Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 163

Automated Creativity Is Inevitable (And A Good Idea) - Strategy Magazine Column

You can't throw a marketing professional down a flight of stairs these days without the words "artificial intelligence" tumbling out of their mouth.

We've seen a slew of announcements about just how much artificial intelligence is going to be used to replace all of us protein-based, left-and-right-brain-evolved monkeys in marketing today. Still, there seems to be this top-level thinking that artificial intelligence will never be smart enough to replace the creativity and human insights that truly make our work sing in the marketplace.

What makes us so confident?

This isn't about a dystopian science fiction narrative, the inevitable moment where we switch on SkyNet. This also isn't about the futurist's Pollyanna glee over that moment when Star Trek's Holodeck goes from virtual reality to reality, and suddenly nobody wants to leave the hot sex fantasy of virtual worlds. Maybe we've all spent too much time watching Westworld? Maybe it's just me? Coca-Cola's global senior digital director, Mariano Bosaz, recently did an interview with AdWeek during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. He talked about breaking the age-old process of creative briefs, pitching ideas and producing content for experimenting with "automated narratives" (quick, get that title on your business card, before everyone else does). Bosaz believes that artificial intelligence can do simple content activities like update social media platforms and choose music for video content.

His is a long-term vision for the industry, but it could come sooner than most people anticipate.

AI is already doing the work of creatives in other arenas, from composing music to bots writing all kinds of weather reports and basic sports journalism. Companies like Tronc (formerly Tribune Publishing) will be using artificial intelligence to ramp up video production from a few hundred to two thousand videos a day. It's not hyperbole. There's technology, distribution and a plan at play here. Still, great content and advertising won't ever become the job of artificial intelligence... will it? Could AI ever create something as mesmerizing as a Monet, as touching as a chorus from Dylan or as cutting as the words of Twain? It could. Look at it this way. Currently, many people are scared about relinquishing their driving to a computer. But as someone who had the pleasure of taking a joyride in a Google autonomous vehicle on an open road in a populated city, my first reaction was: I never want a human being to drive another car again, including me. Being privy to exactly how much the computer can "see", parse and react to in relation to our simple brains made it evident just how transformative that technology could be. Think about the sheer number of cultural and artistic inputs that artificial intelligence can consume, parse and remix to come up with variations on a creative brief. It's fair to argue that they could be better at understanding and emoting than humans with that many inputs.

Artificial intelligence is not going to affect every part of business and then just stop when it comes to creativity.

The wheels are already in motion. So let's think about it in terms of the here and now. If bots are currently (and successfully) writing articles (and humans are none the wiser), what kind of baseline creative content could machines produce for your brand today? Think about all the different iterations on an email newsletter for targeting. Is there part of your creative process that is both repetitive and time-consuming that simple AI technology can not just replicate, but optimize and enhance? Does anyone in your business use or have access to Amazon AWS APIs, Google Cloud ML APIs, IBM Watson Bluemix APIs and Microsoft Cognitive Services APIs? Why not? What seems like a reasonable timeline for your brand to start experimenting with artificial intelligence and creativity?

I, for one, welcome our artificial intelligence creative overlords.

The above posting is my new/regular column for Strategy Magazine. I cross-post it here with all the links and tags for your reading pleasure, but you can check out the original version online here:

Strategy Magazine - Automated creativity is inevitable (and a good idea).

Tags:

advertising

advertising agency

advertising week

adweek

ai

amazon

amazon web services

api

article

artificial intelligence

automated creativity

automated narratives

autonomous vehicle

aws

bob dylan

bot

brand

business blog

chatbot

claude monet

coca cola

cognitive services

computer

content

content marketing

content marketing automation

creative brief

creative content

creative process

creativity

digital director

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

distribution

email

email newsletter

futurist

google

google cloud

google cloud ml

holodeck

human insights

ibm

ibm watson

ibm watson bluemix

ideation

j walter thompson

journalism

jwt

machine learning

mariano bosaz

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

marketing professional

marketplace

microsoft

microsoft cloud

microsoft cognitive services

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

ml

mobile

mobile world congress

music

newsletter

publishing

reporting

science fiction

self driving car

six pixels of separation

skynet

social media

social media platform

star trek

strategy

strategy magazine

strategy magazine column

technology

tribune publishing

tronc

video

video content

video production

virtual reality

virtual world

vr

watson

waymo

westworld

wpp

      mark twain

Be The Brand That You Wish To See In The World

Brands have done a wonderful job of stepping in it over the past little while, haven't they?

