online marketing

As promised, below are some notes from the second day of the event. Please note that it only includes notes for presentations by the following people: Shawn Ohler, Ernest Barbaric and Ken Chapman. I had to leave at the lunch break.

Social meida insights from Shawn Ohler, ATB Financial

• Social media campaigns are rarely a success, but when they work, the results are amazing.
• Asking audience "what do you know about our company?" is often a good first step to solve a brand recognition problem.
• Many companies say they care about communities, but in fact they rarely do. So, identifying a strong value and sticking to it is very important. The idea is to create a value that resonates with the entire company. ATB Financial found it as "we are Alberta".
• WeAreAlberta.ca, or any other social campaign site is not a place to sell your product. The company treats it as a place where conversations start.
• According to 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer, the top 3 corporate reputation factors are: transparency, quality of product / service being offered and trust.
• Based on ATB Financial's experience, traditional media started the conversation and social media picked it up and continued.
• Asking your Facebook friends to contribute to your social campaign does not work. Instead, look at relevant conversations in relevant online communities, offer help, contribute, share value, then ask for help.
• According to Shawn, any social media project should accomplish 3 things: publishing (content development and distribution), engaging (starting conversations with the target audience), and influence (ability to influence audience's decisions based on the relationship formed during the campaign).

Social media trainer and consultant, Ernest Barbaric, Ernest Media

Ernest's presentation was of two parts: trends and social media campaign steps. Below is the summary of key points.

• Trend 1: Mobile. Smart phones are taking over the market. According to admob data, 50% of all phones are smart phones. 30% of mobile users access social networks from their phone. In short, our experience is becoming increasingly mobile. As marketers, we need to make sure we strongly consider this mobile revolution.
• Trend 2: Location-based services. It's about here and now. Yelp and FourSquare are two example of location based services that have been growing substantially in their user base. Google Places is a good example of bigger company concerned with location-based services.
• Trend 3: Augmented Reality. Conversations are happening outside of places they originated. For example, I wrote an article on my blog, distributed to my social networks profiles. As a result, my article is discussed on those networks, not on my blog. Another lesson is that conversations are happening where it's most comfortable for your audience, not you. Learn more about Microsoft Augmented Reality Research.

To be continued with more from Ernest Barbaric and Ken Chapman.

Although there are events happening on local level, we don't usually get bigger marketing events with reknowned speakers and writers. There's a few organizations in Calgary that are doing great marketing events, among them are Internet Marketing Conference, Digital Alberta, Calgary CMA. I want to share one of the upcoming events by The Art of Productions.

About The Art of Marketing

Building on the success of the SOLD OUT inaugural Toronto program, this one day conference features six internationally renowned bestselling authors and leaders who will share an exciting blend of cutting edge thinking and real world experience on today’s most critical marketing issues. Don’t miss out on your chance to be a part of history and network with over 1,200 of Canada’s most influential marketers. See the event agenda for more details.

About The Speakers

Chip Heath - Strategy & Communications

Chip Heath is the Thrive Foundation of Youth Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. He is the co-author of the New York Times bestseller book Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. Made to Stick has been translated into 29 languages, the last of which was Slovakian, and it was retired from the BusinessWeek bestseller list after a 24-month run. More about the speaker.

Gary Vaynerchuk - Personal Branding in the New Media Landscape

Online marketing trailblazer Gary Vaynerchuk (VAY NER CHUK) is a 33-year-old entrepreneur whose dual identity as both business guru and wine guy has made him known as the “Social Media Sommelier.” A self-trained wine expert, he revolutionized the wine industry with his video blog, Wine Library TV (affectionately known as The Thunder Show), and grew his family wine business from $4 million to $60 million in five years. More about the speaker.

Sir Ken Robinson - Innovation & Creativity

Sir Ken Robinson, PhD is an internationally recognized leader in the development of creativity, innovation and human resources. He has worked with governments in Europe, Asia and the USA, with international agencies, Fortune 500 companies, and some of the world’s leading cultural organizations. In 1998, he led a national commission on creativity, education and the economy for the UK Government. More about the speaker.

