Disqus - Friends of burbridge

Re: Skittles home page takeover – great viral or social media spam?

Joanne Jacobs — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 11:35:35 -0000

I'd like to focus on a few points here:
1. 'Brands delivering value': social media is about engaging with consumers and people interested in individuals and organisations, and their activities. The very notion of 'delivering value' (as if it is a one-way street) is to misunderstand social media utterly. Value may be derived from productive exchange, but it is not a simplistic act which happens to occur through a social media conduit.
2. 'What causes people to buy on impulse?' What has been increasingly demonstrated in interactive advertising research is that brand awareness is much more useful for service goods than it is for FMCG. It's certainly true that awareness has to exist, but continual re-eposure to the brand has neglible effect on intention to purchase. More importantly, there is precious little data to support the notion that brand awareness and intention to purchase converts to actual sales. And frankly, I'd like to see the number of twitterati who buy skittles as a result of this stunt. I suspect the numbers are substantially less than the cost of running this debacle.
3. 'Focus on a campaign and not a product' When a campaign goes viral, marketers tend to go mad with praise for the campaign itself. The Big Ad for Carlton Draught (http://www.youtube.com/watc... was phenomenally successful as an online/TV campaign mix. The Subservient Chicken campaign for Burger King (http://www.subservientchick... was also extremely successful in terms of the number of hits it got - although interestingly, very few people who used Subservient Chicken could recall it being a Burger King ad. But what is interesting about this and other campaigns (including the notorious 'Cat Fan' unauthorised viral campaign at http://www.metacafe.com/wat... is that while awareness of the campaigns were high, there was little evidence that the campaigns themselves affected genuine sales. As marketers we do tend to focus too much on awareness and too little on mobilising audiences to act for a product or service - both in terms of advocation and actual sales. Getting consumers to focus on the campaign is actually quite simple - produce something entertaining and you win the battle. Getting consumers to act positively and developing brand loyalty is a totally different proposition.

I still find the skittle tactics rather purposeless and twee. Yet it could so easily have been interesting. What a shame.

Re: Cluetrain celebrates 10 years – so what next?

Joanne Jacobs — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:41:07 -0000

I can't believe it's a whole decade but of course Cluetrain formed the basis of all my teaching in strategic use of IT in the years that followed - and it's been a while since I left teaching. Tempus fugit.

Regarding your ideas for where we are going, I think your perceptions are sound. I particularly am interested in the notion of a revolution in marketing and help desks. It has always struck me as particularly stupid that call centres are populated with the lowest paid, least invested staff, and yet they are the first port of call for problems in business. The idea of a shift toward an army of advocates, well-paid, informed and acting on behalf of something they believe in is far more likely to induce a sense of trust in users. I also agree that marketing itself will shift - ironically *back* to more pure forms of the discipline, where marketing is about communication and connecting people with the information, products and services that are of direct interest to a user.

You'll note I use the term 'user' not 'consumer'. I think that is perhaps the other main shift we'll see. The age of pure consumption is probably at an end. The rise of green issues, the concern over health with the rise in obesity and diabetes (among other problems associated with a consumption-obsessed society) will all lead towards a more conscious and conscientious society. There will always be a need to be a user of products, but that use will come with a sense of the consequences of use.

Interesting times. And I do look forward to the update to Cluetrain!

Re: How To Lose a Fortune in Social Media

Joanne Jacobs — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 11:53:03 -0000

Quite possible. Though I rather suspect there's less planning than that. Having run a company that builds social networking platforms from scratch i know the average cost of building something that can be classed as a company asset (and thus has almost 100% new code and design) is about £250,000 in labour. However, I'm also aware that if you have to rewrite the base code several times over to accommodate new functionality and usability issues that should have been ironed out at the wireframes stage, then the labour costs can easily double or treble. Then you have overhead costs in real estate, utilities, software and hardware to actually house the developers writing the site and that can be another £150,000 a year. Then you have the hosting costs at about £4000/month. So as a base cost an entirely new platform comes in at about £450,000 for the first year, rising to around £1m if you have a lot of re-writes of the architecture. Now the writers of the original software have a right to sell their work at a reasonable profit, so I can see the cost gettting to about £2m (US$3.5m), with an ongoing maintenance cost (including hosting) at about £120,000/year (US$200,000).

But that still leaves us a good US$13m (at least) off the phenomenal $16m price tag.

All I can imagine is that someone has listed a proprietary social networking platform as being worth a substantial amount more than any proprietary asset is actually worth. Maybe McGraw Hill needed some way of offsetting its tax duties?

