Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 165

The Way That Content Is Changing Is Not Good For (Most) Brands

Brands think that content will solve their marketing problems. Brands may be woefully surprised as this pans out.

There was an excitement in the air here in San Diego at this year's Social Media Marketing World. Selfishly, it would be nice to think that it was because of my presentation titled, How to avoid virtual crickets and digital tumbleweeds with your content (it's not about the headline). The presentation went fine, but the real attraction was Snapchat and live streaming. Sure, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn and other social media channels got their due, but everyone was a-buzz over Snapchat and live streaming... for obvious reasons. Live streaming is the next iteration of video content and Snapchat (also shifting more to a video content play) is moving from the millennials to the olds. Both are rocketships, at this moment in time.

Both are primed for brands and business, so the attendees were revving around trying to figure out how to get pole position.  

Whether it was intended or not, my presentation focused on this strange attraction that brands have for the next shiny, bright object ("look... a squirrel!"). While this strategy might keep them au courant, the jumping from platform and format leaves this strange legacy of content plays from the recent past. Dead ends. Brands don't want to admit this, but just like those many contest and new product micro-sites that have gone stagnant, their content has become a jumbled and confusing legacy, as they jump content plays the way many swipe through Tinder. Brands think that this positions them as being current. Brands don't think about the brand experience, brand legacy and what all of this dead-end content does to create a better/worse brand impression.

This new buzz isn't going to be easy for brands.

I sat through many sessions at Social Media Marketing World. If there was one common thread that pulled it all together for me, it would be this: Brands are creating more content than ever before. They're doing it across multiple social media platforms. They are creating content is multiple formats (text, images, audio and video). It is an expensive process (from staffing, to ideation, to distribution to promotion). In short, it felt like they have been diverting traditional advertising dollars to create content and then create traditional advertising to drive attention to this new content and social media experiences. If you re-read that last sentence, it's supposed to sound confusing, because it is a lot more work than most ever anticipated.

It's only going to get harder. Much harder. 

If we are to believe that Snapchat and live streaming will continue to grow - and be a primary social media experience for brands - we also have to admit something that should scare us: Snapchat's content disappears. Live streaming is most powerful live, then it's gone too. Yes, you can archive a live stream and post it in multiple places, but the real excitement is in the live moment. Everything else is just an archive.

The half-life of content suddenly has no life.

It's now or never. If you're not in it... in the moment... it "seems" like no one might care in the near-future. For some brands, the attitude is simple: we have to change, shift and adjust to this new reality. If our potential for business has shifted from Twitter to Facebook to Snapchat, brands have to move along with it, as these moments happen. That's sounds much easier to say than it is to do. Think about the ephemeral content that we're talking about. Think about the push that will need to be put in place to be both live and breathe in the minute, while also having no history or value from the content beyond that moment. It feels like brands will plan, produce and push... pushing that content right off of a cliff. Even if it takes flight, it's live and done. The next hour if there's nothing there to continue that energy, it's done. The struggle is real.

It's a new social media play for brands today.

No doubt brands can still play in the realm of content creation and social media that caters to search engines, publishing, archives and building a following with newsletters. There is no doubt that brands should still be bullish on this. With that, as consumers flick their thumbs through feeds gifs, snaps, and become more attracted with what's here, now and gone next, it's going to be a dramatic shift in brand spending, planning and production to get into this, and succeed at it.

Which brands do you think will get this... and get this done right?

Tags:

advertising agency

advertising dollars

brand

brand experience

brand impression

brand legacy

brand planning

brand spend

branding

business

business blog

content

content creation

content distribution

content legacy

content marketing

content platform

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital strategy

enewsletter

ephemeral content

Facebook

gifs

google

j walter thompson

jwt

linkedin

live stream

live streaming

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

micro site

microsite

millennials

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

newsletter

presentation

publishing

San Diego

search engine

six pixels of separation

snapchat

snaps

social media

social media channel

social media experience

social media marketing

social media marketing world

social media platform

technology

tinder

traditional advertising

twitter

video

video content

wpp

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #353

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: 

