5 Fantastic Digital First Campaigns

Muchos besos for running this first, iMediaConnection!

Broadcast vs. digital-first
What is the role of TV in the new media environment? Most brands continue to see TV as a one-way broadcast medium -- a platform by which we can deliver marketing messages that consumers should simply absorb and remember. In this world view, digital is an add-on -- a means of overlaying an interactive element onto what is primarily an old-school sledgehammer-to-consumer-skull effort. Little more than checking a box. You know the drill. Or perhaps I should say mallet. The brand blasts away a nice "strategic ad" over the airwaves, but spends 7 percent of the budget pushing some "viral" or "social" effort that essentially asks consumers to spit back the broadcast message.

Fortunately, a few brands are leading a transition. They understand that TV is no longer a broadcast medium so much as it is a mass distribution channel -- one that establishes awareness for a larger campaign effort that gives consumers a real role in shaping and communicating the brand essence. These are "digital-first" brands. That doesn't mean they necessarily spend a larger proportion of dollars on digital. Not at all. Rather, they use all media -- traditional and digital -- to seek out consumer participation. Participation that is channeled through digital platforms.

It might sound like a nuanced difference, but it really isn't. A good digital-first campaign has participatory experiences that consumers seek out; TV simply grows the awareness for such efforts and uses its unique experiential qualities to make the larger campaign more vivid and impactful.

We all know a little prime-time can blow the doors off awareness and seed an idea to a broad audience. With such a foundation, literally millions of people seek out interactive experiences that make the campaign and brand a vivid part of their lives.

Here are five brands and their efforts that showcase the power of the digital-first model, along with one brand that really needs to embrace this approach.

Axe

Those who read what I write regularly (Hi Mom!) know that I talk about Axe a lot, and it's because the brand is a leader in so many digital areas. And digital-first marketing is no exception. While TV certainly communicates the "get Axed 'n get laid" message, the best bits of Axe marketing always take place online. In part, no doubt, because broadcast standards wouldn't let them do this stuff during the family hour.

Need an example? Oh good Lord. Everything Axe does is digital-first. Check out the Axe Undie Run, proof positive that even dirty birdies can care about their fellow woman:



In short, the people at Axe are geniuses, and part of their wisdom is in always being digital-first.

Pepsi

While charity is a small overlay for Axe, it's a big deal for the new Pepsi.

We knew to expect significant changes in Pepsi's marketing approach when it broke with BBDO after something like 2,000 years of partnership. The old Pepsi sought to create TV epics that associated the brand with the hottest celebs of the moment. It was a subtle-as-a-nail-gun effort to link the brand to the next generation. And it worked like a dream until people became the new brand marketing engine.

Here's the "before" vid:



The new Pepsi connects with youth by relating to one of their deepest held values -- community and social responsibility. Pepsi fronts a portion of the marketing budget to help charities, and asks Pepsi drinkers to choose the recipients of blue largesse.

Extended across all traditional and digital media, the effort puts the brand in service of user desires instead of treating their brains as sponges for "we're young and hip and cool like Britney" messaging.

Kia

Auto advertising is perhaps the biggest creative ghetto on the planet, but the Kia hamster campaign for the entry-level Soul stands out as a shining example of how being different and digital-first can drive big dividends.

Let's face it: Most Kia advertising is pretty much invisible. It's the usual shiny car doing the usual things in the usual places making the usual claims, with a bit of value thrown in for differentiation. Not so with the Soul ads.



There's message in all that fun. About juxtaposing the attractive Kia with its toaster-like competitors. That the brand went digital-first for a car targeted primarily to younger and more venturesome buyers is a natural. What isn't is how well the brand delivered this idea across popular forms of digital and traditional media -- and did it in so many ways that consciously invite consumer participation.

It starts with the 60-second viral bait commercial, but there's also a lot more. From "making of" videos to Facebook apps to dedicated social sites in support of the hamsters, this brand clearly understands that attracting attention through TV advertising is only part of the opportunity for this campaign. Rather, TV was simply the catalyst for getting people to seek out and take ownership of other brand experiences featuring the furry spokesrodents.

The side scroller Go Hamster Go app is an example. The user fires up his or her webcam to enter the hamster world and drop hamsters into the Kia as it rolls by.



Kleenex

I think it was two years ago that Kleenex began its Let It Out campaign with TV ads and interactivities inviting consumers to share their feelings.



Of course, feeling has both physical and metaphorical meaning, so it's a nice way to tie up tangible and emotional benefits.

But this is by no means Kleenex's first digital-first effort. From promotions like Choose Your Mom to an interactive application that lets you upload photos and design your own Kleenex box, this brand is way ahead in interactive and marketing evolution in general.

Bing and Yahoo

One of the most interesting things to watch is how digital companies approach traditional media campaigns. Portals can be fascinating on this score because their offerings are, by their very nature, participatory.

Let's start with Yahoo. Forgive me, my fair purple sweet, I have used these pages to confess my love for you before. And I am well aware you have replaced this effort recently with something far better. But your old effort was a good example of what not to do.

Here goes.

You and Yahoo was a classic broadcast-style effort. It had some other layers. But ultimately, it was about delivering a message for us to remember and regurgitate. Me: individual. Yahoo: for individuals. Ergo. Me likey Yahoo. C'mon. I don't even know where to begin. Oh, yes I do. How about with what Yahoo called its anthem spot?



The campaign seems to have evolved into something a little less ether-y with new efforts titled "It feels good to feel." A combination of TV, print, and online is seeding the idea, but the centerpiece appears to be a host a ways that consumers can share their own feelings and memories.