Re: How To Lose a Fortune in Social Media

Joanne Jacobs — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 11:56:48 -0000

Sorry that should read US$12m (at least) off the $16m price tag. I really shouldn't type with long nails :)

Re: The Year in Review through the Eyes of Twitter

Joanne Jacobs — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 02:26:44 -0000

Would have thought #trafigura - being the only internet-only collective acton of the year - should have been in this list.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 08:54:05 -0000

Let me know if you have any questions or comments... I'll be sitting here waiting for any questions and comments from 14:00 London time (see hhttp://timeanddate.com/wor.... Looking forward to participating!
Cheers,
Joanne

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 09:32:33 -0000

Hi Scott and thanks for the question.... I think the advantages of augmented reality in business can be profound. Not only are there advantages for 'practicing' difficult or dangerous scenarios in a physical space, there are clear uses for augmented reality in testing theories and scenario planning that are more informative than standard analysis.

As for Second Life I find that less valuable than the use of tools that operate in a physical space. Second Life still requires a strong understanding of the technologies and strong computing power. But genuine augmented reality is likely to be using technologies that we use more regularly and require low technology literacy - mobile phones which include internet access, phones, recording devices, and so on.

So for business I see the best use of augmented reality as in problem solving.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 09:40:25 -0000

Actually the first groups using AR are education sector. Some great location based games are being used in physical spaces in school sectors.

Augmented Virtuality ... Actually we dealt with a bit of this with universal remotes back at the Centre for Interaction Design in Australia. It's great tech. It's not flawless but it will take a while before people will feel comfortable with AugVir techs. But good question!

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 09:40:48 -0000

Ah sorry mate I answered this above!

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 09:50:52 -0000

Actually my experience of social media and AR is that it brings people together in real life far more effectively than community interest groups.

And my dear friend Deb Polson, a curator and creator of AR gaming tech for education will tell you that the location based games she's run have brought kids and their parents together in a highly social and highly engaing fashion - and this was identified as the best bit of the experience even by the kids. I think the very advantage of social media is that it is inherently social and we have a very human need to meet and engage with one another in the real world.

As for rules - I think the only true rule is authenticity. Trust is key - so inherently reality has to be what we find in these spaces.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:02:48 -0000

I think what Like Minds can do is give a sense of what can be. I like the fact that Like Minds is an explorative space, not a space about rules.

As for the future of social media - I see it growing and evolving as a single-point of reference for information accuracy. I think it's also a point of no return too - this isn't a fad. It's going to just keep growing as a consumer content source.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:20:08 -0000

Yes I probably phrased this incorrectly. Mere social connection in a physical space is fairly dull. But geolocation for business connection, or providing services, or understanding more about one another is truly exciting. And that's why I say I'd like to build games that are AR games - because when there are other tasks and things to achieve it becomes FANTASTIC! I just figure that being in a place is less interesting than *doing something*.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:27:58 -0000

Not just tourism but job environments and educational experiences. :)

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:55:10 -0000

It's an interesting point you raise Sophie, because it's about perspective and intention. Jan Moir clearly didn't believe she was being offensive - and it seems her editors didn't think that she was being offensive either. But offense was the result. So the question is raised: if this happens in the 'real world' in editorial, how do you deal with it in a virtualised world?

Interestingly the answer is - rather more simply. Real time access actually obliges us to be as clear and accessible as possible, and in terms of augmented reality we're talking about phyisical spaces and real people - everything that can be verified. So it's not just utopian to suggest that we're advocating authenticity; it's rather easy to point out where people and organisations are 'getting it wrong'. Trust is currency in the augmented reality economy. Losing trust is losing value.

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 11:04:54 -0000

Yeah I've actually written a few academic articles on this :D

The funniest thing is that in the very early days when i wanted to put an instnat messaging back channel up on screen in a classroom environment, even the techn staff thought I was mad. They all said, "but they won't concentrate on what you're saying!". I shrugged and said, "If I lose their interest then clearly I'm not communicating well enough."

The thing is in Australia there are a lot of South East Asian students as well as European students, and culturally there's a difference in the way these students engage in the classroom, because there's a respect for the lecturer that most Australian students wouldn't have. So they don't ask questions or pose challenges as often. So our solution was to use these back channel technologies to either anonymously or openly enable questions that some students wouldn't otherwise consider asking. And it really worked. It's a much more socratic system so it's deeply engaging.