The 3 Tenets of Capitalism - Tyler Hogge - Medium . "I'm pretty down on free-market capitalism, or whatever we're calling laissez-faire democracy these days. It's supposed to make everything efficient and maximize outcomes, but the concentration of wealth and preponderance of influence undermines those ideals. Then again, it's important to keep an open mind. This is an excellent, well-researched post; and as he points out when it comes to inequity, 'capitalism would fix it, if it were allowed to.'" (Alistair for Hugh).
Chuck Berry Reviews Classic Punk Records In Unearthed Jet Lag Zine From 1980 - Riverfront Times . "It seemed only appropriate that I include something this week for Chuck Berry, an icon's icon and a titanic force in music. He had a good snark to him, as shown by these brief reviews of punk acts. Of the Ramones: 'A good little jump number. These guys remind me of myself when I first started, I only knew three chords too.'" (Alistair for Mitch).
Mr. Nick Baker Teaches Today--Listen - The New York Review of Books . "One of my favorite writers, Nicholson Baker, who wrote (in NYRB) one of my favorite essays, The Charms of Wikipedia, has written a new book about teaching in America. Which is reviewed in the NYRB." (Hugh for Alistair).
More than Magic: the Legacy of Robert Silvers - New Republic . "Robert Silvers, legendary founder and editor of the New York Review of Books, has died. The NYRB is unlike any other publication I know, and I often find my 6 link contributions there. NYRB pieces are always long, always provoking, always well-thought-out. It's one of the few publications that, when I buy it, I end up reading (almost!) the whole thing. 'I believe in the writer -- the writer, above all,' Silvers once said, and he built an institution for all of us readers who believe, also, in the writer." (Hugh for Mitch).
The 50 Best New Travel Apps for 2017 - Travel And Leisure . "The title of this article alone made me roll my eyes and think, 'I could never share this with you.' Still, every Monday on CHOM FM, I do pick my 'app of the week.' After years of doing it, I'm always game to dig around and hope to find a diamond, gem or something. I was, literally, flabbergasted by the vast amount of apps on this list that I had not heard of. More importantly, I was even more taken aback by just how smart, cool and important a lot of them will be to our mutual lives on the road. If you travel - or want more depth to your urban experience - check this list out... seriously." (Mitch for Alistair).
The only line comedy shouldn't cross is the no-laughter line - Aeon . "I admit it: I am a strange bird. Sure, I like standup comedy. I can watch a special or two on Netflix. Still, I don't actively go to comedy clubs, festivals or try to recite jokes. With that, I love, love, love the mechanics of standup comedy. How these folks write, deliver and work the material on the road fascinates me. I just can't get enough of it. So much so, that I believe one of the major keys of success in life, is in understanding the dynamics of what makes people laugh. This is one of the best reads of the year. It's especially relevant, because I believe that the current political climate has turned the modern day masters of standup comedy into our version of folk singers and rock singers during the troubled parts of the sixties. These people are the modern day protest song. So, is there a line that a comedian should not cross? Read on and decide." (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

aeon

alistair croll

bit current

bit north

book a futurists manifesto

brand

business blog

chom fm

chuck berry

complete web monitoring

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

facebook

gigom

google

harvard business school

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

medium

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

netflix

new republic

new york review of books

nicholson baker

pandemonio

press books

ramones

resolveto

robert silvers

six pixels of separation

social media

solve for interesting

startupfest

strata

the charms of wikipedia

tilt the windmill

travel and leisure

tyler hogge

year one labs

 

 riverfront times

 wpp

What They're Not Telling Us About Native Advertising's Explosive Growth

Native advertising is big business... and it's growing.

That's the raw news and data from the good people at eMarketer yesterday. The news item was titled, eMarketer Unveils Estimates for Native Ad Spending, and it was based on their latest report. Here is the headline:

"...spending on native digital display ads will make up more than half of all digital display ad spending in the US this year. The new forecast estimates that US native digital display ad spend will grow 36.2% this year to reach $22.09 billion. At that level it will make up 52.9% of all display ad spending in the US."

Here's what we know about what is driving this growth:

Publisher's like native advertising, because it has much a higher dollar value than traditional display advertising.
Native advertising format is mobile-first by its nature, making it a better consumer experience.
Advertiser's like ads that consumers spend more time with.
Native advertising "feels" more like the core content of the publisher, and is less interruption-based (like advertising).
Facebook is the 800-pound-gorilla for this format, and brands like being in a place where close to two billion users congregate.
Non-social advertisers are waking up and ramping up their capabilities as well in native advertising (they smell opportunity).
Video content is driving native advertising (it's not just advertorial-like text-based articles).
Programmatic technology is also driving this opportunity (scale to purchase).
The next months (2017-2018) are going to see the introduction of much more technology in this space. 
More money is being spent on this kind of media, and it does create a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Is native advertising going to save your brand?

There was one striking omission from this eMarketer new item. It feels like brands are changing their attitude about what it means to be "in" social media, content marketing and native advertising. Instead of building content on their own publishing platforms, the shift seems to feel like brands are now just publishing directly on these native platforms and - if there is a call-to-action - the desire of "owning" a publishing platform seems to be dwindling. If a native ad can push out a great ad or video, why would a brand make the hefty investment in their own publishing platform? These forms of native advertising and native content don't seem to make it back to a brand's own platform. Yes, "native" implies that it's being built specifically for a unique platform experience. Still, content can have many purposes once it is being created. If all we're seeing is unique ad format sizes and content that fits specifically to one, unique, platform, all roads lead to one reality: the cost of advertising (from the strategy, execution and placement) is going to be more expensive than ever before. With that, there is no lack of inventory, so that shift from advertising being a scarcity model to one of abundance also forces brands to get better, smarter and bolder with their messaging. It feels like the price and execution increase is being offset simply because programmatic technology makes the media buying that much cheaper?