Not "new" ways. "You" ways. Get it?

Yahoo -- Je t'adore. Let me say that again. Je t'adore. But good grief! It strikes me that this was an ideal time to let people experience how Yahoo can be the center of their online lives. Or to let people like me tell the world how Yahoo is the center of our lives. Je t'adore, Yahoo, but those jeans did make your butt look big.

Meanwhile, in Redmond...

Now, obviously Bing's challenge was different. The company needed to make people try a new search engine, not communicate the site as the center of an online life. But Bing could have done the broadcast thing and promised us the most unbelievably unbelievable search experience. Ever!

And oh my god, can you imagine the 60-second spots packed with vignettes of Sydney Opera House and Tuvan yurts and tea parties in the Sahara and people on Melrose just being in-di-vi-du-als that Bing could have served up? And a sort of whitewashed anthem, "If search is your thing, now try Bing (brand search engine)."

Instead, Bing's campaign really hinged on a variety of placements that made it easy to try Bing and see how the results are different.

I can look up words in in-text ads. I see Bing's stab at search results as a supplement to site search. I get to start the process of using Farecast in an ad unit.

Oh, and there was broadcast as well. But these TV ads made you ache to try Bing and see if it was really different. Cuz you've been there. We all have. Wanna see what it's like to be somewhere else?



Conclusion: Is digital-first best?

It's tough to imagine a brand that wouldn't be well served by inviting its users in -- as a central part of its marketing efforts. But perhaps even more than choosing such a campaign idea is inviting the consumer into all aspects of a brand.

Digital companies have unique opportunities to do this. That they sometimes don't makes me wonder if they understand that so much of their brand power comes from the minds and hearts and mouths and typing fingers of consumers -- not 1-inch tape or however TV ads get distributed these days.

Now, there's nothing like TV and those tapes to get the word out. Nothing. But brands that decide to use their TV to invite consumer to participate are going to fare better. It's time that we drop our sledgehammers and start sending out engraved invitations to join us in our brands.

The Mind and The Heart

First published on iMediaConnection.com

Working at the intersection of marketing and technology makes for a dynamic and exciting time most every day. But one of the unfortunate consequences of living in a technical age is that most people in the industry try to fact their brands into leadership and differentiation. Facts are great, and can be (but are not always) necessary for long term differentiation. But where are the digital brands? And by brands I mean the offerings that make you feel as much as they make you think.

The thought came to me as I was developing a presentation about social networks and how the business has changed over the years. And as I made my slides, I got to thinking that perhaps part of the reason why so many once mega colossal digital properties have died quick deaths is that they have focused all their efforts on communicating attributes. Now, I don’t dispute that attributes can and should help govern who wins and who bites it. But surely there is a place for both reason and feeling.

Why did Friendster fall from grace so quickly? Well, the rational answer was that it took like 20 minutes to load a page. But perhaps there was more. Perhaps part of it was because Friendster never touched us emotionally. MySpace brought so many of us into the world of social media, but many people shifted away just as soon as there were other options. Again, there were rational reasons. Like trying to load a page and being greeted with glitter and a slow loading song and garish graphics and and and. But again, I suspect there was an emotional void where the brand essence was supposed to be. And hey, they still have more than 200 million users, so they may yet return as a dominant player. It’ll take some product changes. But I believe it’ll take kindling some brand love as well.

The premise works far beyond social networks. Why is it that Yahoo has endured where Excite and Lycos and Netscape and all the rest declined precipitously? Of course there were rational reasons, notleast their email dominance. But Yahoo also gave and gives you something to like. You aren’t a user, you’re a Yahoo. Your kid isn’t a user, she is a Yahooligan. I believe that kind of personality and emotional connection is a key to why Yahoo is the 900(0) pound gorilla while other sites ebb.

Sample size of one, I LOVE Yahoo. I stick with them in part because I feel a part of a movement or a club with Yahoo. I once wrote a love letter to Yahoo and meant every word. I make no money from them. They are not a client. I am not an investor. But I friggin’ love that brand. My suspicion is that the younger set may not have that same feeling for the brand. Perhaps it’s time for some emotional marketing again. But in the meantime, I stick with them even when other sites develop whizbang new features. I have faith that Yahoo will get around to those same innovations quickly, and in the meantime, I can still think of myself as a Yahoo.

My brilliant coworker Nirali has a deep bond with Google. Like any good analyst, she explains her love in rational terms. By I see the twinkle in her eye when she talks about the big G and I know it’s also about what the brand stands for – consumer first, respect, accuracy, and a geeky sense of humor. Like the day they swapped out their logo with the word Topeka to celebrate their alliance with that city. That was pure class, and hits you in the heart instead of the mind.

What other brands have that kind of emotional side? Not many. Twitter flirts with it, with their funny little bird and their dedication to honesty and user empowerment. And that emotional side may have helped them weather the 9 million service outages that plagued their meteoric growth.

Apple has it.

Bing has some emotional oomph too. Emotional branding is a particular struggle for a software company. I think that the Bing people need to ask themselves, “In 12 months, what should people feel when they use Bing?” Are they rebels fighting Google hegemony? Are they the bold new upstart spirit of a new MSFT? Does using Bing make them feel brilliant? Cool? Confident? Inspired?"

That kind of emotional bond builds loyalty, and helps brands weather stormlike periods when new companies and arch competitors come up with things first. It also helps hold the eyeballs when they make a mistake. Because we forgive the errors of the ones we love. But when rational machines screw up, we scrap them and buy something new.

