Snarkist http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com Most recent posts at Snarkist posterous.com Thu, 06 May 2010 12:06:00 -0700 Hey Pfizer, Facebook made a page for you. You (and other companies) should be concerned. http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/hey-pfizer-facebook-made-a-page-for-you-you-a http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/hey-pfizer-facebook-made-a-page-for-you-you-a

Imagine you are a huge pharma company (Pfizer, for instance), and you've been waiting for the FDA to finally present some guidance on the use of social media before creating an "official" Facebook Fan Page. You just want to be certain that you aren't on the hook for every complaint, adverse effect or random interaction. For instance, would you (in your Pfizer persona) need to report someone who likes ED? Most pharma companies are being cautious before fully exploiting the potential of social media, and that's a good thing. 

Now imagine you are still Pfizer, and you discovered that Facebook went ahead and made a page for you. In fact, not just one page, but a whole bunch of them for your products and your brand. Now imagine if those pages pull together random updates from people too foolish to adjust their privacy settings and 'credible' sources like Wikipedia.Would you   go bat-shit-crazy at the chutzpa (hubris? balls? insanity?) of Facebook to package a collection of random content and call it a Community Page? If I were Pfizer or any other pharma company, I would be on the phone with my lawyers right now. The spamification of Facebook puts pharma (and other industries, companies and celebrities) at risk. The conflation of Fanpages, (real) Community Pages and Community (SPAM) Pages is clearly deceptive and benefits no one except Facebook. 

Look at all these pages Facebook built for Pfizer.
5-6-2010_2-25-41_pm

5-6-2010_2-27-45_pm

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Sun, 07 Mar 2010 19:49:17 -0800 CNN Money Covers "You Need Doug Winfield" http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/cnn-money-covers-you-need-doug-winfield http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/cnn-money-covers-you-need-doug-winfield
Cnn_doug

CNN Money published a story about my You Need Doug Winfield social media job search campaign. It was great working with Jessica Dickler. It's always exciting to be recognized for doing something right.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Sat, 02 Jan 2010 13:41:00 -0800 Blockbusters aren’t just for theaters any more, but maybe they should be. http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/blockbusters-arent-just-for-theaters-any-more http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/blockbusters-arent-just-for-theaters-any-more
The tools of simulation have become very refined over the years. Using animation software and detailed data capture and environment maps, it’s possible to produce accurate and compelling recreations of events like the collapse of the World Trade Center or the assassination of JFK or to produce over the top cataclysms for a movie like 2012.  Erring on the side of accuracy would lead to a very boring Summer blockbuster; and turning the knob to 11 when trying to inform the public about a real world problem, leads to disinformation and deception. 

Case in point, The Washington State Department of Transportation’s simulation of what would happen to Seattle’s antiquated Viaduct and beautiful waterfront during an earthquake. The animation shows a scene of total destruction of the area. The problem is that they state that the simulation was based upon a “similar” earthquake. The truth is that they used data for a quake that is much closer and two levels of magnitude stronger. It’s certainly possible that such an event could happen. It’s far more likely that the area will have a smaller quake that will cause plenty of damage but nothing that will have the biblical punch of what they produced. Their goal was to soften up the public, not to inform it. Credibility is exchanged for the necessity to make a slam dunk.  Why let the truth get in the way of your agenda.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 10 Dec 2009 15:14:00 -0800 Crowd sourced videos: Cultivated Creativity? http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/crowd-sourced-videos-cultived-creativity http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/crowd-sourced-videos-cultived-creativity

I'm seeing more and more "spontaneous" displays of grass roots virals, of course spontaneity requires planning. It’s clear that these examples weren’t truly improvised, but they do show how creativity can be sparked to encourage folks to do great work. The first example was produced by the staff at Gap Store 1604, Roseville, MN. It’s a really clever, car crash of a music video. It’s a hot tranny mess that was instigated by a contest promoted by CP+B and Cheer Factory. It’s quirky, weird and entertaining; and it show’s a very human side to the Gap brand. From an execution standpoint it’s probably twice as long as it should be, but it’s still a lot of fun to watch.