Usual gaffs and poor advertising judgment aside, brands may have crossed a new line when they are physically accosting and having their paid customers roughed up and out of the brand experience. Not sure a brand wants to be known as the new "Fight Club"... unless they're putting out a sequel to the 1999 blockbuster film. And with that, comes many things: excuses, apologies, adapting policies, legalese, public relations, spin, consumer backlash, social media armchair quarterbacking, memes (oh, the memes), and the general piling-on of traditional media and the late night show crews.

It's enough to make a brand want to curl up in a corner and die... for a little while. 

Many pundits point to the stock market as an indicator of just how much value/money a brand pays when they make silly (and super huge stupid) mistakes. The next day's markets are not a true indicator. One needs to look out (about a month) to see if there truly is any lingering impact, or if the corporation lives to tell the tale of another stellar quarter. The bigger the brand (and the bigger the gaff), the less we have (historically) seen any kind of longterm impact. The big behemoths have resilience, don't they? This is a generality (and there are exceptions to the rule, of course), but it's true. One airline's massive public relations and business scandal today is hardly even mentioned on the next quarterly earnings calls. If you're a consumer advocate, that can be a depressing fact. If you're a brand, it gives them carte blanche to make massive mis-steps, correct as they go, and hope that the market's memory is short. 

Is this the way that consumer's really want brands to be?

There seems to be common thread throughout many of these mistakes that can easily be summed as: "it is legal?". There are rules and regulations in place. With that, mistakes are human nature so long as they don't cross the rule of law. In the UFC-like clip from the major airline this week, there is that same underlying statement hidden with the brand's apology. This is all legal (unfortunate, but within their legal rights to remove the passenger). Here's a pretty clear and simple rule for a brand that is looking to trascend the ordinary, and move from good to great (as the saying goes):

If all a brand is looking to do is stay within the legal bounds of what is acceptable, it's going to be a tough slog towards greatness. 

Oversold, overbooked, or even having a clause that allows a paying customer to removed so that an employee can take their spot is not going to be compared against whether a brand lobbied government or created a loophole to make this a legal practice. Your consumer is not a lawyer or a government official. They are your paying customers. They come first. Always. Period. Just because your industry has a set of laws, legislations, regulations and more, it does not mean that the brand's job is to get as close to the edge of that law as possible without falling into the abyss.

To be a brand that cares... you need to be a brand that is better than the law. 

Why not simply ignore those laws, regulations and legislations? Know them. Ensure that your people know them, but let your brand be the one that puts the consumer first. Let your brand be the one that doesn't need those rules or laws, because you would never - as a practice of buisness - get close to what is being considered offside. 

Who would not want to be a customer of that brand... today and tomorrow?

Being an airline is a tough business. It's a very sophisticated and complicated and regulated business, where the airline also takes a lot of heat that is unwarranted, due to the many other corporations involved in this business. With that, there is nothing stopping any airline from saying that they don't believe in overbooking/overselling a flight, and that a paying customer always take precedence over their own employees. When instances arrive that put these philosophies into questions, the brand will have to decide what is in the best interest of their business (the customers and the brand experience). It's not easy. What happened this past week is both tragic, sad and not necessary. 

Brands can make choices.

A friend recently asked me about how Mirum wins new business. When I explained the pitching process, they marvelled at the fact that agencies actually pitch creative and strategic ideas (the work) in order to win the business. They were in complete disbelief that these brands have the legal right to take and use this work, even if our agency was not chosen to be their partner. My response was simply this: brands have the legal right to do it, but not the ethical right. If they liked the idea enough to use it, they should do it with the agency partner that came up with the idea. Having a legal right does not give a brand the moral right. 