So I ask you, what does your brand make people feel? Ten years from now, will you have users writing your brand love letters?

What's NEW in Social

Much love for iMedia Connection for printin' this puppy first.

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If you said "social media" to a marketer 18 months ago, chances are they'd have thought exclusively of social networks. No more. We're seeing social capabilities incorporated into virtually every digital experience. This has brought opportunities and dilemmas for marketers. I say dilemmas because lots of brands got online by pounding to fit a broadcast-shaped peg into an interactive-shaped hole. They developed one-way websites, banners, and search programs. Social media analytics tools are showing us that this model had many flaws.

But as more and more brands embrace social for the two-way offering it is, it's important that we keep abreast of major news in the segment.

This post is designed to give marketers some highlights of what new initiatives, offerings, and companies appear to have traction. It's not for the social "expert." Rather it's geared to the generalist who wants a survey of some of the more important and interesting developments.

Without further ado, check out this summary of social developments divided into four "buckets":

Facebook Open Graph and the socializing of content sites

Facebook's new Open Graph (OG) initiative is a means of adding value for its members across the web while simultaneously enabling content publishers to offer social features. In OG's launch week, more than 50,000 sites incorporated OG components. Many of those implementations were small, such as adding a "like" button embedded in content. But here are some of the ways it's being used on a grander scale:

Pandora is leveraging Open Graph to facilitate the sharing of music and discoveries between friends. Capabilities include:

•See a list of friends who use Pandora
•See which artists and songs are "liked" by friends
•Import Facebook pic into your Pandora profile
•Listen to friends' stations
•Get music suggestions based upon music you "liked"
The Huffington Post has socialized its content by offering a "Hot on Facebook" module, a "what your friends are reading" module, and a "like" button on most stories.

Newspaper sites are incorporating a sort of "your news" box that lists the latest "news" you have received on Facebook. Yes, Facebook's hit some roadblocks and hurdles over privacy. Assuming it gets past those, Open Graph will make profound changes in how we consume content.

Promoted Tweets debut

The big news on Twitter is Promoted Tweets. These are sponsored tweets that appear in the Twitter Search results.

Twitter announced Sponsored Tweets and its charter sponsor list (Best Buy, Bravo, Red Bull, Sony Pictures, Starbucks, and Virgin America) in April. More recently, Twitter altered its terms of service to ban the Twitter platforms and third parties from embedding sponsored tweets into users' tweet streams. Twitter shared this rationale:

First, third party ad networks are not necessarily looking to preserve the unique user experience Twitter has created. They may optimize for either market share or short-term revenue at the expense of the long-term health of the Twitter platform. For example, a third party ad network may seek to maximize ad impressions and click through rates even if it leads to a net decrease in Twitter use due to user dissatisfaction. Secondly, the basis for building a lasting advertising network that benefits users should be innovation, not near-term monetization.
UnFacebooks and user control

Partly as a response to concerns about Facebook's privacy missteps, a number of alternative social networks are attracting attention. From tech blogs to Elle.com, the UnFacebooks are a popular story. Of course Orkut, MySpace, and Friendster are also trying to capitalize on Facebook's stumbles. But here are some new sites getting play:

Diaspora: Billing itself as "an open source personal web service that will put individuals in control of their data," Diaspora is the brainchild of four NYU students and has raised more than 20 times its initial funding goal. The idea behind Diaspora is essentially opt-in, versus the major social sites' opt-out approach. It is working feverishly to get everything going this summer.

Pip.io lets users define different "rooms" of people that they want to share information with. Users can also define if they want one- or two-way communications with their rooms.

A self-described "social operating system," Pip.io is clearly trying to be more than a social net. When you visit, make sure you are using Firefox or Chrome, not MSIE.

Story of My Life is a new platform enabling members to tell stories in a variety of media and make them private or public. I love the idea of letting more people tell the stories of their lives. And not just in words.

Does it sound like a blog platform to you? Yes, but the community features make it more than that. And it's really more about defined stories than a stream of consciousness.

Social search

The biggest proportion of online dollars goes to search, so let's take a look at some of the "new" social search offerings:

Mahalo bills itself as a human-powered search engine that combines machine results with expert and consumer recommendations. From its beginnings as a search-focused entity, it has now added a lively Mahalo Answers section and Mahalo How To, where experts help users accomplish tasks.

Wowd (disclosure: a Catalyst:SF client) helps users understand what content is popular now and what content users like best. Users download the application, and conduct searches that reveal:

•The most popular pages related to the search query
•The freshest content available on a topic, whether just created or just viewed by other Wowd users
•Real-time content from most sites, not just a select few
•Pages that other users have rated as most valuable
Wowd is for people who are interested in the latest information on a topic -- in the things that are happening now and the content that has just been created or updated.

By combining a sophisticated search algorithm with consumer behavior and ratings, it provides a unique perspective.

Delver is a social shopping community that helps people find the best products and make the best buying choices with the help of friends, family, and the community at large. The idea behind this offering is to create a community around shopping and help people learn from each other about interesting products and the best places to buy them.

The bigness of this concept is that the site is out to make online shopping fun, rather than a utilitarian experience.

The portals (and Meebo)

The social strategies of the major portals are very different from one another. At one end of the spectrum, Yahoo is leveraging social content from its own sources as well as third parties like Facebook. Apparently, Yahoo has concluded that trying to create a new social media entity won't work. Instead it blends the information available from existing platforms to enrich Yahoo channels.