I remember when we first introduced blogs in graduate economics classes the students were really excited when academics and other students around the world began to engage in their group work questions. (Gosh that seems so long ago now, yet it was only about 8 years ago! Now it would be reagrded as very old skool!) But the point was that we were able to clearly demonstrate accelerated learning thorugh deep engagement with ideas beyond the classroom.

interestingly enough I'm now writing a subject for an international business course which is entirely focused on aggregating resources and inspiring critical engagement. I'm pretty excited about that because it's ALL live and asynchronous communication. And my suspicion is that it's going to be both rigorous and fun. :)

Re: @JoanneJacobs on Augmented Reality and Innovation

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 11:13:55 -0000

Authenticity, I think, is the key word. Trust is generated by authenticity. 'Turth' is more difficult.

I always loved that line from Jesus Christ Superstar, sung/spoken by Pontius Pilate: 'But what is truth? Is truth unchanging law? We both have truths. Are mine the same as yours?'.

Truth is based on perspective, and is influenced by culture, emotion, relationships and beliefs. In fact it is easier to denote what is real, than what is truth.

Okay - enough deep philosophy. But I think what social media can provide is authentic responses to real events, places and people. This isn't a crafted environment; dominated by media players, public relations and spin. It's a decidedly casual, often amateur, but also often enlightening space. And it's also a brutal space. If you do something inauthentic you can expect to be pulled up fast by the community and will need to reestablish trust.

So in my (very humble) opinion, authenticity is both goal and characteristic of social media. Trust is based on a track record of authenticity. And being honest about one's perspective - being truthful - is central to authenticity.

Re: On foursquare, location & privacy…

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 04:34:05 -0000

Because:
(a) it's in the FB Terms of Service -
"Facebook users provide their real names and information, and we need your help to keep it that way. Here are some commitments you make to us relating to registering and maintaining the security of your account:
1. You will not provide any false personal information on Facebook, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission."; and

(b) because it is easier to find people with their real names.

Re: On foursquare, location & privacy…

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 04:46:07 -0000

Actually it's not the robbery itself that will be motivated by 4sq activity. Frankly thieves are much more capable of determining if people are home by casing a place. The problem isn't with 4sq as an invitation to be burgled. The problem will be with claiming on insurance if a burglary occurs. I foresee a situation where insurance agencies will void insurance claims where claimants have acted negligently by identifying their location outside their residence.

There is some sense in the Gawker insert, but not because it renders the concern redundant. Insurance claims and torts-based litigation has been the primary agent for changes of behaviour and establishment of strict rules for gathering in public places, kids' leisure activities and how you secure your home. Geolocation will also be affected.

So it's not a matter of check-in producing a response (theft) that is as significant. It's a matter of geolocation of any kind (on twitter/FB/4sq) voiding your insurance.

Re: My thoughts on LikeMinds09

Joanne Jacobs — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 09:04:47 -0000

Let me know if I can help in any way. I am happy to come back to Exeter to help with an Amplified style event if this helps? Details of how to run Amplified-style structured conversations (like our lunchtime gatherings) are up at: http://amplified.pbworks.co...

Re: Why I think #likeminds 2010 truly delivered

Joanne Jacobs — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 09:37:28 -0000

Agreed entirely Robert. And I think there was a little more too - it wasn't just easy to connect; there was a generosity in everyone there that made connections not just easy, but pleasant. It may sound a bit naff, but that warmth and openness is crucial to fire that interest in continuing a connection. I met some extraordinary talents at Like Minds - both on and off stage - and I look forward to some great discussion and business arising from the event.

So glad you enjoyed it too!

Re: Redrawing

Joanne Jacobs — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 08:37:11 -0000

Dunbar's number strikes again! (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...

Whilst I don't have anything like your following, Chris, I think what you are trying to do is laudable but may need reviewing again in just a short period of time. Redrawing the engagement opportunities is likely to be an ongoing process and prioritisation is ever more difficult as work and life compete for your time, and more and more people enter your sphere of interest.

Of course, I recognise your frustration in not being able to engage in deeper conversations and deliver more for the people you meet, but anyone who meets you, or regularly reads your blog would realise your intention to interact is there. Eventually, however, there comes a point where you need to forgive yourself for not accessing everyone. You're right to share the load among others in your network and the network itself produces its own support and idea-sharing load. And the beauty of many-to-many networks is that true value is more easily identifiable where appropriate filters are applied.

I'd like to overcome Dunbar's number but haven't so far achieved it. But clear communication of availability and regular updates to that status is the next best thing :)

Re: Can You Blog From an iPad? I Just Did

Joanne Jacobs — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 03:31:32 -0000

"if you want to get up a quick post on-the-go, the iPad does a decent job"

- so does my blackberry. And with no US$499+ price tag. FTW!

Re: The ‘word of mouth’ election

Joanne Jacobs — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 11:17:09 -0000

Direct phone canvassing calls are less tolerated from political groups than they have ever been, and I already feel like I need to carry a stick to shoo away all the awful dead-tree-product political brochure peddlers at tube station entry-ways. This isn't just outdated, it's actually in direct contradiction with promises of information privacy and green/sustainable living policies.