Mitch Joel - Digital Marketing & Social Media

When Google wanted to explain online marketing to the top brands in the world, they brought Mitch Joel to the Googleplex in Mountain View, California. Marketing Magazine dubbed him the "Rock Star of Digital Marketing" and called him, "one of North America's leading digital visionaries." In 2006 he was named one of the most influential authorities on Blog Marketing in the world. More about the speaker.

Sally Hogshead - Persuasion & Influence

Nine seconds. That’s the length of the average attention span today. Just nine seconds! People become distracted by the next product, the next ad, the next option. How can you possibly hold your customers’ interest long enough shape their opinion? How can you break through the clutter to nail your next sales call, or motivate your internal team? For that matter, how can you influence any decisions? More about the speaker.

Max Lenderman - Branding & Experiential Marketing

A pioneer in the field of experiential marketing, Max Lenderman encourages businesses to look beyond traditional communication to get customers interacting with and living their brands. More about the speaker.

Event details

• When? Monday, June 14th, 2010, 9:00AM – 4:30PM
• Where? EPCOR CENTRE for the Performing Arts – Jack Singer Concert Hall

Find more at the event website.

I hope you get a chance to participate. I plan a surprise for you shortly, so please stay tuned. Talk soon!

I recently presented at a conference. Once of the questions was: Can you suggest a list of books to read to get better at social media? It was a good questions, and, of course, I gave a crappy answer. But this got me thinking. Here is the result:

1. To learn social media is to practice social media. Social media is the way we communicate by sharing. It changes, it evolves, it happens now. So the best way to learn it is to do it.
2. It's no longer about books (books take time to be published), it's about faster, up to date knowledge that's developed through the community members sharing information. So, it becomes a question of NOT "What book to read?" BUT "Who to follow?".

Instead of a list of books, here's a list of select people I follow and listen to. Actually most of the have written books on the subject. Unfortunately, by the time most of those books came out, the online community has already evolved beyond the book's contents in many cases.

• Guy Kawasaki, GuyKawasaki.com
• Jeremiah Owyang, Web-Strategist.com
• Charlene Li,  Groundswell Blog
• Chris Brogan, ChrisBrogan.com
• David Armano, Logic+Emotion
• Seth Godin, Seth Godin’s Blog

Here's a list of more people I follow on Twitter. And I'm sure I'm missing some of the brilliant modern minds, so feel free to suggest more people to the list above. Who are YOUR gurus?

Another great event on Calgary's digital marketing scene happened last night. Alexander Manu presented New Years Evolution at the Theatre Junction Grand and Velvet Lounge. The event was organized by Digital Alberta in collaboration with CMA Calgary Chapter.

This time I will not give you notes for two reason: it was dark in the theatre and Alexander was way to fast to take notes after. All I'll do is share some of my personal reflections based pon what I could recall afterwards.

In short: Alexander was going fast but long (started shortly after 7pm and wend until quarter to 10pm). Aside from being uncomfortably long it was quite engaging and full of twists in all directions. At times it was difficult to figure out where he goes next. To me it was more of a theatrical play enhanced with insights into social, mobile, marketing, technology, future, innovation, creativity, and "i see you".

Given the audience mix of marketers and tech people, the presentation was well addressed with a slight emphasis on marketing, as mentioned by Alexander himself. There were over 200 people in attendance. About two thirds stayed until the end. Thanks to all parties involved in organization of the event, the deck and video presentation will be available soon on Digital Alberta and calgaryCMA websites.

A few points that stuck with me until today:

• Russians-Americans space competition: Americans did not have another choice but to outperform Russians. However Russians were the ones to define the strategy, merely by getting to space first. The concept is very applicable to innovations in business.
• Trendwatching.com If you don't read it yet, get on it. Alexander recommended.
• Desire, goals, motivation, media, activity... I only got the beginning of this sequence, it actually continues. The key about these first steps (desire, goals, motivation) is that these are what everything starts from. I can't wait for the slides to be available to see where it all goes. Alexander promised to share an entire chapter on this from his book.
• Behaviour is constant, business is variable. Yet another deep thing that stuck with me. Alexander's point was that most businesses have it the other way around (behaviour is variable, business is constant). Meaning that you cannot change behaviours but you CAN adapt business. Interesting. I want to read more on it.
• Great concept of equating media, ubuntu and "I see you" from the Avatar. Early in presentation Alexander defined media as... "a tool that allows me to see me, you are my media, I'm yours". Ubuntu was later define by "I in You and You in Me". Finally, Alexander brought up the Avatar's "I see you". Brilliant.