On the other end of the spectrum, Google is still trying to create a homegrown social platform to help it become a leader in providing social content. One of the more interesting integrations is its flavor of social search. By linking your Google profile to social platforms, you get search results that include comments and content from connections.

Google Buzz is a social sharing service integrated into Gmail that lets you share statuses, text, photos, and videos easily. Public and private sharing are offered.

Google Wave is a collaboration platform that creates a shared space for teams. Participants can add text, photos, and videos in real time. The vision for Wave is to replace a variety of other applications with a single environment.

Microsoft's strategy sits between these two poles, though it's closer to Yahoo's. Bing is leveraging existing third-party communities to socialize search results. Now tweets, blog posts, and shared links are incorporated in results.

But Bing is also striving to create unique social-centered experiences. One example is how it integrated social into Bing Shopping. According to its blog, "With a single click you can ask for advice from your friends on Facebook and followers on Twitter for their take on a product you saw on Bing Shopping."

Meebo's strategy is to focus on its strength in instantaneous sharing to carve out social territory. Its new "Meebo Bar" offers publishers an easy way to socialize content and promote virality. This ad-supported bar appears when a Meebo user visits a bar-enabled site. Users can send pages and content via IM of course, but also through email, Facebook, Twitter, Google Buzz, and Yahoo.

Conclusion

Sharing content and opinions is something consumers seem to want in many of their web experiences, not just on specific social sites. How some of these companies and platforms will work with marketers, or indeed if they will work with marketers, remains to be seen. But consumers show a marked unwillingness to pay for content, so my guess is that many of these companies will be a-knockin' on our doors before long. That doesn't mean that they will work with us using the classic advertising model, though.

I would be remiss not to mention blogs as the "sleeper" of social. It seems that these high-quality, high-passion, high-depth environments often get overlooked by marketers. While social nets and Twitter can offer us enormous reach, so can blogs, many of which offer the added benefit of expert perspective and depth of content. They may not be the shiniest of the social objects, but in my view brands would do well to spend more time and attention on them.

An article like this omits other good companies and developments. If you are working on something that is more real than vapor and want me to talk about it as a follow-up, send me an email. If I like it, I will be happy to follow up with a brief piece about you.

More Great Sponsor Presos On Monday!

As you know if you read my post from yesterday, I really enjoy the sponsor presos both because they are a great way to learn about new products and a way of getting inside the thinking on the publisher side.

Today’s presentations were from DoubleClick, BrightRoll, and Yahoo.

DoubleClick began the day with a look at key benchmarks by industry – such note taking has never been seen before in an iMedia breakfast preso! ;-) The thing I most appreciated was that 80%+ of the numbers they offered were completely unrelated to clicks. Bravo! Additionally, they gave us a look at some of the new tools, reports, and interfaces available in DFA – they are great evidence that the acquisition by Google is leading to some great strides in usability for DoubleClick.

BrightRoll (disclosure: a former C:SF client, but not a current one) followed with their classically candid preso about the good and the not so good of online video industry practices. They showed some startling comparisons between where ads are running from one network to another – definitely food for thought. BrightRoll has always drawn its line in the sand about content quality – and this year’s preso was no exception. Additionally, they are taking a different path than many of the others in the space – they are NOT creating original content, instead focusing solely on helping advertisers get their messages out there.

Yahoo rounded out the day with a preso about the new developments in Smart Ads that allow you to use the “DNA” of Yahoo information on users to dynamically optimize creative to individuals. Somewhat analogous with what we have seen from the ad solutions sides of Offermatica and X+1, though with the Yahoo user data as the key difference. With thousands or even millions of creative combinations available, the opportunity to optimize creative to individuals is clearly something we will be hearing more about.

More great info, and I offer my personal thanks for their continued sponsorship of iMedia events.

Digital Marketing Factoid of the Day: Search Engine Market Share

My beloved Yahoo grew right out of the hide of the Goo this month! Dancing in the streets in Sunnyvale!

Digital Marketing Factoid Of The Day: Search Share A Bright Spot For Yahoos

Yahoo! boosters rejoice. Yahoo's share of search grew slightly in November. Googlers were flat. I spit on your flat. Yahoo!



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

My Ten Year Love Affair With Yahoo!

Exactly ten years ago, Yahoo and I began an exclusive relationship. In my younger days I was searchually promiscuous – I played the field, getting Excite-d for a while, whoring all around the Netscape. Just Ask-ing for trouble.

And, of course, there was that other girl, the one who always appeared whenever I went online. Truth be told, I found her a little too available for my taste, ya know? Anyway, I never knew her name, but she always wears a monogram, MSN. Don’t get me wrong. She has a lot going for her, and I’m sure she’s lots of people’s idea of ideal. Just not mine.

I kept coming back to Y!, drawn like a moth to a purple flame. And over time she taught me life’s most important lesson: playing the field can be titillating for a time, but the search really is better with someone you know.

I am very proud to say that my girl Y! is the BBW I adore having in my life – the Big Beautiful Website that is with me through thick and thin, day in and day out. Yeah, she’s gotten bigger over the years, but it just means there’s more to love.
I’ve never gotten into the whole My Y! thing – trying to change her into what I wanted instead of just letting her be. I’ve always accepted Y! as she is. I still greet her sunny homepage every day.

Y! and I have been through a whole lot. She’s changed her style a few times, and went out and splurged on a couple of facelifts, even though I’ve always loved her looks. But I’ll say this for her, she’s always working hard to keep our relationship fresh.

