the thin wall

Cast your net wide

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 09:53:00 +0000

Some of us went to see a fascinating talk by Evgeny Morozov (promoting his new book ‘The Net Delusion’) last month about how perhaps the internet isn’t the great force for democracy we think it is, and specifically how we marketers are involved in making it worse.

In short, Morozov highlights how sites like Twitter and Facebook are widely acclaimed as activators of democracy in oppressed states, as they are viewed as a means for people to share their opinions to a wider audience and organise protests and events. Totalitarian governments at first responded by simply shutting these sites down, but they are now allowing full access with a hidden twist – using tools developed by marketing companies in less restrictive regimes, they are tracking influencers and agitators online profiles, and then paying them a short, and usually brutal, visit in person. This leaves protestors in a quandary they find it hard to get out of – don’t declare your real profile online and lose trust from other supporters, or declare and be treated like a criminal. They only people to win from this? The oppressive regime.

Morozov also went on to talk about ‘slacktivism’ and how the internet serves a purpose as a ‘release valve’ of angry pressure. Whereas in the past people would use direct action to let governments/companies know their displeasure, these days it’s more about joining the Facebook group. Good deed done in a couple of clicks, the wannabe protestor then wanders off to other things with the misconception that their voice has been heard. Of course no-one pays a blind bit of notice to the Facebook group, and the world carries on unchanged. Morozov argues that direct action is still the most useful form of protest and urges everyone to not be misled by cyber-utopianism.

It was a fascinating talk and I’m sure the book is going to be a fascinating read. At a time of increased online tracking, it’s an important wake-up-call to see the techniques we marketers employ can have far-reaching and unexpected consequences.

You can read a much more erudite article on the book here and get the book yourself here.

Drown in a stream?

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 11:02:00 +0000

Maybe I read too many sci-fi stories when I was younger, or maybe I just haven't had enough sleep recently, but I genuinely think Twitter is going to change the world. The platform has the potential to become an enormous stream-of-consciousness for the population, becoming not only an amazing tool for marketers to measure public opinion, but also a whole new means of communication for the 'net-connected punter.

It all started to make sense to me when I was trying to explain the benefits of personally signing up to Twitter to my colleagues. Fed up with being constantly batted back with "only a narcissist would want to advertise the minutiae of their life on the web" (I think it's fair to say it wasn't put quite that eloquently), my first reaction was to assure them that this is not what Twitter is about. While there are a few egotists out there, I ascertained that the vast majority of users utilised Twitter as a huge open-ended chat room, conversing rather than commenting.

However, as Twitter's user-base has expanded exponentially over the last month, I realised that I was wrong; Twitter's greatest asset is its ability to allow the populace to chart their every thought and collate it in one place. It is appealing because it attracts the individual by giving them their own soap-box and convincing them that their opinions are important; but it is fantastic because it collates all of this info into one place; the twitter-stream, the long line of tweets gradually churned out by everyone using Twitter.

It's obvious that individually monitoring tweets is important for customer service aspects of a brand; but we all know about statistical significance and wouldn't be doing our jobs (as marketers) correctly if we were to panic the second a single customer complains via a tweet. What we should be looking at, and more importantly empathising with, is the actual ebb and flow of the twitter-stream itself. The ramblings of Twitter's thousands of users all merge and flow together, and marketers should become adept at reading this data.

To understand these vast rivers of data, some fantastic pieces of software have been developed to allow visualisations of the twitter-stream, allowing instant recognition of trends and patterns. Although some have attempted to visualise the whole twitter-stream at once, it's probably out of the average human's capacity to comprehend and use this data, so each visualisation is usually broken down by particular key-phrases. My personal favourite is TwitterStream by the visionary folks at Neoformix.

TwitterStream allows any user to very quickly follow peaks and troughs in interest, as well as chart specific keywords and phrases; allowing attitudes and opinions to be imputed. Ok, it's not perfect and doesn't usually cover a wide timeframe, but this is great for measuring the effect of any marketing activity and I strongly advise you to check out Neoformix or their contemporaries ManyEyes to see all the other great visualisations. (If you fancy a laugh, TwitterStream 'Gordon Brown', see if you can guess in advance some of the words that appear.)