This was not the promise of digital marketing.

Digital marketing's true opportunity was to empower brands to place their messaging on more relevant publishing sites, in front of better curated audiences with something other than an annoying ad. That, coupled with the notion that everything would be trackable and measurable, seems to have shifted towards the performance of the placement over the "who did what with it"? Imagine that: we're in a world where all creative must be unique (by size and what it says) to each specific placement. Plus, the way it which this will scale, is how it will be purchased using programmatic technology?

Is it just me or does something not feel right about this trend?

Tags:

abundance model

ad inventory

ad placement

advertising

advertising agency

advertising inventory

advertising placement

advertorial

analytics

article

audience

brand

brand engagement

brand platform

brand strategy

business blog

communications

consumer

consumer experience

content

content marketing

data

digital display advertising

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital media

display advertising

emarketer

engagement

facebook

j walter thompson

jwt

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

measurement

media

media buying

messaging

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mobile

mobile first

native ad

native ad spending

native advertising

native advertising report

native advertising spending

native content

native display advertising

native platform

non social advertiser

programmatic

programmatic technology

publisher

publishing

publishing platform

scarcity model

six pixels of separation

social advertiser

social media

video

video advertising

video content

wpp

 ad messaging

Do Your Consumers Care About Your Digital Marketing? (Really, Really Care)

This week marks the annual pilgrimage to Social Media Marketing World in San Diego.

Personally, I have been attending this event for many years. I've had the pleasure or speaking, presenting, mentoring, teaching and even networking there. For some, it's more like summer camp than a conference. For others, it's a vital part of the year to get a brand's digital marketing stack in order. Social media, content marketing and native advertising all intersect for these few days right off the pacific coast. And, as the years go by, the appetite to better understand how to connect with consumers through social media has not dwindled. Many prefer to use terms like "content marketing" now over "social media," and many are there to figure out how to make their efforts more effective, and to see which technologies might help them to better automate the process.

It's hard not to feel old.

Before there was this world of social media and right before blogging took hold (early 2000s), I had been tinkering with desktop publishing and digital media. Back then, you could feel the pending wave of publishing, content and connectivity about to collide for brands. It's amazing to see how far things have come. It is a veritable industry unto itself within the marketing industry. On one hand, I take tremendous personal pride in being right about how things evolved. On the other hand, I still believe that so few brands are able to truly understand what social media and content marketing can do to build a brand for the future. Instead, many brands have both invested in technology to evolve their marketing, while at the same time they have relegated their social media activity to content that feels more like advertising (than anything else). As Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and the others continue to fight for supremacy, brands are stuck in a pay-to-play model that looks, feels, acts and smells like just any another paid media channel. Sadly.

Is this a brand strategy or execution challenge?

This is a question that the CMO of a multi-national brand asked me the other day. It gave me pause. Is there a universal truth as to why so many brands have tried to be engaging in social media and failed? Why have so many brands built out their own publishing platform, and yet the results have been mixed (at best)? Maybe it was fortuitous that MediaPost published the article, CMOs Plagued With Widening Gap Between Strategy, Execution, the other day? From the news item:

"Only 7% of more than 250 marketers surveyed are able to deliver real-time, data-driven engagements across both physical and digital touchpoints... Only 5% are able to see the bottom-line impact of engagements in real time, primarily due to the current processes requiring manual transport of data and intelligence from disconnected systems... companies have willingly adopted a number of new technologies, and the marketing technology stack has continued to grow. In the past five years, 42% of marketers have installed more than 10 individual solutions across marketing, data, analytics or customer engagement technologies, and 9% have brought on more than 20 individual tools or solutions. During that same time, marketers have gone through numerous rounds of 'rip and replace,' with 44% of marketers indicating that they have spent more than 25% of their marketing budgets to replace existing technologies. And despite the implementation and discarding of various data and customer experience solutions, only 3% of marketers believe they are totally connected and aligned across all systems, with data, metrics and insights flowing seamlessly across all technology platforms."

Ouch, marketers... ouch!

There is way too much posturing going on in marketing today. Brands are attending marketing automation, cloud computing and artificial intelligence symposiums and showering audiences with PowerPoint slides that would make the owners of Westworld proud, but there is a bottom line... and it's not pretty. Using technology and spending on it, without knowing how it hits the consumers - and their pockets - is problematic (and that's being kind). Marketers want digital marketing to work, but there is a problem of pace. Marketing technology, marketing automation, social media, content marketing and whatever else is being dumped into this marketing stack is not advertising. We know this philosophically, but do we understand it tactically?