Y! has expanded my horizons in so many ways. She introduced me to online romance. Though that ended when she started charging for love connections – she learned fast that I won’t pay for dates.

But in other areas she’s been all I could hope for and more. For instance, she always seems to be able to uncover a bargain on whatever I need to buy. Plus, she keeps track of money better than anyone. And helps me make sense of my mobile phone –she’s always there to answer my questions. Heck, she’s even taken my dog places – she has such a caring heart.

Hey, Y! isn’t perfect. Sometimes that jealous obsession with her younger, richer sister Google can get tiresome. I wish she’d just recognize that Miss G isn’t more attractive than she is – she’s just beautiful in a different way. Sort of a rhinestoned Angelina Jolie to Y!’s t-shirt and jeans Jen Aniston.

Y!, just relax. You don’t need your li’l sis’s multibillion dollar bustier to catch my eye.

Y! can hold her own in any conversation. Some days she’s bursting to tell you about some important political issue in the minutest detail. At other times, OMG, she’s just bubbling over with celebrity trash.

Everybody always says, if you want the Buzz, turn to Y!

Y!’s no doormat, that’s for sure. Sometimes she really enforces her honey do list. Like transforming her appearance without warning. Or trying to force me to send mail in some new way when I am more than satisfied with the Classic. But when I go with the flow and am content to just let her be her, things usually turn out better.

I don’t know what I’d do without her. Like any aging husband, there are many times when I can’t find things on my own. But all I have to do is ask and she has the answer right away. And she never rolls her eyes about even the dumbest questions.

A couple years ago, I was disappointed for a time. See, she went on a Panama retreat, promised she’d be back fast, but then took forever to return. But since she did, it’s like she’s clairvoyant – she knows me so well that she can finish my sentences and give me answers that much faster.

She’s gotten more animated in the past couple of years, and definitely more motional. It’s nice that she open to trying new things. And it’s interesting…she was always a private person, didn’t want to “let others in.” But lately she’s become a wonderfully open book – she calls it her Y!OS and everybody seems to like her more for it.

My girl Y! is full of secrets and surprises -- like how you click her homepage logo in just the r!ght place and she lets out that happy yell! She can also be a delightful tease – showing a little leg of her news stories, and making you click for more. She knows how to draw you in, that’s for sure.

There are so many other things I love about her. There isn’t enough time to list ‘em all. So let me just close by saying,

Honey, Jerry Yang may THINK he’s Chief Yahoo, but no one loves you more than me!

Happy Anniversary, Y!

October 08 Search Shares Are In, And The Winner Is...

Baited breath, people. It's Google. What a surprise!

Yahoo Bias For the CornHuskers?

AP is reporting that while Yahoo employment has suddenly declined by 1500 in California due to pink slip outbreak, the company has applied for a bevy of tax breaks in another state in exchange for promising to create at least 100 jobs that pay more than $68,700. That state? Drumroll:



The office will be a data center and a customer service facility.

No reason why the industry shouldn't spread out, especially since the cost of living in Norcal is nothing short of absurd.

But as a public service to any Yahoo Sunnyvale people who may be relocated, I provide the following info about Omaha which you may find invaluable on a daily basis:



Starbucks Locations:

1 15th & Douglas
222 South 15th Street
Omaha, NE 68102
402-342-4486

2 Mutual of Omaha
3316 Farnam St
Omaha, NE 68175

3 Dillon Food Store-Omaha #319
888 Saddlecreek Rd
Omaha, NE 68106
402-551-0613

4 Hy Vee Omaha #1
5150 Center
Omaha, NE 68106
402-553-2664

5 72nd & Dodge
219 South 72nd Street
Omaha, NE 68114
402-391-3615

6 Target Omaha T-2125
7400 Dodge St
Omaha, NE 68114
402-390-8880

7 Bass Pro Shops - Council Bluffs
2911 27th Ave
Council Bluffs, IA 51501
712-325-6000

8 87th & Pacific
8734 Pacific Street
Omaha, NE 68114
402-397-1081

9 Target Omaha T-2010
6600 N 72nd St
Omaha, NE 68112
402-573-2220

10 Hy-Vee Foods-Council Bluffs #2
1745 Madison Avenue
Council Bluffs, IA 51503
712-322-9260

No sarcasm, people!

Oldest Living Digital Marketer: I'm Jim Nichols and I approve this message.

[[[Fade up martial music.]]]

Oldest Living Digital Marketer [considerably thinner than currently, blue blazer flung over left shoulder held by thumb] Personally I find it magical that we live in a country where you can buy bass fishing equipment in the same place you can get a Latte. I really do. It's why, sniff, we are not red states or blue states, we are the United States of America.

[[[Sunset fades to black behind fluttering flag.]]]

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

Yahoo Debuts New Profiles

CNET has an excellent post about the new Yahoo profiles, which are a critical early step to transforming Yahoo into an enormous social community.

There is apparently a large group of people who are ticked off about the change, principally because the debut of the old profiles blotted out the info in the old ones, so folks gotta type again.

But I have to say that the demise of the old profiles (not the info wipeout) was no big loss. As a matter of fact, it was no loss at all. Let's face it, the old profiles were very...1996. Now, this is not to say that the angry have no right to their annoyance. But the move is going to be a huge step forward overall for most users that participate, because it is the beginning of a new utility for our use of Yahoo. Here are a couple of screens of the new profile from the CNET post:





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

Chunk-It Makes Easier Work of Research

As a research wonk, I have a baited breath fascination and anticipation for any web tool that promises to make it easier to find things. I pride myself on the ability to find ANYTHING, and I mean ANYTHING online. If its out there, I can get it -- legally of course.