It's not just airlines. Brands don't have to follow ethics (just the law). The best brands do create the best customer experiences. That's (still) the (real) opportunity.

Tags:

advertising

advertising agency

brand

brand ethics

brand experience

business

business blog

business model

business pitch

creativity

customer

customer experience

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

fight club

good to great

j walter thompson

jwt

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

media

memes

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

new business

pr

public relations

resilience

six pixels of separation

social media

spin

stock market

strategy

traditional media

ufc

wpp

[image error]

Amazon Is Eating Retail, Uber Is In Hot Water (Again) And More On This Week's CTRL ALT Delete Segment On CHOM 97.7 FM

Every Monday morning at 7:10 am, I am a guest contributor on CHOM 97.7 FM radio out of Montreal (home base). It's not a long segment - about 5 to 10 minutes every week - about everything that is happening in the world of technology and digital media. The good folks at CHOM 97.7 FM are posting these segments weekly on iHeart Radio, if you're interested in hearing more of me blathering away about what's going on in the digital world. I'm really excited about this opportunity, because this is the radio station that I grew up on listening to, and it really is a fun treat to be invited to the Mornings Rock with Terry DiMonte morning show. The segment is called, CTRL ALT Delete with Mitch Joel.

This week we discussed: 

Amazon is eating everything. Literally. They're calling it "the Amazon effect." Just this week, the Payless shoe chain filed for bankruptcy, Ralph Lauren said it will close its flagship Fifth Avenue Polo store, Rue21 is preparing to file for bankruptcy as well. Hudson's Bay Company didn't mince words about their retail challenges last week, and Bloomberg is reporting that we could see over 50 retailers file for bankruptcy this year alone. 
Uber is back in the news. It's not good news. Now, the company is involved in a class action suit over the use of "sophisticated" software that was able to defraud not just the drivers, but us passengers as well. It was filed in federal court in Los Angeles last week. And, if proven to be true, paints a terribly anti-Silicon Valley view of this company as it continues to struggle with good values and ethics in business. 
This Wednesday evening, I will be giving my latest keynote presentation (for free) here in Montreal. I rarely do events that are open to the public. It's part of a Canadian Marketing Association event in partnership with KPI Digital. It's from 5:30 - 7:30 pm at Musee des Beaux Arts, and anybody is welcome to come but they have to register here.
App of the Week: Postepic.

Take a listen right here...

Tags:

advertising agency

amazon

app of the week

bloomberg

brand

business blog

canadian marketing association

chom fm

ctrl alt delete

ctrl alt delete with mitch joel

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital media

facebook

google

guest contributor

hudsons bay company

i heart radio

j walter thompson

jwt

kpi digital

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

montreal radio

morning show

mornings rock with terry dimonte

payless shoes

polo

radio segment

radio station

ralph lauren

retail

retailer

rue 21

rue21

silicon valley

six pixels of separation

social media

technology

terry dimonte

twitter

uber

wpp

 chom 977 fm

 postepic

Transform Your Digital Marketing - Live (And Free) In Montreal This Wednesday

I will be speaking live in Montreal this coming Wednesday... and it's free.

I am often asked when I will be speaking live in Montreal. Candidly, it does not happen often. And, when it does, it's usually a private corporate event that is not open to the public. So, if you're interested in seeing my latest keynote presentation (and what I've been thinking about when it comes to disruption, marketing innovation and the future of business), you are more than welcome to join me on Wednesday, April 12th, 2017 at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (1379 Sherbrooke Ouest, Montreal, Quebec). There is one catch: You must register.

Why is my presentation and this live event open to the public and free?

It turns out that KPI Digital (an IBM partner company), the APCM (Association des Professionnels de la Communication et du Marketing), AMR (Association du Marketing Relationnel) and the Canadian Marketing Association have all come together to host, sponsor and bring this event to Montreal. 

Space is limited.