What TwitterStream really excels at, is giving a human user an opportunity to actually connect with the data; any marketer can quickly call up streams on their brands and are afforded a fantastic insight into how consumer opinion has flowed and changed over the last couple of days. Not only can you see the data, but as the stream represents the composite of hundreds of individuals opinions, the viewer can almost feel the ups and downs of consumers over a time period.

And the fuel for all of this? Those narcissistic egotists mentioned above. Our brands and us need these people! So get out there and convince everyone you know to relentlessly Twitter about their every thought and opinions, because somewhere in that huge stream of data, their opinions can be the first in a breaking wave across the stream.

So, back to my opening, how will Twitter change the world? I warn you, there's nothing about marketing from this point on, just my own ramblings…

What if visualisations such as these become not a record of conversation, but the actual conversation itself? Communication could move to a level where individual questions and responses become irrelevant in a sea of dynamically moving data. Individuals could communicate by viewing their particular TwitterStream (or the whole stream if we get to a capacity of being able to process it) and tweeting specifically to modify its visualisation. Essentially, semantic voting begins to occur and individuals become part of a whole, almost a group-consciousness, determining the view of the majority, and being influenced by others thinking on the same topic.

This obviously requires that participants in any Twitter conversation are aware of the overall ebb and flow of group opinion, via something like TwitterStream, but as Twitter becomes bigger and bigger, more and more people will realise the benefits of thinking of Twitter as a stream, rather than focusing on the individual tweets. As developers create more innovative ways of interacting and viewing the stream, Twitter could become the catalyst for group consciousness for an internet-enabled audience, ultimately changing the way people think and the world they inhabit.

How many other things can you say that about?

The internet makes me want to rock out

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 18 May 2009 12:03:00 +0000

Today is the day Wolfram Alpha went live. Some people have called it a Google killer, but these people are all journalists and haven't been paying attention.

Wolfram Alpha is basically a HUGE database compiled from loads of information on the internet. Instead of providing you with links to pages to answer a question, it just gives you the answer in a simple, usable format, along with any extra information you could want to know. Average age of someone called Nick, just search 'name nick'. Want to know what happened on your birthday? Just search it. Average salary for Finland? It's there.

It's definitely worth checking out the search examples page to get an idea of the enormous potential this engine has as I've inevitably quoted some really boring searches, there is LOADS of juicy stuff in there.

Google and WolframAlpha will sit alongside each other, both offering different ways of searching the web, each one subtly more suited to certain situations. It's certainly not the end for Google, but it is the beginning (or next step if you use Ubiquity) of the view that the internet is a single entity that can be directly queried, rather than have to be navigated using millions of incongruous pages.

Brilliant.

extend your reach

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 11 May 2009 16:33:00 +0000

i love graphs. usually i manage to keep my enthusiasm for these beautiful creations to choice clients and colleagues, but every so often, a graph comes along that gets me so excited i have to tell the world. well, that 'so often' is today folks. marketing profs emailed me some facts today that i just HAD to turn into a graph. the excitement never stops for me.

So, without further ado, here is:

Years taken to reach 50 million market audience by channel!

books on demand

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 15:09:00 +0000

blackwells have recently revealed an "espresso book machine" in their Charing Cross store. the book is essentially a huge database of texts (mostly out-of-copyright, but new publishers constantly added) which you can select, print and bind on the machine within 5 minutes. that, in my humble opinion, is very very cool.

obviously we've all had access to sites like project gutenberg for a while now, but reading off a screen just doesn't compare to reading a book in print, and i for one would be willing to pay for a hard-copy. as more and more publishers come on board, and the machine is spread nationwide, it means any bookshop can begin to compete with amazon on a stock level, without any expensive storage costs.

the only downside i can see is that the machine, although I'm sure it has a browsing option, won't compare with wandering around a bookshop and picking up random titles (i'm easily attracted by flashy covers). but then, nor can amazon, and they've never seemed to struggle...

facebook releases more data

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 13:50:00 +0000

Heard from econsultancy that facebook are giving more power to marketers and developers by allowing access to users photos and other information within their API. all comes with the obligatory extra level of 'allow access' buttons, but that's to be expected.

