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

What's Your Brand Rep?

I really appreciated Peter Hershberg's commentary in MediaPost this week on "Five Ways to Manage Your Brand Reputation" online. Five simple ideas that so few companies seem to have internalized. But today is a fresh chance to do so.

Anyway, check it out here.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

White Paper Thursdays: Search Benchmarking Study - Gratis!

Over on Marketing Sherpa they've made available an exec summary of their search marketing benchmark study. The doc, available here, is a tight overview of what's happening and what appears to be working best in search.

Grab it right now!

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

WHITE PAPER THURSDAYS: SMS Marketing

A nice succinct white paper on SMS marketing, prepared by MobileStorm, is available over in the DMNews white papers section. Good stuff including an in English glossary and some sound advice on how to use SMS to your advantage, particularly in the area of CRM. Get it here (reg req'd.)

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

WHITE PAPER THURSDAYS! UGC VIDEO ADVERTISING

TDG has released a much anticipated report about the state of video advertising on UGC video content. The findings show that while professional video content is in high demand, UGC is emphatically NOT.



Download the exec summ of the presentation here on Videonuze. It's a fascinating report!

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Google's New Social Search

Apparently Google is testing a new search interface combining their trad n tru search with social features. Check out the demo courtesy of TechCrunch:



If you know me you know I am not a huge fan of Google, not because what they do is bad but rather because we need two large competitors in Search AT LEAST to ensure competition and innovation. So I Yahoo! and actually I think their offering is better. But this is certainly thought provoking.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

PCs is FLYING out the door

According to Gartner, Inc., that venerable research outfit that, among other things, covers the PC hardware biz, has just released sales figures for PCs for Q2 and they are good.

Sales are up 4.2 percent versus YAGO.

The big winners are Dell and Apple, which grew share 2.2 points and 1.4 points respectively.

Anybody else surprised by Apple's share? Not the growth, the total figure. Last time I checked, which was admittedly about the time of the discovery of fire, their share was more like 3%. That was back when I had just purchased an iMac in tangerine (should have been called lemon based upon the number of times it crashed in a day.) I understand from the Catalystsa Apple freaks John and Adam and Riley that Apples is stable as can be now. In any case, bravo to Cupertino and Cupertino.



Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Rep Markey Wants More Info About Embarq and NebuAd

In this MediaPost news story, they report that NebuAd continues to be under Congressional scrutiny despite the generally friendly reception they got last week at the Commerce Committee hearing on BT and privacy.

According to the piece, ISP Embarq CEO Tom Gerke was sent a letter that questioned whether his company had provided robust notice to consumers about the tests they ran with NebuAd.

The text of the letter, which I found on Congressman Markey's site, appears below:

July 14, 2008

Mr. Tom Gerke
Chief Executive Officer
Embarq
5454 W. 110th Street
Overland Park, KS 66211

Dear Mr. Gerke:

We are writing with respect to a recent test conducted by Embarq to tailor Internet advertising to the web-browsing patterns of individual Embarq subscribers. We are interested in the nature of this test as well as the impact that this test, and the underlying technology it employed, could have on consumer privacy and other issues.

We understand that Embarq conducted a test earlier this year in a select community in conjunction with NebuAd to create consumer profiles for the purpose of serving ads to consumers based upon their search and surfing habits. As you may know, questions have been raised regarding the applicability of privacy protections contained in the Communications Act of 1934, the Cable Act of 1984, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and other statutes, to such practices.

In particular, we are concerned that Embarq may not have directly notified the subscribers involved in the test that their Web use was being analyzed and profiled. We therefore request that you answer the following questions in order for us to better understand the nature of the test conducted, its impact on consumers, and the broader public policy implications of this technology.

1. In what community was the test conducted and how was that community chosen?

2. How many subscribers were involved in the test?

3. How did Embarq notify subscribers in the affected community of the test? Please provide a copy of the notification. If Embarq did not specifically or directly notify affected subscribers, please explain why this was not done.

4. Did Embarq conduct a legal analysis regarding the applicability of consumer privacy laws on the service used in the test? If so, please explain what that analysis concluded.

5. Please explain why Embarq chose to conduct the test allowing consumers who objected to "opt out" rather than first asking customers to "opt in."

6. How did Embarq notify subscribers in the affected community of their opportunity to "opt-out" of the test? If Embarq did not specifically or directly notify effected subscribers of the opportunity to "opt-out," please explain why this was not done.

7. How many subscribers in the affected community opted out of participating in the test?

8. Did Embarq conduct a legal analysis regarding the adequacy of the "opt-out" notice and mechanism employed to allow consumers to effectuate this choice? If so, please explain what that analysis concluded.

9. What is the status of the consumer data collected during this test? Has it been destroyed?

Thank you in advance for your attention to this matter. We respectfully request a response by Monday, July 21, 2008.