It's not a huge venue, so if you are interested, please do register. The event will take place from 5:30 - 7:30 pm this coming Wednesday. I will be speaking for about an hour. Here's what I will be talking about:

"We live in a culture of change. Most brands are overwhelmed by the massive shifts they have to make to their business models. Disruption is everywhere. Digital transformation is imperative. We live in the Uber-ization of everything. There are several new (and dramatic) realities that will force businesses to rethink many of their commonly held beliefs about what works in business today, and what the future may look like. Interestingly, this is less about the evolution of technology and much more about how consumers have become that much more efficient in this very different landscape. Bring an open mind, because the world continues to change and challenge brands like never before. The new leadership is being a digital leader. This is your compass."

Transform your brand and your digital marketing this coming Wednesday night in Montreal.

I hope to see you there!

Register here: Transform Your Digital Marketing  Strategy With Mitch Joel (President, Mirum) Live In Montreal.

(Please note: the registration website is in French, but my presentation will be 100% in English).

Tags:

advertising agency

amr

apcm

brand

business

business blog

business model

business transformation

canadian marketing association

cma

culture

digital leader

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital marketing strategy

digital transformation

disruption

future of business

ibm

ibm partner

innovation

j walter thompson

jwt

keynote

keynote presentation

kpi digital

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

marketing innovation

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

montreal

montreal marketing

online culture

presentation

six pixels of separation

technology

transformation

uber

wpp

Reengineering Retail With Doug Stephens - This Week's Six Pixels Of Separation Podcast

Episode #561 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

Doug Stephens is one of the world's foremost retail industry futurists. His work and thinking has influenced some of the world's best-known retailers, agencies and brands. Prior to founding Retail Prophet, Doug spent over 20 years as a professional in the retail industry. He is the author of two business books: The Retail Revival - Re-Imagining Business for the New Age of Consumerism and his latest, Reengineering Retail - The Future of Selling in a Post-Digital World. The world of retail is facing disruption, innovation and digitization all at once. Is this the end or just the beginning of retail? Enjoy the conversation...

You can grab the latest episode of Six Pixels of Separation here (or feel free to subscribe via iTunes): Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast #561.

Tags:

advertising

advertising podcast

audio

blog

blogging

brand

branding

business blog

business book

business podcast

business thinker

consumer

consumerism

david usher

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital world

digitization

disruption

Doug Stephens

facebook

futurist

google

innovation

itunes

j walter thompson

jwt

leadership podcast

management podcast

marketing

marketing blog

marketing podcast

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum podcast

post digital world

reengineering retail

retail

retail futurist

retail industry

retail prophet

selling

social media

the retail revival

twitter

wpp

The Amazon That You Don't See (That Google And Facebook Are Watching)

Amazon is a media beast. Amazon is just getting started.

In 2012, I published an article titled, Is Amazon The Future Of Media? From the piece:

"While people wax poetic about the retail prowess and clout of Amazon, I am always quick to point out that they are one of the most fascinating media companies that has ever been created. Marketing professionals and luddites alike typically stare at me the way that a dog does when you try to talk to it. What the majority of people don't know is that Amazon is able to undercut so many retailers not just because they have a more streamlined or technologically advanced supply chain system, but because each and every customer also provides Amazon with a significant amount of media revenue per user that eclipses most other media properties (let alone competitive online retailers). I have no formal proof of this - and Amazon is very quiet about how media is played on their site and partner sites - but industry insiders from all corners have all conferred that Amazon gets a lot of media dollars per user, and is able to optimize that number by constantly and consistently putting highly targeted and relevant offers in front of them."

It's five years later. 

A few days ago, CNBC published the news item: Amazon's growing advertising clout threatens the dominance of Google and Facebook, says analyst. From the piece:

"Amazon's advertising business is growing fast enough that it threatens the dominance of Google and Facebook, according to BMO Capital Markets.
The company's ad business is 'gaining significant momentum' and will take market share from Google, Facebook, and others... The advertising segment of e-commerce giant Amazon's business model has the potential to grow sales by 65 percent in 2017, reaching $3.5 billion... 'A key point of differentiation for Amazon [from competitors] is the massive amount of consumer purchase data it possesses.'" 