read the full article here

future of gaming

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:56:00 +0000

my girlfriend recently rekindled my lifelong love of computer games by buying me an xbox 360 for christmas. now she hates us (me and me box), but that's ok because i'm a couple of points off seargent on halo 3.

anyway...

recently, something called onlive was announced. it looks very cool, if a little implausible, but is worth keeping an eye on. it uses the concept of cloud computing (basically lots of servers around the world becoming a massive supercomputer) to build a totally online games console that works on anything that can handle video and has a net connection.

as a (totally fictitious, but informative) example:
i want to play the new game BONG. i don't own a hard copy, but merely log in to 'onlive' and begin playing; the game is processed and everything handled over the onlive cloud network. i then play the game in realtime, with no downloads, system problems etc. i can theoretically access any game and play it on my system instantly (i presume there'll be a payment system though).

the ramifications of this are immense. not only for me, but for the future of my relationship with my girlfriend. check it out at your peril...

twitter; good application #1

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 14:13:00 +0000

as brilliant as twitter is, and it is brilliant, it's currently rare that you see businesses use it to directly drive sales.

well, bakers aren't exactly known for technical innovation, but this lot have really got it nailed.

watch me, but don't listen

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 08:43:00 +0000

jakob nielsen (or God as he's known to most web developers), recently sent out a newsletter showing some interesting stats on viewing time for online videos (US only unfortunately).

contrary to people bemoaning the death of TV, 99% of the TV/video people watch is on TV, only 1% is on their computer; even for the age group 18-24 then 98% of TV/video is watched on TV, so there is no real difference in age groups.

so, TV's not dead yet. the really interesting thing about the research is that when asked to recall their behavior, participants in the study underestimated their amount of TV viewing by 25% and overestimated their use of online video and mobile video.

God says: "First Rule of Usability? Don't Listen to Users"

risky ground, any thoughts?

sounds, amazing

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:35:00 +0000

shameless altruistic[?] plug here

a good friend of mine is holding a 'sound and light installation' at the croft in bristol (BS1 3RW) tonight, so if you're in the area and feeling a little experimental (or in the need of a couch and a pint) come along and check it out between 5 - 7. it's free.

his website is here, and worth checking out if you want to know what's going to happen. it'll be a surprise for me, as i've cultivated a method of appearing that i'm listening to his explanations whilst really thinking about more interesting things; like could i really convince my girlfriend to name our first child Anakin?

however, i think it involves people having a go at drawing on a board without touching it, or some such thing. history in the making i'm sure...

ultimate wisdom

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 12:03:00 +0000

noticed today that google are quietly trying to challenge wikipedia. they've been building up a free service called knol which aims to provide free packets of knowledge, or 'knols' on all sorts of subjects. their usp is that each article is written by an expert on the subject, rather than your average joe, thereby beating wikipedia's apparent untrustworthy articles.

well, almost.

i checked to see what gleaming nuggets of wisdom appeared on the knol homepage and my eye was drawn to the knol for "WISDOM HAPPINESS" by sajid khan. this 'expert' on the subject extolled a load of nonsense for a couple of pages, ending on the witty:

"THE ULTIMATE HAPPINESS THAT EVERY INDIVIDUAL CAN REALISTICALLY ASPIRE TO IS CREATED BY BEING AT THE APEX OF ONES EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE.BY
BECOMING WISE." [sic]

nice. all this from a man whose personal description reads "Wisdom(brain) coach,President of research foundation,solver of the mystery of wisdom, antique dealer, inventor, knoler, solver of the mystery why the sperm is tiny and the womens egg is huge".

think i'll stick with the wiki for the time being.

golden shower?

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 11:58:00 +0000

this christmas saw an increase to the traditional deluge of marketing emails from all and sundry, attempting to squeeze every last christmas buck from us before we all realise that we actually should start behaving like we're in a recession. the increase might be expected by some, but over the past 12 months great leaps have been made in permission-based email marketing, and with most brands now offering customers the ability to adjust their contact preferences, and choose email content, why the sudden mass mailings?

well, it's got to be the current economic climate, ain't it? we all know that.

so, if we all know that, do we forgive the companies for clogging our inbox? are they allowed to spam us, when we are well aware they are fighting for their very survival?

personally, i say no. now is the time for brands to build stronger relationships with their customers, not to p*ss them all off. but maybe, some people sympathise with these struggling, desparate brands and see the very human struggle for survival behind their desparate campaigns?

what do you think?

the second oldest profession?