I don't know if Embarq notified their customers or not beyond including info about it in its privacy policy, though this passage from the MediaPost article indicates that many ISPs that worked with NebuAd did not.

But software researcher Robb Topolski, who recently tested NebuAd and concluded that the program violated users' expectations of privacy, said the vast majority of the Internet service providers who worked with NebuAd did not seem to send separate notifications to subscribers. Instead, they apparently placed information about the program in their terms of service, privacy policies or other lengthy documents subscribers generally ignore.

I am anxious to see Embarq's response. What constitutes robust notice is ill defined by the government, at least in form. The government, to my knowledge, does not have a proscribed process by which consumers are to be informed.

Is it enough to put it in the privacy policy? Is it enough to put it in a brief and well organized privacy policy? If they put it in the privacy policy, do they then need to alter the customer that the privacy policy has been altered? If so, how must they notify? Would an on site notice do it? Is email OK? Do they need to send a letter?

Presumably the answer to this relates to whether each of the tactics described above resulted in satisfactory levels of consumer awareness.

The googly, from Embarq's perspective, is that the generally accepted means of notification in BT has been in privacy policies. Google, for example, does not send out letter before you download their toolbar telling you that all the places you visit are fair game for analysis.

Will ISP targeting be held to a higher standard than the rest of BT? I think that would be dead wrong. To me, the difference between ISP targeting and traditional BT from a privacy perspective seems to relate to the amount of info collected. A notificaiton process is either right or wrong, whether the BT provider collects 20% of my web visits or 100%. And if i am not mistaken, there are currently a number of companies out there diligently pairing BT data with PII, and they are doing so with modest consumer notification. For example, portals and Facebook. NebbuAd may be collecting more information, but other companies are collecting more PERSONAL information.

I'm not sure what I think the standard should be in terms of the form of notification. But I am sure that it should be applied to all BT, not just the technologies that collect the most complete picture. Because if the latter route were taken, at what point would the amount of data collected lead to the requirement of more outbound notification practices? 99%? 98%? 73%

Off my soapbox.

The challenge of this kind of notification is one of the classic push me pull yous of marketing. Often, the government looks at measures like opt out rates to determine whether the average consumer could be reasonably assumed to be notified. There is a lot of grey area between tucking it away where few will see it and sending out letters or emails.

One of the most interesting answers will be to question 5 -- about why they chose to do opt out rather than opt in.

Markey also released a statement when he informed the world about the request for information.

"Surreptitiously tracking individual users' Internet activity cuts to the heart of consumer privacy. The information collected through NebuAd's technology can be highly personal and sensitive information. Embarq's apparent use of this technology without directly notifying affected customers that their activity was being tracked, collected, and analyzed raises serious privacy red flags."

Ouch.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Have You Seen the Simon's Cat Videos?

These viral vids are EXPLODING across the web. And for good reason.







My dog Sleepy suggested that I remind you that dogs don't do such things.



You can get a decidedly more loyal feline or canine at www.petfinder.com. They've also got rabbits and chickens and pot bellied pigs and turtles over there too.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Shamrock 2.0

My friend Liam, an Irish expat, sent me an email Wednesday in which he said I should write about some Irish Web 2.0 outfits. Well, actually what he said was "Ye know, there ARE companies to write about that AREN'T from Israel, Jimmy, so get feck on with it."

OK, so I found a nice list of them at this site. I'll be shilling several that I like over the next week, and the first I want to highlight is Dial2Do, based in Dublin.

Dial2Do is pretty effin neat. It's a phone service that makes it easier to do communications stuff. First you join and input a list of contacts. From there, what you do is mostly voice based. You call a number and it asks you three (or should I say t'ree) questions:

1. What do you want to do? Email, text, etc.
2. Who would you like to contact? Say names form your contact list.
3. What would you like to say? Dictate after the beep.

Their online hub keeps track of what you send so there's a nice paper trail -- err -- electron trail.

It's more than just email and text, though. You can Twitter, Jaiku, send yourself a sticky reminder, set up an immediate conference call, and more.

And it works in a lot of places besides Temple Bar:

AUSTRALIA: +61280147531
BELGIUM: +3228080756
BULGARIA: +35924917160
CANADA: +16044841955
CANADA: +15149073174
CANADA: +14168002218
CANADA: +17806281814
CANADA: +14037751217
CROATIA: +38517776250
CZECH REPUBLIC: +420246019187
FINLAND: +358942419273
FRANCE: +33170617829
GREECE: +302111768254
IRELAND: +35315262713
ISRAEL: +97237219379
ITALY: +390699268239
MEXICO: +525527895439
NETHERLANDS: +31208903824
NEW ZEALAND: +6499849443
SPAIN: +34911878144
SWEDEN: +46852500653
UK: +442088193991
USA: +12133252615

More places are being added pretty fast as well.