So when I read about ChunkIt on RWW, I headed right over.

The service is a browser extension for Firefox and MSIE that essentially previews results so you can find exact matches for your needs. Their intro video uses the example of a boombox, a word with multiple meanings. Your browser screen gets split in two, with the official results of your search engine of choice on the right, and the previews in the Chunkit window on the left.

In that left window, you click on the highlighted word in context and the page appears in the right hand side with the paragraph containing the clicked word highlighted. Oh, let me show you with pictures.

1. Search (in this case in Yahoo for Android)



2. Your Yahoo search results appear on the right, and the Chunk-It content chunks on the life.



3. By clicking on a chunk in the left hand column, the page appears on the right with the content area highlighted:



The demo is rather long, but the quality of the service is quite good, so it is worth your time.



Here's what their launch release said about the need for an offering like this:

According to research by Microsoft, roughly a third of Web searches don't get answered correctly on the first search and first click. Usually searchers find the information they want eventually, but that often requires multiple searches or clicks on multiple search results. A main cause for this problem is that a
search result may look promising based on its short description, but instead it turns out to be irrelevant when the actual page is visited, resulting in wasted time. ChunkIt! saves searchers time by exposing the contents of the search results so that they can determine which results best align with their intent. In
addition, by reviewing the contents behind the search results, users may easily identify other keyword combinations to further refine their searches and gain better results. ChunkIt! helps everyone save time, whether you are a shopper, student, teacher, parent or business professional, by making almost any search task on the Web faster and easier, including:

• Online shopping – ChunkIt! shows the keywords users are looking for in item descriptions and product specifications, saving lots of time in online comparison shopping on sites like eBay and Amazon.
• Academic research – ChunkIt! seamlessly previews the valuable contents stored within the links of research sites like LexisNexis, JSTOR, ScienceDirect and Wikipedia.
• Searching news sites – ChunkIt! makes it easy to find stories about the specific topics users are
looking for on news sites with countless links like the Drudge Report, ESPN.com and Perez Hilton.
• Reading blogs – ChunkIt! makes it easy to review which blog posts contain the subject matter users are looking for without needing to read through every single post.
• Classified items and apartment hunting – ChunkIt! lets users dig deep into Craigslist to find classified items and apartments with the features they want in a snap.
• Investment analysis – ChunkIt! takes the hassle out of looking through the countless pages of SEC financial filings.

It's a very effective tool. The offering worked best for me on search sites than on content sites, which RWW found as well.

Give it a try, it's a nice way of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of your research.

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

Yahoo's Feeling Veeeery Purple!

Start Wearing Purple, people!

At least what Yahoo's saying with their new marketing campaign, which is based around a minisite of the same name. It appears to be an effort to get more people to identify (or identify again) with the Yahoo brand, which has had its downs of late. Thing is, there are still like 450 million people worldwide using Yahoo every month, so they are hardly in death throes.

But the deliberately quirky nature of this campaign -- and associating the color purple with being a maverick or innovator -- seem a deliberate attempt to create that sort of "Think different" persona in support of the portal.

Purple has been a favorite color for yahoo branding for a long time, and you may remember that there were reports that Yahoo was testing a new purple logo earlier this year. Perhaps this plainly odd campaign is the precursor to that major initiative.

I don't hate it, though I think they'd have done better to commission a contest on XLNT Ads to get consumers to do the purple defining. It'd feel richer and more authentic than this. I mean, the "kick the habit leap"?

But anyway, thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.

Yank Goes the Plug at Eco Search Engine Forestle

Well, Forestle, the eco friendly search engine that donated revenue to save rainforests, was launched last week, and got some pretty good traffic. The site, which was using Google search results, was well on its way to saving some land when...pop when the plug from Google. Shutting the site down indefinitely.

Google's Rationale: It said Forestle incented people to click on sponsored links so as to raise more money and save more land. Forestle had an alternative interpretation:



Dear Forestle user,

We just received an email from Google in which they announced the end of the partnership with Forestle. They said that we offered "incentives to click artificially on sponsored links" and that this was not compliant with their policies..

Well, we don't agree with that!

We displayed a note at the top of the Forestle result page that says "only click on Google sponsored links if you are really interested in them". Also we saved 0.1 m² per search and not per click! So where did we offer incentives to click on ads?

In our opinion Google ended the partnership, because Forestle became too successful: Yesterday we earned almost 200 USD and saved more than 4,000 square meters of rainforest!

We will try to reactivate Forestle and clarify this issue. Meanwhile, we ask you to use our eco-friendly search engine www.Znout.com. Znout does not save rainforest, but it reduces your energy consumption thanks to black backgrounds and EcoServers considerably.

We will inform you with a message on www.Znout.com, when we are able to revive Forestle. So please make Znout your home page or install the Znout plugin for your browser.

Hmm. Lemme tell ya, if I were in charge of YAHOO search...

Widgets: Coming to a TV Near You

Yahoo and Intel have announced an initiative that will bring widgets to the TV viewing experience. Here’s how Yahoo is defining these TV widgets:

TV Widgets are small Web applications that make it easy to surf your favorites sites with your remote control. Watch Web videos, track your favorite teams or stocks, interact with friends and family, or stay current on news and information by clicking on the compact, interactive apps that sit on top of your normal TV picture.