Advertising is direct response. Everything else is (pretty) different.

The promise of digital marketing is real. The ability for it to help, improve and be there as a better brand support mechanism than advertising is real. Still, none of that matters if the brand's consumers don't care. If consumers aren't buying more and/or if they're not being brand loyal, what is this all of this technological and content infrastructure for? Consumers will not stand up and applaud a brand's valiant effort to build a Snapchat following. If Snapchat works for a brand, it will look, feel and act almost invisible to the consumer. It won't be as overt (and direct) as a snappy ad campaign. On top of that, I don't think a brand has ever met a consumer who has been thrilled that they replaced an antiquated email marketing platform with a cloud-based marketing automation solution. The results of that transformation are felt only on the bottom line (and are probably impossible for a consumer to acknowledge). If you couple that thinking with the MediaPost post report above, we're seeing something very clear: a massive fail rate between the brand's technology transformation, the strategy on how to use it, the execution of the work and the end result on the company's bottom line. Remember the old advertising adage: "Half of the money I spend on advertising is wasted. The trouble is that I don't know which half?" Well...

We now know our marketing works about 3% - 7% of the time... and that ain't pretty.

Tags:

ad campaign

advertising

advertising agency

advertising campaign

ai

analytics

artificial intelligence

blog

blogger

blogging

brand

brand execution

brand loyalty

brand strategy

brand transformation

business blog

chief marketing officer

cloud computing

cmo

connectivity

consumer

content marketing

customer

customer engagement

customer engagement technology

customer experience solution

data

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital marketing stack

digital media

digital touchpoint

digital transformation

direct response

email

email marketing

ems

engagement

execution

facebook

j walter thompson

jwt

loyalty

marketer

marketing

marketing agency

marketing automation

marketing automation solution

marketing blog

marketing industry

marketing stack

mass media

media

media post

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

native advertising

paid media

pay to play

powerpoint

publisher

publishing platform

real time marketing

san diego

six pixels of separation

snapchat

social media

social media marketing

social media marketing world

strategy

technology

technology stack

twitter

westward

wpp

 

Bad Vibrations From Internet Of Things, Voice As The Next Navigation 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: 

The Internet of Things is really happening. It's a place where anything that you can plug into a wall socket (or that generates electricity) can be connected to the Internet. Think of the Nest thermostat or the countless devices that let us control our lights, televisions and more through our smartphones. Don't think that the adult lovemaking toys are any different. Yup, those vibrating little do-dads can also be powered and connected. So, two anonymous women who alleged an Ottawa sex toy company was collecting real-time data on their use of an Internet-connected vibrator without their consent have reached a $3.75 million settlement. This takes tracking ourselves to a whole other level... and, of course the privacy issues that come along with it. 
Your data and your safety in a world where everything (and everyone) is connected and tracking one another.
Voice will be the primary way that we navigate and control all of our devices. Think of Apple's Siri, Microsoft's Cortana and the massive growth that we're seeing with Amazon's Alexa platform. Now, Alexa is coming to the iPhone. Inside of the Amazon App for iOS, there will be a microphone icon near the top of the screen that you can press to call up Alexa. You'll be able to ask the assistant almost anything you can ask through a device like the Echo. That includes being able to make purchases, look up facts and control smart home products. Amazon says the feature was rolled out last, and should be available to all US users by this week. Let's hope that it rolls out in Canada soon. Voice is the future of how we navigate technology.
App of the week: Facetune.

Take a listen right here...

Tags:

advertising agency

alexa

amazon

amazon app

amazon echo

analytics

app

app of the week

apple

brand

business blog

chom fm

connected home

cortana

ctrl alt delete

ctrl alt delete with mitch joel

data

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital media

echo

facebook

facetune

google

guest contributor

i heart radio

internet connected

internet of things

ios

iot

iphone

j walter thompson

jwt

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

microsoft

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mobile app

montreal

montreal radio

morning show

mornings rock with terry dimonte

navigation

nest

privacy

radio segment

radio station

siri

six pixels of separation

smart home

smartphone

social media

technology

terry dimonte

tracking

twitter

voice

voice assistant

voice navigation

wpp

 

 chom 977 fm

Winning Body Language With Mark Bowden - This Week's Six Pixels Of Separation Podcast

Episode #558 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

Whether it's online, in person or just consuming his content, I always enjoy the time I spend with Mark Bowden. He's perfectly engaging, entertaining and there's always something to learn. There is this powerful notion that success comes not from what we say, but what we do and how we say it. The power of communications can never be questioned. Especially, when you work in the world of marketing and advertising. Few people truly have the expertise of Mark Bowden. He has developed cutting-edge techniques to stand out, win trust and grow profits through the power of communication. Some would call him a body language expert. I believe he is much more than that. He runs a company called Truthplane. He's written the bestselling business books Winning Body Language, Winning Body Language for Sales Professionals and Tame the Primitive Brain. Mark is also the co-creator of online course, Presentation Genius. Mark has a highly viewed TEDx talk and his YouTube Channel has over 1 million views. 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 #558.