On the other hand the video of a spontaneous group dance routine (is such a thing possible?) at a Micrsoft store felt staged and a bit stagnant. In fairness to the Microsoft folks, the Gap has a much larger collection of stores. This increased the chance that at least one of the routines could break out of the mold of predictable line dances . I’m also glad that they allowed comments and responses (including a fun video produced by a kid in an Apple Store) Good viral crowd-sourced experiences require planning and an understanding of human psychology. They also require a Johnny Appleseed like approach to cultivating great content. Create frameworks for inspiration, resources (The Gap sent cameras to stores as part of their contest) and encourage as many people as possible to participate. For every 100 (or perhaps 1000) attempts you may only find a single truly brilliant result, but the relatively low cost for these efforts should be leveraged to generate multiple attempts. While I don’t necessarily believe in the one million monkeys with typewriters producing Shakespeare approach, but perhaps it's possible produce a Steven King novel this way.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 26 Nov 2009 13:03:00 -0800 Using twitter lists to determine top influencers http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/using-twitter-lists-to-determine-top-influenc http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/using-twitter-lists-to-determine-top-influenc

As a follower of Jeff Clark’s Neoformix blog, I always discover something new and interesting about data visualization and analysis. Recently, he’s been looking at how twitter’s new lists function can be used to define and categorize topical relevancy and influence. Using this process he’s created a twitter profile dedicated to aggregating the top 100 in a series of topics. This is a far more powerful approach than the uber influencer ranking used in TweetLevel. Influence varies widely via topic, and the one size fits all approach is scattershot at best.  Follow @Top100in to stay up to date.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:03:00 -0800 More thoughts from the WOMMA FTC panel http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/more-thoughts-from-the-womma-ftc-panel http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/more-thoughts-from-the-womma-ftc-panel

From Jory Des Jardin, Co-Founder and President, Strategic Alliances at BlogHer  and Sean Corcoran, Interactive Marketing Analyst at Forrester Research

blogher.mp4 Watch on Posterous

forrester.mp4 Watch on Posterous

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:01:00 -0800 Social Media as a regulated industry, The view from WOMMA's Tony DiResta http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/7706740 http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/7706740

WOMMA counsel, Anthony DiResta, talks about some of the fine points of the FTC guidelines that will take effect on 12/1/2009. Key points:

  • Recognition that the days of the “Wild West” are over, this is now a regulated industry
  • Social Media requires a culture of compliance
  • Clarity on what constitutes an endorsement
  • Companies require up to date social media policies that enable engagement while minimizing risk
This was part of a larger panel discussion on Friday 11/20/09


Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:37:00 -0800 Clarification of FTC Digital / Social Media Guidelines http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/clarification-of-ftc-digital-social-media-gui http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/clarification-of-ftc-digital-social-media-gui

Chuck Harwood, the Assistant Deputy Director – Bureau of Consumer Protection for the FTC spoke about how the agency’s guidelines will affect social media and word of mouth marketing efforts.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:04:00 -0800 Clear is the new clever, telling the story of the Patagonia tribe http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/clear-is-the-new-clever-telling-the-story-of http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/clear-is-the-new-clever-telling-the-story-of
Rob BonDurant was the keynote speaker today at the WOMMA Summit. He’s the VP of Marketing at Patagonia, and he helps to tell their story across multiple channels (largely avoiding traditional advertising). His methods are social, digital and customer enabled. In fact, Patagonia’s customers provide the company with the lion’s share of the photos, videos and reviews published on their website.  Rob’s job is to give folks something to talk about, and he gives great insight into how he does it.

Of course, Patagonia is a truly aspirational brand, so I assume that some of his advice might be harder to implement at a waste treatment company (a coffee table book on effluent tidal flow?), but that doesn’t mean that it’s not possible.