It should come as no surprise to Hibernophiles like me that Dial2Do and many of the other Irish 2.0 outfits are phone-based. Ireland is celly crazy -- or perhaps I should say mobile mad.

You should watch the vid now, if only because there is nothing more pleasant than an Irish accent and because the spokeswoman looks a scosh like a gorgeously youthful Assumpta Fitzgerald from Ballykissangel (Dervla Kirwan.)



And now here's the part of the post where I put a twee photo of storybook Ireland because that prize feck Liam hates how Americans think Ireland is all sheep, red headed Mary Margarets and affably drunk old men named...well...Liam.



And he particularly hates how people think being Irish relates primarily to The Guinness. So I thought I would find the most stereotypical pic to reinforce the stereotype and set him off a bit.



Seriously, all kidding aside, check out Dial2Do. It's cool, no shite.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

WaPo on the Role of Online Reviews

Check out this Wapo article on the importance of online reviews in purchase decisions. Nifty!

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Advice on Boosting Your Reputation...From a Guy with a Great One

Sean Cheyney, VP of Marketing and BizDev for Accuquote, just published a great column on how to earn a strong positive reputation in our industry. Find it here on iMediaconnection. Have a look.

Qoof Up Sales

Israelis strike again with another great 2.0 idea. Qoof is a "video commerce" platform that lets esellers and retailers sell their products through video widgets that can be distributed almost anywhere online.

Billing itself as the first video commerce company, Qoof connects content sites -- publishers, bloggers, affiliate sites, etc. -- to retailers through its widget platform. Publishers place the widget on their sites and download the most relevant products from Qoof to display on their widgets. Back-end reporting lets them keep accurate track of sales driven through the widget so they can collect commissions and optimize the featured product mix.

Publishers can select from a range of widget sizes or define their own player size.

The focus of the Qoof platform is sell sell sell. Unlike most video advertising platforms that emphasize branding, Qoof is DR through and through, measuring its success not by views but by units out the door.

Qoof will produce the DR video for you in their studios, so existing assets don't need to hold potential advertisers back.

Qoof widgets are pretty and inviting, which are of course essential qualities in a user initiated platform like this. Take a look:



Note: I tried to download a working model but as I have no Linkshare ID, the widget would not function. But if you visit their site here you can see a bunch of 'em in action.

Using video as DR media makes a lot of sense in this context. Not everything can be adequetely presented in a 200x200 png.

Another great idea from Israel. Has Silicon Valley lost its dominance?

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Drop.io May Put an End to the Dirtiest Three Letter Word in Digital: FTP

Way back in the bubble days, I got called to interview for a marketing job at a company that gave free online storage to users. Your box was virtually unlimited in size, the content would be preserved forever, and they had pledged never to charge for their services. Oh, and there was no advertising and no plan to add it.

Hmm.

I was new to the whole idea of a business that didn't need to make money -- I remember asking how they expected to earn cash and was told that what mattered was eyeballs, they just needed millions of users to make money. Which puzzled me, so I followed up -- but if you lose money on every user, won't you just lose...more money with more members? The answer is very memorable to me because of the tone in which it was delivered "You dinosaur..." and in its absurdity, "Well, in storage, costs are asymptotic." Which, it turned out, was an adjectivized version of asymptote, a math concept I vaguely remembered as one in which the horizontal line approached zero over time but never quite got there.

My interview was promptly ended and I am sure they found someone much more attuned to the revenue-less business model.

So when I first saw drop.io reviewed yesterday on ARSTechnica, I was a little skeptical. Storage costs money, and I could store things for free for a year.

But happily there is a very tangible, very sound revenue model at Drop.io, and for that I am thankful because this is a really cool product.

FTP is the nastiest three letter combination in digital. Why? Because they rarely work properly. You get a user name and password, input it, end up on some incomprehensible page, get bumped out after 45 seconds, and then find that the user gave you a 1X permission. So then you must call or email, tail between legs, asking for another. And so on.

With Drop.io, you get an easy peasy and secure way to share content online. The system simply asks you to create a url, upload "drop" content, choose a password if you want one, and decide how long you want your content to be stored -- one day to one year. Then share away.



Note what I didn't state in the above? What you DON'T have to enter? No PII! So they clearly aren't going to be selling your data to people or scanning your secret docs to determine the best behaviorally targeted text links to...

Oh, they do charge for larger boxes and additional features, and thank the Lord for that because then they can make money and keep this marvelous service going. You get 100MB free, and then $10 a year per gig. Reasonable in my book.

From a UI standpoint it is a dream. It's like two clicks and you're there. And if you want to share 500 files, you just control click them all and "drop" them all at once. Not 1 by 1.

Right now I pay about $100 a year for a "MyFileFolder" site that offers similar benefits though with a somewhat less convenient management system. But when that expires, you better believe I'll be dropping it. Arr Arr.