It's easy to look at Google... it's easy to look at Facebook. Dig deep into Amazon and the media story is more fascinating than ever before.

The article goes on to make the argument that Google knows what you're searching for, and that Facebook knows what people are interested in (and who they are connected to), but Amazon knows what they're shopping for. That's fairly elementary. Amazon has become a beast of a search engine. If someone is looking for anything to purchase, they use Amazon (over Google) for their searches. This is profound. Amazon's marketplace also enables vendors (not just Amazon) to build and stock their own stores. Amazon also has a lot of personal information (and who it's connected to). Think about wishlists, gifting friends and being able to pull that data together.

It goes even deeper.

Think about AWS (Amazon Web Services), and how much of the Internet it powers through this early investment and constant innovation in the cloud computing space. Gartner is now predicting that about 30% of all searches will be done without a screen in the next four years. Voice is driving the next generation of navigating technology, and Amazon is one of the significant leaders of voice with its Alexa platform, and their line of Internet of Things voice-control hardware for the home and office. Think about the data, information and analytics that Amazon will be soon be collecting based on voice commands (and listening to those enviornments).

Staggering.

Amazon is a juggernaut. Not just in retail, but in disruption, innovation and understanding consumer behaviour. Don't think - for a second - that the media play is not going to quickly become a significant component in everything that Amazon does. Amazon has search. Amazon has deep understanding of consumer's needs and wants. Amazon knows who those consumers are connected to. Amazon knows which web services these consumers use. Amazon knows much more than most of us will ever know. There are more pieces to this puzzle (look at their acquisitions over the years). 

If that isn't the recipe for a beast of a media company, I don't know what is.

Tags:

advertising

advertising agency

alexa

alexa platform

amazon

amazon advertising

amazon web services

analytics

aws

bmo

bmo capital markets

brand

business blog

business model

cloud

cloud computing

cnbc

consumer

consumer behaviour

consumer data

consumer purchase data

data

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

disruption

e commerce

ecommerce

facebook

gartner

google

hardware

innovation

internet of things

iot

j walter thompson

jwt

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

marketing professional

media

media company

media dollar

media property

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

navigation

online retail

online retailer

retail

retailer

search

search engine

shopper

shopping

six pixels of separation

social media

supply chain

supply chain management

technology

voice

voice commands

voice control

web services

wpp

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #355

Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?

My friends: Alistair Croll (Solve for Interesting, Tilt the Windmill, HBS; chair of Strata, Startupfest, Pandemonio, and ResolveTO; Author of Lean Analytics and some other books), Hugh McGuire (PressBooks, LibriVox, iambik and co-author of Book: A Futurist's Manifesto) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person "must see".

Check out these six links that we're recommending to one another: 

Did Reddit's April Fool's gag solve the issue of online hate speech? - Ars Technica . "You can do a lot of things when you have the world's attention. Reddit has occasionally been a lab of sorts for nearly-collaborative interactions, where the nature of collaboration is severely restricted (the reddit button social experiment is a good example.) Well, this year, they gave the reddit community a canvas on which users could change one pixel to a color of their choice -- and set it free. Would it result in chaos? Coordination? Competition?" (Alistair for Hugh).
The Silicon Gourmet: training a neural network to generate cooking recipes - Postcards From The Frontiers of Science . "We're finding ways to get algorithms to do all kinds of things. In this case, write recipes. Feed a neural network a bunch of recipes, let it iterate and compare what it makes to real recipes, repeat. The results are hysterical -- but also a good demonstration of the gradual, relentless improvement algorithms can make. Plus, this makes for hysterical clipart." (Alistair for Mitch).
Cooking with Cthulhu - Postcards From The Frontiers of Science . "Take some incomplete recipes, feed them through a neural network trained on the works of early horror master, H.P. Lovecraft, and enjoy some tasty ideas for your next kitchen session." (Hugh for Alistair).
Early Heavy Metal Documentary - BBC Proto - YouTube . "This one's for you, Mitch!... and all the other headbangers out there." (Hugh for Mitch).
The Five Stages Of Tech Disruption - Disruption Hub . "I often lament that brands don't really understand the difference between 'disruption' and 'destruction'. No, they are not the same thing (clearly), but many brands do this. They think that disruption is the end, verses an amazing opportunity to future-proof their business. Here's a great way to think about tech disruption, that got me thinking about how the marketing industry was disrupted... and how it will be disrupted next. What happened next? A whole bunch of new business ideas." (Mitch for Alistair).
Dad photoshops kid into dangerous situations, people think they're real and go mad - ShortList . "The headline says it all. This is perfect for a serious laugh... and also helps to illustrate how people react, interact and comment online, without stepping back to think about anything. Still, all of the funnies are here." (Mitch for Hugh).

Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.

Tags:

advertising agency

alistair croll

ars technica

bbc

bit current

bit north

book a futurists manifesto

brand

business blog

complete web monitoring

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

disruption hub

facebook

gigom

google

harvard business school

hp lovecraft

hugh mcguire

human 20

iambic

j walter thompson

jwt

lean analytics

librivox

link bait

link exchange

link sharing

managing bandwidth

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

pandemonio

postcards from the frontiers of science

press books

reddit

resolveto

shortlist

six pixels of separation

social media

solve for interesting

startupfest

strata

tilt the windmill

year one labs

youtube

 wpp

When Will Instagram Wake Up To Business (Or Should It)?

With apologies to my friends at Shopify, is Instagram the best place to sell stuff online?

Building a website is hard. Building a mobile app is harder. Making your business work across both screens is even more complex. It's not just design and usability, but there's technology involved. What should you build it on? WordPress? What about hosting it? Who does that best? Yes, there are easier solutions (SquareSpace, Wix, Shopify, etc...). Still, it's not as simple and intuitive as others make it out to be. Plus, let's agree that you managed to cross the chasm, how do you get consumers to your digital doorstep? How do you keep them coming back? Email offerings? Marketing automation? Maintaining a database? Again, all doable, fairly reasonable from a costing perspective these days, but not as easy as many make it out to be. 

Why not just build your business on Instagram?

Sure, there's the whole "owned" versus "rented" land issue that a brand will have to reconcile. It's a debate that continues to this day. I used to write about a "hub and spoke" model (build it on your own hub and market through other channels as your spokes). With that, things change rapidly in the digital media world, and we do find ourselves in a "hub and hub" model (build your own and build unique hubs on the platforms). For many brands these are untenable strategies (think about the resources of small/local business owners). The time, energy and effort is just too much. 

What's a brand to do?

This phenom of building a business on Instagram is not new. Several years back, a group of burgeoning small business entrepreneurs in Kuwait started using Instagram to sell their wares. How? Isn't Instagram a photo/video sharing platform? How are the transactions processed? How do consumers get service from the brand owners? The workarounds were abound. Customer service and communications was done via a WhatsApp account that was promoted in their Instagram header. Transactions were then handled using Square or PayPal. How much did this all cost? Instragram accounts are free... as are WhatsApp accounts, and the transactions are a small percentage of the sale. This is a low cost barrier to entry. Instagram is almost half a billion users strong, and the very nature of its experience enables brand to very powerfully merchandise their wares... and be interesting. Images, videos, collages... you get the idea.

Instagram is not an e-commerce platform (or is it)?

Today, Fast Company ran an article titled, Young Entrepreneurs Are Using Instagram To Bring E-Commerce To Gaza. It features the story of several young entrepreneurs in Gaza, who are using workarounds and MacGyver ingenuity to sell stuff. Gone is the worry of trying to figure out how to nurture and develop one's own e-commerce experience, as social media can connect these vibrant entrepreneurs to local (and distant) markets. Don't kid yourself, either. This is a real thing. It even has a name: Insta-Business.

Whatever works.