Just came from another great event by Third Tuesday Calgary this time hosting Julien Smith, co-author of Trust Agents (Chris Brogan and Julien Smith). Those who missed it, missed a lot. Below are the notes for those who attended, let's compare!

• Hype vs. channel: hype dies, channel is forever
• Controlling future is about controlling a channel
• Channels used to be one-way, now it's both ways
• A channel starts from a network
• Channel: a tube you use to communicate with members of your network (my understanding, I may be wrong).
• Channel examples: Twitter, YouTube Channel, Facebook Fan Page
• Channel example (specific): ShitMyDadSays
• $50,000 / year example: great example, also referenced in Guy Kawasaki's Reality Check: on average $50,000 / year is enough to live in North America. Anything beyond that should not (hypothetically) make you happier.
• Social Networks and happiness. The closer you are to the centre of your network, the happier you are.
• Over time networks dissipate, so one should build tribes continuously.
• Laughter takes walls away; at work and at home. Laugh.
• Social capital = puzzle piece of the game
• Facilitate the exchange of social capital
• Reliability is huge. Be consistent with your content.
• Create content that's visible and indexable.
• Insiders vs. outsiders of a social neighbourhood.
• Insider language. Example: Sprite commercial ;)
• Differentiation: Blue Ocean Strategy
• Pattern breaking. Example: Cirque Du Soleil
• Do something different.
• What can be measured can be sold.
• Book reference: Connected by Nicholas A. Christakis.
• Be the lead goose.

For those who could not attend, you can catch Julien on his Canadian tour. More about the tour and the author:

• The next event is on Wednesday in Victoria.
• See Julien's site: InOverYourHead.
• Julien is talking (podcast): http://inoveryourhead.mevio.com/
• Alternatively, feel free to buy the book. BTW, I'm not getting paid, I just liked the presentation.

Recently I decided that I want to continue my hobby of making and performing music. I realized that I need a website for my hobby. I looked around and had three options:

1. build one on my own (very simple html/css with a cool image and an audio player, possible a one-pager),
2. use wordpress (there's a number of suitable templates that can be used as homepages for performing artists and musicians)
3. get on an online platform for musicians online.

Below are the results of what I found. My requirements were

• tool for bands to make and manage websites online
• tool for bands to promote their creativity
• tool for bands to distribute their content viraly
• tool serving independent rock folk segment
• audience is russian speakers

Went to google.com to collect a list of available platforms. Here are the contenders

• Jamendo.com
• ReverbNation.com
• BandCamp.com
• MuxTape.com
• PureVolume.com
• MySpace.com
• Last.fm

Went on alexa.com compare traffic

• Jamendo.com on Alexa.com
• Last.fm on Alexa.com
• ReverbNation.com on Alexa.com
• BandCamp.com on Alexa.com
• MuxTape.com on Alexa.com
• PureVolume.com on Alexa.com
• MySpace.com on Alexa.com

See something that I missed, please let me know. See something that you've used and would like to comment on? Feel free to leave a comment, I will be extremely happy!

Just reading an article at iMediaConnection about Twitter Experiments and how companies are using Twitter to get closer with their customers, create and enrich the conversations. I’m still one of those who has no solid idea on how to use Twitter productively for business purposes. Please let me know how your company benefited by twitter. In turn I’ll post my insights on the tool. Below is the snippet of the article with URL.

Article Highlights:

• H&R Block’s feed is 75 percent @replies
• Glam Media’s Tinker allows brands to sponsor filtered Twitter feeds about hot topics
• A mobile L.A. eatery uses Twitter to keep customers aware of its location
• Microsoft sponsors a collection of tweets from top executives

To read the article: 5 Twitter marketing experiments