Drop what you're doing - oh, sorry, I was going to get really punny. And punny ain't funny. But Drop.io is a goodie.

And FYI, if you are Mr(s) Curious as I am, the .io suffix is the code reserved for British Indian Ocean Territory. Think...Diego Garcia.



Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Can Saff, Eddie, and Patsy Agree on Jackson Fish Market?

The people at Jackson Fish Market should be aware that I mean any association between their message and AbFab as a compliment. But JFM's focus on how beautiful their branded apps are put Edina and Patsy in my head. And Yahoo photos made the rest possible.;-)

Anyway. Jackson Fish Market is a Seattle based start-up that makes simple, elegant web application/destinations and then sells exclusive sponsorships for them to brands. They take a proven consumer need (like ecards and communication)and gorgeously execute it, leaving ample room for a brand presence.

Their first two apps, a simple invitation site called Invitastic and a virtual flower "ecard" service called "They're Beautiful," represent consumer utilities that can be branded by virtually any high quality mark. The former is sponsored by the Dry Soda Company, the latter is waiting for a sponsor.





They also have a carbon footprint reminder app that Saffron would adore.



But the premise behind the company -- the idea that companies need wholly positive experiences with which to associate themselves, is an interesting one. Essentially it takes the concept of "branded content" on a publisher site to a deeper level.

This model has some appeal for me, though I think the challenge will be in the chicken and egg question. I think that many marketers will want to devise the app they want rather than simply branding something unrelated to their core category. This of course is the conundrum of publishing everywhere -- do you create a magazine people want to read or advertisers want to buy pages in?

Since we are in a world where, for better or for worse, consumers play a significantly larger role in determining what content wins or loses online, maybe this chicken before egg concept will lead to more uses and brand exposures than the model I suggested.

In the meantime, while JFM pitches its wares and brands decide what to support, check out their apps, which really are gorgeous. Edina and Pats would be very impressed, even though neither of these gorgeous little things is from La Croix.



Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

The Ad Buck Isn't Stopping with Widgets

emarketer put forward an estimate of total widget ad spend. It shows strong growth, though a small total figure. As of 2008, they estimate that spend will constitute 2.5% of total social media spend, which is of course a small fraction of total online spend. Getting ad dollars in the widget world is indeed a hard slog.



But there are also many signs that companies are incorporating widgets into their broader marketing plans -- as distributed content platforms. So that's good news for the crowd of companies selling widgetry. And makes a lot more sense in my opinion. Microscopic ads are hard to justify -- creating a web site satellite emphatically isn't.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

The McCain Girls Strike Again!

Ok, so I disagree vehemently with their message. I know a good parody when I see one. Combine that with a nice song from my youth - err - young adulthood and you have tasty video. Was bluescreen the greatest adventure ever or what?

Astounding Viral Growth

What's infecting everyone?

Mr T and the Average American

The newly hitched Cory Treffiletti has a great post on his blog about the average American. Stats galore for wonkmeisters like moi.

Ya'll probably read his weekly over at mediapost, but you can get an at least daily dose of Trefftruth at trefilletti.blogspot.com.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Digital Strategic Planning: Post 3

PART THREE: KEY COMPONENTS OF A DIGITAL PROCESS AND ROADMAP

The ideal process for developing a thorough and comprehensive digital strategic plan must be thorough, familiar,and proven. For this reason we generally recommend using the classic brand management key learnings/objectives/strategies/tactics approach:



At minimum, the insights and tactics phases should consider the following digital platforms. This list is constantly growing, but this assortment is a minimum for consideration:



The process is not unusual. But it is very thorough and comprehensive and will provide the insights and direction you need to maximize effectiveness in digital.

CONCLUSIONS

The idea that having a strategic approach to an area of marketing as critical as digital should not be at all surprising. Yet a shocking number of companies dive into the space with little more than a pile of competitor digital activity press releases as a guide. Given the limited resources available for most brands in terms of time and money, it should be clear how taking a strategic approach will pay off in both the short and long terms.

Sightix Poses and Answers a Fascinating Question

Is Google a 1.0 web property? I've never really thought about it until I visited Sightix, an Israeli start up that offers a different kind of search engine designed specifically for collaborative 2.0 sites like social networks.

The idea is to determine relevance both form classic approaches as well as through using a person's identity and their social sphere as a way of refining search results to be more specifically relevant to YOU YOU YOU.

Through their platform the user gets personalized results as well as a social map that defines paths and people that are relevant to fulfilling their needs.

I found a screenshot link on CNET that pointed me to this pic (click to enlarge.)



Very cool looking, no? In this case it appears that the search was for a bar in Berlin, and the results pointed to friends and friends of friends that could offer recommendations. How cool is that?

Anyway, another great idea from Israel. I am convinced every office building in that country houses 100 2.0 startups!

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

9/11 Humour?