The web site for this offering, which essentially says that these services are coming soon, promises that its first widgets will be in the following areas:

Sports
Photo sharing (Flickr)
News
Weather
Finance

Only thing missing from that list of most popular web activities is email. I am guessing that’s on the way as well.

Intel and Yahoo have collaborated on TV initiatives before, but it is widely believed that those moves were just a bit too early for mainstream acceptance.

Methinks the market may be ready new.

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

Search Shares - Google Up Again in July

Google share of Search has grown again. Right out of Yahoo and MSN's hide. Not good for our friends in Sunnyvale and Redmond!



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

iPhoo Search Debuts

ReadWriteWeb has reported that Yahoo now offers a search application optimized for the iPhone. They are a late arrival to this having lagged behind Google by over a year.

RWW's reaction? It's nice. Very nice. Great if you're a Yahoo user, but nothing to drive Google users to switch.

As much as I love Yahoo, I have to agree with their assessment. A nice offering. But nothing to shake the barn down. That's what I expected though, so I am not disappointed. Any Yahoo effort to convert Gooeys has to start with the web product to really make a difference.

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

Wedding DON'TS from Yahoo

The following has nothing whatsoever to do with digital marketing. But as someone who has been a best man 12 times, in 20 wedding parties, and has attended more than 50, I plagarize the following article from Yahoo as a reminder to future wedding guests on what to to and not do as a wedding guest. Read it so I don't have to criticize you behind your back at the next nuptials we both attend. Cuz I can be vicious to people who, for example, wear white when they are not the bride. It's her day, not yours.

9 Things You Should Never Wear to a Wedding

1. White Is Not Right It seems obvious and yet so many guests seem to forget. Material that is mostly white with a small pattern is a no. White suits are a no. If there's a question...no. White garb is meant for one person only and that's the bride! Always. End of story.

2. Skip the Shorts Shorts at a wedding? It's just wrong; even if you dress them up with a blazer or a pair of sexy heels. Guys, no matter how preppy you make 'em, and, girls, no matter how stylish Charlize Theron looks in them, shorts just won't do at this affair.

3. Keep it Classy Up-to-there miniskirts, shirts with more buttons undone than not, and bustier tops are best left for a night out with the girls (or that person you really want to wow). We know you're sexy, you know you're sexy, but a wedding isn't the place to show off. Play down the sassy and play up the classy.

4. Coattails Don't Cut It If it's a black tie wedding, men are going to be renting a tux or digging one out of storage, so tap into your inner James Bond. But keep it in check -- a classic or modern-cut style is the best bet. Stay away from extra frills like tails, ruffles, loud colors, or satins which are inappropriate and overly fancy. Even if you plan to be the funny man in a powder blue '70s number, refrain. All attention should be on the groom (and his tricked-out honey, of course).

5. All That Glitters Is Not Gold Stay away from anything lamé, sequined, shiny, or glittery. It's distracting (both in person and in those precious keepsake photos). Again, the newlyweds are the star attraction, so resist the urge to be a "shining star."

6. Lose The Leather Leather rocks (where would our shoe collection be without it?!) but it's not the best choice for anything above the ankle on a day of "holy matrimony." Leather jackets and skirts are probably too casual, and leather pants are just too flashy. Even if the bride and groom are hip enough to roll with it, opt for something more sophisticated.

7. Mad Hatters Whether you wear a baseball cap to show your allegiance to the A's, disguise thinning hair, or hide a bad hair day, a wedding (even the most casual summer ceremony) is the last place to don one. Go hatless and hit a home run!

8. Give The Wild West A Rest Bandanas, cowboy boots, and ten-gallon hats all make it onto the list of what not to wear. Unless the betrothed couple has planned a themed bash and requests that guests get decked out in ranch gear, save these goodies for another day, pard'ner.

9. Dress to the Nines Don't be too cool to don your finest fixings. Honor the couple's union by leaving your jeans at home -- even the really nice ones! Unless the invitation mentions a beach barbecue or luau, forego the casual fare and plan on turning it up. It's a wedding after all!

Pigs CAN Fly!!!

From the Wonderful people at ValleyWag:

120 technology brands tracked by Covario, a search-engine marketing firm, including Adobe, Lenovo and Intel, increased their spending on Yahoo search ads from the second quarter to the first, and decreased their spending on Google. Yahoo ads got 14.3 percent of their budgets — up from 10.3 percent. Google's take decreased from 85.6 to 81.2 percent. It's the first time Yahoo won market share from Google among Covario's clients since the first quarter of 2007, reports the Wall Street Journal. Yahoo says it's gaining share because Panama's improvements mean advertisers are starting to get more for less, which encourages them to spend more. Covario VP Craig McDonald guesses that Yahoo is benefiting from combining its display and advertising sales teams. Either way, since Yahoo will soon outsource much of its search-advertising sales to Google, Google wins even when its losing.

The Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, Lawsuits, and the Portals

The Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, Lawsuits, and the Portals

Did you read that the Indian Supreme Court sent notices, to Google, Yahoo, and FaceBook warning them that if ads that market services that help aspiring parents preselect the gender of their child, they will be liable under the Act and subject to punishment?

Hunh, you might be saying?

The law is rather complicated but essentially prevents the advertising of services and techniques that help parents predetermine the gender of their unborn child. The law is not aimed at so called “medical” gender selection, which could for example enable parents to avoid having babies of a gender if their family lineage genetically predisposed them for an illness. Rather, this law is intended to curb what is euphemistically called “elective" gender selection where parents want to have one gender (read: boys) over another (read: girls) for political, economic, misogynist, or other reasons.