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:31:00 +0000

went to a pub the other day; on the walls they had all sorts of kitsch old advertisments from the turn of the century. one particular ad for 'bile tablets' caught my eye, graphically describing the constipations of an edwardian housemaid.

anyway, in the bottom right was a small box offering a free sample of the tablets, all you had to was write to the company and provide your name and address and the name and date of the paper the advert was seen in. it was humbling to know that direct-response ads were being tested over a 100 years ago. considering how much everything else has evolved since then, have we really moved on that much?

you can count on facebook

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 12:06:00 +0000

ever wondered how many people in the uk like something? i have. how many other 25 year olds love ultravox? did anyone actually enjoy 'bring it on'? to us marketers the questions are even more pertinent; for example a up-and-coming online fashion retailer may want to know exactly how many females aged 18-25 would consider themselves interested in fashion?

in the past, these questions have been answered by expensive lifestyle surveys and 3rd party data, but now a new opportunity has arisen for the savvy marketer; facebook.

facebook allows advertisers to pick exactly who their ads are targeted at. selling emo t-shirts? select anyone age 18-22 with 'my chemical romance' in their profile. selling travel insurance? select anyone over 18 with 'travel' in their interests. the possibilities are endless and it's a powerful tool for social network marketers, but whats in it for us?

well, when setting up the ads, facebook convieniently tells you how many people will see your ad. you want a count? just click on the 'advertising' link at the bottom of any facebook page and set-up a fake ad. it takes 30 seconds and allows you access to instant counts on the whole facebook base.

just extrapolate this out to the uk population, round down for safety, and you've got your count. whole thing done in a minute. fair enough it's not as accurate as a lifestyle survey, but it certainly gives you a pointer in the right direction.

so, for all of you who did enjoy 'bring it on', you'd better hope the count is high; when the revolution comes, you're first against the wall.

obama wins, no thanks to darren

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 10:01:00 +0000

imagine our dazza's surprise a few days ago when he got an email inviting him to click his way to a url linked to the presidential race. being the inquisitive sort, he did.

what it revealed was a fantastic way to engage obama-minded voters who'd rather sit at home and eat cream donuts by the dozen. hats off to obama and his digital team!

see it in action down below:

voter apathy

stop looking at me

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 17:24:00 +0000

a certain video has been brought to our attention, revealing interesting facts about the way we communicate with each other. edward muzio of group harmonics has conducted some research into the problem of dealing with, well, problems, via email.

we've all experienced someone misinterpreting what we've said in an email, but muzio has concluded that only 7% of communication between us is based on the actual words. the remaining 93% is made up of visual cues (55%) and tone (38%), which are a little hard to convey through outlook.

it therefore seems wise to save your emails for saying nice things to people. bad news is better communicated face to face or on the phone, a useful piece of information to those of us who live and breathe through email.

(plus, they've got no record of what you've said then... you don't know me, right?)

not kidding

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 13:46:00 +0000

you can create x-rays with sellotape. i jest not:

sticky fingers

how brilliant is that?

ubiquity

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:34:00 +0000

Amid all the hype of the release of the Google Chrome browser a couple of weeks back, Mozilla, the people responsible for Firefox (the second most popular browser behind Internet Explorer) quietly released their 'Ubiquity' add-on.

Although Ubiquity is currently only at version 0.1 and in a testing phase, it raises massive implications for the future of online marketing and, I say this seriously, the Internet itself. Put simply, Ubiquity allows a user to communicate with the Internet (not web-pages, the whole internet) in real-time, without all the silly hassle of using web-pages and actually doing something.

Essentially Ubiquity is a small panel that can be called up at anytime and given instructions using normal English language, but it's best demonstrated with examples:

Example 1)
I'm browsing houses on the 'net and find something that I think my girlfriend will like; normally I'd have to save the link, go to my email, paste the link into an email and send it to her. With Ubiquity I simple say (type) "email this to Beth" and voila, all done for me; Ubiquity uses web-pages to do the job I would have to do without me having to actually see any of them.