I've occasionally wondered how long it would be before a marketer would try to use 911 humorously to sell crap. How soon is too soon? I mean, very little is off limits in a world that has a fashion company sell tween girls right tank tops that say "Who needs math when you've go these?" Thanks for that, Abercrombie. Just the message little girls need. A World in which - no, wait, I am not going to even pretend anything comes close to this.

Behold...



Note to the disgusting people at x-travel.nl -- it's too soon. It may indeed always be too soon to make fun of the deaths of more than 3000 people.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Viral Animal Trix - Anything But Stupid

Why Are Retail Brands So One Way?

(Retailer pride: an impossible dream?)

One of the really interesting developments in branding over the past 25 or so years has been the creation of brands with which consumers identify and participate. Nike was the pioneer, of course, but other brands -- like Cadillac of late, and Abercrombie and Fitch, and i-*.* from Apple -- have also accomplished this. Naturally, the degree to which brands have achieved this objective has varied, but all over the country you will find people who pay lots of money for t-shirts with brand logos, or who build "I love..." websites.

A major step forward in this area has been Social Vibe, a service that connects brands to social media influencers by offering them social compensation, charitable donations, and great creative with which to adorn their personal web pages. You join, find a brand you love, and pick a piece of creative to feature on your profile. Full disclosure: SocialVibe was a C:SF client, so take my endorsement for what you will.

But whether you are thinking about t-shirts or beautiful brand graphics for personal pages, there are some brands that seem not to participate in this at all. And that "some" seems to include most retailers. To prove the point, let's consider what someone would be trying to communicate about themself with a t-shirt bearing the following logos:

Budweiser: American, patriotic, perhaps sports fan, solid, All American
Pepsi: Youthful, perhaps brash, celebrity oriented
Dr. Pepper: individualistic, contrarian
Body Shop: green, socially responsible, organic, natural
M&Ms: kid like, irreverent, geeky cool

Now, consider the following massive brands. What would a t-shirt bearing their logos stand for?

BestBuy
Dillard's
Publix
Wal-Mart

If I saw one, the message I would get is "BestBuy gave out free t-shirts." It would not compute that someone actually paid money -- financially sought out their logo on a t-shirt.

Now I should be honest and say I don't know if these companies sell branded wear. For all I know there is a robust business in Dillard's tanktops, and a vibrant eBay community trading Dillard's designs like others trade Beanie Babies.

OK. So...there are a couple of retailer brands that I could see getting people to buy their shirts -- so long as they were pretty cheap:

Target: because chances are it would have a cool logo design
Whole Foods: greeen, etc.

But it's not a "natural" in the way that selling Pepsi shirts might be.

The point is that most retail brands don't really seek to get consumers to identify with their brands. I think this is a big mistake because many retail brands really make possible a certain lifestyle by offering a range of accoutrement's associated with living a certain kind of existence.

Think about the following:

Macy's: upscale, aspirational lifestyle, a little blingy
Wal-Mart: unabashedly blue collar, 'Merican. This is actually an image a lot of people seek to communicate. Jeff Foxworthy don't sell a lot of redneck books fer nuthin'.



PiggyWiggly: kid at heart, all American, solid
Dillard's: unabashedly Southern and cultured

The list goes on.

Digital offers a huge platform by which retailers can begin to create those sorts of participatory brands. Let's hope they capitalize on digital to do so.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

LVIMA's Viral Idol Event: Thu July 24 6PM

Well, where better than Las Vegas to host Viral Idol, a presentation featuring viral videos from some amazing talents in that sector of our business? If you work in Vegas, or are going to be visiting at that time, get yer caboose over to the Cili Fine Dining Restaurant.



Oh, and you also have the opp to submit what you think is the best viral you've gotten in your inbox or IM window since Dramatic Gopher. The prize is a 1 year Starbuck's card. Seriously, LVIMA knows how to throw an event and I am sure all will have an excellent time -- and what could be better than watching good viral with a fruity drink in your hand? Get the details at: LVIMA.com

And special shouts out to their sponsors:

About
Atlas
DoubleClick
DrivePM
IAC
Millenial Media
Specific Media

Though I am not a BlackJackian (my term for someone who works and lives in Las Vegas,) I personally appreciate the willingness of these real digital leaders to support digital in markets across the country through sponsorships like this. ;-)

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

New Quantcast: Vanity Stats Gone Wild!

Well, the QuantCast interface has changed, and with it the amount of free info you can get about your site has exploded. I input my url here to give you an idea of the stats it provides:

1. Total monthly visitors: This tells you how many uniques you have and where they come from.

2. Gender: M/F splits of your visitors

3. Age: Percent of your audience by demo

4. Income: Percent of your audience by salary quintile

5. Presence of Kids: Like it says on the tin.

6. Race: Percent by.

7. Education: Percent by schooling level.

It also gives you stats about your users and the frequency with which they visit. This tells you about loyalty.