Tags:

advertising

advertising podcast

audio

blog

blogging

body language

body language expert

brand

branding

business blog

business book

business podcast

business thinker

communications

david usher

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

facebook

google

itunes

j walter thompson

jwt

leadership podcast

management podcast

mark bowden

marketing

marketing blog

marketing podcast

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum podcast

presentation genius

social media

tame the primitive brain

ted

ted talk

tedx

tedx talk

truthplane

twitter

winning body language

winning body language for sales professionals

wpp

youtube

youtube channel

We Are Going To Shove Augmented And Virtual Reality Down Your Collective Throats

It's happening. It's going to happen. Brands, be prepared.

It's a binary world when it comes to those who believe in augmented and virtual reality. Many business professionals believe that this is all hype. Many business professionals believe that it will change everything. I'm bullish on VR and AR. Very, very bullish. I do believe that its true day of reckoning may come sooner than expected. If rumours are to be believed about Apple (and, when have they been wrong?), the pending Apple product announcement (some time in September) will be highlighted by a new iPhone that will feature "mixed" reality functionality. We're also hearing murmurs of a new Apple Watch, some kind of eyewear/headset and more. It doesn't take a futurist to see that these devices will all act as connectivity points to push this new kind of interactive experience forward. Apple's own Tim Cook stated back in September of last year how he feels about it: "Virtual reality probably has a lower commercial interest over time... augmented reality is the larger of the two, probably by far." With that, the Financial Times reported last year that Apple already has hundreds of people working on this area of technology, and the company continues to acquire both small and large-ish companies with this specialty. It's moving in this direction. That is clear. 

How bullish on VR, AR and mixed reality should brands be?

Here's my thinking after tinkering with the many formats and giving hour-long keynote presentations on the current opportunities (and obstacles) of this VR and AR space for brands today all over the world: I have no doubt that virtual reality/augmented reality/mixed reality will be the next - and only - platform going forward (much in the same way I felt about the internet after seeing the first Web browser in action during the early nineties). We will move away from the Internet and mobile (as the pipe), and the way in which we connect to information and one another will come from this new tech stack. "Mixed" reality seems like the better term these days (it's also confusing to always write "augmented reality and virtual reality"), as consumers will be able to move from a place where they are seeing their physical world with information layered on top of it, and then opt into a completely virtual experience seamlessly (if desired or needed). That futuristic statement is, probably, more than a ways off, but it will happen. We will no longer think about connectivity in terms of computers, desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones, wearables, etc... connectivity and experiences will be very, very different. Everything will be in front of our eyes and we will navigate with voice, our eyes, movements and... yes... our hands.

Why so soon? Why so fast?

It's hard to know just how fast this will all take hold, but we have enough of the major players already deeply vested and pushing this technology forward). Facebook has Oculus. Microsoft has HoloLens. Apple is coming (if you believe the rumours above). Google has Tango and Cardboard (plus investments in companies like Magic Leap). Snapchat is just getting warmed up with Spectacles. Companies like Samsung, Sony and many others have their own plays. In short: everyone is in the game... and everyone is highly invested in trying to dominate this platform when the mass adoption hits. Make no mistake about, this is where the push is coming from.

So... yeah... what about those customers? Where are consumers at?

Last year, the media was quick to point out that all of the hype and hyperbole didn't add to much. Articles like: VR, the newest trend in tech, is (for now) dead on arrival were published well into the mid-year point. With that, IDC (one of the world's leading market intelligence and data analysts) published a report yesterday titled, Worldwide Augmented and Virtual Reality Headset Market Expected to Grow at a Compound Annual Rate of 58%, Reaching 99.4 Million Units in 2021, that sported some big, new and brave pieces of information:

"New device launches, an expanding array of content for both consumer and enterprise users, and lower price points will propel the worldwide augmented and virtual reality headset device market at a breakneck pace... total headset device shipments will reach 99.4 million units in 2021, up nearly 10-fold from the 10.1 million units shipped in 2016. This results in a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 58% across the five-year forecast period."

If the consumers don't speed up their adoption, the brands will shove this technology down their throats.