Brains on Fire has a great recap, but here's a bit of the video.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 13 Nov 2009 14:18:00 -0800 Is TweetLevel the new Flim-Flam-A-Scope? http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/is-tweetlevel-the-new-flim-flam-a-scope http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/is-tweetlevel-the-new-flim-flam-a-scope

I was recently thinking about the Flim-Flam-A-Scope. Not familiar with the FFAS? That's understandable, it’s a term that my old boss Rich coined to describe a product we were producing a video for. It was a device that, through the use of ultraviolet light and mirrors, allowed people to see every wrinkle, sunspot, freckle and pockmark.  This sounds like a medical device, right? Well it wasn’t. It was used in skin care salons to encourage customers to buy deep cleansing facials and other premium treatments. Of course those treatments didn’t fix any skin conditions. The Flim-Flam-A-Scope's sole purpose was to surprise or shock people. Then soften their resistance to unnecessary (yet soothing) spa sessions.
Recently Edelman released a new social media tool called Tweet Level. I won’t go so far as to call it a next generation flim-flam-a-scope, but it does have some remarkable similarities. Like the original FFAS, it reveals something generally invisible, In this case a ranking of twitter users. They do this by analyzing influence, popularity,engagement and trust to produce a numerical value to define a score. So far so good, those may not have been the exact factors I would have chosen but they are certainly a fair set of variables to work with. The problem is that the system produces results that are questionable. When an entertainment blogger who paints semen on the mouths of celebrities, Demi Moore’s boy toy and the most trusted name in news are all in the top five, I think something is seriously askew.  It looks random or at least less than rigorous. I assume that Edelman was expecting (hoping for) debate on the products and its results. The more conversation, the better.

 

OK, so where’s the flim-flam? If the FFAS was designed to convince you that your skin was a mess so that you would voluntarily pay money for a useless facial, TweetLevel’s goal is to get people to turn over information to Edelman so they can build a database that allows them to better target their outreach efforts. In exchange for a mostly meaningless score, users provide information about their jobs and industry focus. Is that a fair exchange? That’s hard to say. People pay for palm readings. Companies spend money on Myer’s-Briggs and other pseudo psychological employee evaluations. So where’s the harm? I think when asking people for information there should be disclosure about how that information may be used. It doesn’t matter if that information is being used to derive a more accurate score or if it will be used to help micro-target a future social media campaign. By not disclosing that information Edelman negates one of its ranking measures, trust. And, that’s not something easily regained.


PS

Here’s my Tweet Level Score. Not that really means anything.

tweetlevel3.png

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:13:36 -0800 The Inappropriate Larry King http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/the-inappropriate-larry-king http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/the-inappropriate-larry-king

I'm sure Larry King has been inappropriate many times in his life, but recently disgraced beauty queen, Carrie Prejean accused the talk master of just that after he asked a simple question. In the 21st Century it's inappropriate to ask questions that people don't want to answer. As the news media devolves into advocacy media, expect to see more behavior like this.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:31:00 -0800 My recent favorites from NPR's On The Media http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/on-the-media http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/on-the-media

I always enjoy NPR's / WNYC's On the Media. They always provide fresh perspectives about what's happening in chaotic world of media. Recently they've had some great stories about how DVRs actually increase commercial viewership, the good the bad and the ugly of paid vs free content and an interesting episode devoted to the death spirals of the music industry. 

Here are a few of my favorite stories:

TV's Unlikely Ally

As the DVR became more and more popular, many in the TV industry feared that commercial-skipping would destroy the medium. But it turns out many DVR-users still watch commercials. Bill Carter of the New York Times says the numbers are startling and the DVR actually helps ratings.

 

 

Is Paid Content Nigh?

News Corp and The New York Timeshave suggested they might start charging for web content. Last weekNewsday did start charging for access to its website. Does this mean the days of completely free news websites are over? Steven Brill is founder ofJournalism Online, a company that works with over a thousand news organizations to help monetize online content. He says the moment has come to pay up.