The law was enacted in 2000, and was successful in drastically reducing such ads in PRINT, but the web has not been targeted so intensely until now.

Interestingly, the Supreme Court also warned the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Communications and IT that they were also complicit because they took no action against the publishers.

This is a big stir both because of the nature of how web ads work (so many sellers and servers) but also because of the odious nature of this practice. Here’s an article about this vile custom. Over 900,000 girls are killed annually in India. That’s three St. Louses a year, people. What it's about is sexism, having to provide a dowry, and the traditional role of men as earners and women as expenses.

I’m frankly not sure how such tracking would occur given the distributed nature of ad serving, though there must be a way given that genitalia do not often greet our eyes on web pages unless we seek them. You could certainly reduce the number of ads drastically. But eliminate entirely would be tough.

Hey, it’s a country with a billion people – they get to decide how sites can operate in their borders. I mean, China tells them to block content and few even bat an eye. Certainly the number of these ads could be drastically reduced. But here’s an idea to go along with that that might enable the police to focus on the most pressing aspects of the problem: imprison more of the people that kill their daughters, and work to develop a society that values women equally. I’m not saying Google and Yahoo don’t have a role they can play in helping people rethink their misogyny, but using them as Western scapegoats for what is a vastly complex social ill is hardly addressing the real issue, is it?

And hey, I am well aware that the US has some absolutely deplorable practices as well – more murders in US HIGH SCHOOLS annually than in all of Britain, 1 in 101 people now incarcerated, judging the value of women by bust size or marketing t-shirts with slogans like these at the fine purveyors at Abercrombie and Fitch.



(BTW, I can't remmeber where I pulled this graphic from. If it was your site and you want a credit, just drop me a line.)

Oh and continuing to export Camels and Marlboros, and starting new smokers in the developing world as young as 8.

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

Placecast: Connect That I May See Thee

One of my favorite quotations is "Speak that I may see thee," which relates to our ability to know a great deal about someone by what they say, how they say it, and what they sound like.

The digital version of this is the idea behind Placecast, the place-based ad network of 1020, Inc. 1020: as in "what is your 1020 (location.) Get it?

Put simply, Placecast uses real time information about where you are to predict what you may want. Essentially its geotargeting on steroids, and it holds the potential to help a variety of different classes of business better pinpoint their messages based upon apertures of location, activities, time of day, and need needs at that very moment. They can also highly localize the message that gets delivered.

Hear President and CEO Anne Benzacon talk about what makes them different in this BROLL I found on YouTube:



As I understand the model, their focus is purely on place -- this is not a solution that requires billions of datapoints to bucketize consumers. Rather, it is the opposite -- the concept is that knowing essentially one data point -- where you are right at the instant of connection, can be of superior value. Presumably as well, at least in theory, ISPs could work with these folks while also working with the deep packet ISP targeting folks. Sort of the opportunity to have impression jump balls would be possible in this manner.But you get it, it's an ISP targeting play, though their focus on location may provide an alternative for ISPs to crank the ole ARPU without running into some of the Congressional googlies that have afflicted NebuAd.

This model would seem well suited for free WIFI access companies as well, since those companies obviously need a variety of rev streams. And indeed may be more willing to vend data than ISPs that rely on consumer good feeling like cable and DSL ISPs focused on homes and SOHO. FrontPorch has a nice and profitable business working with those lads, and isn't getting called to testify by the House Commerce Committee.

In fact, if Placecast sounds similar to Frontporch, you are partially correct, but FrontPorch is largely a data and insights play for WIFI and also does deep packet long term tracking, whereas Placecast is built around an ad network and real time place only.

Placecast identifies location for laptops, mobile, and GPS based devices.



So who is this for? Well, from the advertiser side, it could be particularly relevant to local and regional advertisers -- an example would be the tremendous value of placing ads on mobile phones while consumers traverse an auto show.

Another example: a person is in a mall on a Saturday in August: time to show some HP laptop ads for back to school.

That sort of targeting could be useful to pubs selling too much of their stuff as tonnage -- the CPMs form this sort of targeting precision must be far better than the LCD value of an impression!

But it surely isn't only a local ad play. In the same way that Centro has been able to attract major national advertisers (with both geotargeted and contextually targeted messages,) Placecast could well prove to be a similar business case, albeit with a focus for people on the go. Whereas I think the sweet sport for Centro is in strong volume plus contextual layering, Placecast seems suited especially for a class of trade like retail trying to get butts in seats or behind carts. But that of course isn't just a Mom and Pop need. I am guessing that there will be a bunch of retail SIC codes in their top 10 advertisers.

Regular readers to this blog will know I like Centro's model because of this dual ad class potential -- local plus national advertisers. Local media have enormous noticing value -- are by their very nature very lean forward. So may place based prove to be.

I would expect that the local sale for Placecast will be easy, whereas with the national they will need to overcome that tendency in many of us to immediately pigeonhole opportunities rather than exploring alternative uses. But hey, Search had that problem a few years back. And from what I understand Google and Yahoo have done OK with that. ;-)

I think planners would do well to consider how localized targeting can make a difference for them. And Placecast's model would appear to offer some intriguing possibilities.

Will it work for your brand? How the heck should I know. I don't know your brand. But I do think they are worth your consideration, particularly if they can deliver solid volumes in this precisely targeted environment. And particularly if your emphasis is on brick and mortar distribution.

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