It's hard not to admire the spirit of these young entrepreneurs. It's harder not to realize that this could well be one of the best ways for brands of any size and stature to think about. Instead of spending months rolling out a new product or service, why not try it as a Insta-Business? It's an opportunity to see what might happen to a business model, when it is put in front of half-a-billion people. Of course, you won't be able to reach all of those people on Instagram, but they are there. Plus, think about the technical and business requirements required to do this. Imagine cutting those lag-times down to a fraction of the time. Products and services can, literally, be in market within a few hours. Brands talk about speed, disruption and innovation. Here's a true way to truly bring that spirit to life.

I wonder how many brands will dive in?

Tags:

advertising agency

brand

business

business blog

business model

business requirements

communications

customer service

database marketing

design

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

disruption

e commerce

e commerce platform

ecommerce

ecommerce platform

email

email marketing

entrepreneur

fast company

hosting

hub and hub

hub and spoke

innovation

insta business

instagram

Instagram business

j walter thompson

jwt

local business

marketing

marketing agency

marketing automation

marketing blog

merchandise

merchandising

messenger

messenger app

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mobile

mobile app

paypal

photo sharing

platform

sell online

shopify

six pixels of separation

small business

social media

speed

square

squarespace

technology

usability

video sharing

website

whatsapp

wix

wordpress

wpp

[image error]

Why I Started Subscribing To The New York Times (It's Not What You Think)

This week I started my digital subscription to The New York Times. It's not what you think.

I did not subscribe because the publication is aligned with my political views. I did not subscribe because I wanted to support the cause of journalism. I did not subscribe to thumb my nose at the current political parties in power. I did not subscribe to support their mission. I did not subscribe because they have a writer (or two) that I want to read. I did not subscribe because the good content was being placed behind a gated wall. I subscribed for one simple and honest reason: each month, I would surpass my limit of free articles, and it became frustrating to me that I was not able to read the articles that I really wanted to see. As more and more articles would come online that interested me, I felt like I was missing out on content that could be of tremendous value.

This may not shake your universe, but it should make you think twice about your content marketing strategy.

The quality of the content from The New York Times - constantly and consistently - made me feel like I was missing out. The free content was great, but getting unlimited access to everything made much more sense. From an elementary analysis, you could say that I was paying for more quantity. From a different perspective, you could say that The New York Times has been able to think differently about paid content. It says something - in a world of so much free content - that a company is able to produce such high quality (with such consistency) that I was compelled to subscribe. There must be some kind of graph for this? Brands should consider this as well. At what point does the total quality of your content pass from causal, free and "good enough" to build some audience, to consistently, valuable and would be missed if it were not readily available? 

Support the content that matters to you.

It is true that I am happy to buy the physical copies of magazine like Fast Company, The Atlantic, The New Yorker and Wired. I do not want to see these important business publications go away. Candidly, they offer so much content (for free) online, that I rarely look at the printed versions. Candidly, I'm not sure that I would pay a fee for just the online content, based on how often I find myself clicking over to stories that are of interest to me. Many of these traditional publishers are in a literary fist-fight with models like Vice and BuzzFeed. They are all constantly battling over headlines that get attention with content that doesn't match the desire to click on the link. 

The lunchbag letdown of content.

When is content not a lunchbag letdown for your consumers? How often are brand analyzing their content to ensure that the work to click on the headline is surpassed only by what comes after that click? It's a hard model to live up to in this bizarre world of digital media that we find ourselves in. Still, those that put in the time and consistently deliver against it are reaping the rewards. With that, there are many (many, many) online publications, newsletters and podcast that offer up this high level of quality that are still free. As a consumer, when given the chance, I am always happy to financially support these publishers. Not in an effort to be exposed to less advertising. Not in an effort to "tip jar" the producers. More in an effort to be a part of a thriving business world. When I derive value from any product or service, I am happy to pay for it. Most people are. Brands should pay closer attention to this, as they grapple with what to charge for and what to give away for free. This isn't explicitly an online publishing opportunity, either. I'm guessing millions of people would pay for a more premium version of Facebook, Twitter and more. Don't be skeptical. Look no further than LinkedIn.