 

<a href=

They Say That I Stole This

Twenty years ago a series of lawsuits criminalized the hip-hop sampling of artists like Hank Shocklee and Public Enemy. And yet, two decades later, artists like Girl Talk have found success breaking those same sampling laws. OTM producer Jamie York talks to Girl Talk, Shocklee and Duke Law professor James Boyle about two decades of sampling - on both sides of the law.

 

(<a href=

Charting the Charts

The music charts have traditionally relied on album sales and radio plays to rank songs and albums. So what do the charts mean today when there are so many other ways to listen to music? OTM producer Mark Phillips reports that charts as well as the very notion of popularity are changing.

 

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:12:33 -0800 Bringing stories to life through animation http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/bringing-stories-to-life-through-animation http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/bringing-stories-to-life-through-animation

StoryCorps collects the memories of regular people and helps to archive them for the future. This animation visualizes one of those memories via an evocative animation that brings a piece of personal history back to life.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:39:00 -0800 The Fun Theory: Change people's behavior for the better by making everyday tasks more fun http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/the-fun-theory-change-peoples-behavior-for-th http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/the-fun-theory-change-peoples-behavior-for-th

DDB Stockholm created a great social experiment for their client VW. They modified a set of stairs in a Stockholm subway station so that each step functioned like a piano key. The best part is that the stairs are right next to an up escalator. Before the change few people used the stairs. After the musical enhancement 66% more people "played" the stairs vs passively riding the escalator. This is experiential marketing at its best. Make subtle changes to deliver a point, in this case an everyday act like climbing a set of stairs can be the high point of your day. I suppose they can try to correlate that to having fun while driving via a VW somehow. 

The campaign also allows folks to enter their own fun theory ideas to potentially win a prize.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:12:09 -0800 Nielsen's Measurement in a Multi-Screen World http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/nielsens-measurement-in-a-multi-screen-world http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/nielsens-measurement-in-a-multi-screen-world
11-6-2009_6-44-28_pm
The number of screens that consumers are viewing continues to increase, and it's long been the business of Nielsen to track and make sense of how many eyeballs are looking at TV screens. In this report they look at online and mobile screens as well. They have some interesting findings: Time shifted TV is up 32%, video via mobile has increased 70% and online video viewer ship is up over 12%. All of this while TV usage is largely flat. They also point out that people are better able to recall what they seen online better than content viewed via TV. This flies in the face of the idea that online advertising is less valuable than broadcast spots. >>>

11-6-2009_6-52-54_pm

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:34:54 -0800 WilliamShatner reads Levi Johnston's tweets on The Tonight Show http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/williamshatner-reads-levi-johnstons-tweets-on http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/williamshatner-reads-levi-johnstons-tweets-on
Sara Palin's daughter's baby daddy, Levi Johnson is now on twitter. This could be a sign that it's now time to move on and find another tool to use, but it's really just another example of how mainstream twitter has become. In fact, it's so mainstream that the Tonight Show had a skit with William Shatner reading the himbo's tweets over a jazzy beat. It's quite funny, and it's always great to see Shatner oozing coolness (at least I think that was coolness). Enjoy.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:34:00 -0800 Social Media Monitoring Through The LookingGlass http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/social-media-moniotring-through-the-lookinggl http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/social-media-moniotring-through-the-lookinggl
One of the things that often gets neglected in discussions about social media is the need to discover and make sense of the conversations that people have about topics and brands.  The normal approach for this is to watch the usual suspects of newspapers, TV, bloggers and key influencers.You  look at and listen to the people you already know and respect, then ignore the rest. This approach worked when influence was based largely upon the ability to afford to own a printing press or a broadcast transmitter, but social media and other new platforms allow the thoughts of regular people to be posted and shared with great rapidity. This means that important (and potentially influential) conversations are being ignored. What’s needed are tools that allow us to move from a model of selective monitoring to a new model that allows us to effectively sample the conversational firehose, and make that information usable for deep analysis and visualization.