To get all this info free you simply insert a tiny HTML doodad into your template. Voila! Free stats.

Now, for this little non-revenue producing blog, all this may seem like vanity stats. And truth be told, for me it probably is. But ad bearing web sites can also get these analytics to help them sell advertising and sponsorships.

So, for those who may wish to indulge in vicarious vanity -- there are about 1300 uniques to this blog per month. 6/10 are male, and you tend to be very well educated and well heeled income wise. About 1% of you are "addicts." If you take me out of the equation -- ergo removing one unique, that means that 12 of you -- or thereabouts -- are extremely regular visitors. Big sloppy kisses to all of you dozen geriophiles! A massive 70-some-odd percent are "passers by" -- meaning you only visit once in a blue moon. I love you anyway, and thank you for your visit.

Get yourself some Quantcast, baby. It's free.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Or is the iPhone all that?

And here with the alternaPOV are the summer employees of Catalyst, who operate their own blog on behalf of the company.

Tired of iPhone Hype?

Well, you'll find some thought provoking stuff over at RyanDigicrest about the GPhone. It the antidote for the relentless overhype of the admittedly remarkable iPhone. I'm not saying it isn't a great device -- just that perhaps...just perhaps...it doesn't deserve mroe ink than the Iraq War. Call me crazy...

DIGITAL STRATEGIC PLANNING: POST 2

PART TWO: WHY YOU NEED A SPECIAL STRATEGIC PROCESS FOR DIGITAL MEDIA

Digital strategy should not be created in a vacuum. You want to dovetail your digital marketing closely with your overall objectives and strategies. But digital is such a different beast that it truly necessitates its own specific strategic efforts. Those should be a subset of your overall planning processes, but digital should also be managed as a separate project within that planning process.

We have seen companies try to develop a digital roadmap without this sort of comprehensive approach, and the consequence has ALWAYS been a need to stop midway through the “abbreviated” process and go back to perform the omitted steps.
A special process is necessary because:

1. Most marketers have some knowledge of the digital behaviors of their consumers, but do not know their consumers at a “mastery” level. Ensuring a complete planning process including a consumer insights phase places the focus of digital marketing on the consumer rather than on “what’s hot”.
2. Consumer digital behaviors change very rapidly. The adoption rates for specific vehicles and platforms are ever shorter. Many platforms are reaching 50% penetration in just 2 years. Some even faster. Thisrapid pace of change requires that we develop a comprehensive picture of digital consumer behavior AT LEAST annually, preferably QUARTERLY.
3. The “best practices” of broadcast media do NOT work in digital. Effective digital planning requires an entirely different kind of thinking, and building that foundation of thought requires the focus of a dedicated planning process.
4. There are over 40 digital platforms with household penetration of >1%, whether device- or contentbased, with solid consumer acceptance. It’s essential to consider ALL of the vehicles when evaluating alternatives and developing an optimized plan. We cannot merely consider those that are top of mind.

Further, a special process helps address the very real problem in most organizations of educating ALL decision makers on the digital environment and how it relates to their targets. Often, while the people in charge of digital are experts, those higher up in the “food chain” are novices, and a comprehensive planning process provides the insights and rigor necessary for selling in a comprehensive investment in the space.

Bev-Weiser!

Press Release

Leuven, Belgium – July 14, 2008 and St. Louis, Missouri – July 13, 2008
InBev and Anheuser-Busch Agree to Combine, Creating the Global Leader in Beer with Budweiser as its
Flagship Brand

Combination Will Create One of the World’s Five Largest Consumer
Products Companies

Company to be Named Anheuser-Busch InBev

Budweiser to Expand Globally

Transaction Will Yield Cost Synergies of at Least $1.5 Billion Annually by
2011;

Neutral to EPS in 2009 and Accretive Beginning in 2010

St. Louis, Missouri will be North American Headquarters and Global Home
of Flagship Budweiser Brand

Fully Committed to Support Wholesalers and Three-Tier System

All U.S. Breweries to Remain Open; Commitment to Communities of

Combined Company Maintained

InBev (Euronext: INB) and Anheuser-Busch (NYSE: BUD) today announced an agreement to combine the two companies, forming the world’s leading global brewer. Anheuser-Busch
shareholders will receive $70 per share in cash, for an aggregate equity value of $52 billion, in an industry-transforming transaction. The combined company will be called Anheuser Busch InBev. Both companies’ Boards of Directors have unanimously approved the transaction. InBev has fully committed financing for the purchase of all of Anheuser-Busch’s outstanding shares.

The combination of Anheuser-Busch and InBev will create the global leader in the beer
industry and one of the world’s top five consumer products companies. On a pro-forma
basis for 2007, the combined company would have generated global volumes of 460 million hectoliters, revenues of $36.4 billion (€26.6 billion) and EBITDA of $10.7 billion (€7.8 billion). Anheuser-Busch and InBev together believe that this transaction is in the best interests of both companies’ shareholders, consumers, employees, wholesalers, business partners and the communities they serve.

