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Digital Influence Mapping Project

Digital Influence Mapping project: How are we influenced and how do we influence in the digital age. This is about the intersection social media, word of mouth and digital marketing and how it is impactive marketing, advertising and public relations.

5 "Watch-outs" when looking for a social media "expert"January 3

  

Recently, Jeremiah Owyang from Forrester relayed a post an agency had created on how to detect "carpetbaggers" in social media (and a self-promotional video from another agency and a video of someone reading the original post...). The goal of the agency was to claim that their approach is legitimate and that marcom executives had better watch out for consultants or agencies professing expertise and solutions in social media that they do not have.

For the most part, their list of what to watch out for is the same old list. It covers basics:
"...1) When asked about listening, gives you a blank stare
6) Believes in delivering messages
10) Their blog is less than six months old or has no comments...."

This doesn't make it wrong. There may, in fact, be some marcom executi

For the Guy/Gal Who Has Everything: Web Trends 3.0December 29 2008

I love great visualizations. This is going to be a year for more of them, no doubt. Oliver and his folks at IA Japan have released another version of their mashup of the Web 2.0 landscape and the Tokyo subway map. It is but one group's view on cataloguing many of the significant brands and businesses online. It is done so well that it is worth having. You can buy a poster at their site. You can also download jpegs and even a full pdf.

The best part if their interactive start page which makes all of the "destinations" on the route clickable - not sure what Badongo is? Just click on it to go there.

Buy a map for someone you care about in social media. And tag their site, they do great work.

The Shape of Corporate Comms: FordDecember 24 2008

There have been a couple of interesting social media-driven corporate communications stories during the last quarter. One is, of course, Motrin. That has been posted about ad naseum. Suffice it to say that there was a missed opportuntiy there for J&J, but that's another post.

Thre more interesting story unfolded in the middle of December with Ford. While the specifics of the conflagaration between Ford and it's attempt to protect trademark with Ford fan sites and blogs, the more interesting by-product is Scott Monty's (Ford's recently hired social media guy) willingness to jump into the conversation. He held a sober conversation, stayed within the bounds of messaging without coming off like a flack in any way, and he didn't take the bait from the more extreme voices in the comment flow.

For those who weren't following along, the basic skirmish arose as follows (from PickupTrucks.com):

"Ford and TheRangerStation.com, a 10-year-old website for Ford Ranger enthusiasts, have mutually agreed to end a legal dispute that originally had Ford's attorneys demanding $5,000 and the rights to the domain name "TheRangerStation.com." Word of the dispute quickly caused an eruption of online support for the fan site that had some questioning Ford's relationship with some of its mos

Idea Bar #11: The Agency of the Future - Innovation LabDecember 22 2008

Agencies are going through a dramatic transformation. Traditional Ad Agencies will scale back staff between now and first quarter. Media agencies, at the top of the pile, are choking on word of mouth marketing because that discipline does not behave like all of the paid channels out there. Public relations continues to grow and not because it is the "cheap" medium. PR works really hard for clients and is more efficient at selling and building brand at the same time. With all this change, what is the shape and role of the agency of the future? Sure, the marketing and PR silos will crumble into one 360 pile. But there is another opportuntiy for agencies as the next innovation lab for clients (and themselves).  

Google spends a tremendous amount of time and money on innovation (the fabled "20%" of everyone's time and the expression of that effort via Google Labs.) Agencies struggle to follow suit due to the business model of the big conglomerates (mine is WPP). Considering my entire business -

Social Network Advertising Must Change for BrandsDecember 15 2008

One of my favorite quotes for a presentation I am working on comes from a blogger, Samir Blwani at left the Box. He summarizes much of what has been written about the effectiveness of the current style of advertising in social networks:

“Social Network Advertising is a Waste of Time…”

While he gives a shot to inventorying the strengths of social networks including their larger-than-TV reach, ultimately he arrives at the conclusion that many have come to: the old model of interuptive advertising will not work well on a platform based on communication. But it's not the ad network inside Facebook that is at fault but how it is being used...

Randall Stross takes his own look at brands on Facebook in the NY Times. He questions the meager examples offered up by P&G and the somewhat empty experience of becoming a "fan" or "friend" of many brands. The Crest Whitestrips fan page dwindled from 14,000 back down to 10,000 following the wake of a promotion. Randall wonders if the effort of endless promotions to keep that number up may be prohibitive. Actually, it looks like Whitestrips has a weekly drawing or free pr