Example 2)
Pretentious as I am, I'm catching up on my Baudelaire, and I get to a tricky phrase I don't understand. Normally I'd have to go find an online translation program, type info in etc etc. With Ubiquity I simply select the text say "translate this" and I have my answer. Ubiquity is not a translation program; it merely uses existing web-pages to fulfill the task I set it.

Ubiquity can also handle map queries, searching and summarizing information and many other things. Within two weeks of public existence, there was already a huge community of developers making new commands every day and it's still growing exponentially. The theory being by the time we get to version 1.0, you'll be able to give the 'net an instruction and get a solution without actually using web pages. Crucially, Ubiquity beats search-engines and comparison sites by acting as an 'Internet companion' that will perform any task for you without you having to leave the page you were viewing.

So, before I lose the point of this, what are the marketing implications of Ubiquity? Well, Amazon have already got in on the act, imagine: I'm reading a book review on a website, think to myself that I might like to get the book, so say to Ubiquity "Amazon this" and I get the price of the book (and all related editions) without actually going to Amazon. No need to visit another page; Ubiquity gets me all the info I need instantly.

I'm then one click away from buying the book. Imagine the first person who writes the 'compare' command, they'll have massive power in deciding which pages Ubiquity uses to compare the prices of a product that a prospect is looking at in a review or news article. Why use a compare website, when Ubiquity can check them all, and then report the cheapest prices back to you? A book club could be using Ubiquity to "compare this book price", a retailer - "how much is this", a national travel board - "show me local information", the possibilities are endless. For real marketing clout, imagine the power of the person who gets the 'buy this' command! Instant transactions from two words.

Ubiquity is still at a development stage and most of it's basic functions could be replicated by a search engine quickly, but I think it's speed and ease of use stands a chance of genuinely changing the way we use the 'net, as well as the way we market digitally; so keep it in mind for the future. Check out the introductory video at: http://labs.mozilla.com/2008/08/introducing-ubiquity/

As a final aside; voice recognition software has been around for years. Ubiquity makes a point of using normal English language to control the web ("email this...", "compare this...", "how do I get to..."). Combine the two? You'll be literally talking to the 'net in no time. Who needs a mouse and keyboard? You heard it here first.

Yours in geek

Nick

time

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 08:12:00 +0000

just to make sure everyone knows that google can do anything they put their mind to, they've brought back the internet from 2001, the whole(ish) internet. using their oldest available search index you can now search and view pages from way back in 2001. looking for youtube? myspace? facebook? not invented yet. what's really interesting is seeing the first version of wikipedia, back when it was still run by a couple of blokes in a shed.

anyway, can't really think of a marketing application for it, but it's all very interesting (try searching for 'breaking news', or search some competitors websites and laugh at how crap they are), and is a great reminder that google are all-powerful. be afraid.

back when limp bizkit could be number one

another brick in the wall

noreply@blogger.com (Rushmore) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 15:51:00 +0000

3d web browsers have been knocking around for a while now, but until recently none of them seemed to provide the user with anything useful... well now steps up cooliris.

this small firefox add-on allows users to browse web-pages as a 3d wall, displaying hundreds of images and videos at any one time, allowing fast, intuitive navigation around them all. indeed, some quick mouse-work was all it took for one of my more discerning colleagues to be drooling over 1,000s of images of lindsay lohan within seconds... a must have for any marketing agency.

that aside, the marketing applications of this tool are phenomenal. amazon are onboard and you can already quickly browse books by authour or title in a large virtual bookshelf. no clothes retailers are involved yet, but the ability to quickly survey a stores range using images and videos has obvious advantages to department pages that have been kept plain and functional by countless web usability studies.

with the whole application weighing in at a mere 2mb, it won't be long before websites will be pushing the app when you arrive, enabling instant 3d viewing for all those who aren't likely to voluntarily add this to firefox, which, lets face it, is about 99.9% of the population.

would you like to view this page in 3d? i know what i'd pick...

a new dimension to online