To me, this is more of a 'who else can we vote for?' election, and we're all struggling to find alternatives that are not either schizophrenic in policies or are making plans for things that are completely unfunded. Sadly, in the one domain where many of us would be happy to engage with campaigning politicians - in our own time on twitter and elsewhere online - only a handful of savvy politicians are actually present and listening.

Agree this is not word of mouth at all. It's all mouth, and no coherence.

Re: My Vote For Sale. Price: Engagement.

Joanne Jacobs — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 12:44:52 -0000

I've been meaning to respond to this for days and it's only because I have been focusing my idea development on work that I have failed to do so. But here goes...

The points you make on engagement are crucial: in order to facilitate a truly participatory democracy it is vital that all citizens feel their vote counts and that their values are being supported. But my concern is that politicians themselves shouldn't be regarded as an embodiment of values - and in an age of brands and televised debates,it's an unfortunate fact that a 90 minute tv programme can swing a vote in favour of a politician rather than policies.

I'm dismayed but not surprised you never learned about politics in the home or at school. I did study politics at school, but I don't think that's where I learned about political systems in Australia. I'd say my understanding of politics was grounded in two primary experiences: my brother's time at an elite private boys school (which he attended on an academic scholarship) when compared with my own public schooling, and a thorough dose of Australian history and anti-authoritarian sentiment percolating through my childhood. The dismissal of Australia's Prime Minister in 1975 by the Queen's representative in Australia when I was just 4 years old set the stage for a lifetime of education about political systems, and the machinations of power. It did eventually lead to studying politics but I was never very good at it until I got to university and started to apply political understanding to issues - in particular to the development of policies and legislation pertaining to public sector broadcasting, pay television and telecommunications at the cusp of the development of the WWW. But as a result of these diverse experiences I learned that the exercise of power in a vacuum of ignorance of political process was inherently undemocratic. And I spent a great deal of time contributing to public education and developing curriculum that educated about processes and properties of governance in the new media sector. I even took on a political role, when I ran petitions in Queensland, Australia, campaigning for daylight saving to be adopted in the South East, in the face of phenomenal opposition in the north.

But the curious thing I also discovered through all these experiences, is how difficult it can be to get people to accept responsibility for their own participation. Citizenship - the active involvement in one's community - is being mistaken for community service, and involvement in the *development* of policies is being regarded as a problem for politicians.

Nowhere is this more pronounced than the decision to draft legislation in Committees appointed from the House of Lords. Instead of generating policy statements through engagement with stakeholders, there's a tendency in the House of Lords, to get a small number of high-profile personnel from industry giants to contribute to a *report*. The report includes little if any analysis of relevant and impacting legislation and includes no legislative instruments of its own. Then another Committee of appointed politicians in the House of Lords go about drafting the actual legislation which may or may not have any bearing on the wording of a Bill.

How is this remotely participatory? And why are not more stakeholders demanding a say over the wording of legislature, before it goes to debate in parliament? (And don't even get me started on appointed peers in the House. Personally, I regard the current system positively medieval.)

But, as they say, baby steps. It is indeed marvellous to have a politician actually providing individuals with an opportunity to help draft and vote on pledges. And it is wonderful that a few souls have taken the initiative to contribute. But again, few have taken up the challenge.

I believe it is Citizenship that should be taught in schools, not history. I don't disregard the value of history - I'm a huge history buff - but there are different channels through which history can be explored - in museums, art galleries, and in tourist ventures. But the value of active Citizenship and collective decision making (which can indeed result in better communities) is something that is not just lacking in education now, but which has been lacking for centuries.

We have an opportunity to redress that inadequacy in a more digitally connected age. And I'm hopeful that a new generation of voters will use technologies to put pressure on the exclusive processes of policy making and legislative drafting and debate. I like your style in 'selling' your vote for engagement. I think you don't actually mean a financial trade, but a trade in representation of your interests. That's true citizenship, and it's something that should be applauded.

Re: My Vote For Sale. Price: Engagement.

Joanne Jacobs — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 15:42:44 -0000

RE: Lords v Commons... it's actually pretty simple. A majority in Commons is easier to attain as the sheer number of seats and the voting system makes majority rule rather immune to sensible debate. It's also true that most laws are drafted in Committees, and the vast majority of laws drafted in Commons committees that pass in to the upper house are simply drafted along party lines and are decimated on proper inspection. It's still a problem with parliamentary process, not with the 'value' of aristocratic heritage (ie: nil).