A number of companies have made social media monitoring tools that have a wide range of functionality and costs. I some cases some systems that cost hundreds or thousands of dollars per month offer little more functionality that what can be cobbled together with free and low cost tools. The best of them are able discover topic related posts and comments in close to real-time from blogs, microblogs and the mainstream print media. Some also incorporate engagement workflow tools that help to track conversations and assign team members to determine how best to deal with those conversations.

Most of the companies creating these systems are small, scrappy companies (although some are funded by very large interests). So I thought it was very interesting that Microsoft Research was looking in to this space as well. They’ve created a system called LookingGlass that is able to discover pertinent conversations, present them in dashboard form and incorporates CRM features based upon the Sharepoint platform. It looks like a potentially very robust tool that could do a lot to establish a standard for social media monitoring. Of course, monitoring is just part of the solution, but this type of data is essential to analyze and determine the impact of social media engagement. Here's a video introduction to LookingGlass.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:30:00 -0800 How Microsoft is Crowd Sourcing Comments & Reviews http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/how-microsoft-is-crowd-sourcing-comments-and http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/how-microsoft-is-crowd-sourcing-comments-and
Downlevel_500

I'm impressed that Microsoft is crowd sourcing the information on their home page. They are presenting quotes posted on twitter by regular people. This lends a credibility and "realness" not normally associated with global corporate behemoths. The only negative comment I have is that they just attribute the comments to "Twitter User" rather than showing the actually user name. A simple twitter search leads you to the sources, but they should have made it a bit easier.

What's is a real winner is how they are aggregating and presenting user comments gathered from across a wide swath of social media. Windows 7 related posts, tweets and updates from twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flicker and select bloggers are displayed for all the world to see in one convenient place. The content is moderated before being displayed, but they do allow the occasional less than glowing comment to be shown. I took a look under the hood of the data feeds and noticed that they are doing some form of sentiment analysis as well. That information is not being surfaced, but it offers an some ideas about how a product like this could be used in the future. One thing that I noticed is that this dashboard has more than a passing similarity to Waggener Edstrom's Twendz. I don't think WaggEd produced this, so I have to assume that someone at Microsoft or Crispin, Porter + Bogusky saw it and decided to make it their own.

11-5-2009_3-55-23_pm

Marty Collins of the Microsoft marketing group mentions some of the behind the scenes information about what she calls their Social Media Hub. She mentions they are using a Microsoft Research project called Looking Glass to provide the data. Looking Glass is an interesting development, and I will do another post about it shortly. It seems like an amazing tool that could revolutionize how businesses monitor and make sense of conversations and buzz online.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:43:00 -0800 Windows Advertising Through the Years http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/windows-advertising-through-the-years http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/windows-advertising-through-the-years

Slate covers the history of Microsoft Windows advertising from version 95 to Windows 7. There are lots of highs and lows along the way, from user aspiration to ads about nothing. What finally worked are ads that focus on customers' wallets.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:13:00 -0800 Finding a designer is now (not) a needle in the Haystack http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/finding-a-designer-is-now-a-needle-in-haystac http://snarkist.snarkandawe.com/finding-a-designer-is-now-a-needle-in-haystac
Haystack
The folks at 37Signals recently released a new service called Haystack, a directory of web designers. Designers are able to post examples of their work and their average project size for free. For $99 per month they can get a premium listing with a logo and prime placement. My only disappointment is the lack of commenting or other social media features.  There's no feedback mechanism to allow folks to comment or aggregation of comments from the larger digital world. The do have a link to post to twitter, but I would expect more than that today, especially for a service that offers no vetting of the listings.

For now it's a one-way conversation. I hope for more in the future.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/261565/DSW_1s_w.jpg http://posterous.com/users/4aQN283nqdDX Doug Winfield d2k Doug Winfield