Pay for quality content: not to demonstrate support, but because the value is there. Create quality content with the same disposition.

Tags:

advertising agency

article

brand

business blog

business model

business publication

buzzfeed

clickbait

content

content marketing

content marketing strategy

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital media

e newsletter

enewsletter

facebook

fast company

free content

headline

j walter thompson

journalism

journalist

jwt

link bait

linkedin

magazine

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

media

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

new york times

newsletter

online content

online publication

paid content

podcast

publication

publisher

publishing

six pixels of separation

susbcription model

the atlantic

the new york times

the new yorker

traditional media

twitter

vice

wired

wpp

writer

Calm Down, The Name "Oath" Ain't That Bad

People are very upset with the new company name, Oath. 

Oath is what the Verizon-owned AOL and Yahoo will be known as going forward. That was the news of the day, and "whoa!" are people pelting rocks at this announcement. There's not a lot of love for it... at all. Candidly, I'm not sure why? It seems like a cool name to me (am I getting old?).

What's an oath?

Genrally, this is what people want to know. The pure definition (thanks to Wikipedia) is: "either a statement of fact or a promise with wording relating to something considered sacred as a sign of verity. A common legal substitute for those who conscientiously object to making sacred oaths is to give an affirmation instead." So, a sacred commitment or promise. Seems strong. Seems bold.

It's really not about the word "Oath" at all... it's about how humans react to anything new.

On Facebook, one of my coveted marketing professional friends stated that Oath is a dumb name for a search engine (and that it was a weird one too). Does anyone else remember the days of yore, when people said, "what's a Google?" and "why would you ever call a company, Yahoo!?" Those names were considered dumb ones too. This does not mean that I am defending the name change to Oath. It does mean that what was once seen as dumb, often becomes commonplace and we tend to forget just how silly it seemed at first blush. The argument, of course, is that a lot of the silly names didn't have any true meaning, but the word "oath" already has meaning and connotations attached to it. With that, it's hard to argue that words like "apple," "amazon" and "yahoo" did not, in fact, already have meaning before they also became commonly known as technology, retail and search engine giants. 

Time will tell if a brand name clicks. It's never that obvious.

Verizon is a smart company. Tim Armstrong (CEO of AOL since 2009 and now Oath) is also someone that I have seen in action (since his early days at Google). This was a strategic move, and my only advice when it comes to branding and new nomenclature is this: give it time. Twist Image became Mirum a little over two years ago, and it's still something that we are all working on. Many people do not understand what the word "mirum" even means (it's latin for "wonder" and "amazement"), many people think that it's "Mirium" or "Miriam" (no, not a female name), and even more people still think of us as "Twist Image." A rebrand takes time. A rebrand of AOL and Yahoo proportions will not only take time to sink in, but will be scrutinized from day one... by everyone. This also has to do with how these individuals brands are perceived (legacy Internet companies that have struggled to remain relevant and fresh).

Still, it's not a bad name... not by a long shot.

Oath is a brand that will house over one billion consumers with over twenty brands that Verizon owns, and it will launch this coming summer. It's a brand that is serious, wants to be taken seriously and will push hard to make and keep their promises... to their consumers, advertisers and partners. Showing strength in a world where Google and Facebook (primarily) dominate the digital media landscape is not that wrong of a positioning. It's always easy to be a market of one. It's easy to hear a new brand name and give it a quick thumb's up or thumb's down. It's easy to take to Twitter... or Facebook... or Snapchat and take those potshots. Still, it's a brand... and a strong brand takes time to build.

The future will tell if Oath is a good brand or not. Personally, I don't think it's all that bad. Do you?

Tags:

advertisers

advertising agency

amazon

aol

apple

brand



business blog

company



consumer

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital media

digital media landscape

facebook

google

internet

j walter thompson

jwt

market of one

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

marketing professional

media

media landscape

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

nomenclature

oath

partners

rebrand

retail

search engine

six pixels of separation

snapchat

technology

tim armstrong

twitter

verizon

web company

wikipedia

wpp

yahoo