The company will make St. Louis, Missouri the headquarters for the North American region and the global home of the flagship Budweiser brand. With about 40% of the combined company's revenues to be generated in the U.S., the company will draw on the collective expertise of Anheuser-Busch's dedicated and experienced employees and its culture of quality. Given the limited geographical overlap between the two businesses and the efficiency of Anheuser-Busch’s brewery footprint in the United States, all of Anheuser-Busch’s U.S. breweries will remain open.

InBev CEO Carlos Brito will be chief executive officer of the combined company. The Board of Directors of the combined company will be comprised of the existing directors of the InBev Board, Anheuser-Busch President and CEO August Busch IV and one other current or former director from the Anheuser-Busch Board. In addition, the combined company’s management team will draw from key members of both InBev’s and Anheuser-Busch’s current leadership. Anheuser-Busch will become a wholly owned subsidiary of InBev upon the completion of this transaction.

The expanded company will be geographically diversified, with leading positions in the world’s top five markets – China, U.S., Russia, Brazil and Germany – and balanced exposure to developed and developing markets. A combination of Anheuser-Busch and InBev will result in significant growth opportunities from leveraging the companies’ combined brand portfolio, including the global flagship Budweiser brand and international market leaders such as Stella Artois and Beck’s, maximizing the combination’s unparalleled global distribution network and applying best practices across the new organization. Budweiser and Bud Light are the largest selling beers in the world, and the combined company will have an unmatched portfolio of imports, local premiums and local core brands.

Carlos Brito, CEO of InBev, said, “We are very pleased to announce this historic transaction today, bringing together two great companies that share a rich history of brewing traditions. We are extremely excited about the opportunities that this combination will create for consumers worldwide, as well as our shareholders, employees, business partners and wholesalers. Together, Anheuser-Busch and InBev will be able to accomplish much more than each can on its own. We have been successful business partners for quite some time, and this is the natural next step for us in an increasingly competitive global environment. This combination will create a stronger, more competitive global company with an unrivaled worldwide brand portfolio and distribution network, with great potential for growth all over the world.”

August Busch IV, Anheuser-Busch President and CEO, stated, “Today’s announcement
brings new opportunities for Anheuser-Busch and its business, brands and employees. This agreement provides additional and certain value for Anheuser-Busch shareholders, while enhancing global market access for Budweiser, one of America’s true iconic brands. We will leverage our collective strengths to create a truly diversified, global company to sustain long-term growth and profitability. In the United States and Canada, both InBev and Anheuser-Busch have seen significant benefits from our existing relationship and we look forward to replicating this success in other parts of the world.”

Budweiser, together with Stella Artois and Beck’s, will become the combined company’s
leading global brands, leveraging InBev’s expansive international footprint. InBev has a history of successfully building brands around the world, which will complement the unparalleled strength of Anheuser-Busch’s brand-building in the U.S. The two companies already have a successful U.S. distribution partnership for InBev’s European premium import brands including Stella Artois, Beck’s and Bass. Anheuser-Busch’s world-class sales and distribution system will continue to support the expansion of these brands in the U.S. market.

Kisses and Hugs for ISPs!

Leichtman Research Group has reported that consumer satisfaction with their broadband ISP is quite high. Somewhat surprising given the fairly high churn rates iun that category, though churn certainly is lower than it used to be for dial-up.

- 72% of broadbansd subscribers give their provider an 8 out of 10 or better.

- The article also states that 24% of subscribers are interested in receiving faster access, and willing to pay for it.

Leichtman is the research deity of broadband, so you can take these finding to the bank.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Jim

Veoh Announces BT Video

BT and video haven't really gone together very well -- in large part because you don't cookie a video stream. There are other factors as well -- such as the need to categorize the increasingly ginormous quantity of video available on which to advertise.

Enter Veoh, which announced its launch today of a BT video solution. The platform allows one to target on interest areas -- like tech -- or more esoteric segments, like the fans of a particular show.

This MediaPost piece lays it out in some detail.

I presume that this is either being done through the delivery of tandem banners bearing cookies or through tracking based upon logged in users.

It'll be very interesting to see how well the market accepts this innovation.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

More TV Than Ever

The American love of TV just keeps running deeper, according to this post from eMarketer. They report ACNielsen fiendings that...well, here's an excerpt:

Nielsen found the average TV viewer surveyed in May watched more than 127 hours of television and spent more than 26 hours online.

In comparison, online video viewers watched an average of 2 hours, 19 minutes during the month, and mobile video viewers watched an average of 3 hours, 15 minutes of video on their handsets.

Looking for Gretchen and Cory's Wedding Pics?

They're here.

Super Friends: Rachel is Robin?