This may be the easiest way to parse and translate this news. Will consumers reject this tech? While the adoption of this technology is growing is specific areas like B2B manufacturing, healthcare, transportation, etc... more and more brands, agencies and consultancies are beginning to see how gaming, entertainment and social media might be the true catalyst to push this forward. Are there hurdles? Many. Apple's entrance into this space (again, rumoured to be happening this coming September) will probably level-set expectations and experiences. From there, we could see it hit its own tipping point, if the price point gets more reasonable and there is enough substantive content to fill it with. That's not being cautious. That's not being bearish. That's being a realist and a "presentist." With that, we must always remember the wise words of Futurist and Wired co-founder, Kevin Kelly, who so brilliantly said...

"The future happens very slowly... then all at once." Brands should always be ready for the future.

Tags:

advertising agency

apple

apple watch

ar

augmented reality

b2b

brand

business blog

business professionals

cardboard

computer

connectivity

consumer

data analyst

desktop computer

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

entertainment

eyewear

facebook

financial times

future

futurist

gaming

google

google cardboard

google tango

headset

healthcare

hololens

idc

interactive experience

iphone

j walter thompson

jwt

kevin kelly

laptop

magic leap

manufacturing

market intelligence

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

media

microsoft

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mixed reality

mobile

mobile browser

mr

oculus

playstation vr

presentist

samsung

six pixels of separation

smartphone

snapchat

snapchat spectacles

social media

sony

spectacles

tablet

tango

tech stack

technology

technology adoption

technology stack

tim cook

transportation

virtual experience

virtual reality

vr

wearables

web browser

wired

wpp

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #352

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: 

The Dark Side of Roald Dahl - BBC. "Roald Dahl has been one of my favorite authors since I was a young child. He's subversive, whether through Mathilda tormenting her oppressors, or Danny poaching with sleeping pills, or the BFG trapping his kin in a dark hole. Parents wonder if it's too dark; kids lap it up. And BBC writer Hephzibah Anderson argues that this shouldn't surprise us at all." (Alistair for Hugh).
Elevated Functionality - Welcome To Techwear - Hypebeast . "With movies like Ghost In The Shell and games like Metal Gear Solid, tactical technical clothing is a real genre, having a proper aesthetic. Here's a look inside the slightly-cosplay, slightly-Burner style that's leaking into the mainstream." (Alistair for Mitch).
Leaked video shows a new robot on wheels from Boston Dynamics - Mashable . "Yes, they are scary, these robots, but they also generate in us (me at least) a sense of empathy, a certain joy when they get that 'move' right." (Hugh for Alistair).
Living With Robots - A Conversation With Kate Darling - Sam Harris Podcast . "Kate Darling is an MIT researcher on the ethics of robots. Here, she talks to Sam Harris about the emerging universe of our moral and ethical relationship with robots." (Hugh for Mitch).
Secrets Of The Magus - The New Yorker . "I've often spoken about how powerful business lessons can be learned by studying comedy and comedians. How they think, nurture, work, edit and nuance every single word of a joke, until it can make a bunch of very diverse people all laugh at once. It's one of the toughest jobs in the world. Well, my thinking on this topic has expanded greatly, and I'm now convinced that everybody in business should spend time studying magicians and illusionists. Not the Vegas-ilk (doves and sawing a woman in half), but the real practitioners. In fact, I've become somewhat obsessed with it. Especially close-up work that involves coins and cards. Here's an older The New Yorker article featuring Ricky Jay, that is worth a read. And, you should watch his documentary, Deceptive Practices - The Mysteries And Mentors of Ricky Jay." (Mitch for Alistair).
Self-Publish The Bestseller Inside Of You: A How-To - James Altucher - Medium . "If there's anyone who understands what it takes to write a book and the entire sausage factory of what it takes to get it into print/digital format, it's James Altucher. In this smart post he breaks it all down. Everything from why (or why not) to self-publish a book. People think that writing a book is hard. It is. Still harder is how to get it to market and get people to pay attention. There's this glamorization of writing that is so wrong. Many think that authors like me spend their days sipping lattes and staring off into the crowded cafe for inspiration. Nothing could be further from the truth. Here's the truth..." (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

bbc

bit current

bit north

book a futurists manifesto

boston dynamics

brand

business blog

complete web monitoring

deceptive practices

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

facebook

ghost in the shell

gigom

google

harvard business school

hephzibah anderson

hugh mcguire

human 20

hypebeast

iambic

j walter thompson

james altucher

jwt

kate darling

lean analytics

librivox

link bait

link exchange

link sharing

managing bandwidth

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

mashable

medium

metal gear solid

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mit

mit media lab

mitch joel

mitchjoel

pandemonio

press books

resolveto

ricky jay

roald dahl

robotics

robots

sam harris

sam harris podcast

six pixels of separation

social media

solve for interesting

startupfest

strata

techwear

the new yorker

tilt the windmill

year one labs

 

 wpp

Let Twitter Tweet (And Be)

Forget what you think that you know about the business world for a moment.