Just Click it:

LoudClick: Sites Built Like Community Barnraisings

So, part of the lore of Americana is the idea that when our neighbors needed something, we all pitched in and made it happen for them. A community can build and raise a barn in a couple of days, where a farmer alone might have to work for months to get it up.

That wonderful community spirit is the idea behind LoudClick, a service that instantly intrigued me and scared the bejeezus out of me as a Boomer that grew up in a world of one way branding.



But I got over my fear because LoudClick harnesses the passions of web users in the service of site building, content, and commerce. And the risk of brand control is mitigated by an approval process.

It works like this: they offer a free platform that you join. You build the beginning of your site, and invite other LoudClick users to help improve your site by adding content, features etc. Your committed users submit their ideas, you review them, and then consent to have your content supplemented by those passion players.

While the idea of adding content to a site is old hat -- see FaceBook, MySpace, and and and, the difference that LoudClick offers is for members to create richer, more dynamic experiences quickly and easily. And you can have it on your site rather than a social net.

Check them out
Here's their one minute pitch form TechCrunch.



Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Thanks iMedia

As the blinking banner says...

CLICK HERE!

Yee Haw! Viral Vid Round Up

Next is profane...

Developing a Digital Strategy for Your Brand: Post 1

INTRODUCTION
This is designed to outline a process for developing a digital strategy or “roadmap” for a brand. It is
centered around five key questions:

1. Why is digital worth your time?
2. Why should you have a special strategic planning process for digital?
3. What are the key components of a digital strategy?
4. By what process should you define objectives and strategies for your digital strategy?
5. What are the key deliverables and process steps for a digital strategy?

Our goal with this document is to combat the tendency for some marketers to approach digital from an executionally centric perspective. Far too many brands approach digital by reacting to what’s new or “hot” in the space, rather than taking a more comprehensive, objectives-based approach. Unfortunately, the result of this practice is that hundreds of millions of dollars – perhaps even billions of dollars – are wasted on tactics that don’t properly align with the overall needs of brands.With that in mind, we offer the following as a starting point towards a more strategically-driven digital planning process.

PART ONE: WHY YOU SHOULD CONSIDER DIGITAL

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for ten or so years, the meteoric growth of digital media will come as no surprise. In addition, a variety of factors make digital a different sort of media challenge for brands:

1. Media fragmentation has splintered audiences and dramatically increased the complexity of effectively reaching most audiences. Where consumers used to have four of five major media choices (TV, Radio, Magazines, Newspapers, and Outdoor), they now have dozens of platforms and literally millions of professional and amateur publishers from which to gather information.
2. The two-way nature of IP-based media (Internet, Mobile, etc.) necessitate that brands stop think as broadcasters and adopt a more collaborative and consultative approach to brand development. This warrants special thought and consideration because the “rules” of collaborative marketing are far different from the “rules” of broadcast-oriented branding.
3. Practically everyone is using digital media. 194 million US consumers are using the Internet. Most of these consumers are spending large amounts of their time with digital media. According to IDC, of the 70.6 hours per week the average consumer (15+) spends with media, 32.7, or 46% of the total hours are spent using the Internet. Further, 52.5% of the total population is using online video.1
4. Digital media are playing an increasingly large role in all purchase decisions. Information on the web influenced almost $500 Billion in offline retail sales in 2007, up 19% versus the year before.
5. Certain target audiences are becoming increasingly difficult to reach WITHOUT digital. For example, Men 18-24 now spend so much time gaming, online, and with their mobile phones that it is increasingly difficult to effectively deliver against this target without digital vehicles.
6. “User generated content” and “citizen journalism” have driven a massive shift in how we receive information about products and services, and what sorts of info we trust. Increasingly, people prefer grass roots sources of information and recommendationsto the so-called professional sources of mainstream media outlets. Even venerable professional journalism organizations like CNN and MSNBC are now routinely airing citizen journalism originated news, video, and other types of information as part of their “professional” offerings.
7. From a practical standpoint, many brands are seeing diminishing effectiveness from traditional “analog” media. Brands need to identify new “on buttons” for their businesses.
8. Again, from a practical standpoint, you’re brand is already being represented to consumers in the digital space, even if you do not have proactive marketing efforts in the space. That is because people –defenders as well as hecklers – are already talking about your brand and product and reaching audiences that are potentially in the millions.

By monitoring and creating brand expressions in the space, you can
influence the discussion in a very positive way. When even TV’s biggest historical “believers” report shifting massive resources away from broadcast and into digital media, it becomes even more apparent that digital media are “must considers”. Most major firms that used to rely heavily on TV are redistributing spend toward digital. Examples include CPG, automakers, and even political campaigns.

In your own category(ies), you are probably witnessing major competitors pursuing digital initiatives in earnest. But you are probably also finding that many of their initiatives don’t appear to be part of a cohesive strategic platform. Again, this is because many companies do not have an objectives based underpinning to their total digital strategy.