If I pulled you aside and told you that I had built a social media application that allowed people to share simple text message (140 characters at a time), small images and short videos, would you think this was a good idea? What would you think a business like this might be worth? What if I told you that this business:

Generates over one billion dollars from U.S. display advertising a year.
Has 88% of total advertising revenue coming from mobile.
Had Q3 2016 revenue of $616 million compared to Q3 revenue of 2015 is $569 million.
Has over one billion registered users.
Has 300 million monthly active users.
Serves over 500 million messages every day
Would be the 12th most populated country in the world based on that size.
Has a current valuation of about $16 billion. 

Would you be interested in a business like this? Would you be impressed?

If any traditional newspaper, radio station, magazine or TV station had numbers like this, we would never read articles about the death of TV, radio, print, etc... Still, we live in Wall Street-driven world, where valuations are out of this planet and expectations on what something is/should be overrides the amazing business that a brand has truly developed. For most people today, Twitter is on the ropes. Facebook continues to soar. Google continues to solidify. Snapchat is the darling du jour. Instagram continues to shine. LinkedIn is the place for professionals. YouTube is still valuable, viable and interesting. It's not hard to see that the markets, the media and some people are (very) sour on Twitter. It's also not hard to see how a certain United States President seems to be the best PR and marketing that Twitter could have ever imagined, as he keeps the brand in the zeitgeist on a daily basis. 

Still, most people look at Twitter, and they are not impressed. That's scary and sad.

At what point can we - candidly - look at one another and say that this may be the biggest and the best that Twitter can become... and that there's nothing wrong with that? As of this writing, Twitter's stock is at $15.12 per share with a market cap of $10.78 billion dollars. Maybe this is a mistake. Maybe this is too many money people hoping beyond hope that Twitter is anything more than a $5 billion company. And, if it is a $5 billion media company, what is so wrong about that? How many people do you know that have built a $5 billion business in a little over ten year?

Have we lost all perspective?

This isn't really about Twitter, is it? It's about market expectations in relation to what a healthy and active business can look like. This need for constant triple-digit (or even double-digit) growth is not sustainable, reasonable or fact-based. In fact, if you told me that a social media application that allowed people to share simple text message (140 characters at a time), small images and short videos was worth $5 billion dollars, I might look at your sideways (take no offence to that). If Twitter is a healthy $5 billion business that serves over 300 million customers and delivers valuable content that is monetized (somewhat) decently, is that so wrong? Would Twitter not be in a better place to optimize and grow against that metric, than those waiting for them to become the next... what?... Facebook? Google? Maybe that's not what Twitter can become. Seeing Twitter get acquired and becoming something even less than what it is, would be disappointing too. Seeing Twitter decline, because it may not be able to live up to its $10+ billion valuation would be tragic as well. We live in very unique times. We have small, medium and large businesses that thrive within their own varied sizes. We see multiple forms of successful brands across B2B and B2C. Maybe being a unicorn is not all it's cracked up to be?

Expecting Twitter to become something that it may not be, and then dismantling it because of that would be tragic. What do you think?

Tags:

advertising

advertising agency

article

brand

business

business blog

business culture

content

content marketing

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

display advertising

facebook

google

instagram

j walter thompson

journalism

jwt

linkedin

magazine

marketing

marketing agency

marketing blog

media

media company

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mobile

newspaper

pr

print

public relations

publishing

radio

radio station

six pixels of separation

smartphone

snapchat

social media

social media application

television

text message

tv

tv station

twitter

unicorn

valuation

wall street

wpp

youtube

The Hard Things About The Hard Thing Called "Digital Transformation"

You can't throw a marketing professional down a flight of stairs without the words "digital transformation!" tumbling out of their mouth.

There is no doubt that digital transformation affects everyone in business today. Small, medium and large businesses are being impacted. B2B and B2C are both dealing with how this works - both internally to move the operation forward and externally in terms of what the consumer sees, buys and connects with. With that, we're seeing a myriad of agencies, consultancies and independent players come forward with this service offering. Everyone seems to have a process, strategy and proprietary IP coupled with strategic technology providers to help business make the leap from here to where they need to be (and, yes, it is core to the business of Mirum as well). With that, we're seeing countless reports, articles and case studies that show both how far some brands have come, but how much further most brands need to go. 

The brands who have already transformed digitally are few and far between. It's time that we admit this.

A better web experience, implementing marketing automation software or shifting your business model from a Web-based digital experience to a mobile-first strategy does not make the transformation complete. In fact, those types of deployments are (mostly) the tactical stuff that may (or may not) have much to do with true digital transformation. So, where's the rub? We know the facts: all consumers are digital-first. All consumers are (mostly) mobile-first. Most brand experiences don't replicate the current way that consumers use and move with technology. In short, brands have a long way to go. Brands know that they must transform. Brands have digital transformation as core to their roadmap. Brands understand the need for a complete digital strategy.

Here is a partial list of the challenges that brands face, when it comes to digital transformation (based on the many conversations I've had over the past few years): 

The why. Famed business book author and TED Talker, Simon Sinek, continues to gain fame for his one, simple (but seemingly hard to do) concept of: Start With Why. If your brand does not have a clearly defined "why" that is attached to financial business objectives, then it is simply chasing the latest and greatest shiny objects. Business objectives are then coupled with the much-dreaded Key Performance Indicators. Know your why, know what metrics will make it successful and - most importantly - know what that delta means in terms of real new money that this will bring into the business. 
Have a vision for your business, not the future. Most failed business transformation attempts happen because the brand was focused on where the world was going (social, mobile, messaging, VR, AR, automation, etc...), instead of having a vision for how their business ought to function in the future. This is similar to choosing the tools before you have the strategy. It helps no one. It has the brand chasing fads, instead of investing in the next iteration of the business.
Talent gap. There is plenty of positive energy, budget and desire to get this done, but the brand lacks talent within the organization to make it happen. This talent vacuum starts at the top and rolls down into the actual practitioners who have to get this done. It's not just enough talent to make the work happen, but the talent that can get this done are often trapped in organizational structures that don't facilitate the multi-disciplanery departments to get it done. They are trapped in different silos. This vacuum removes all capacity for having the power to get the work pushed through the organization. It's often just another failed or stalled project.
Digital transformation sits with IT. While different from the talent gap, when the digital transformation sits solely in IT, it's never given the breath that it needs to transcend the tech department and truly integrate and unify the complete organization. If marketing, operations, sales and the c-suite are not a part of digital transformation, the entire initiative is treated with as much respect and attention as the implementation of the latest CRM update.
It's about the brand and not the customers. It's true that at it's core digital transformation is a business strategy and theology that happens internally. It's done to ensure that the business is (at least) one step ahead of the consumer. It's done to ensure that the brand is (at least) using the same technology as their consumer's use on a daily basis. Still, that's not enough. That's the beta phase. The true rollout of digital transformation has one major imperative: what does our consumer need, use and want... and how do we deliver against that? If digital transformation is not done with a thorough understanding of how this makes the consumer's life better, there is no point. Yes, digital transformation will/should deliver better efficiencies, but that is coupled with a better brand experience for the customer. Know your audience - the internal and external ones.
The data vacuum. This is the standard struggle of brands from the inception of time. Too little data. Too much data. Too much data in too many different places. Making the data work. Making the data work together. On and on and on. Brands rarely understand and use their data beyond vanity metrics (as my friend, Avinash Kaushik calls them) or in the rear-view mirror (looking at the data in a post-mortem scenario). For business transformation to true work, brands must be able to understand, optimize and use their data for better business outcomes iteratively. Period. Full stop.
The technology investment. Businesses think that buying technology is a like buying a house. Technology does not appreciate over time. Technology can't be seen as a long-term investment anymore. Notice how quickly we moved from hosting to cloud services? The technology world is changing and moving much quicker than ever before (Moore's Law is being questioned). With that, digital transformation will never happen within an organization, so long as there is this ideology of: "we can't invest in technology today, when we made a $100k investment is this other technology three years ago." This may be a tough pill for brands to swallow, but antiquated technology and legacy systems have a dramatic effect on a brand's ability to be future-proof.

Digital transformation is not (just) a cultural attitude and imperative. It's strategic. It's tactical. It creates a lot of disruption. Is your brand ready?

Tags:

advertising agency

analytics

ar

augmented reality

automation

avinash kaushik

b2b

b2c

brand

brand experience

business

business blog

business book

business model

business objective

business outcomes

c suite

case study

cloud computing

consultant

consumer experience

crm

customer experience

data

digital experience

digital first

digital marketing

digital marketing agency

digital marketing blog

digital strategy

digital transformation

disruption

hosting

innovation

it

j walter thompson

jwt

key performance indicator

kpi

legacy system

marketing

marketing agency

marketing automation

marketing automation software

marketing blog

marketing data

marketing professional

mirum

mirum agency

mirum agency blog

mirum blog

mirum canada

mirum in canada

mitch joel

mitchjoel

mobile

mobile first

mobile first strategy

moores law

operations

sales

simon sinek

six pixels of separation

social media messaging

start with why

strategy

talent

team

tech department

technology

ted

ted speaker

ted talk

vanity metrics

virtual reality

vr

web experience

wpp